Recurrence of the meme

People enter my life once, but they leave it twice. They always come back, but when they leave the second time -- they're gone.

Every man over forty is a scoundrel. - George Bernard Shaw

Tomorrow I will be 46 years old. When I was 18 years old, I made a number of predictions. I predicted (accurately) the types of women my friends and I would marry, the divorces, and I predicted the age of my death to be 39. I secretly planned for this eventuality. I expected to simply fail to wake up on my 40th birthday. I was somewhat surprised that i did. 40 is a great age and, having not planned for the eventuality, I was working without a map there for a little while. Then I learned that there is no map. Plan as you like, alter your life to meet all eventualities and you will be continually surprised as your world is thrown into chaos. This is true because you are not living this life alone. So, now with all of these bonus years under my belt I have learned a few things. But first, we brag.


45 was a good age -- 46 will be better. Yes, I need reading glasses after all this time, but damned if they don't look good perched on the end of my nose. I might have a second gray hair in my beard, but so far, my hair hasn't got the message. No wrinkles, just a few smile lines around the eyes. I still have to show my driver's license when I tell people my age. I am still tough as an old horseshoe.Next weekend I run a 5k obstacle course in the mountains again. But today, today I celebrate life, not just my life, but life in general, because it's really good when you let it be. So, here it is, the path to a good life:


* Spend your time with the young (or the young at heart)

* Watch more movies than television

* Watch more plays than Movies

* Be absurdly passionate about art, music, theater, and love

* Be a hopeful and hopeful romantic

* Cultivate the love of children, old-people, nice cats, good dogs, and great horses

* Like yourself even when you don't love yourself

* Dance in the toy aisle of the department store

* Cook for yourself like you're cooking for your mother

* Ride on the back of the cart in the grocery store

* Tell good stories to great people

* Write every day

* Sleep with the air down low and the covers up high

* Work hard

* Keep your sworn word

* Be nice to the people you love

* Forget the people you hate

* Engage the cashier in friendly conversation

* Joke

* Love

* Laugh till it hurts

* Smile like you're up to something

* Help people especially when it costs you something

* Have faith

* Drink Arnold Palmers

* Eat the Strawberry Ice-Cream

* Never waste a moment on fear or doubt

* Learn two new skills every year

* Say "yes" more than you say "no"

* Be the problem solver and not the problem causer

* Don't ever back down because your stand is unpopular or inconvenient

* Look everyone you talk to in the eye

* Hug

* Explore

* Be a scoundrel

* Listen

* Walk through the corridors of the world with your arms stretched wide and burn everything you touch with the fire inside you

* Read good books

* Cultivate the friendship of creative people

* Take vacations

* Never Ever Quit


And because it bears repeating: "I am neither old, nor young, but, instead, the perfect age for a man. I have accumulated wisdom and remain youthful enough to enjoy it. I know the words that will unlock a woman's heart, the means to turn tears to laughter, how to listen for heartache, and how to speak into silence without the stir of an echo.


I have begat children, loved women, fought men, and ridden great horses. These are the things of which a wonderful life is composed. My words have reached millions, I have written songs and sonnets. I have brought smiles and laughter. I would say it has been a complete life, but it has only just begun.


If the quality of a life is measured by those who love him and seek out his company (and surely it must be), then the value of this short season of my immortal existence is immeasurable. My friends are countless stars in my heaven.


Life, it gets under your skin, metaphorically speaking. You take one breath and have to have another."

Quem deus vult perdere, dementat prius

I was wrong. You were never my insanity, instead you gave my madness purpose. On the longest night of the year, Earth's shadows fall across the full moon and eclipse me. And only one wolf to howl.

Tale as old as time

Tale as old as time
True as it can be
Barely even friends
Then somebody bends
Unexpectedly

Watch Disney's "Beauty and the Beast" sometime with kids and when it gets to the end, watch the building excitement as the Beast fights Gaston. Then watch their faces fall as the last petal falls off of the rose. Then watch the Beast transform into the prince and the happy ending -- quick, look at the kids. They are frowning.


Just a little change
Small to say the least
Both a little scared
Neither one prepared
Beauty and the Beast

Why do the kids frown? The same reason you do. The very reason that the end of Disney's masterpiece ultimately fails -- You don't want to see Belle dancing with the prince, you want to see her dancing with the Beast.

Ever just the same
Ever a surprise
Ever as before
Ever just as sure
As the sun will rise

No matter how handsome he is, Belle didn't fall in love with the prince, she fell in love with the Beast and so did you.

Tale as old as time
Song as old as rhyme
Bitter sweet and strange
Finding you can change
Learning you were wrong

No matter how you package it, the Beast is not the prince. All of his experiences, the ones that made him worthy of love were made as a monster, a monster that loved enough to change. But what did he change? At the end, he was a monster. He killed Gaston. He clawed. He roared. He was the Beast.

