When You Wish Upon a Star

Hey. How’s it going out there for y’all?

I hope all y’all are doing well, and that this year has been going better for you than the last couple of years have. I don’t know about you, but things appear to be returning to some sense of normalcy for me. And the pandemic has disrupted my life less than pretty much anyone else I know.

I am blissfully unaware of almost everything going on the world, but even in the severely limited news items I follow, the Coronavirus doesn’t appear to be front page news anymore. I don’t know if any of the people I know that still work in Healthcare would agree with that assessment, but I rarely talk to any of them. Now that I think about it, there are maybe seven or eight people that I converse with on a regular basis, and four of them live here at the Chula Vista Resort and Spa most of the time.

I have become a person that mostly exists in other people’s memories.

* * * *

When You Wish Upon a Star is a song written by Leigh Harline and Ned Washington for Walt Disney’s 1940 animated adaptation of Pinocchio. The original version was sung by Cliff Edwards in the character of Jiminy Cricket.

The Library Of Congress deemed Edwards’s recording of the song “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” and inducted it into the National Recording Registry in 2009. The American Film Institute ranked the song seventh in their 100 Greatest Songs in Film History.

When You Wish Upon a Star has become an icon of The Walt Disney Company. In the 1950’s and 1960’s, Disney used the song in the opening sequences of all the editions of its television series. All of the ships of the Disney Cruise Line use the first seven notes of the song’s melody as their horn signals.

Personally, I think it’s one of the most beautiful songs ever written, and listening to it will bring tears to my eyes. The song is pure magic.

* * * *

I can’t remember when I started writing this installment of my blog, or how many times I’ve deleted everything and started anew. It’s been a couple of months, at least. For a guy that doesn’t have much of an idea of what he’s going to write about, I appear to be pretty goddamn picky about what I actually post. I figure if I’m bored by my writing, no one else is going to get excited about it either…

I would like to give some props to Jane Castleman. She’s one of the many people I know that I rarely talk to, and she lives only a couple of miles from us. My lovely supermodel wife and I had dinner with Jane and her husband Al back in January.

That’s one of the reasons I think life might be getting back to normal. This year has seemingly flown by compared to the last two years, and they seemed to go on for, like, ten years or something.

Anyway, at the end of dinner I gave Jane a hug and she whispered this in my ear, “Keep writing.”

Jane is one of the few persons that I’m not related to in any fashion that regularly reads my blog. My wife reads everything I write, but only because I’m married to her. Jane almost always leaves a comment for me, and I have loved every one of them. For that reason, and a good many others, I love Jane.

I didn’t know then that it would take me this long for my scattered thoughts to congeal enough into something I felt writing about. But Jane is the main reason I’m even attempting to write now.

Thank you, Jane! You are a sweetheart.

* * * *

If you’ve ever read my blog before, you know that I lead an incredibly boring and bucolic life. If this is your first visit here, prepare to be underwhelmed.

If you’re thinking I’m bored because I don’t have anything to do, you would be wrong. We have something like unto a dozen gardens here at the resort, and I am the primary caregiver for most of them. During the Dry Season, which we are in the very peak of dryness right now, the gardens need to be watered on an almost daily basis.

It takes hours to water them all.

Granted, watering a garden isn’t something that most people would describe as their favorite thing to do. I’m not sure even I could say that, and I mostly enjoy watering my plants. It gives me a lots of time to ponder stuff deeply, and I’d probably have to say that is my favorite thing to do.

Deep thinking isn’t something most guys appear to be capable of doing, mostly because guys are the least complex organisms on Earth. And most guys that think they’re complex are not. They’re just confused — probably because almost everything going on around them is complex and they have no idea how process most of it.

A truly complex guy is almost as rare as a unicorn.

We don’t really look like this, eh

* * * *

Yo, dude. Have you ever considered the possibility that you’re not complex. Maybe you’re just confused, too.

I will freely admit that I am confused about a great many things. But I am not the only person I know that thinks I’m complex. My wife says I’m considerably more complex than she is, and she’s the most complex person I know. I’m confident both of her daughters would corroborate that statement. They’ve both lived with us, and I doubt either one of them knew what the fuck to think about me at that time.

If you need additional information about my alleged complexity, I can provide you with a list of references upon request.

