Snow, Cleverness and Sweethearts

Standing in the drifting snow, my cracked plastic shovel in hand I take a few deep breaths. Waves of pain radiate along my spine just north of the belt. The pair of herniated disks howl like veteran death metal vocalists whose voices exude physical pain. Seconds before I resume the digging the blaze orange truck rounds the corner and buries the end of my driveway in a wave of snow any surfing professional would admire. The added snow isn't the concern but the packing effect of the repeated passings of the plow. Each run up the street adds a new level of difficulty to my chore. Just what my back and cracked shovel needed.
 

I wondered if the drivers of the plows use the same technique when cruising by their own home or those of their friends and family? Is there any other technique available? 

I can buy a plane ticket, rent a car and book a hotel room via the internet on my phone but there's no other snow removal technology in this country that doesn't result in burying driveways. Isn't it ironic that the plows are making the roads passable and the places the cars are parked impassable? 

I remember living in New York City where street parking in the same zip code as your apartment is comparable to hitting a scratch ticket for $1000. The plows would absolutely bury cars beyond any hope of freeing them. The owners who could simply took public transportation. The parking spots would be locked up for days until the snow melted enough to motivate the owner. 

I remember looking out the window at my landlord, Jack digging out the space in front of the walk up to the house. The plows had made a berm three feet high down the entire street. His car was double-parked down the street at his mother-in-law's house. He finished shoveling and walked off to get his car when someone driving along the street decided to park there. When Jack got back he was furious and had words with the man who refused to move the car. I cracked the window to eavesdrop. The man, dressed in a suit and dress shoes told Jack that if there was anything wrong with his car when he got back from wherever he needed to go, he would call the police. Jack accepted defeat and stormed up the walk into the first floor entrance. The man walked around his car a final time though I don't know why and headed off.
 

I heard the door slam downstairs. I looked out the window and saw Jack on the sidewalk drinking a beer. It was 9am! He put the can into a snowdrift and started shoveling again. But this time Jack was shoveling the snow into the street all around, under and on top of the slickster's car. I wasn't around when he got back, but I wish to hell I could've seen it.

Retail abounds with people giving away goods at reduced prices or for nothing at all. They make these decisions for friends, family and you guessed it, other retail employees! Sometimes it's a co-worker at the same company. Other times it's the clerk from another store. There's a mutual benefit to both involved. The restaurant worker gives out free food and then gets free cd's at the media store. The grocery store employee signs an inflated invoice for the soft drink delivery driver and then gets 30% of the take. Two employees at the same store steal customer's credit card personal information to open fraud credit cards and run up thousands in illegal purchases.

Professional courtesy or just theft? No one is really getting hurt, right? A patrolmen let's an off-duty cop off for running a red light. Celebrities get meals and hotel rooms comped though they can afford it. There are probably a hundred examples of professionals or non-professionals who take care of their own. Services and good are bartered openly every day in this country. When you're the owner of the business you're empowered to make that choice. Employees, not so much. So when politicians, law enforcement, military personnel, school administrators, financial representatives and members of the media alter the way they do business or operate simply because they're dealing with a fellow member of their club, is it professional courtesy? Is it discrimination? Is it plain old dishonesty? Corruption? I say yes to all of the above. 

In 2008 Jennifer Muir, a reporter for the the Orange County Register in California exposed how thousands of state workers obtained untraceable license plates that rendered their vehicles immune to all moving violations. Visit this link to check out the story. http://www.ocregister.com/news/dmv-189719-police-confidential.html

Do you get these kind of perks at work?

