The 2023 RANT

December 24, 2023

Another year winding down and it’s almost past time to have completed the rant… Who could have predicted it would be the week before Christmas and I would find myself sitting in a hotel in North Carolina struggling to condense a year’s worth of experiences into a few short pages? It’s rare I find myself ambivalent when it comes to rant material but, the whole SBux and Dunkin’ thing seems a bit tired – which doesn’t mean they aren’t true, cause let’s be honest those are universal and timeless and there’s been plenty of examples again this year… I fear it’s never going to change. I guess I should insert the normal disclaimer here too… every year the audience for this grows and there will be some “first timers” – don’t take yourself to seriously and if something here pricks your conscience or sensitivities well you might want to ask yourself why… understand though it’s probably you not me…

Last year we talked a bit about being vulnerable, opening up to the ones you love and doing this thing called life together… still good advice and this year has been a further exploration of that dynamic. Our family has another generation coming along and will be adding a fifth grandchild in February… boy do we seem a long way from those first rants! I think back on those early days, the struggles, leans times, figuring it out along the way while learning to raise young children – we were still so young ourselves. I sometimes wonder if my kids are having their own rant worthy experiences; part of me hopes so and then again I’ve worked hard to give them an easier path – maybe the measure is they don’t feel the need to write their own rants – they would probably just text it anyway!

I normally keep “work” out of these but, it’s worth mentioning that I went back to work a year ago and that shit continues with no real end in sight; hell, I am even traveling again if you can believe it. As usual I have met some really great folks, made some new friends, and as is always the case have run into some seriously toxic people – they are out there! Oh, if you are wondering which one you are… don’t wonder you know the truth… I’ll be magnanimous though – no names or details; I’ll just smile and raise my glass of wine toasting their inability to be a genuine human. Hurting feelings in the first page – it’s like the old days, how refreshing.

Enough of that though, should we do a rundown of family events or maybe some pontificating on current events – we do have an election coming up and the world is tragic lately; then again when hasn’t it been? Always a matter of perspective, a derivative of where you stand in the continuum of the human experience; does it really affect me or can I simply feign the appropriate emotions while plodding along in much the same way I always have? It’s the fundamental existential question: does it really matter anyway? I think it probably does, but you could forgive the apathy of those that just say “fuck it all anyway…” So, I vote we skip the political and world events section this year, and since my vote is the only one that matters… motion passed unanimously!

So, family updates it is – and we have a few noteworthy ones this year. First off the princess is pregnant with number two! Yes another granddaughter is on the way; and if you know Kiersta then you understand how much she hates being pregnant. Not being a mom, she is a great one, and not having another child just the physical manifestation of actually having a human inhabiting her body… oh boy does she not enjoy that part of it. Annie can’t wait for a little sister though and her excitement is pretty contagious; we are within weeks at this point! Our core four continue their adult journey – jobs, relationships, kids, businesses, new puppies, stolen trucks, chickens and now that I think about it plenty of rant worthy events! The four grands keep growing; gymnastics, horseback riding lessons, piano, dance, soccer, all the activities kids are supposed to do, making parents ask, “what the hell were we thinking!” In quiet moments of retrospection, I often ponder where the time has gone, cliché? Sure, it is, but it’s too easy to trudge through another day assuming they won’t ever end. Having grands as great as mine though is a bit of a cure for the pervading cynicism of growing old. If I was a touch more sarcastic I would be sending out a yearly syrupy letter extolling their exploits… way to ironic even for me.

Couple of experiences really brought this getting old thing home for me this year; my daughter “gifted” me this online “story” activity – you write a weekly chapter recounting experiences from your life and this company compiles it all into a book for you; well not really for you but for those who remain after you sign off – beautiful hardcover with color pics. Two things on this – asking a writer to write a book about his memories is a perilous ask – no seriously. I reluctantly completed it though – all eighty plus chapters and now I am hoping there is a Volume Two somewhere down the road ‘cause geez do they know something I don’t? I am also anticipating at least one “WTF dad…” out of this… and in a few generations… “great, great grandpa was pretty crazy wasn’t he mom?” “That’s what they say honey…” Should be fun!

A few weeks ago, we lost a friend unexpectedly; “Cinnamon” was only about a year older than I am, went in for some routine outpatient surgery… never came home. The details aren’t important, but she left too early – I joined the family at the hospital for an “Honor Walk” – a ritual where the staff line the halls as they wheel the body to the OR for organ harvesting. There is no delicate way to describe this process and although I am glad I did it – I would be happy never doing it again. It was an unexpected and stark reminder of the impermanence of this thing we call life – organ donorship aside… her journey here is over. Apologize if that seems harsh, I am not blind to the huge gift someone will receive and how their life will continue forward and the joy their loved ones will experience… however, the scales are balanced by the magnitude of loss on this side.