* * * *

When I’m not hanging out in the gardens, I still play golf badly several times a week. I usually play with our roommate, Todd. I used to golf with Todd and Phyllis, but Phyllis has more or less given up golf. The way I’ve been playing lately has reached a new low, and I didn’t think I could get any worse. I’ve thought about giving up on golf, too. But I don’t want to spend that much time in the gardens.

I’ve often heard people say that golf is mental game. That would certainly go a long way to explaining why I suck at golf. My mind rarely focuses specifically on golf.

I enjoy playing golf, even if I can’t do it well most of the time. It’s incredibly satisfying to smack the living shit out of a golf ball and watch it soar through the air like a missile, then land in the middle of the fairway. Or slip your golf ball cleverly through a group of trees. Or sink a really long putt. There’s nothing else like it. Those are the shots that keep you coming back when you suck at golf as much as I do.

Golf is also an easy way for me to meet to people that I can add to the long list of people I know that I will rarely speak to. I enjoy getting to know people on a superficial basis. It’s a helluvalot easier to like someone when you don’t know much of anything about them. Well, it is for me.

* * * *

So. What are these incredibly deep and complex thoughts that so completely occupy your mind?

Mostly, I think about God. And the Truth — whatever that is. You know, stuff like that.

* * * *

I’ve written a lots of stuff about God in my blog. You could look them up in the archives if you don’t have anything else to do. I’ve probably written a lots of stuff about Truth, too. I don’t think I’ve ever been very specific about it because Truth is something that doesn’t appear to have any consistency to it if you’re not talking about science or mathematics.

Those truths are seemingly absolute. All the time. Well, except in the quantum universe, where pretty much anything appears to be possible. Every other truth appears to be nothing more than a matter of opinion. Don’t agree with me? If you believe something to be true, isn’t that the truth to you?

Okay. I see where you’re going with this, but what if I change my mind about what I believe?

Then whatever you have decided to now be true still remains the truth to you, does it not?

* * * *

Probably the one thing that mystified me most about God was the fact that if there was one person, or entity, or whatever you want to describe God as being — He has to know what the real truth is. There had to be a Ground Zero for the Truth at some point in time, even if no one knows what the hell it is anymore. What happened to the Truth, and how could our All-Knowing, All-powerful God allow something as vital as the Truth fall off the fucking radar?

How could there be so many differing opinions on just who and what God is, and what He really wants from us. Where did all of these religions come from, and why, oh why would He allow something that might lead millions of His children to wander down these dusty roads to perdition? Are we not the masterpiece of all His creation?

How do we know if we’re being saved, or if we’ve been pranked?? Is one religion really more better gooder than any other religion? Is there One, True religion? If so, which one is it? How does one determine a religious truth when such truths can essentially be anything you want them to be? What the fuck!

Why???

* * * *

In nursing school we had to take a class entitled Anatomy & Physiology. We learned everything that was known at that time about the human body, and how every part of it functioned because as nurses we would be caring for people whose bodies, or parts of their bodies, no longer properly did its job, or jobs.

I’m pretty sure I learned a lots of really important stuff that I’ve probably forgotten about now that I’m no longer a working nurse. But there are two things that jumped out at me when I was a student, and I will never forget them. The first was: form always follows function. And the second was the All or None Law.

* * * *

Form always follows function. Every part of your body has a shape that directly corresponds to what it does. I took that one step beyond: We are created in the image of God, according to the Bible. If that is our form, then what, exactly, is our function supposed to be? Yeah, I pondered over that sucker for decades, and some of the answers I’ve received to that question still make me chuckle.

By the way, you should never ask a manic person that question…

* * * *

The All or None Law is a principle that states the strength of a response of a nerve cell or muscle fiber is not dependent upon the strength of the stimulus. If a stimulus is above a certain threshold, a nerve or muscle fiber will always react to that stimulus. Essentially, there will either be a full response or there will be no response at all for an individual neuron or muscle fiber.

* * * *

I’ve tried applying the All or None Law to a lots of things outside the realm of human physiology, like, you know, religion. Based on that principle, either all of the religions on this planet are true. Or none of them are. I found both of those speculations to be morally and ethically abhorrent.

