Life, the Universe, and the Marathon Bombing

It's hard to believe that it's been nearly two years since I last posted anything. I could say it's because I didn't have anything to post - which is partly true - but really, I always have something to say. I'd just convinced myself no one cared enough to read it, so why bother?

Well, that stops here.

Life is funny. It's not until something like the bombings at the Boston Marathon happens that most of us really give a thought to how fragile our existence really is. And yet, millions of people the world over live with the constant threat of violence - in war-torn countries, in regions of geopolitical unrest, hell, just in neighborhoods where the crime rate outnumbers the good guys - so why is it that we're constantly surprised by "higher-profile" events like the Marathon?

Our capacity for doing harm to one another continuously shocks me. I have trouble squashing ants in the bathroom; it's inconceivable to me how someone could deliberately plan an action designed to cause harm - even death - to other humans. It's comfortable to think that actions like the Marathon bombing are carried out by inhuman monsters; by people so brainwashed by evil that they're unrecognizable to us. But is that really true?

Over 200 years ago, when America fought for its independence from Britain, America was roundly criticized for not adhering to the "conventions of military engagement." Our forces were so outmanned and outgunned that our strategists resorted to what amounted to guerilla warfare - sneak attacks, ambushes, suicide missions - in order to emerge victorious. If Britain had won, do you think the original colonists would have been called "terrorists" by the history books? Although, the argument must be made that at least the American forces concentrated on military targets - unlike today's terrorists - but is any loss of life ever truly justified?

An extreme example, I grant you - but sadly, today's world is full of less extreme examples, if you care to illustrate the point in more subtly varying shades of grey. Darfur. Somalia. The West Bank.

This is not an apologist post on behalf of the misguided souls who cause this harm. I'm not looking to justify or rationalize the suicide bombers, radicals, or jihadists.

All I'm asking for is that we remember that we are all human. We are all connected. Causing harm to any living soul brings harm to ourselves.

When we are hurt, we can - and should - stand up and defend ourselves. But there's a world of difference between defending oneself from attack and picking fights with half the planet.

If there is one thing that I have learned in my life, it is that we have a very long way to go in our quest for peace, for evolution and advancement. We are still so focused on 'an eye for an eye' that we have lost sight of the fact that when we descend to revenge and hatred, we become the very thing we claim to be fighting against. We have been hurt, and so we lash out blindly at those who hurt us, hurting other innocent people in the process... which creates more hurt, angry people, lashing out in all directions... and the cycle continues.

An eye for an eye, until everyone is blind.

The child left orphaned today by a stray missile could well become tomorrow's suicide bomber. The husband left widowed and childless could turn his grief to rage in the span of heartbeats. These are not inhuman monsters. These are people, like you and I, who have been convinced - through pain, through grief, through religious fervour, through mental imbalance, through any number of channels - that the only path left to them is death and destruction. That the only choices involve how much damage to inflict, and whether they expect to live through it.

In that context, it becomes a little easier to imagine how someone could decide to hijack a jetliner, or build an IED out of a Crockpot. It gets no easier to understand - but then, emotions aren't logical. They can't ever truly be understood, only experienced. They are visceral, chimeric; they overwhelm reason.

I scan the world news each day and weep for the innocent lives lost. I pray, every day, for a future where such carnage is inconceivable. That we will choose to reach out with a healing touch, rather than an angry fist. That we will inspire kindness and compassion, instead of revenge and hatred.

Dare to imagine this world with me.

You may say I'm a dreamer,
but I'm not the only one.
I hope one day you'll join us,
and the world will live as one.
~~ John Lennon, 1971

Another Year, Another Gift

This has been a hectic year, as I try to regain the ground I lost whilst I was sick. I've been writing a lot, although most of it is not ready for public consumption yet. I have over 80k of a work of fiction that I'm in the process of editing. Hopefully it's not utter nonsense.

I also have been doing a *lot* of theatre. 6 shows in 6 months, to be precise. February: Love Letters. March: Crimes of the Heart. April: The Vagina Monologues. May: Present Laughter. June: MOMologues. July: Sylvia. (Yes, I am insane. There are 12-step programs out there, but who has the time?)