Litter Apocalypse

Six people threw their garbage on the ground in my presence over the
last two weeks. I'll describe four of the situations in detail and how
I reacted to the experience. Author disclaimer: Littering is a symptom
of acedia/indolence/sloth, one of the seven deadly sins. I experience
revulsion to an extreme degree when I see people in the act of
littering or discover evidence of said offense.
Case Study 1: Drive Thru Disgrace. I pulled up to the drive thru
window of the burger joint to pay and collect my bagged artery
blockage. I noticed the mini-van in front of me had been asked to
"pull ahead", presumably because they ordered more pseudo-food than
could be stored under the radiation lamps at any one time. I
successfully paid without dropping my change (Yes!) and received my
order. The mini-van still idled in front of me but there was space
aplenty for me to squeeze around. That's when the passenger's hand
emerged from an open window and tossed a grease-laden wrapper to the
paved driveway. The stained paper landed softly on the faded yellow
lines of the drive thru boundary. I slowly curled around the minivan,
unable to believe what I witnessed. The passenger, a sixty-ish man
with white hair and bad teeth observed me looking at him with disdain
and mouthed the question "What?". I drove on, unable to think of any
response to the perp.
Case Study 2: Fast Lane Launch. Riding along at 75mph in the center
lane of the highway, I heard it approach only at the last second. The
interior of my car reverberated with loud music until the roar of the
passing pick-up truck got my attention. It sounded like the monster
trucks I cheered for as a kid, watching them crush junk cars. Remember
Bigfoot? The truck swerved into my lane and then quickly
course-corrected. The driver must have been distracted by his
passenger who proceeded to open window and toss a fountain soda cup in
my direction. The cup hit the nose of my car. Lid and straw lifted
straight up, suspended in the wind for a moment like a graceful kite
and then was swept past the car. The cup disappeared under the car
after impact. The ice and remaining liquid detonated in a burst
resembling an array of peacock feathers, flat across the bottom and
objects lancing out in all directions. A clear liquid covered my
windshield. The truck accelerated away. I drove on in disbelief.
Case Study 3: No Excuse. I'm sitting in my car, parked in a space on
the street taking a conference call. In the Dunkin Donuts parking lot
across the street, a grey Chevy Impala with a spoiler pulls into a
spot close to the coffee shop entrance. A man wearing glasses, cap and
a plum Members Only jackets emerges from the driver's side and drops a
plastic bag tied off at the top. He looks about suspiciously and kicks
the bag under his car. He heads into D&D, passing a large trash
receptacle in the process. A moment later he emerges carrying the
rectangular box used for the purchase of a dozen donuts. He puts the
box in his trunk and drives off. My name is announced to respond to a
question on my conference call. I stumble through the answer sounding
unprepared due to my frustration with the "bag-kicker".
Case Study 4: Enough Is Enough. I pulled into the CVS parking lot and
leaned into the cold wind. The temperature dropped rapidly now that
the December sun had disappeared.  I spied a man in his early thirties
exit the drug store very rapidly. He was tall, maybe 6'4" with red
hair visible under a trucker cap. He was carrying a plastic shopping
bag as he hustled to his SUV parked in one of the closest spaces to
the door. He opened the door, removed what he bought and threw the
plastic bag on the ground. Red got in and turned on the interior
light, turning his attention to something I couldn't see in his lap. I
instantly made a course correction and made for his SUV. I picked up
the plastic bag before the wind whisked it away and knocked on Red's
window. His face registered a bit of surprise but he lowered the
window. Without hesitation I calmly said, "You dropped this." and
handed him the bag. I walked around the front of his truck feeling
both satisfied and confused.
I keep asking myself why people feel compelled to throw their garbage
on the ground. It must be a reflection of how they feel about their
environment. They hate it. Don't respect it. Or they are guilty of the
human ability to abuse something until it is utterly destroyed,
useless or extinct. Is that it? We place ourselves so far above our
environment, use what we please, discard what we will and consequences
be damned. We are guests on this planet. Not supreme beings able to
create new worlds in a week's effort. Will this implied entitlement
and self ascribed superiority over nature be our undoing? I vote yes.

You Give Me Pain

"You give me pain,
But you give me pleasure,
Get out of my life.
You give me pain,
But you give me pleasure,
Don't know what I like"

The chorus to Judas Priest's "Pain and Pleasure" when taken out of context from the rest of the song transports me be back in time to 1989. It was there, in a rectangular room reeking with the smell of sweat, lined with spongy mats and wall padding that my perception of pain altered.