It’s probably not a good idea for anyone to try this line of thinking without professional supervision. Even then, the results aren’t likely to get any better than mine. And I like to think I’m extremely good at abstract thinking…

* * * *

I had pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I was asking questions that could never be answered by me, myself, and I. Nor did it seem that any of the religious “authorities” I questioned knew the answers to those questions either. I label them as authorities because that’s what they thought they were.

They went to school and studied the Bible, and holy scriptures, and stuff. So what could I possibly know about God that they did not? It’s like unto seeing your doctor and telling him you’ve looked up all of your symptoms on WebMD, and this is the treatment he should give you.

* * * *

You might wonder why I spend such an inordinate amount of time contemplating questions that don’t appear to have an answer, like I was some kind of Zen mystic or something. My lovely supermodel wife certainly does. I’m sure I’ve asked myself that same question more than once. And for me, the answer is simple: Spirituality.

Spirituality is a vital aspect of health and well-being, even if you don’t believe in God. That might not appear to make any sense, but even atheists believe in Something. Nature. The Universe. Call it what you will. Almost everyone on this planet believes in a God, or a lots of gods, or something that is externally greater than themselves. As far as I’m concerned, that constitutes spirituality.

In nursing school, we were taught about this spiritual component in terms of the Health-Illness Continuum. You can Google that up if you want more information on it.

I don’t think most people consider Nursing to be a spiritual profession, but every nurse I’ve ever known has prayed to God to save someone in their care. Or to save them from killing someone that the world would be much better without. Nurses know they are going to need all the help they can get from God because so many things can go wrong in healthcare, and very few of them are under our direct control.

* * * *

Many people equate spirituality with religion. Spiritual people go to church, don’t they? I mean, like, every Sunday — not just Christmas and Easter. I consider myself to be a spiritual person. and I rarely go to church anymore. Mostly because I think organized religion is the most successful scam operation ever invented by man. I could seriously elaborate on this topic for hours, but that’s the last thing I want to do because that would entail one helluvalot of typing, and I type about as well as I golf.

* * * *

I am not a great writer. I’m a great re-writer. I edit everything I write about 10,000 times. Sometimes even I don’t know what I was originally trying to say.

* * * *

Religion isn’t just the opium of the masses, as Karl Marx pointed out a couple of hundred years ago. It’s much, much worse that that. Organized religion has created far more problems than it has ever solved, and it has harmed just as many people as it has ever helped. Blatant hypocrisy and sex scandals aside, there’s this undisputable fact: Organized religion is Big Business.

The Roman Catholic Church is a corporation that has a net worth greater than General Motors, and possibly every other automobile manufacturer worldwide, combined. The Church isn’t just rich, it’s filthy fucking rich. Not bad for a bunch of dudes that took an oath of poverty…

And don’t get me started on television evangelists. I seriously hate every one of those motherfuckers.

* * * *

If you’re wondering where I’m going with this, take heart. I’m almost done.

I went to church on last year on Christmas Eve. My wife and son-in-law wanted to go to church, and even if I don’t think organized religion serves much of a higher purpose to me, it meant a lot to them. So to church we went. Gwen, John, Lea and myself.

It was a candle-light service, which was very soothing, even to me. The pastor of this church gave a little sermon about the birth of Jesus — the kind of stuff you’d expect to hear at a Christmas Eve service. I would have probably fallen asleep if it weren’t for the lit candle I was holding in my hand. And then the pastor said this, “Redemption always requires blood.”

It was a seemingly random sentence that popped up out of nowhere. I’m not sure he was even aware he said it because he didn’t elaborate on it. I’m not sure anyone else inside the church even heard what he had said.

But I could not forget it.

I thought about what he said for hours. When we went to bed that night, I was still thinking about it. And because I couldn’t stop thinking about that one random line, I decided to do something I had never done before.

I opened my heart, I opened my mind, I opened every cell in my body — I opened my very soul to God, to the Universe, and Everything.

* * * *

I’ve prayed to God a million times or more in my lifetime. I’ve prayed for a lots of things. Mostly things, I think. I’ve prayed for other things, too. Strength in times of trouble. Wisdom. Patience. That’s something you should never pray for because I can guarantee you will not like the way God will answer that prayer.

* * * *

I didn’t pray that night. I simply opened my soul to God and asked Him one question.

What is the truth?