So between theatre, writing and my newfound Twitter obsession (seriously, idek), blogging and photography have taken a bit of a backseat the past year. However, now that summer is upon us and I have a new camera zoom lens in hand, I expect that to change. I've already been shooting the flowers in the yard, so it's only a matter of time before I start dragging the camera with me everywhere.

Although, the more time I spend out in the world again, the less patience I have for my fellow denizens of humanity. Seriously, is it so hard to behave respectfully and courteously towards other people? Is it truly too much to ask that we all treat each other well?

Perfect example: I did a show this past weekend. It's summer, which means it's tourist season, which means parking is ... difficult. There's a pay-and-display lot across from the theatre, where you pre-pay at the station and get a receipt to display on your dashboard. It's a little confusing, because you have to choose how much time you want first, THEN insert the payment, then get your receipt. I watched the couple in front of me - a guy in his 50s with a 30-yr-old trophy wife in 4"heels - put a quarter in first and get a receipt for 30 minutes. They were about to do that again - which would have meant another 30-minute receipt for the same time frame, and probably a parking ticket, because it's tourist season - so I politely stopped them and showed them how the machine worked. The wife completely ignored me (as in, wouldn't even look at me) and the guy made some nasty comment about the town and how backward everything was. They got their parking receipt and stalked away without another word to me - not even a thank you.

Seriously?

It just got me mad. I could have let you keep feeding money into that meter, and you would have gotten a parking ticket. I was polite and went out of my way to help you, a perfect stranger, and you don't have the common courtesy to say Thank You??

I could list a dozen examples just like that, from just the last week, but I am tried of being surrounded by so much negativity. I want kindness and manners in my life. And I think I've finally decided, once and for all, that if you treat me poorly with no reasonable excuse, I am simply no longer going to allow you into my life. I mean, we all have bad days, myself included, but it shouldn't be our "normal" interaction. So if it is, be warned: your days of pushing me around are OVER.

That's not to say that I will stop trying to be kind and helpful to people I encounter, nor that I will meet rudeness with rudeness. However, I have no intention of being the Universe's doormat forever. Those days are gone.

I have been thinking a lot about my past, and everything that has happened to get me to this point in my life. It's not where I wanted to be, but all things considered, I think I've done pretty well. I have a good job, decent salary, I'm able to provide for my family, keeping a roof over our heads, along with some basic "extras" like cable, wifi and replacement windows. Things will never be easy, and the weight of the world will always be on my shoulders, but so far, we're managing. And that's more than a lot of people can say.

Rambling post is rambling, but basically, I suppose my message is this: be kind to each other. Treat people as you wish you'd be treated. If we all did that, the world would be a far better place. If you can give someone a helping hand, you should. What seems like a small and insignificant gesture to you, may be the thing that keeps hope alive for someone else. You just never know.

And conversely, the nasty comment you thoughtlessly throw at someone in a parking lot, might be the final straw that convinces them that none of this is worth it...

... I certainly wouldn't want that on my conscience.

Playing catchup

It's been a shamefully long time since I've posted any content here.  I've been busy with my writing over at Livejournal, and apparently I only have so much creative force within me at once. ;)  I went on vacation, and when I got back went straight into tech week for the show I was producing; had a two-week run, wrapped and struck on Sunday 6/13 and began rehearsals for my next show on Monday 6/14.  My energy levels are limited, although they are getting better, so I find myself really having to pay attention to what's on the to-do list and to prioritize what HAS to be done versus what I'd like to get done.  It's frustrating, but I just hope things continue to get better.  I think about where I was a year ago, and I can see the improvement. It's just not as fast as I'd like.

A year ago, I was less than two weeks out of surgery for the cancer.  I couldn't sit up for more than 20-30 minutes at a time, for the most part.  I slept on the sofa because walking down the hall to the bedroom was too much for me. I was having horrific tetany symptoms, because my parathyroid wasn't working but the doctors kept trying to wean me off the calcium/vit D regimen. It was good times.