Four students wearing crisp white uniforms and belts of varying color aligned in a row. Behind them a row of four more nervously await instruction. I stood in the second row. New to martial arts and the rituals of class, every day in this room offered hope and anxiety.

I was not new to an underlying theme ever-present in these classes. The theme of pain. Pain was the unseen but omnipresent instructor in the room. It was feared and respected at the same time. It's ironic that pain impaired my enjoyment of football, so much so that I decided to walk away from the game. Yet here in the dojang (dojang is Korean for training hall) pain was as certain as sweat. It might not surface in the first minute of exercise but it would be arriving shortly.

If we unpack the word 'dojang' we find that 'do' means way and jang means 'a place'.  The place where one practices the way. The way of pain. This is accurate. In that room the techniques of a martial art system were taught, some philosophy shared, spirited sparring and training occurred. But the real lesson was in the pain and the wildly successful lessons bestowed upon the students came during stretching.

Stretching the body in ways it was not accustomed to move creates an immediate reaction. Pain is the result.  From the McGraw-Hill Science and Technology Encyclopedia we find this description of pain:

"Pain, especially in its acute form, is usually a reflection of a tissue-damaging or potentially tissue-damaging stimulus. There is a transmission system that conveys this information to the central nervous system. This phenomenon is called nociception. Pain is more complex than other sensory systems such as vision or hearing because it not only involves the transfer of sensory information to the nervous system, but produces suffering which then leads to aversive corrective behavior."

Aversive corrective behavior. What a beautifully scientific description of screaming, a body recoiling, curling up in a fetal position or lashing out in violence. All are common responses to pain in the dojang. At least the onset of pain. What we came to learn transcended that first sensation of pain. Beyond the next agonizing thirty seconds. It became a sauna of misery that engaged a peculiar coping mechanism.

Awash in our seas of suffering, realizing it would not be allowed to end engaged in new behavior. There were tight-faced smiles. Groans transformed into laughter. And lastly, into song. We would sing our way through the pain. One instructor, Keith brought in a small radio with a cassette tape player and during the peak of our suffering hit the button that kicked off what would become our theme song. James Brown's "I Feel Good".
 
"Wo! I feel good, I knew that I wouldn't of
I feel good, I knew that I wouldn't of
So good, so good, I got you
Wo! I feel nice, like sugar and spice
I feel nice, like sugar and spice
So nice, so nice, I got you"
The song played on and we all understood. Pain was our ally. It told us we weren't good enough yet. There were barriers to be broken. Plateaus to cross and peaks to ascend. We were nothing without pain, like a sailboat without wind on a calm sea. Pain would always be there for us, but we must seek it. And it was not our friend. Pain could not be embraced or empowered to the level of friend. No. More like a parent whose interests were split. Instruction. Development. Submission. Obedience.

Buddhism came into my life during this change in my ship's heading and the myriad proverbs supplied by the masters reinforced my acceptance of pain.
"One is taught in accordance with one's ability to learn."
"When the student is ready, the teacher appears."
Our instructors showed, corrected and motivated. Only pain taught. The pure lessons as transparent as water and hard as steel.

On Monday, a headache descended upon me. It was difficult to concentrate so as I left my office and walked the last fifty feet to the door my mind wandered. The moment I exited and stepped into the cold, wind-swept night I stiffened and closed my eyes. A chill breeze slammed into my neck sending waves of pain up to my brain. I staggered for a second but corrected my body and hurriedly stepped to the car. The hour and forty-five minute ride home was excruciating. Every headlight in my mirrors felt like a pinprick to the surface of my eyes. The back of my head pulsed with pain. My eyes were reduced to slits, face tight in a grimace, my entire body tense. When I made it home, I hit the couch, huddled under a blanket and could barely stand to look at the Christmas lights on our tree.

Some student of pain, eh? Curled up in a ball under a blanket, a few degrees of hurt away from sobbing. Sleep rescues me later when I tire from the effort of resisting the pain. Resisting? Yes. That's where pain gains in amplitude. The brain is telling us there's a problem and our reaction to the stimulus is what makes it seem unbearable.