I know I’ve asked Him that question countless times, expecting to receive some sort of response, only to hear the disappointing sounds of silence echo inside my head.

But on that night, Christmas Eve, 2021, exactly at midnight — God, the Universe, and Everything — answered me.

It’s All in the Wrist

I’ve heard it said that growing old is a privilege because it’s something that is denied to many. Yeah, that’s probably true, so I don’t have an issue with that.

But it probably isn’t true about being old. Being old appears to be more of a pain than it is a privilege. And I mean that in the most literal sense that I can.

* * * *

I think it was last week that I finally realized that my blog has become an on-line diary of my incredibly bucolic and mostly boring life. I’m not a smart man, but even I know that. It mostly surprises me that it took me so long to figure it out.

I’m starting to remind myself of our 1997 Chevy S-10 Blazer. We had it for 11 years, and it’s my favorite vehicle of all time. It was a deep metallic maroon color. It had running boards and heated seats. And it had four-wheel drive. Because of the length of time we had it, and possibly because of the way we utilized it — we took it down the most spurious roads we could find on the North Shore of Lake Superior– the Blazer required far more serious maintenance than all of the other cars we’ve had in the last 33 years combined.

I’m pretty sure I ended up replacing every mechanical apparatus on it except the engine and the transmission. And I upgraded the sound system at least once. Lea eventually got tired of all the upkeep on it and more or less demanded that I get rid of it.

* * * *

It’s all in the wrist is a phrase typically used to indicate a certain level of skill or mastery at something where the hands are involved somehow. It’s a reference to the deft skill required to successfully perform certain activities. It’s mostly a sports reference.

Toss a ball in the hoop with nothing but net. Sink a long putt in golf. Throw a Frisbee. Throwing a perfect spiral with a football. Casting a line or better yet — fly fishing — you got it. It is all in the wrist. That’s the latest part of my body that has been malfunctioning for the last month. And I’ll apologize in advance for putting you through this yet again

* * * *

The weird part is I couldn’t think of anything I had done to injure my wrist. The only thing I did on the day it started hurting was wait in line for my first COVID-19 vaccine injection. It took ten and one-half hours. You wouldn’t think that any mishap could befall you by doing essentially nothing except play on your phone while you wait seemingly forever for the process to run its course, but that’s what I was doing on St. Patrick’s Day this year. And that’s the only reason why I remember that date.

* * * *

Why am I here? That’s a question I have asked myself countless times in my lifetime. Not necessarily in any spiritual or existential sense. It’s more like unto Why did I come into the kitchen? I was in the bedroom, and I know I came in here for a reason… I just can’t remember why anymore…

I can’t even say that this is something new. I did it thirty years ago, too. The only difference is the number of stairs I have to climb before I forget why went up them in the first place. Here, it’s only one. In Minnesota, it was a flight of stairs that led up from the basement. And it usually took three trips up and down the stairs before I could remember what I was trying to accomplish.

_{If anything, you’d think that my ability to concentrate would actually improve…}

* * * *

If you’ve read any of my previous posts about my adventures with the aging process, you know that the first thing I do when something like unto this happens to me is diagnosis my ailment. I have described this as the process of ruling shit out until you can’t rule something out anymore. Because I am both a guy and a nurse, I tend to pick the worst outcome I can think of, then work my way back to sanity from there.

So, yes, we can eliminate getting stabbed by knives and being attacked by wolverines. Some of you might possibly be thinking, You know, a much more common wrist malady is Carpal Tunnel Syndrome… And that’s what I’ve come to believe it is, too.

* * * *

Carpal Tunnel Syndrome is a condition that causes numbness, tingling, or weakness in your hand, or a combination of any/all of the above. And a ridiculous amount of pain in your wrist. It’s my right wrist, and I am right-handed. It has changed almost everything about my life, so much so that I’ve contemplated coming out as Left-handed and trying out that lifestyle for awhile. I’ve even stopped playing golf because I don’t want to have start wearing Depends®.

CTS is caused by too much pressure on your median nerve. It runs the length of your arm, goes through a passage in your wrist called the carpal tunnel, hence the name, and ends in your hand. The median nerve controls the movement and feeling of your thumb and the movement of all your fingers, except your little pinky.