3 weeks out from the surgery was the wedding of a very good friend of mine.  I wasn't cleared to drive and wouldn't have had the stamina anyway, and a dear friend gave up his entire weekend to drive me to CT for the wedding, stay overnight so I could rest, and stop for a few hours at a family party on the way home.  Through the whole weekend he was at my side, ready with a steadying hand or a smile, and he will never, ever know how much that meant to me.  I've tried to tell him, but there really aren't words for it.

4 weeks out of surgery I bought my first home.  I was completely taken advantage of on a couple of different issues, but I'm trusting in the Universe to help me find a resolution. 

8 weeks out of surgery, terrified that permanent damage had been done to my vocal chords and singing ability, I agreed to be a minstrel in the summer Shakespeare. I made it through, and except for one night I botched a whistle reel because I was in too much pain to concentrate, I think no one could really tell I was sick. Of course, that same friend who took me to the wedding was also a minstrel, and now he will say things like "Don't you remember last year at Shakespeare when X happened?" and I have to remind him that I mostly spent the entire run telling myself "don't pass out, don't pass out, don't pass out, whatever you do."

And then, of course, another 4 weeks or so after that I began the radiation treatments. Those wiped me out almost as much as the surgery had - I spent my isolation week laying on the sofa and when I felt up to it I would prop myself up with pillows and read Harry Potter books.  I reread the entire 7 book series in that week.  It's not clear whether I'll have to have more radiation.  I have a nuclear scan scheduled for the fall, when I will be given a small dose of radiation (about 1/50th of what I was given in treatment) and then be somewhat isolated (I haven't gotten the procedures yet; I think I just have to stay away from kids and pregnant women) for a few days and return for an imaging study which will show if anything that was left has grown since last year.  I had a similar scan done after the initial radiation treatment, and it was not fun.  Plus I have to do the low-iodine prep diet for 3 weeks with it, which means no seafood, no dairy, no processed foods, nothing with red dye in it, blah blah blah.  The worst part? No sushi from now until after the scan. =(

 But, I'm alive and my prognosis continues to be "excellent."  I may be frustrated by my lack of energy, but I'm doing better than a lot of people with cancer. And for that, I am grateful.  Even if all I did in this post, mostly, was kvetch.

But as the day of the Summer Solstice draws to a close, I wanted to take a look back at what has been an incredibly difficult, amazing, humbling, moving, insane year.

And to thank the Universe and the Spirit for giving me another year.  I promise to make the most of it.

A Rare Political Diatribe

I belong to several industry listservs, one of which is dedicated to political discussion (supposedly as it pertains to healthcare). I have been disheartened to see that the majority of people who post regularly are staunch conservative Republicans, spouting anti-Obama rhetoric at every opportunity, praising the Tea Baggers, and crying foul the moment anyone challenges anything they post.  This morning's digest contained a number of references to "Obama and his socialist cronies," among other things.


While it's not worth it for me to wade into the fray in my industry (where I am known, and where my own political leanings and beliefs do not mesh with those of my employers), I very nearly did post this response to that listserv - I actually hit "post" and then had a change of heart and deleted it before the moderators could approve it.
But then I found that I still felt like I needed to say it SOMEWHERE - so here it is.

A political party "spinning" dissent about their policies is not unique to the Obama administration.  Nor is working with the media to slant what information is presented, or to withhold information altogether.

Just in recent memory? The anti-war protests during the Bush administration? There were HUGE protests in NYC and DC. Minimal news coverage. Those who expressed anti-war sentiments in the media were blacklisted (Dixie Chicks? Bill Maher?) and the country was basically told: "If you're not with us, you're against us." I saw a huge resurgence in "America: Love it or Leave it" bumper stickers - and we were right back to where we were during the Vietnam-era protests, the Korea-era protests, the Gulf War-era protests.... Do I need to keep going? So, don't place all the blame on "Obama and his socialist cronies" - it's both sides of the aisle doing the hush jobs.