The lesson of the dojang comes back to me the next morning. The moment just before sleep, the pain receded a bit. I entertained the thought of getting up if the headache was subsiding, but I was off to sleep before I could take action. The way of pain is unavoidable. Our reaction to its presence makes all the difference.

Quiet House

Blessed silence in an otherwise boisterous house. This became the subject of a tangent phone conversation with an old friend of mine. We share something that many parents of young children will recognize: the divine moment you discover you are the only human being awake in the dwelling. It’s a magical stretch. Even spiritual. I've decided to name this oasis in time the "Quiet House". QH is a treasured event for me on several levels.

The Remote. I own it during QH. I can indulge in sports, manly movies, or my favorite DVD. No requests for kid’s shows or complaints about what daddy likes is boring. Period.

The Computer. During non-QH hours my time in front of the home pc is spent satisfying requests for line drawings of super heroes and princesses. My orders are to locate the requested drawing, e.g. "Daddy, I want a picture of Juggernaut fighting Hulk", print it in the appropriate size and then provide positive reviews on the artists' work. There's also the rapid fire requests for pbskids.com and games they can't remember the names of, e.g. "Dad can you put on the game where you hit the ball and there's all those colored blocks and the guy laughs and you have to watch out for the dog off his leash and you can't draw outside the lines?" What??? That makes my brain hurt and it doesn't even sound fun.

But during QH I can check e-mail, write down my thoughts, heck, even have thoughts! It's a glorious time but it is finite. Either I succumb to sleep in the evening or in the early morning sessions, depart for work.

The Reward. The payoff moment for me is the sleep-faces of my son and daughter. Lips parted slightly, breathing deeply, awash in the peace of toddler dreams. Tiny hands clutch soft pandas, fuzzy puppies, fleece blankets. I watch them and recall how they slept during their first weeks of life. The grasping, infant fingers. Warm, sweet breath. Saliva bubbles forming and popping. Nuzzling noses pressed into the joint of my neck and shoulder. Tiny toes peeking out through a swaddling blanket. Each night moves them further in age from those first weeks in our home, but I can still close my eyes and recover those first images in the hospital. The tiny knitted caps. Mittens to prevent scratching. The smallest socks I'd ever seen.

QH. Time for reflection and clear thinking is rare. If you don't schedule it then you must be prepared to seize the moments as they appear. Silence is fleeting in the world of the parent and the employed. I suppose even if you are neither of those things there are so many gadgets or toys created to distract us, silence remains elusive.

Allow yourself to find QH. I read a book called Thinking for a Change by John Maxwell. JM writes about several different kinds of thinking available to us that are as diverse as flavors of Ben & Jerry's ice cream. Depending on your need, you turn the dial to a different thinking mode.

JM writes “If you don’t like the crop you’re reaping you must change the seed you are sowing…unleash the power of focused thinking, recognize the importance of realistic thinking, question the acceptance of popular thinking, experience the satisfaction of unselfish thinking…”. There’s a bunch more and he goes into detail about how to harness each type. JM recommends you find a place and time where you can think. Uninterrupted. I recommend it.

The innocence of the sleeping child distracts me. I could watch them until, head nodding, I must join them in slumber. The QH supplies a respite from the bustle and speed of daily life. For me, I can slow it all down and walk the old paths of memory, rest on the stone bench of reflection and view the stream of thought as it murmurs its secrets if I am sufficiently still to listen.

Bumper Sticker Wars

The weathered white van never really stopped as it glided beside me at a red light. It was about to turn green, so when it did change, the van lurched ahead of me paying homage to Sir Isaac Newton. That's when I saw the bold lettering of a bumper sticker on the back window that read "TRUST JESUS".
I thought that the driver must really trust Jesus because if anyone ran the red light at the street we were crossing, he wouldn't have had any time to react. That got me thinking about Jesus bumper stickers. There are an awful lot of them out there. This one seemed pretty tame. TRUST JESUS. Ok. As far as first amendment rights go, no problem, right? The little hairs on the back of my neck didn't raise up like they usually do when someone wants to talk religion with me and they are way more interested in my beliefs than I am.
But haven't I seen some other messages out there that did make me react either in mild revulsion or outright laughter? I'm pretty sure I have. So I went on a week long mission of cataloging all the religious bumper stickers I could find.