Certain as the sun
Rising in the East
Tale as old as time
Song as old as rhyme
Beauty and the Beast

The prince became the Beast to learn what? Not humility. Not peace. Not even kindness. He must love and be loved. And while he already loved (and was loved) by his subjects, it was the love of Belle that ended his "curse."

Tale as old as time
Song as old as rhyme
Beauty and the beast

But is it a curse to learn what you are and to be loved for it? You frown at the end because the prince is a stranger and because we do not love perfections, we love flaws. So often we try and change what we love into something else and in the process we lose what we loved in the first place.

This is all apropos of nothing -- just remembering that I was the beast long before I was the prince.

"You begin saving the world by saving one person at a time;" - Charles Bukowski

"I used to be a superhero,
no one could touch me,
not even myself"

"How is saving the world coming?" they ask, and they smile. I pretend a smile, the one that doesn't touch my eyes at all. The one JP calls the too-tight-smile-that-never-touches-your-eyes-and-the-eyes-go-from-storm-cloud-gray-to-steel-in-a-heartbeat. I never know what to say when they ask that question. People say it with humor and half-seriousness. Sometimes it's a question that states: "Stop what you are doing and think about joining the human race."

And I do -- for the moment.

"Look, up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! It's Superman!" the crowd would yell, black-and white faces with a sotto-voce whoosh underneath. But, when George Reeves lands in his monochrome superman-suit, he's not a member of the human race. He's standing in front of the globe or a flag or the cosmos. Superman never comes down to Earth -- why would he? There is only peace in the lonely sky.

"How is saving the world coming?" I've been asked it a hundred times and never once answered: "Painfully, thank you." or "Saved another one and then in the last panel I winked and we never saw that character again. Only the spectator's got closure."

I wish I had a fortress of solitude, like Superman or Doc Savage. A little hide-away at the top of the world where you can scream in silence and no-one can hear you except that stupid dog.

Lois Lane and Lana Lang will happily tell you they don't need your fucking help as they plummet to the side-walk and for a split second you think to yourself: "What would happen if I didn't save the day?" Then, faster than a speeding bullet, you're there and they frown and you wonder why you bothered. Everything was fine when Lori Lemaris was in that fucking wheelchair and then it turns out she's a mermaid and you wonder if your life will ever be normal.

At the end of the day, after your fought a giant gorilla with kryptonite eyes, and you're tired as hell, someone says "How is saving the world coming?" and their eyes are tight and the smile doesn't quite reach those eyes and you know that's not the question they want to ask anyway. Then, somewhere deep inside you, you just want to yell "Peachy, thanks for asking!" and punch down half of a mountain because even Jimmy Olsen doesn't know why you do it. No one does, because even if you don't put on spandex, you have to be a little bit mad to do it over and over again.

"How is saving the world coming?" they ask.

"It hurts like hell," you answer and then the signal watch goes off and you take to the sky -- the lonely sky, because it's peaceful up there.

Happy is the new black

Yesterday started off and ended badly. It was a rough day. My Tao was blown. Today is much better. We learn from communication. We learn from talking. But more important, we learn from listening.

2009 was a year of change. All the people that came and went in my life were there for a reason -- to remove NEED so I could live with and love myself.

It's all about the Strawberry Ice-Cream. It's about giving and loving unconditionally. Not to get preachy or churchy (you have to find your own bliss), but here is an experiment:

This is Corinthians 13:4-8

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.

We know it, we've all heard it. Now, take out "Love" and insert your name.

Brian is patient, Brian is kind. He does not envy, He does not boast, He is not proud. He is not rude, He is not self-seeking, He is not easily angered, He keeps no record of wrongs. Brian does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. He always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Brian never fails.

That's the template. That's the goal. That's what we should be, even when we aren't.

It's what Pooh would do.

Peace.

The Gifts of October

In the south, we call it Fall. The rest of the world may fancy it up and call it Autumn, but in the South, we are reminded of the short season by the changing of the leaves and their descent from the trees like so many copper parachutes.

October is the transition from boiling heat to winter cold. November is bitter and August is cruel, but October is the gift giver. Miracles are commonplace in my life, I have been blessed with health, children, good horses, great fights, and beautiful women. I have, at times, been at war with the source of the miracles.

You may call it God or the Tao -- finding your own faith is key, I know what I believe. And I have made war of that granter of miracles for a long time. Be careful what you wish for, I asked to change lives and people entered and exited my life with alarming speed, changing as they went. But once I said a prayer, if you will, I said I would stop struggling against my role in the universe if I heard a certain set of words under very specific circumstances, in the belief that I never would. October gifts. It's a private matter and changes my world completely without changing a thing. But it was another miracle that laid me flat.