Do I think that the Tea Baggers have a few screws loose? Yup. Do I think that Obama is the second coming? Nope. Do I think Glenn Beck needs to be banned from the airwaves? You betcha. Do I read the Huffington Post? Not on your life.

Partisan politics have degenerated so far that we can't even have useful dialogue anymore. It's name calling and mudslinging from all sides. That's NOT free speech. It's NONSENSE.

The freedom of expression and the right to dissent against our government are two of our most valuable freedoms, which many people have died to protect over the last 2+ centuries. As has been ably pointed out, many people in other countries suffer greatly because they lack these freedoms.

Maybe, if we all take a deep breath and try to express our opinions calmly and rationally, without name calling, rhetoric or insults, we all might find that we want many of the same things from our government, and from our country.

Or maybe we'll begin to realize that nearly all the political rhetoric being thrown around are simply "tales told by idiots, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." (Shakespeare)

Rainy Days and Wednesdays Always Get Me Down

Today, I'm having a Day.  One of those Days where a million little things (and sometimes big things) go wrong, and you spend your time wishing you could have just stayed in bed and avoided it all.  But, like 99% of the world, I couldn't go back to bed after the day showed its true colors.  The car we just spent $680 fixing (last week) is driving worse than when we took it to the mechanic.  The dryer that's been broken for a week is going to cost "more than the original estimate."  The roof is leaking.  The basement is wet.  I made my lunch but left it on the kitchen counter.  There's no coffee at the office.  I got pulled over by a state trooper for "not moving into the left lane to pass an emergency vehicle in the breakdown lane" and only avoided a ticket by explaining that it would have been suicidal to pull into the left lane on a busy NorthEast highway when the car's check engine light is blinking and I can't get the car to do above 60MPH.  I bought a bag of jelly beans to have as an afternoon sugar rush for the rest of the week, and left it at the house.

So here I sit - no coffee, no lunch, (no breakfast either, because I was rushing and thought, "well, I can eat my lunch a little early"), no candy and a caffeine withdrawl headache the size of Missouri.  I send a TXT to a couple friends that says "this is not my day" and everyone agrees.  Everyone's had a Day.

Why is that?  It's not a full moon.  Mercury's not in retrograde.  There's no other phenomenal cosmic forces swirling around us, as far as I can tell.  It's just an average March day, cold and wet with a north wind driving snow and frozen rain inside jackets and through scarves, sending dry leaves and sand scudding across the pavement.  So why has everything gone catawampus?

A question like that could send you downspiralling after too much contemplation.  So, I try to clear the cobwebs from my head and correct my perspective.

Nobody I love died today, or was seriously injured.  People may be sick, perhaps dying - but not today.  Things may be broken, and expensive to fix, but so far we're managing.  The roof and basement may be letting water in where they shouldn't, but it's a home of our own, and we're making the mortgage payments on time, at least for now.  I may go hungry today, and have a caffeine headache that's only slightly smaller than Missouri, but that 's just for today.  We have food to eat and clean water and a host of other things that millions of people in this world are lacking.  I may get aggravated by my job, but I'm working.  We're doing all right. 

Sometimes I think we all feel like bad days are punishments from above.  One thing after another goes wrong until we lift our faces to the sky and shout "What more? What else are you going to throw at me?"  But maybe that's not the right attitude at all.

Maybe, these days come to us to underscore how lucky we are when things go right.  How lucky we continue to be even when things go wrong.  When everything works the way it should and we have a great day, maybe we take it a little too much for granted.

So I am embracing today's message.  No, my life is not what I would want it to be.  Yes, I will always have unfulfilled dreams and hopes and wants.  No, that does not mean my life sucks.

I thought after being diagnosed with cancer, it would be easier somehow to deal with all these petty problems.  I thought I'd have some incredible epiphany that would elevate me above the small problems.  But a year into my diagnosis and treatment, I still struggle with the day to day nonsense.  A lot of the time it feels like I struggle even more than I used to - it's hard to have patience for the little things when so many big things are wrong in your life.  I was always the person who soldiered on and got it done, regardless of how I felt or anything that was going on.  To be suddenly faced with being physically unable to soldier on was a sobering, humbling betrayal of the personal strength I'd always prided myself on.  Pride goes before the fall, as they say.