The main cause of CTS is chronic, repetitive motion — like typing, or any wrist movements that you do over and over when your hands are lower than your wrists, like, playing with your mobile device while you wait in line for ten and a half hours straight without a break.

Studies have shown that the incidence of CTS exploded with the emergence of the Computer Age for one simple reason. Not everyone used a typewriter before the age of computerization. Then, pretty much just like that! Everyone was using a keyboard to conduct business, for personal use, and entertainment. Up to five percent pf the world population is currently effected by CTS with varying levels of severity.

I have broken bones, sprained both of my ankles, pulled muscles, damaged my right knee three times, and partially separated my left shoulder. Those things hurt. But there is nothing that compares to the sheer motherfucking agony of putting too much pressure on one little nerve for an extended period of time.

It takes your breath away. It consumes all of your attention, so don’t get any stupid ideas about going into another room for anything. You could get lost for hours. You might end up as a Silver Alert, and that would just be embarrassing when the search party finds you in the bedroom staring at the ceiling…

* * * *

Being a nurse probably caused my CTS. At the very least, it played a significant part in my developing it. I’ve had CTS symptoms on and off for the last twenty years. My decision to try to become a rich and famous author certainly didn’t help any. And writing my blog is probably the stupidest thing I could do right now.

See? I told you I wasn’t smart.

I have a wrist splint that I have sometimes worn when I go to bed ever since the late 1990’s. I only use them whenever my right wrist greatly pains me. Historically, it has happened in streaks, then has disappeared for sometimes extended periods of time. I wouldn’t have described my symptoms as severe, until this last flareup. At least, that’s how I remember it.

I don’t think my CTS was progressively getting worse. This was more of an unanticipated blitzkrieg of pain. From hell. This was, hands down, the worst recurrence of it ever for me, and I’m hoping that it will go away again and go bother someone else for awhile. That’s probably how that phenomenon works, too.

The treatment of CTS is simple. Rest — stop doing the stuff that caused the flare up, Wrist splinting. A splint that holds your wrist still while you sleep can help relieve nighttime symptoms of tingling and numbness. And NSAIDS, drugs like Motrin® and Aleve®. And if those don’t work, you’ll probably need surgery.

* * * *

I’m not a huge fan of surgical interventions for anything, especially when there are so many non-surgical options available, so I’ve been doing all of the preventative measures mentioned above, plus, stretching exercises to try to pop my wrist into non-pain producing positions My caddy taught me how to do them. And I bought a new splint because I figured splint technology has probably changed a little in the last two decades.

My right wrist is mostly better now. Except for the low-grade ache that never really goes away, and sometimes hurts like unto two hells whenever I try to do something manly, like, open a jar of pickles. And the tingly sensation that sometimes extends from my elbow to my fingertips. And the fact that my fine motor skills are sometimes greatly diminished. My only fear is this flare up has lasted longer than any of the others. I’m not sure it’s going to bounce back all the way this time.

All of these things are more annoying than they are anything else most of the time, and I am more than accustomed to dealing with stuff like unto that on a daily basis. There are several parts of my body that are working at 80% of the capacity they had only ten years ago. As much as it sucks sometimes, getting older still beats the hell out of the alternative. It just seems to be the price most of us have to pay for staying alive.

* * * *

I want to jump back to the ten and a half hour wait that Lea, my lovely supermodel wife, Phyllis, my golf wife, and I had to endure for our first COVID-19 vaccine. It’s probably the most exciting thing I’ve done all year.

Obviously, it wasn’t well-organized. If it was publicly advertised, I didn’t see or hear about it. Almost everyone we talked to while we waited, and waited, and waited some more — had heard about from word of mouth — like us. Or they read about it on Facebook.

It was held in the little village of Ajijic — in the park down by the malecón, and it was a first come-first serve administration of all the vials that happened to make it into town on that particular day. It was sponsored by the Mexican government, and was free of charge to anyone in the country. All you had to do was produce three pieces of mandatory paperwork at the time the vaccine was being dispensed.

One of these pieces of paper was a form you actually had to fill out on-line to register for the program, then print out that form and bring to the administration site. Yes, you’re absolutely correct. You would think that once you registered on-line that would’ve done the trick. It probably would’ve worked in any other country on the planet. The other two pieces of paper contained essentially the same information as the on-line form. Failure to have the three correct pieces of paper meant that you could not receive the shot, no matter how long you had waited.

