Digressions of a Dilettante

Digressions of a Dilettante
Vignettes of Inanity by Bud Hearn

Thursday, December 31, 2015

The Interval Between


It’s the week after Christmas, or ‘holiday’ if you’re part of the alchemist crowd that mixed Jesus with Visa and got Santa. Hopefully you dodged the dictates of the Office of Diversity and Inclusion that mandated all celebrations be generic. Whichever season it’s called, the last week in the year seems to be a peaceful one.

The frenzy is over. The family has vanished. The career for the perfect evergreen is over. It’s ready for the chipper, anxious for the recycled life ahead.

The fading tree lights reflect it all. Another Christmas, come and gone. Another year, over and done. You know what lies ahead. Still, you’re at peace. Which is what Christmas is about.

This ‘tween week might bring mild anxiety, since the tree has to be disposed of. It has to be done; you do it, affirm your action. But lingering in the back of your mind is the knowledge you’ll have to do it all again next year. The very thought of that could spoil your reverie if you let it. But for the moment, you’re at peace.

Myself? I zone out, forget negative thoughts. Instead, I focus on some books my children gave me. You can’t go wrong giving books for Christmas. Books, like socks, are utilitarian. Who could possibly live without ‘Spy Secrets That Can Save Your Life?’ I flip through it, imagining myself a CIA operative drinking martinis and saving the world from destruction. Who hasn’t fantasized such foolishness?

I read about the Escape and Evasion Gun Belt. It has everything from hat pins to a monkey fist key chain, household items to extricate you from dangerous situations and maim any malefactor. Oh, it also comes with a hand cuff key, handy if you’re detained by TSA goons because your eyeballs inadvertently match those of a bearded fellow in the next aisle who keeps winking at you. Everyone is suspect these days.

Another book, ‘100 Deadly Skills,’ describes techniques for eluding pursuers, evading capture and surviving dangerous situations. Notable are articles on how to make the NYT’s into a newspaper nail bat, plus how to convert an elbow into a deadly weapon. Every housewife needs to know this.

But like most gifts, the novelty soon wears off. On the coast the sun blazes. The thermometer registers 75 and I consider being re-baptized. No, not in the church font, but the ocean. I want to get a jump on the January 1st baptizers who wash off last night’s sins in the Atlantic. Dripping wet in 30 degree wind chill is as close to a cryogenic experience as I want to get.

So I take the plunge and emerge a new person, born again, with a resurgent spirit of enthusiasm that mingles with the multitude of chill bumps. Sufficient champagne will produce the same feeling I’m told.

Back in my chair I pass up reviewing the Christmas cards, everything from family biographies, pictures of people you don’t know and Hallmarks from CVS. Rather, I leaf through a poetry book by T. S. Eliot.

Maybe you don’t dig poetry. It’s a poor career choice anyway and can’t compete with Wall Street or welding scrap steel into yard art. Poets are mostly morose, unwashed people with bad hair, I think. But at least Eliot’s fresh breath went against convention.

Lines from ‘The Hollow Men’ are intriguing. He stretches to grasp the mystical interspace between dreams and reality, between now and later:

“Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow

Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow”

Strange lines, don’t you agree? But when read in the context of this waning week of the year, they seem to hold a message.

At midnight the year 2015 will end forever. In the interspace of a millisecond the old will pass, the new will begin. Everyone gets the chance for a second wind. Perhaps it’s in that very instant when the Shadow falls.

A line from one of Wendell Berry’s poems comes to mind:

I greet you at the beginning; for we are either beginning or we are dead.”

What will 2016 hold for us, for you, for me, for them? It’s a mystery. But to the poet in us all, life is a strange, mystical romance if only we’re willing to embrace it.

Happy New Year. Live big!


Bud Hearn
December 31, 2015

Thursday, December 17, 2015

Something’s Troubling Me


Ancient manuscripts offer good advice about not being anxious for tomorrow, but it’s hard to buy into that wisdom at Christmas. Just surviving the season is a challenge.

**********

The pressure has been building slowly for weeks. It’s that omnipresent nagging feeling inside that something’s just not right. You know what I mean. It’s something you just can’t put your finger on, but you know it’s there. Like wondering if your Social Security number has been hacked and making the rounds in Russia.

Christmas for many, especially men, is like that. It’s traumatic. It’s when men encounter the most dreaded event in life…shopping. Anguish is everywhere. Where’s joy to the world, peace on earth? There’s wailing and gnashing of teeth as the deadline nears. It’s all caused by one universal, unanswered question: “Honey, what do you want for Christmas?”

Shopping is a ritual to endure, like presidential debates. We hear a lot of, “I don’t need anything, want even less.” Such answers are traps for the uninitiated. Postpone the inevitable if you dare, but you know that somehow, from somewhere other than Ace Hardware something expensive must appear under your Christmas tree. But what?

It started last week when I skipped church to buy a Christmas tree. I assumed the little drummer boy wouldn’t miss me and that the angelic host would give me a pass. But my conscience is troubled. Star-gazing wise men from the east who keep sheep are keeping score. Retribution is certain.

I plunge the tree in a bucket of water and wait patiently for an inspirational jump-start. A week goes by. The three kings of the orient fail to show. Fear of recompense for my church truancy builds. I’m troubled. Emerson advices, “Do the thing and you will have the power.” I rebuke procrastination. Instantly heaven and nature begin to sing.

Finally it’s up. “Best tree we ever had,” I say, hoping to set a positive tone. But under close scrutiny from more discerning eyes, it’s pointed out that it’s not a perfect tree. It’s crooked. Anxiety wells up, answers narrow down, while visions of sugarplums dance in my head.