So, I struggle along like everyone else, trying to find reason and meaning in the midst of chaos.  I try to find the positive spin as much as I can.  I remind myself again that perhaps this is the Universe's way of reminding me to be grateful that my cancer is treatable, grateful for my spouse, family, friends - to be grateful for the things I have instead of lamenting what I lack.

Maybe the Universe really is out to kick us when we're down.  But if that's true, there's nothing we can do about it... and really, by focusing on the positive spin, at least my headache's diminishing.

Or maybe that's just the Diet Coke kicking in.

Music, a magic beyond all we do here....

JK Rowling, author of the phenomenally popular Harry Potter books, has Hogwarts Headmaster Albus Dumbledore speaking those words in the first book of the mega-watt series. A worthy sentiment that is subsequently completely ignored, as music plays virtually no part in the books or the plotline. Small snippets are included in the movies (which, as any Potter fan is happy to explain at length, do deviate from the books in some rather conspicuous ways), but any music heard directly by the characters (I am excluding, for the moment, the movie scores) is incidental. As a musician, that made me a little sad, but I can't really call JKR out on it. After all, she got millions of people to read, among generations that would not have picked up a book they weren't forced to. She can't solve all the world's problems. (But, perhaps in her next series... hint, hint)

Accepted treatment protocols for my type of cancer involve ingesting radioactive isotopes that ablate (kill) the cancerous cells from the inside-out. However, the treatment leaves the patient radioactive for several months, and for the first 7 days, I had to be in isolation from anyone. Anything I used had to be segregated, and what couldn't be thoroughly rinsed down (ie, books) had to be kept separate for 3 months before others could handle them again. In an effort to keep myself sane (one can only watch so much mindless TV), I decided to re-read the Harry Potter series, in order. It took me almost the entire week to finish, which allowed me to simply put those books in a lined bag and leave them at the back of the closet until January. I hadn't read the books since the final one had been published, and I was reminded again of all the wonderful details of Ms. Rowlings' imagination had to be chopped in the interests of the movies. If your only experience with the Potter-verse is the movies, I strongly encourage you to take the time to READ THE BOOKS. This is not a slam against the movies, which I think are quite well done; it's simply that the books are better. In the history of movies-from-books, I challenge anyone to find a movie that is better than its original source book. In recent memory, the closest example I can come up with is The Color Purple, which I would classify "as good as" the original novel. Even then, it lost some things in translation to the silver screen.

But I started talking about music. As I metioned in my "tweet" last night, I had the good fortune of being 1 of only 5 musicians at the local seisun. This was due, I'm sure, to the Superbowl, but since I am not a football fan, I couldn't have been less interested in "the big game." I only learned who was even playing from talking to people at the pub last night. (But when spring training starts, I warn you, there may be more baseball-related blogs than I originally intended.)

So there I was, in a room with 4 other musicians who were, in no particular order, 3 recording artists (one a former Grammy nominee) and a singer from Ireland who has a wealth of traditional old sean nos songs that the Smithsonian archives would envy. And me. And maybe a dozen or so audience members (again, the Superbowl was on). Normally all those numbers are at least doubled, and it's not as intimidating to participate because there's a wider range of experience and talent. It was only marginally easier for me that I was a "regular" at the seisun before my treatments began, and had gotten very positive feedback from audience and other regulars; also the fact that two of the "professional" musicians have known me since I was a child allowed the butterflies to ease somewhat. Still, rather humbling to be in such phenomenal company. Also humbling to know that I held my own in the song swapping. To have a Grammy-nominated musician (who is, quite honestly, one of the most incredibly talented people I've ever had the pleasure of listening to) ask the origins of the songs I did, and ask me to come back more frequently, was amazing.