Lea said she filled out her online in form about ten minutes. It took me more than half an hour to even sign into the goddamn website. Phyllis was easily as challenged as I was by the process, and at the end she couldn’t get the form to print. Phyllis emailed all her information to Lea, and even she couldn’t get it to print. Fortunately, Phyllis had brought along almost every piece of legal paper she has collected in her time here. A government official somewhere in the vicinity of the park okayed a different piece of paper as an acceptable alternative, and she was allowed to receive the vaccine.

I’m going to guess that Phyllis wasn’t the only one who wasn’t able to print the registration form.

* * * *

It is a well-known fact of modern life that all bureaucracies run on paperwork. But the Mexican bureaucracy appears to worship paperwork. Getting a legal document down here can be one of the most frustrating processes you will ever experience. Every document has to drawn up by a notario. They’re like unto attorneys down here, only more important. All legal documents are written in a highly specialized form of Mexican-Spanish that is so stylized it’s almost incomprehensible, and the entire thing must be correct down to the punctuation. If there are any errors, the entire document must be completely re-written and that process can take months. And months…

That’s why notarios are so important. They make sure every i is dotted, every t is crossed, and every comma and period are all in the right places at the right times.

And there isn’t much logic when it comes to what is deemed to be the correct pieces of paper to have in any given situation. There are a few forms you always seem to need, but after that it is anyone’s guess.

You have to fill out reams of paperwork to get a Mexican driver’s license — which has your name, your address, a picture of you — and a shitload of other information that the Mexican government generates — but it cannot be used to prove who you are, where you live, or any of the other numbers and codes that the government provided to you, and only you.

A driver’s license is just that. Something that allows you to get behind the wheel of a motorized vehicle and do pretty much whatever you want when you’re on the roads down here. And that is all.

A rental agreement, something that is written in that very specific Mexican-Spanish jargon of inestimable profundity, cannot be used to provide proof of residency. You need something much more vital. A utility bill for telephone or internet service. Or you need a bank statement.

Evidently, commercial billing is far more of a reliable source of information to the government than anything the government actually produces.

* * * *

At the end of our ten hour wait to get our injection, there was another half-hour process where dozens of high school volunteers filled out one more piece of paper that verified all of the information we had already provided to get the shot, and they also wrote down telephone numbers and email addresses. I asked if anyone was actually going to contact me so I could get my second shot of the vaccine. Everyone that heard my question laughed. Even the people taking down all of our information.

* * * *

Yes. Three weeks later we had to go back down into the little village of Ajijic, in the park by the malecón again and wait in line once more, but this time for only two and a half hours. We had to have the three all-important pieces of paperwork with essentially all the same information again so we could to receive the piece of paper that had been filled out for us, but not given to us, after we received our first shot. You know, the one with all of the same information on it one more time, plus our telephone numbers and email addresses that no one needed because no one contacted us. We heard we had to go get this piece of paper by word of mouth, again.

This is just a guess, but I figure we’re going to need four pieces of paper to qualify to get the second COVID -19 vaccination, whenever that might be. Phyllis will probably hear about first, and then she’ll let us know once more.

* * * *

I have serious doubts about how effective this global vaccination program is going to be in the long run. I’ve read reports about people who have received the vaccine coming down with COVID. I even saw one report about a woman that survived the illness, got the vaccine, then came down with the ‘Rona again. I guess the good news is she’s still alive, but this disease doesn’t seem to play by the rules, and that’s a serious cause for concern.

The Mexican government bought all their vaccines from China. By all accounts I’ve seen, this vaccine is the least effective of all the vaccines that are currently being employed against the pandemic. I may have wasted half a day of my life for a vaccine that might not do anything against the disease it’s supposed to prevent. I had lab work done about two weeks after I received the vaccine. One of tests I had done was a COVID antibody titer test.

It came back negative.

