Tag: priorities

The Dad & I Dream

Don’t know my age when it started. Seemed like I was a young adult.

Dad and I were sharing a smallish but modern apartment. A winter storm howled outside, snow pummeling the world in unending shovelfuls. A general sense of disturbing chaos reigned.

I had a few cats. I was trying to feed them but they were running around, attacking each other, hiding. In the midst of this, in the living room by the stereo, I discovered a large window was broken. I stopped to check on it, inspecting it, confirming, because it was hard to tell, yes, a panel is gone. You’d think that’d be easy to see with snow falling, cold weather, a murdering wind, but it required earnest consideration of it for me to figure it out in the dream.

Yes, the window was broken. Several panes were missing or shattered, laying in pieces in a growing snowdrift. The cats tried to get out. As I lunged to pull them back, they retreated on their own, discouraged by the storm. Confusion seemed to paralyze me.

Dad came in, talking about a need to go somewhere, to get food, I think. Impatiently, he told me to hurry up. I was grabbing a cat, checking on the cats, looking at the broken windows. Concern over the stereo getting ruined rose up, so I moved components. Dad shouted at me to come on. I locked the cats in another room and followed Dad out. As we went, I was telling him, “Dad, there’s something you should know, there’s a window broken in the living room.”

It felt like it took some repetition of telling him this before what I was saying sank in. Then, he responded in alarm, “You should have told me this before.”

Next thing I knew, we were going back home because he was worried, and I was defensively trying to tell him that I’d been checking out the window, and I tried telling him but he wasn’t listening.

Then we were in the living room. The heater was running, hot air coming out of vents but snow dusted the floor and crusted the sofa, table, and chairs. Many things were turned over. Things were missing. The stereo and television were gone. We realized people had broken in; we realized, looking out the window, it was teenagers. They were running away with our stuff.

Dad said with bitter disappointment, “You didn’t do anything. You knew this had happened, and you didn’t do anything. Why didn’t you do anything?”

I was an adult now, and shocked. He was right; why didn’t I do something? Why didn’t I take action? I could have called someone to repair the window, or put up boards. I could have done something, but I didn’t.

Dream end.

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A Traveling Dream

I’d met some people on the road. We were going in the same direction, so we traveled together. I was about my current age, it seemed. It was a dark night. We were in a car that felt and seemed like a Jeep but I was sitting the back and another person sat behind me. This was a woman. The ride was rough and we bounced around a great deal.

I seemed to know the woman behind me slightly more than the rest. She said, “You seem like you’re very stressed.”

Laughing, I replied, “That’s an optical illusion.”

Saying, “Let me give you a massage,” she began massaging my shoulders and neck.

It felt so good. After a minute, I told her that. She leaned forward, pressing herself against my back, comforting me. Warmth flowed from her into me. I leaned back into it and turned my head. I wanted to kiss her but stopped myself.

Then she and I were walking together in an airport. She said something about her flight being changed. I reminisced about how I used to travel so frequently, I was often upgraded and never bumped because my travels were a priority. She said, “I bet your travels used to be a high priority, especially the ones in the military.” I shrugged that off because I couldn’t say that was true. Priority was always a complicated matrix in those days.

I was looking at our clothes. Very tall and my age, she was dressed in a light grey suit. I was in a charcoal gray suit. It was an unusual style, almost pseudo-military, and very wrinkled. I said something about needing to upgrade my suit or at least iron it.

We reached the gates. My flight was already boarding, so we hugged and said good-bye. The agent took my ticket and waved me in.

Dream end

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Sunday’s Wandering Thought

Governor Abbott of Texas said after the Robb Elementary School shooting that guns weren’t the problem, mental health was the problem. But he’d just cut two hundred eleven million dollars to the state’s mental health budget to build a wall to keep them safe.

There was something wrong in the governor’s logic, but he’d not had enough coffee to figure it out. He didn’t know if he’d ever have enough coffee to deal with that logic.

2

Space Walk

Bored and restless, he left the table in the cafe and walked to stretch his legs. He walked without thought under the trees, sometimes watching the traffic as he went or other pedestrians, but mostly looking inward, until he found himself at one of observation decks. It was empty. He stepped up to look out the windows.

Space seemed as empty as the observation deck. Readouts clicked, whirled, and blinked on panels of information presented in red, blue, green, and amber characters below the window. It all seemed too abstract for consideration. Three things remained concrete to him for now. One, he and his family had made it onto the Ark. Two, they’d left Earth behind. Three, he probably wouldn’t live to see the new world, but his son would.