Words and deeds are the only gifts that matter at the end of the day, all other things are as dust. On the off-hand chance that I am not actually immortal, my words will be my immortality for a time, echoing in forever, or not.

What is a miracle but a gift for which there is no expectation, no understanding. You accept it and learn to be selfish and covetous of that moment, because it is yours and everything in it belongs to you. Hold it and know that it is yours for always, like the cycle of the seasons. October has come and brought its gifts and there is only tomorrow before us and all the miracles that come with it. The people you love, the change of things as they move through the cycles of life, for few things remain -- except the promise of always and the gifts of October.

In the clearing stands a boxer, and a fighter by his trade...

And he carries the reminders of every glove that laid him down or cut him
til he cried out in his anger and his shame
I am leaving, I am leaving, but the fighter still remains

When I was a younger man, I was a fighter. I hesitate to call it boxing. I did box, but I never fought as many times with gloves on as I did with them off. It paid bills. It was dumb, but it was something I did. No one ever asked me about marks on my face because I seldom had them. My forearms and biceps and ribs would be bruised, but not my face. I protected my face.

My hand are meathooks. I have big hands. My dad says I should have been a machinist. I have short, blunt fingers, pronounced thumb muscles, and thick knuckles. The old man would say: "Those hands are for a machine shop, or for beating a man." They seem to work well enough on the keyboard. I've never been particularly fast with my hands. My punch count was usually two-thirds of my opponents. But I seldom lost. Because my strength is that I never quit. Ever.

I never give up on people. I never give up a fight. I never quit hunting, seeking, hoping, loving and (sadly) hating. It's part of the passion. I love to hunt. I love to love. And, sadly, I love to hate.

The past few years have been rough. Divorce, problems with my youngest daughter, jobs, friendships. But I remain. This is not self aggrandizement, it's a recognition of the self that I tried to forget. The fighter.

I am a lucky man. I meet people for a reason. Sometimes I change their lives forever. Sometimes it has to wait. I have long since given up on believing in coincidence. When I make eye contact and there is a moment of understanding and people just unload their lives on me or try to get me to stay just one moment longer, I wait. I listen.

I am a mountain. I am patient and unmovable. I'm a fighter that never quits. Even when life is good, and, frankly, for me it is seldom bad. I am a very lucky man. I never live in fear.

I would usually say my "Prayer" about invincibility. But instead, I issue a challenge to the universe, the one I always issue. "Is that all you've got?" And end with a quote that both establishes my geek-cred and says it all.

"No, madman! Whatever you may see there -- it is not fear! Fear is for lesser men. Never for Doom!" - Victor Von Doom

And for all of us, through the heartbreak of loss and the everyday worries and struggles, we have one prayer in those moments "Today, let me be invincible"

The Magician and the Fool

Flip through the tarot deck and flip over a card. The Magician, that's me.

Traveling on his way, the Fool first encounters a Magician. Skillful, self-confident, a powerful magus with the infinite as a halo floating above his head, the Magician mesmerizes the Fool. When asked, the Fool gives over his bundled pack and stick to the Magician. Raising his wand to heaven, pointing his finger to Earth, the Magician calls on all powers; magically, the cloth of the pack unfolds upon the table, revealing its contents. And to the Fool's eyes it is as if the Magician has created the future with a word. All the possibilities are laid out, all the directions he can take. The cool, airy Sword of intellect and communication, the fiery Wand of spirituality and ambition, the overflowing Chalice of Love and emotions, the solid Pentacle of work, possessions and body. With these tools, the Fool can create anything, make anything of his life. But here's the question, did the Magician create the tools, or were they already in the pack? Only the Magician knows - and on this mystery, our eloquent mage refuses to say a word.

Standing at the crossroad, unwrapping the traveler's pack, showing them the road and the tools they have. I spoke with someone today, looked through all their layers into their souls and listened. A kindred spirit with a guarded heart.

It's unsettling sometimes, talking to people and seeing things. Some come closer and show it all, others run and hide because they fear for someone to see. We all guard our hearts to one degree or another, I know I do, while I ache to have it taken and risk the bittersweet heartbreak.

It's to feel, to burn.

Burn with me.

Our Cancer Year - Followup

The report came back from the doctor. It's not cancer and it's not AIDS. Apparently the issue looked enough like an auto-immune problem that they checked. Where do we go from here? Another specialist to see if it's an infectious disease.

When you put it that way, it's still a scary proposition, but it's not cancer. Heather told me and I started to cry. Relief flooded into me and I just let go. I hadn't realized I was holding my breath.

Today is a good day, because it's not cancer. Today is a good day because we have hope and the future and so long as we have those, we are invincible.