As I was undergoing surgery and treatment this summer, I began re-evaluating my priorities. I think it's something anyone with a potentially terminal illness does in varying degrees. I thought about my writing (which I'd all but abandoned), music (which I had taken up again about 18 months previously), art (again, mostly abandoned) and theatre (which I had also begun to do again, with a local community theatre). I thought about what I wanted my life to be, and how to blend that better with the life my circumstances require me to live. This blog, and another (work-related) blog, along with a few more tendrils of artistic endeavor, have been born out of those musings.

So I hope that you'll join me on this journey of self-discovery. Re-evaluate your own priorities. Shape your own future a little better. And most importantly, in the words of Patrick Dennis (quoting his "Auntie Mame"), "Live, live, live! Life is a banquet, and most poor suckers are starving to death!"

Beef bourguignon and other pretentions

I'm wondering how pretentious it is to have beef bourguignon for lunch? Is it made better or worse by the fact that it's (homemade) leftover beef bourguignon? How about that I'm drinking diet coke with it, instead of the obligatory burgundy or beaujolais? In the end, it doesn't matter, because it's as delicious leftover as it was fresh, and I'm not going to stop eating it just because I'm afraid of a few pretentions.

It's not my intention to turn this into a foodie blog, but I am something of a foodie, so it's going to sneak in from time to time. I love good wine, good beer and good food. Usually, it's far simpler fare than Julia Child's beef bourguignon recipe (she did have a penchant for complicated recipes, although to her credit, she somehow made us believe that we could follow them - in the words of Julie Powell, "because goddammit, if Julia did it, so could we.")... no, a "normal" lunch for me is far more likely to be bread, cheese, veg and fruit than anything found in the pages of a cookbook. My coworkers think I'm a little nuts, as they microwave their lean cuisines and hot pockets, while I'm standing in our office kitchenette slicing avocado wedges and spreading chevrie on a baguette. But at the end of the day, I know most of what has gone into my body, and it's not chemical preservatives that I can't pronounce. Except for what's in the diet coke, and the odd Konditor Meister pastry, of course. ;)

I do sometimes get a little pretentious when I'm having folks over for a meal. I have developed a reputation as a very good cook among our circle of friends, and this means I feel I have to live up to that reputation, instead of making spaghetti marinara with a salad and calling it a day. That's not to say I don't enjoy the accolades. When a friend (for whom complaining is, well, second only to breathing) tells me that she has never had a bad meal when I've been cooking - Julia Child herself might as well have descended from heaven and asked me to cook for her. But it can be a lot to live up to. So perhaps there will be some foodie stuff in this blog - recipes of my own or other musings. Really, who knows where this is going to take me?

For now, I've finished my beef bourguignon and am looking forward to a mid-afternoon sugar rush with a piece of Konditor Meister cake. I'm expecting to head over to my former "local" Irish pub for the weekly seisun tonight, so I expect the next post will be oriented to music, rather than food.

Midnight Haiku

snowflakes falling soft
dissolving on eyelashes
silent night again

It's interesting how creative one can get under the influence of mood-altering substances. Now, before anyone gets their knickers in a twist, I am NOT talking about any illicit substance - I'm talking about the effect that can be brought about on the body with a glass of good wine and a slice of Konditor Meister cake. Truly, gods and goddesses among patissiers. It's the grown-up equivalent of a sugar high. And it's good. I mean, if I'm going to have insomnia, I might as well enjoy it, right? (As a completely Type A aside, does anyone know how to get the circumflex to display over the a in patissiers?)

How is it that I seem to be stuck on West Coast time when the only time zones I've visited in the last 3 years are GMT, GMT+1 and GMT-5?? I've written 2 more poems and finished another chapter in a short story I've been working on. I can feel myself slowly starting to wind down, so I'll start revising stuff I wrote earlier this week and then try to get a little sleep.

And if that doesn't work, I'll just cut myself another slice of pastry heaven.

Haiku quartet

Here are 4 Haiku I wrote this morning on my way to work, driving along the shore.



tree against a bright sky
reaching out with greening arms
spring is on her way



waves caress the shore
flash of sunlight reflected
gull calls to her mate



sparks of memories
shine so bright behind your eyes
strangers yet again



love shining bright
reflecting the universe
the ice cracks loudly