Right now, those three things were all that mattered.

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American Essentials

fat shame

hair shame

body shame

lip shame

boob shame

skin shame

– “You ain’t nothin’ ‘less you got the look.”

smart phone

iphone

TV

car

clothing

house

– “Better work harder until you got the best.”

money

mansion

influence

power

Republicans

Democrats

– “You don’t matter ’cause you’re not rich.“

minorities

women

immigrants

L-G-B-T

children

foreigners

– “Who the hell are you?”

9

Let Go

There had been decisions before, but things change, so new decisions were reached and accepted. What had been important became meaningless as priorities sifted like sand dunes.

Others ran into him, exchanging greetings, but then, privately told one another, “He’s really changed,” “Yes, he let himself go.”

They saw it as a bad thing.

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Fitbit Holding

I’ve leveled out on my Fitbit activities and achievements. I’m averaging almost nine miles a day and twenty-three flights, which is where I’ve been for a while.

I’ve settled into this, but I looked at the whys and wherefores behind this leveling.

Weather (and smoke). We’re into summer. I love the weather, except, you know, it gets a little hot. This year is more comfortable in Ashland. We’re cruising along between the mid-eighties and the mid-nineties. Temperatures usually drop below sixty at night, so it gets cool. However, walking during the day is still a sweaty endeavor. I stay well-hydrated and push myself on some days, but after achieving ten miles, I think, “Again?” Then I permit myself to back off (see #3).

Smoke is also a factor. We’ve been fortunate this year in Ashland this year. Smoke from only one wildfire blanketed us for a few days. Last year, it was worse, with fires all around us smothering the valley. I toughed it out on many days, wearing masks when the pollution levels became a health hazard. This year, I asked, why? What am I proving, and to whom am I proving it? So when the smoke was demoralizing thick earlier this month, I curtailed walking outside and did other activities.

In all of this, I’ll share my inherent liability (for this) that I don’t like exercising at the gym. I’ve never gotten into that scene. My wife loves it, and that’s good for her. But being a stereotypical reclusive writer, I don’t go to the gym. When I was in the military, I ran a few miles a week, and played racquetball and handball three or four times a week. Once I went through a hernia and blew out a knee at the end of my military career, forcing me to moderate activities, I stopped doing those things. The end.

Time Management. There are finite hours available. More importantly, my energy levels are finite. Wrestling with where fitness piece fits into my life puzzle required priorities.

  • Number one, my writing time.
  • Personal commitments involving my spouse.
  • Socializing with my wife and friends
  • Exercising, yardwork, reading, and everything else.

My writing time is almost sacrosanct. I put it off a lot while I was in the military and then working as a civilian so that we could pay the bills. Not that I quit working, I’m pursuing my dream.

That fourth one, above, is a catchall. Yardwork must be done, in my mind. Otherwise, it bothers me. Sure, I can shrug it off for one day…a week…maybe two, but then it becomes an irritation. Besides that, with the fire threats of our area, keeping weeds down and everything trimmed back is precaution.

And I like to read. I want to read. I read. Sometimes it’s a choice: do I want to read, or walk? Well, am I doing yardwork? Cleaning the house? Washing the cars? Going shopping? What can I shuffle off for another day?

I Don’t Wanna Laziness. Sometimes I just tell myself, you deserve a break, Michael. You’re writing and doing all these things. You’re sixty-two years old, retired from two careers and working on a third. Chill for a while.

Yes, it’s a rationalization. I came to grudgingly accept it. Number one, I grew up believing you are your clean house, your neat yard, your shiny car, and your job and appearance. That’s how I was socialized. Those of you who grew up in America in the last century probably know what I’m talking about. Now I know that, no, all those things are mostly superficial. As with a lot of living and activities, there’s a balance to be found and kept.

Part of my rationalization was also recognition that I was getting a little obsessive about my Fitbit activities, trying to push myself to higher and higher levels to the detriment of other activities. I’d tell myself, you did sixty-five miles this week; do sixty-six next week. I also realized that house-cleaning, yardwork, and other chores are perpetual, never-ending activities. Cut the grass this week, and you’ll need to cut it again two weeks later. Vacuum now, and the floor will have things on it again tomorrow after people and cats go through the house (especially cats!).

So it goes.

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