I’m sure you’re asking by now… umm we going to RANT anytime soon? Listen both my knees hurt all the time, one of my shoulders only half works, I’m tired, old, and a bit grumpy so how about you calm the fuck down… I’m getting to it!

Here we go – broke down and took a flight this summer for the first time in almost four years; turns out the shit you see on the news is 100% true – people have lost their minds. I am old enough to remember when we knew how to act on an airplane and we didn’t wear our pajamas either. This wasn’t a little trip either – Tampa to Seattle so a solid six hours in the air each way; and unbeknownst to me this was apparently a CDC charter flight to test whether Covid is still transmissible – it is and yes I got it. I am pretty sure it was the woman sitting behind me on the trip home since she coughed literally the entire time; maskless of course and didn’t bother covering her mouth. I’ve got a great pic of her spewing spike proteins directly on me… Tammy swears you can’t contract it that quickly, but I’m pretty sure I was part of a horrible and involuntary science experiment. I’m not in a hurry to interact with the traveling public again anytime soon and even more reticent to get on a plane again – if you’re traveling; try acting like a normal, responsible and respectful human… it’s not that hard.

This air travel experience informed my decision to drive to my client in North Carolina recently… not interested in revisiting Covid again; having said that I can confirm stupid is not confined to those flying, but alive and well on our interstates. Now I’m not a drive 10 miles under the limit in the left lane guy, but I’m also not a ride your ass at 90MPH in the rain idiot, but those guys are out there and there seems to be an inordinate number of them in the Carolinas… just saying. And by the way, who doesn’t understand the universal merge rules? We take turns one from each side – it’s a system that actually works if you aren’t say a cantankerous entitled old guy in Jacksonville – he was ridiculous, but not quite brave enough to put his Mercedes at risk – I was willing to sacrifice the Kia though! I did feel bad for the young couple from Wisconsin that was completely traumatized by the Florida interstate scene; the man was nearly in tears trying to merge that U-Haul he was driving – he made the mistake of trying to be polite in a state that has never embraced that concept – they are going to love it here!

Maybe I’m just out of practice, it’s true I haven’t really traveled since early 2020, but I just don’t remember it being as insane as it is. Seems to me we have suffered a degree of systemic trauma – a loss of grace and collective patience – did all that social isolation leave a permanent stain on us? The pandemic has been declared over for now, assuming you believed in it to start with; but many folks never returned to an office, to the socialization of spending time face to face, working shoulder to shoulder (literally) and it shows. This is not a new theme for me and a bit of self-introspection is probably in order; is this my new reality or has it always been this way, but I am now just noticing? Did I change, get older, develop a greater sensitivity to these abrasions or has something really changed – my guess is probably a little of both.

For myself I am working hard to develop a greater self-awareness in these situations, making more of an effort to foster positive personal interactions, reduce the tendency to have an immediate negative reaction to these triggers. If you find yourself in similar circumstances rise above, stay the course, and remember time is moving quick enough as it is… no need to waste any energy on this type of nonsense – we all have better things to do with the time allotted to us. Unless you are in my drive thru being entitled and taking up way more of my time than is reasonable… which means order off the damn menu or go inside – just can’t fix stupid!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays my friends none of us know the length of our journey… but is definitely worth the trip, so stay in the light…

Joe

The Coffee Rant…

July 21, 2017

Now here is the thing about going on a “Rant” there is always someone that gets his or her feelings just a tiny little bit hurt. So let me say right up front, that is not the intent of this rant, in fact you should definitely consider this more in the style of say a “Public Service Announcement” (PSA) and if you still think maybe just maybe this hits a little too close to home than by all means feel free to take it to heart, the rest of us are rooting for you!

The coffee drive-thru is a unique animal; not at all like the “fast food” drive-thru. For one it’s a beverage, not food, not a meal, no combos, it’s coffee. Count on it being busy in the morning, most people need that caffeine fix as they start their day… interestingly enough it’s pretty busy at night as well… the night-walkers need their caffeine too apparently. So the question I keep asking myself is… why oh why do we insist on acting like the coffee drive-thru is a fast food drive thru? Read more ›

The Soul Collector

July 17, 2017

The soft rain had waned not long after midnight leaving only a sporadic errant drip from the swaying leaves overhead, the shifting patterns of their shadows chasing each other through the shallow puddles gently illuminated by the hiss of magnesium street lights parading down 5th avenue – giant sentinels blind to the cloaked figure silently passing beneath them. Jed came this way often passing by the brick alleys of the older apartment buildings fortunate enough to have survived the onslaught of the glass and steel of the high-rise condos surrounding them on all sides, his purposeful stride belied by the vacuum of silence emanating from within the folds of his cloak. Three blocks down the gentle flicker and then darkness as the street light gives out altogether bringing him back to the moment he whispers, “I’m here Jason.”