In Connecticut, I drove through (on secondary roads not highway) Naugatuck, Waterbury, Prospect, Cheshire, Winsted, Colebrook, Union, and Woodstock.

In New York I drove through Troy, Albany and Clifton Park.

In Massachusetts I drove in Springfield, Otis, Southwick, Holyoke, Chicopee, Worcester, Auburn, Dudley and Webster. All these miles were work-related but I was poised to read every bumper sticker I could get close enough to decipher.

What I discovered intrigued me. I realized that there were numerous Jesus-related messages out there but an equally vast number of Christian religion stickers as well. And for every five religious stickers I saw, there would be one that mocked or was anti-religion/Jesus. I struggled a bit with this 20% rebellion because I didn't understand the need for a public statement against organized religion. I moved my research to bumper sticker web sites and the 20% rebellion swelled to a fair fight. For every "Jesus is my co-pilot" sticker for sale, I found the anti-venom for it. Here are some examples:

"Jesus, save me from your followers." "Jesus loves you but everyone else thinks you're a moron." "Jesus enters through the heart. Stop shoving him down my throat."

I started to get the picture. There was a war being fought between Jesus-lovers and Jesus-haters. I didn't understand why the chosen battlefield was a bumper sticker, but if they were trying to raise awareness and gain more followers to their cause, I could see the point. It would be more fun if they lined up like a 19th century conflict and had an organized battle. One can dream...

The deeper I looked I found variations of the original theme. I made labels and starting adding the slogans under each one like Hypocritical Republicans for Jesus, Anti-Muslim, Anti-Semites, Christian Elitism, Darwin Elitism, Science Over Religion, Anti-Obama, Social Catch-All and Humor for Humor's Sake. The Pro-Jesus and Anti-Jesus factions outnumbered the other factions 10-1. But the use of Jesus or the messiah idea to support or denigrate a particular group was fascinating. Some people might have been offended, some could care less. But for me, a had a specific reaction for each one. More samples.

"I found Jesus. He was in my trunk when I got back from Tijuana." Whatever they were trying to do with that one, it's flat out funny.
"Jesus is my pool boy." This one seemed cheap to me. Try harder.
"Jesus would slap the shit out of you." That one will get your attention! Kudos to the author.
"1 cross + 3 nails = 4 given" Very clever. Thumbs up.
"I sold my soul to the highest bidder. Jesus Christ." Another top entry. Well done!
"My family values: Science and the Arts." Tell us how you really feel.
"CH_ _CH. What's missing? UR" Very effective, I think.
"If going to church makes you a christian, does going to the garage make you a car?" An oldie but a goodie.

The slogans I really struggled with had to do with driving. I don't see the correlation between bad driving and religious beliefs. Take a look.

"Are you following Jesus this close?" So, tailgaters are Christian, huh?
"How would Jesus drive?" Same idea as the last one.
"I bet Jesus would've used his turn signal." Really? I thought he got rid of all his worldly possessions.
"Jesus is my car insurance." Good luck defending that one when all your assets are seized to pay someone's hospital bills.

Some slogans were just brutal to read. "Science flies you to the moon. Religion flies you into buildings." "Jesus saves you from thinking for yourself." "I love Jesus but in a gay way." Someone was trying a little to hard to offend.

These made me laugh out loud. "Forget about Jesus. Jump start your life - have sex!" "Beware of God" "Jesus saves, passes to Moses. He shoots, he scores!" "Jesus is coming, look busy!" "Jesus. The bailout you can count on." "Go Jesus! It's yer birthday!" I salute the creativity within those entries!

In summary, Jesus is a polarizing figure. In this country, when the name is mentioned or seen in print there's a pause. We immediately filter for intent. Is this an attack on Christianity? Is it proselytizing? It's the religious equivalent to the fight or flight syndrome. We hover on the edge, ready to leap in the appropriate direction.

