Thursday, Thoughts

They just keep coming, those thoughts...

It’s Thursday, and you know that means only one thing—thoughts!

1. I could never go on Jeopardy! I am positive that I would do something so awkward during the contestant intro that I could never go out in public again. (Think Elaine dancing on Seinfeld.)

2. Does anyone besides me prefer muffin bottoms to muffin tops?

3. The other day I was at BJs. These Are Days by 10,000 Maniacs was playing over the sound system and I was enjoying it. I was also buying by a graduation card for my nephew, also enjoying it. These were two discrete things in my brain that suddenly and surprisingly collided, exited my brain, and emerged in the form of watery eyes and jagged breaths…these are days to remember indeed. My oldest takes The Long Walk and graduates from Trinity College tomorrow. I could not be any more proud of the hard work he has put in, of the remarkable person he continues to become, and I’ll always be amazed by his unique ability to simultaneously soar and remain completely grounded. I love him beyond words and beyond measure, and I also love that even in the closing days of his baccalaureate academic career he reached out to me to ensure that he was correctly using the word “misappropriate” in one of his papers. I’m sad that I can’t be at his graduation for a couple of reasons. There’s the very obvious one, that he’s my godson and I want to show up for him—this is a big deal! But also because in my immediate family graduations were such a fun-filled event, each epic in their own ways—the hijinks the thing of which family legends are written. And I’m sad for all the college experiences he was cheated out of by COVID. He doesn’t know exactly what he’s missing, but he knows he’s missing something. And that stinks. Personally, I never expected to be there once the pandemic rolled along…but I’m sad in general for the circumstances it’s created, for a lot of people. And it could be worse, so livestream it is. Go Patrick. Go Bantams.

4. Oh my god, how is it that I’ve gotten here without knowing anything about pigeons’ nests? And if you have no idea what I mean when I say that, you must click on this link right now. We have business lingo clogged up with all this random bullshit of holier-than-thou word soup, yet we have real gems of expressions in hiding. The fact that I had never uttered the expression “kind of looks like a pigeon’s nest if you ask me” when shown something underwhelming might possibly be the most horrible injustice of my (also underwhelming) professional career. A pigeon’s nest. Fucking brilliant. What a fucking pigeon’s nest that presentation was. And so on. (Thanks, friend (🌱 ), for illuminating my life with this). Seriously, it’s hysterical, so go click that link. But here’s a preview 🤣🤣🤣:

   

5. So I caught this on-the-street (read: off-the cuff) interview the other day with Congressman Dan Kildee (D, MI) and he said this: “It’s devolved to a point where if somebody says the sky is red and I say the sky is blue, well that doesn’t mean that there’s a 50-50 chance that the sky is red, it means somebody’s nuts.” He was saying it in response to the comment that video footage from the insurrection looked like any group of tourists…but it’s an observation that could be applied to many of the political debates of today. Don’t be nuts. Follow the facts.

6. Right after I saw, that I read this:

   

   From Your True Home by Thich Nhat Than

   I know that for the Catholics among us “reconciliation” is a religious term. But now more than ever we need it as part of our everyday experience. We have to work to understand who is right and who is nuts and then make decisions about whether or not we want to get involved in the enlightenment of the nuts. In any case, I think, our first response should be of attempted reconciliation, of keeping things together…and then the second thing we do is when we decide whether to hold on or let go. But you have to do the first thing before the second thing, right? That’s reconciliation as I see it.

7. Lucky 7. This feels like the right place to talk about no more mask, no more cast, no more cover on the pool…rip…off…the…Band-Aid brand adhesive bandage and get back to living. After 101 days and two surgeries, this week I learned that my wrist is healed…I’m so happy to put that in the rearview where it belongs and label it “old news.” The only thing I can’t do right now is submerge/soak it (the incision needs a bit more time) but since the pool is in the 60s and we have no bathtub in the house, I’m not really at much risk. It’s time to breathe freely, but to bathe carefully. 😂😂😂

8. Speaking of no masks, now all of a sudden I’m super skeptical of someone who pulls theirs up when they walk past me, outside. What do they know about their droplets that I don’t know?

9. And also on the (no) mask subject, it’s hit me that I have three months of life in Utopia (or Camelot or Brigadoon or whatever ) in front of me. I’m vaxxed, no masks or limits on crowd sizes, and working from home until September. I’m like Medina Spirit in the starting gate at the Derby…hopped up and ready to win.

10. Bennifer, The Sequel. I just can’t. The pandemic isn’t ending for us to time travel backwards.

11. Did Matty in the Morning really quit his 40-year-old radio show over Demi Lovato’s pronouns‽‽‽

12. I was feeling neighborly the other day (no idea why) so I answered the door and chirpily asked “what can I help you with today?” That poor door-to-door-whatever-she-was who didn’t look up from her tablet and responded by calling me “sir” earned every bit of the swift closing of the door in her earnest young face (before she could even choke out the first word of her sales pitch, let alone a “sorry”). For fuck’s sake my voice isn’t *that* deep. Look up, young people. You never know what it might reveal. Jesus.