The bottle had slipped from the arthritic clasp of Jason Whitlock’s bony hands its poison syrup mixing with the lingering residue of the earlier shower winds its way down the sidewalk to the anxiously waiting gutter. A gentle breeze picks up the brown paper bag releasing it from its most recent vocation; cast to the sky it twirls and dips like some macabre kite before settling behind the stairs to watch the next scene in this tragic play.

The darkness deepens and as he gathers the living spark recently inhabiting the rapidly cooling husk that had been Whitlock, he murmurs to himself, “long is the day, hard is the struggle…” He had no recollection of where he had picked up the phrase, but it seemed to fit his purposes he muses already moving past the corner and crossing the avenue – in his wake the street light sputters and hisses back to life. How many more to gather on tonight’s journey he wonders pointlessly for he already knows the tally had been calculated long ago and wasn’t he just the courier after all?

Picking up his pace he whistles some Duke, briefly amusing himself with an interlude between “Sentimental Mood” and his personal favorite “Jeep’s Blues,” as the street lights perched upon their steel spires sputter out and hiss back to life the only mark of his passage.

The siren’s wail fades into the night muted by the fog rolling off the sound, the red light’s prismatic flashing in the watery air bounces off the dark brick creating a kaleidoscope of shadows heightening his invisibility. For a moment he wonders why it had to be one so young and seemingly full of life – the thought passes quickly there has never been an answer for this particular question.

“Be not afraid Marcus I am here for long is the day and hard is the struggle…” that refrain again why couldn’t he remember where he had picked it up? In the ambulance Jack Roberts continues compressions knowing he has lost the young man but unwilling to concede the moment. Marcus Jefferson’s fate had been sealed the moment the knife had passed between his ribs creating a three-centimeter tear in the lining of his heart. It had rapidly grown to a point beyond repair and doomed him long before he had heard the approaching sirens lying there on damp grass smelling the loamy dirt below him and the sweet fragrant firs mixing with the night jasmine; a small smile playing across his lips, Marcus can feel himself falling away.

Picking his satchel up the collector whistles, the soft refrain intermingling with the wails of young Marcus’ grandmother and the receding siren, he heads further up the hill two more stops tonight as a slight line of turquoise forecasts the coming dawn beyond the Eastern hills.

He stands silently in the shadows of the parked cars the street lights having sputtered out as he had approached from further down the sharply inclined street never quite regaining their intensity as he maintains his vigil. He had found himself here every night over the past three weeks he could still sense the residual echoes of Marcus’ soul where the young man’s life force had bled into the spongy earth of the old row house’s front lawn. More curious than concerned he had been pondering why now, why this soul, why, why, why…

As usual there were no answers, it wasn’t his purview to understand or even question, but he couldn’t seem to let this one go. He had traveled these avenues and back streets for years without count, collecting the young, old, healthy, diseased, happy and despairing it had made no difference when the time came he was there to usher them through. He had heard their prayers, lamentations, curses, and pleadings all to no avail the inevitability of death’s transition spared none.

Slowly he walks down the hill toward the center of the city, a few more to collect this evening, he whistles softly in the falling rain. Passing within a few feet of Terry’s listless body he slows, the young heroin addict was in his usual spot tucked under the 3rd Street overpass, tonight the Collector hesitates; how is it this soul abuses itself every day yet lives on while young Marcus has already become a fading memory?

These are dangerous thoughts, questions from the unquestioning, judgments from one who isn’t here to judge. A full stop now and unbidden comes his mantra “long is the day, hard is the struggle…” and with those simple words he collects the soul of Terry Parsons once of Davidson Oklahoma a small town on the banks of the Red River.

Startled, Terry feels his last breath escape him as he watches his crumpled body lying in the soft rain to be discovered by he knows not who, but realizing in quiet desperation that most unexpectedly his time has come. The Collector turns picking up his pace he has a schedule to keep and he has not absorbed the full impact of what has just occurred.

The night hurries before the breaking dawn as he makes his way uphill finding his path leading once again to the site of young Marcus’ early demise. Looking up he is surprised to find a collection of individuals arrayed across his path. Not concerned he continues on knowing that the mortals of this earth may sense him, but he exists in a different plane then their awareness can penetrate. Slowing he turns to gaze upon that verdant grass listening carefully for a whisper of the young man’s final vestiges of life.

The hand on his shoulder is firm but somehow he is not concerned; it is almost comforting and with a long breath of relief he hears the words, “long is the day, hard is the struggle… welcome to the Company, we wondered when you would cross over….” Jed shivers, not thinking that was possible, and nods unsure of what he had crossed over to.