I've always bought into the advice of sales master Tom Hopkins who said that in the workplace, there's no room for greed, jealousy or gossip. I've always tried to emulate that advice and pass it on to the best of my ability. Religion should be part of that advice. Maybe politics to a certain extent. Akin to bringing up Jesus, engaging in gossip or asking someone's political affiliation can produce an instant reaction. It just might be more than you bargained for.

The staff at The First Draught has much more to offer on this topic. I'll have to continue in the next blog. My kids are begging to be fed and I'm required by law to do so. I can't wait to expand more on Darwin, Republicans, elitism and political correctness. Until next blog, then. Cheers.

Nine Year Itch

Occasionally I latch onto a recurring train of thought. It's very deja-vu like. A warmth of familiarity wraps itself around my mind and I'm amazed how the details can come back so sharp and tangible. The feeling appeared tonight while driving home. I faced a two hour commute after 6 pm in a driving rain accompanied by high wind, ground fog and dozens of eighteen wheelers spraying water over the roof of my car as I passed.

Yes. As I passed the hulks in my little Malibu. This is when the familiar feeling caught my attention and I sat up a little straighter. An audible "Oh" probably slipped from my lips though I don't remember that. My awareness of what was happening came on in a rush. I processed the details: high wind and slashing rain. Gouts of water sprayed by big trucks. Malibu nearly pressed to Jersey barrier. Ground water pooling under left tires, materializing out of the dark. Rolling fog obscuring tail lights and painted lines on asphalt. Speedometer reads 80.

80? Yes. Things slowed down then and I could actually see the revolutions of the tumbling fog-pillows. I eased off the gas as sheets of water sprayed by trucks hung in the air before colliding with my windshield. Brake lights flashed in too-slow patterns on the vehicles I passed. The song "Drifters" by Paul Rodgers playing on my iPod immediately gained clarity. I heard the phrases "highway of my life" and "shadow on the wind" and I connected with them.

For the last nine years and four months my role for my employers has been a field manager. Rather than being tied to one location I have been responsible for many locations. Sometimes the number was 10. Then it was 36. This year it's 57. I proudly display my road warrior tag. I should get a license plate frame that says road warrior and has a picture of Mad Max. Four hundred miles in a week is what I call travel-lite. Sometimes I pile up fifteen hundred miles or more in five days.

The realization is that I am at home on the road. I am desensitized to the rigors of life in a car. An unintended consequence is supreme confidence in most situations. Example, lost in a city with no GPS, map or cell phone? Fine. Where's the sun? Cloudy, huh? No worries. Just start following other people. They're probably going to a highway or other populated area. Middle of the night? Even better. Lot's of police cars idling, watching for drunks or killing time until the next call sets them in motion. Find an officer and ask him for guidance. There's a ton of other cues and clues, too. Commuter train blows by. Head in the direction is going or where it came from. Train stations are located in centralized locations, easily accessible for travelers. I could go on all day.

I just know I am in charge in the car. I don't want to ride. Passenger seats are not for me. I'd rather walk than sit in the passenger seat of a Porsche or any other thrilling sports car you can name. Gimme the wheel. Plug in my iPod. Crack the windows. Slug my coffee. The other drivers all seem inferior. They make all the wrong decisions. Why? because they're in my way. Stop looking at your phone or unwrapping your Whopper. If driving is the second or third most important thing you're doing when you're behind the wheel, you don't get it. Yes, I have updated Facebook while driving before. I rarely ever do that anymore. But I can because I'm such a better driver than you. I choose not to because I need to keep an eye on all the other inferior drivers.

So the recurring feeling is time awareness deal where I see it all happenng slowly. My confidence soars. I slide by all the other cars like they're slowing to a stop. It just feels right. I secretly hope Petty's "Running Down A Dream" will come up next on the iPod. It's the perfect driving song. Instead, it's Mark Knopfler's "The Car Was The One". Hmm. Even better.