Writing Reality

You cry the rest of your life. As I watched Tom Hanks in "Captain Phillips", I couldn't remember the true story behind the film. It alluded me at the time it occurred. If you've ever been kidnapped, rendered to someone else's possession it changes you forever. Even when you fight the changes, they are forever and as well they evolve. You become a different person. There is no going back.   If you were a social otter, that may change. If you're a loner, due to betrayal any past traumas, you may want more aloneness. There's less trust for you. You want to trust, yet something tells you not to. And now usually you're correct on some level. You seem to read people better, however, you don't usually reveal that to anyone. There's no catharsis. You want to be in a place where no one questions you or anything you do. Nature and animals are safe. Going back to the movie Captain Rich Phillips does everything to protect his ship and its crew as Somal...

As of late my bedtime has been by 10pm or before. However, occasionally and more so in the past I’d been up way past that due to working a night closing shift at the market—or waiting for medical personnel who’d just finished up their twelve- or sixteen-hour shift at the hospital for session in my therapy office. Or perhaps waiting for one our children to arrive home from a function. If not out for a late-night run— I’d then be watching part of a late-night comedy show to wait or unwind before bed. I’m only so familiar with late-night comedy; however, I think it’s a good thing. It has been an unadulterated sign of the times, true to form and the levity from it is healthy. Healthy in perhaps every way imaginable. I will say there are comedians of the past I couldn’t appreciate because I felt they were untrue, non-creative and too cruel. But that humor was quite some time ago. I’ll name one I didn’t care for, Don Rickles. I also didn’t like Rich Little. Although those two personaliti...

  “You drink espresso?” He queried. He appeared astonished that I’d ever drank espresso. It was as if he didn’t think I needed it. “Oh Yeah. I just made a shot on the stove this morning.” I stated casually, as I bit into my bagel with lox and cream cheese sandwich—after devouring a whole meal of avocado-mango salad. “And you’re going to eat that whole thing?” He asked as I was chomping down on the sandwich again. I nodded, paused. “Yeah. I had no breakfast, except for the 40 ounces of water, grass, chlorophyll and the espresso with oat milk frothed in it I’d made before my morning run. So, like—Yeah. I make my own Cuban Espresso.” Meanwhile, he’s watching my 102lb body devour over 1,200 calories for our lunch meeting. And I think this is normal. As I chewed, he spoke. He seemed mesmerized at my ingestion of huge quantities of food. As I’m thinking, ‘Hey buddy, you’ve been following me, filming me for over a decade. You’ve seen me devour 30 ounces of steak in one sitting haven’t y...

Is it that we can't get along? Or is it that we won't get along? One day in 2016 my fight coach said of a woman who came to him wanting to train for a MMA amateur fight and compete in the cage. As he was training her, he told her to work a new strategy/move with one of the men in the fight gym.  She replied, "I can't." He was stunned because there was nothing wrong with the woman. He then asked, "You can't or you won't?" Soon after this, my fight coach contacted me, expressing his concern for her unwillingness to train something new. I was appalled that she wouldn't try. For he had 114 MMA fights under his belt, winning 111 of them back in the day before the UFC had become a 'thing'. So the woman that wanted to fight, was discriminating on what she thought she knew for whatever reason.  She wasn't trusting an expert who had all the science she needed for her first fight. That is like shooting yourself in the foot. Believing only...

“I Won’t Last a Day Without You.” And Civility “When there’s no getting over that Rainbow. When the smallest of dreams won’t come true. I can’t take all the madness the world has to give. …and I won’t last a day without you…” -The Carpenters.  We won’t last a day without some civility, from all of US. The other day as I got ready to drive and run errands—I dug into the car’s console that held extra sunglasses, some medical masks and a variety of CDs my husband had placed there months prior to his death. Too, I found a couple of CDs I’d forgotten about, one being that of the “The Carpenters”. They were a brother, sister duo who had quite a few hits in the 1960s and 1970s. I hadn’t remembered putting that CD in there. Neither had I remembered the exact day when I’d bought that CD. However, I did know where I bought it, it was just before the store closed a few years back after my husband had passed. It was at the “Barnes & Noble” store that was on Route 17 South near or in ...

  I told this story last night to our eldest. About 12 years ago I was speaking with a friend, who.has known me coming up on 27 years. He's incredibly well-read. Liberal with a fiscally conservative view on government. Yes, a person can be Liberal and embracing equality for all, yet be fiscally conservative. We speak quite often about living off the grid. We repeat Percy Wells Cerruty's word, "Stotan". Live, train uninhibited and primitive. Living Spartan like as well. Especially, when in training for a race. Your whole life then is based on the race. My friend understands A.I. emphatically. He has a medical license as well. He's been in show business decades ago. His family was involved in our government as he has been.  None of our children have met him. Yet I speak to them about him as if he was their uncle. That's how tight he and I are. And so too was my husband.  Last night we discussed that people given the chance can change at anytime they wish to. T...

  I often wonder how people exist not knowing what is outside their little circle(s). Some haven’t read a news article fully in years. Some say it triggers them. Some say they can’t be bothered. Some claim that they have ‘no time’ to read. Some state they don’t believe anything. Others claim religion is their news. Or that they only read fiction works. My response to all this is, grow up. And this lack of reading from a variety of sources I’ve found, leads to tribalism and various forms of coercion and brainwashing. By the way, the rate of men reading for leisure dropped 40% in this country in the past 20 years. Tribalism is quite similar to having a provincial mindset. And as a society it is unhealthy. Too, as an individual it stymies growth. My husband and I had decided long ago that it was not intelligent to indoctrinate our children in any particular religion. I would have them study religion yet not push them into attending any services with any regularity. We’d let them cho...

My body sagged, my hands roared with pain, as I spoke with a friend on the phone last night. A song was stuck in my head. The line repeatedly played, “…I was stuck in the rush hour… The expressway to your heart…. Ohhh, its been so long…” I thought it was a Motown tune. I couldn’t put my finger on it. Neither had I been able to—and to a point, nor was I willing to stop the song from playing in my head. It just felt right. Too yesterday, sometimes as I pulled out old plants and weeds, I’d sing a few words of the song. This went on for hours, after my morning drive to an old park and old run I used to do. I knew the song meant something. Yet, I didn’t want to dictate its presence in my life with my own meaning as opposed to why spiritually it hung in the balance with me, for nearly ten hours—continuing this morning upon waking. The dreams I’d had and the goofy ‘never in my lifetime’ experiences that occurred in the past two weeks were weirdly comforting. As I’d thought this morning, o...