13. Last night I was mildly annoyed because I kept getting calls from a number I didn’t know (Ocean City, NJ). After several hang ups I got a voicemail…from what sounded like George Costanza’s mother, apologizing and telling me to excuse her calls as she had the wrong number. Good manners; always in style.

14. Our new neighbors (did I tell you they gave us an Easter basket? With beer? And chocolate?) are out back all the time, say hello over fence, do a fair amount of entertaining, etc., etc., and it’s so nice having neighbors who bring sounds of happy to our outdoor experience. Welcome to Mayberry. Where we don’t miss the yellers, their dogs, or their obnoxious spotlight one bit.

15. I was happy to hear that the Go-Gos are getting inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. They were my first concert ever, on The Common, front row. I’ll never forget it. I also never forget how after they broke up my dad started calling them the Went-Wents. And he cracked himself up. Every. Time. (Boy do I miss him. He was such a funny guy.)

16. This Bill Gates divorce story is getting sordid. How is it possible to be so smart…and so stupid??? She’s now being referred to as Melinda French Gates so power to her for (presumably) making a statement and reclaiming her past identity as her future identity.

17. Speaking of sordid, how about that dirtball Matt Gaetz? Just a matter of time before we find out how bad of a seed he is.

18. A new season of Master of None drops on Netflix Sunday. Aziz! Dev! Yay!

19. Autocorrect well may have a life of its own, but overall it’s a total crutch on my iDevices…it’s also had a terrible impact on my typing on a real computer. I’m all sloppy typing and am also all cavalier, thinking “Yeah, you get me Word” and then I look up and my document has more red squiggles in it than a Jackson Pollock painting.

20. Does anyone know how to tie one of those infinity drawstrings? I always manage to get something in place to keep my shorts from sagging while I walk but then when I get home and am faced with the inevitable urge to pee my shorts suddenly become the love child of a straightjacket and a chastity belt and I’m looking for the scissors.

21. Whatever will they think of next? I maybe would drink Dill Pickle seltzer for money, but not for pleasure. But working on the packaging and marketing campaign had to have been a dream job.

    

22. Tomorrow I’m turning 54. I remember turning 21 and 30 and 40 and 50…so vividly…good times. But I only mention my birthday for one reason, and that’s because my birthday wish is for all of you—my wish is that each and every one of you enjoys each and every second of the earth’s annual trip around the sun, even when it feels like it’s gonna fly off its axis. I know…country…I know…but I gotta…because it really is a cosmic hallelujah that we’re sitting here right now. I’m grateful that our orbits intersect!

23. So as the pandemic winds down and we toy with the idea of getting back to business as usual, I offer a simple challenge (that I have decided to take on)…getting back to business as usual will be so easy and feel so good…but won’t getting “back to better” feel even better? All that bad shit that you didn’t miss? Don’t bring it back. The good stuff that opened your life up to new possibility? Find ways to sustain it. No more business as usual. We’ve learned so much over the last 14 months, so let’s not forget it in 14 days. It’s one really good thing we can get out of this…so let’s not throw away our shot!

24. Speaking of the pandemic winding down and of end points, I’m going to end this post here (two dozen thoughts, lots swirling in my head!) by talking about something that’s ending. I’m no longer adding songs to my Quarantine Songs playlist. I’m not deleting it—it will remain forever as a 273 songs catalog that plays over the course of around 18 hours, and it will always be there as a reminder of this time in my life—of darkness and light, of highs and lows, of loss and hope…but most importantly of resilience.

    I’ve started a new playlist (working title, After the Apocalypse: Still Here) First song on it was AJR’s Way Less Sad (their Bummerland was on the QS playlist so this seemed a fitting way to capture this turning of the tide in playlist form).

    After the Apocalypse: Still Here has only 21 songs on it so far, and they’re skewed to the peppy and inane, “just” a collection of songs that catch my mind, good for a walk or for when we’re hanging around out back. A regular old playlist, and it feels (and sounds) so good.

It also feels right for me to send you out with a song from the QS playlist, to officially close it out, to send you into the almost weekend. I had trouble deciding which one to play as we head into a new tomorrow, ready to party like its 2019 (which if you sing it as “twenty one and nine” it works with Prince’s 1999 but I digress). Stronger, by Kelly Clarkson, because it didn’t kill me, and I am for sure stronger? Lost Highway, Bon Jovi’s most overlooked great song, because I want to “hit the gas, there ain’t no brake on this lost highway”? Or OneRepublic’s I Lived because with every (literal) broken bone, I lived? I know, Queen’s Don’t Stop Me Now because I’m a force to be reckoned with, or Michael Franti & Spearhead’s The Sound of Sunshine because I’m pretty sure that’s the only thing I can hear right now? Anyway I had to make a decision because I have to send this out. I was, coincidentally, considering only peppy choices, which to me screams “hope wins.” And the idea of hope winning gave me only one choice with which to end this post, and to put the QS playlist to bed with:

Happy Friday Eve! Thanks for being here.

And go Bruins.