We discuss the situation. Weigh our options. We feel sorry for the tree and keep it. It tends to set a standard for the quality of gifts to put beneath, something less like gold and more like frankincense and myrrh. No self-respecting diamond bracelet would coexist with last-minute sale items from CVS.

Last night the dog and I sat and gazed at the glimmering masterpiece. The tree’s illumination with LED lights evokes images of Miami Beach at night. It’s a yogic experience, one that gets you in touch with your inner feelings. And I need to have some revelation of what to buy my spouse.

I envy the dog. He’s not troubled. If he’s hungry, he eats. If he itches, he scratches. He hears, he barks. Nothing bothers him. He smells, he investigates. If he’s tired, he sleeps. He doesn’t plant, he doesn’t reap. He’s got it made. Dogs provide wonderful life lessons for the troubled at heart.

I talk to my dog. He sometimes listens. Tonight I ask him for gift suggestions for my wife. He looks up, twists his head a few times and rolls over. He’s not troubled. His eyes convey what his voice might say, “What, me worry?”

Maybe it’s the bright lights, but a swoon soon comes over me while heavenly harps of gold wish me a merry Christmas. An apparition seems to emanate from the tree itself. Its ghost-like spirit appears as a woman clothed in a glowing, translucent angelic robe.

In one hand she clutches what appears to be a stack of brochures. The writing is vague; my eyes strain to decipher the text. Slowly it materializes…Windstar Cruises, a Greek Isles Excursion. Instantly the specter vanishes, leaving me alone again with an idea and the sleeping dog.

**********

In our culture we’re troubled by many things. Lessons from dogs and Christmas trees will often lighten the load. I immediately book the cruise. Angst vanishes.

Christmas is special. Heavenly hosts sing hallelujah and make life simple again. Imperfect trees notwithstanding, all we have to do is receive it. Falalalalalalalala


Bud Hearn
December 17, 2015

Friday, December 4, 2015

The Gizmo


Face it, there are times of mental overload, times when our powers of recollection are clogged up like traffic on Atlanta’s downtown connector. Names fail us. It’s time for the advent of The Gizmo.

**********

Words keep multiplying. Have you noticed? At last count, the English language has 1,025,109.8 words. I think ‘gizmo’ is still the 8/10ths decimal one. But it’s tenacious.

Gizmo,’ the half-baked baby, hangs in there, even though it hasn’t fully matured into a whole word. It needs a big shove to get across the threshold from being a decimal to a whole number.

Maybe you’ve had one of those times recently. You’re at a party. You stand there with your spouse. Across the room a person you last saw in college approaches. You sense the tension building, the inevitable terror of knowing you will have to make an introduction. But you can’t recall his name.

The distance narrows, he comes closer, smiling like you are his best friend. Hell, you actually were. You’ve known him since high school. But what’s his name? You pretend not to see him. Futile. He’s getting closer now.

Age has altered him, you think. He looks old. His wrinkles have a pained look, suggesting they’re embarrassed to be living on his face. Your alphabet runs wild, cycling endlessly in your brain, unable to aggregate itself into a cohesive syllable. What’s his name?

You search for excuses. You stand there like a blithering idiot, stammering and stuttering some incoherent gibberish, buying time, hoping the answer will materialize. You run through the alphabet, Arnold, Bob, Charlie, David, down to Zero. Nothing. Memory mocks you.

Your spouse adds fuel to the flame, asking, “Who’s this?”

The only thing that comes out of your mouth is the ultimate fallback, “Oh, Mr. Whoziewhat?” You know already how it goes from there. You bolt for the roast beef buffet.

I know these things. Today I was that idiot.

I walk into my office bathroom, shut the door, flip on the light switch. Nothing. The horror of great darkness consumes the space.

Dark bathrooms are terrifying; things can go sideways on you if you’re not careful. It’s a place where even slight mistakes become catastrophic consequences. Light is essential. I grope for the door and escape.

I find ‘whatshisnoodle,’ my landlord, a jovial fellow as long as there are no problems. He smiles a lot when he receives the rent check. I tell him about the light bulb. He doesn’t smile. The conversation goes something like this:

Hey, I have a problem. Light in the bathroom is burned out.”

Have you considered other options?” He points to the grass outside. Did I mention he also lacks refinement? I ignore his crude gesture.

Listen, do you have one of those long, yellow poles, you know, the kind that can telescope out about ten feet, reach the ceiling? It has a long string hanging from a clear plastic cup on the end, you know, and you lick the cup and a light bulb will stick to it and you can twirl it and out pops the light bulb? Not sure what it’s called. I’m dull today.”

“You’re dull every day. What you’re referring to is called a ‘gizmo.’ Better be careful calling it a pole, you know, all those jokes about the Poles changing light bulbs. Not politically correct now. Just saying.”

A gizmo?” I ask. “Nonsense. Who made that up? It defines nothing.”

Well, Mr. Linguist, that’s what everybody calls it. It’s more descriptive than a whatchamacallit.” Pandora’s Box of placeholder words opens. Out spills strange expressions that say everything and nothing, all at the same time.

Later I’m at Ace Hardware, looking for a particular type of screw. I describe it to the clerk: “Stainless steel, round on the end, screws into a tree to run a cable through to lower my bird feeder. I can see it in my mind but I can’t think of what it’s called.”

We don’t read minds here, sir. But the “doohickey” you describe is on Aisle 14. It’s called an eye bolt.” Ace clerks are helpful but condescending.

**********

Memory lapse is a curse with no cure. We’re hung with it. These strange words we use are placeholders for forgotten somethings. Imagine the chaos without them.

You’ll soon be Christmas shopping. ‘Thingamajig’ will go a long way when you need it. Use it early and often.


Bud Hearn
December 4, 2015