I have no idea if I have any COVID antibodies in my system even though I may have had COVID when we went to Mexico City in December of 2019, and I most definitely received the vaccine in March of this year. The world has changed. There isn’t as much certainty as there was before the pandemic. There aren’t as many answers as there used to be. And many of the answers we have right now are I don’t know. We’ll have to see. Maybe…

* * * *

The world has been in the closest thing to a total shutdown that it could achieve for the last year. People have quarantined, worn PPE, and social distanced during that entire time. Pandemic fatigue started occurring about ten minutes after the lockdowns started, and it has continued to fester away ever since. It has been boiling over for awhile, but now it’s starting to reach a fever pitch almost everywhere on the planet

I watched a news story this morning about revenge travel. It’s a visceral reaction to not being able to travel anywhere. With the gradual relaxation of travel restrictions, people are starting to hit the road and airways to any place they can. They don’t even care where they’re going. It just has to a be a destination that isn’t the fuckin’ couch in the fucking living room.

It’s possible that this is going to be the most dangerous stage of the pandemic. Only time will tell. We’ll know soon whether or not all of the things we have done as a global society will be enough to stop the spread and continuation of the Coronavirus pandemic.

The Big Question is, have we done enough?

* * * *

I remember the first time I had to administer an injection as a nursing student. My patient was an elderly nun. If I screwed this up, I’d probably get kicked out of nursing school, and I would surely go straight to Hell for torturing Mother Teresa. I’m pretty sure my hands were shaking as I drew up the medication. I told my instructor how nervous I was, and she reassured me that I was going to be fine.

“Take a deep breath. Relax. Giving a shot is easy. Pretend you’re throwing a dart. It’s all in the wrist.”

I did all of those things, except the imaginary dart I threw probably would have traveled halfway to the moon. I felt the tip of the need hit the periosteum of her femur. That had to hurt like unto three hells. It was the worst shot I would ever administer in my life. And it was probably the worst injection Mother Teresa ever received in hers.

And she didn’t say a word.

My next injection went much better. By the time I gave my third injection it was like I had done it hundreds of times. It no longer produced the adrenaline rush that it did the first time. And I had gotten past the idea that I was intentionally inflicting pain on another human, even if I was doing it for a good cause.

* * * *

There comes a time in everyone’s life when you cease to be a highly-skilled participant and transition into being a once-great-but-now-mostly-forgotten spectator. For me, that transition started on the day that I retired. Four and a half years later, I had assumed that almost everyone I used to work with had forgotten all about me.

Yesterday, something I wasn’t expecting happened. I received a message from a nurse had I worked with at the last hospital I worked. She had just started a new job a new hospital — the second hospital I worked at in Phoenix. I worked on a Gero/Psych Unit there. All of the nurses on the unit knew how to handle the myriad of medical issues their patients brought to the hospital with them, but they had no idea how to address the psychiatric issues their patients had been admitted for. I taught my Med/Surg nurses how to think like Psych nurses.

Lynn said the staff there still talked about me all the time, and what a great mentor I had been to them. She ended her message saying, Thank you for the difference you have made in all our lives!!!

No. Thank you, Lynn. And Julia. And Al. And Liligene. And all of the rest of the staff on the SAGE Unit at Del E. Webb Medical Center.

You see? Being a psych nurse is easy. All you have to do relax. And find a way to make your patients laugh. It’s the most important therapy you will give them.

It’s all in the wrist.

The Real World

It’s another beautiful day in the Lakeside Area. The gas shortage appears to have stabilized. All of the gas stations have gasoline again and the long lines of vehicles clogging the roads waiting to get fuel have disappeared.

That’s a good thing.

I started my apprenticeship as a pool guy last week. The only thing I’m allowed to do is clean floating debris out of the pool with the long-handled net. I’ve been getting in a lots of clinical practice. It’s the dry season here, and the mature trees lining the fairway behind our house have been dropping leaves by the ton.

Todd, my lovely supermodel wife’s boyfriend, will be arriving here tomorrow, provided he doesn’t encounter any weather delays at the airport. It’s been snowing like unto a bastard up in Pacific Northwest for the last few days, so we’re all praying for a break in the weather.

Todd has decided he’s going to move down here. Eventually. Todd is a cerebral guy. He likes to over think everything. Twice. The hardest part for him is over. He’s finally made up his mind.

Todd is going to be busy arranging as much of his future life as he can while he’s here, but when he has some free time we’re going to the National Chili Cook Off. Food, entertainment and shopping. It’s a lots of fun. And we’ll get in as much golf as we can.

Beyond that, there isn’t much of anything else going on down here.

* * * *

I was talking to my buddy, Brother Al, a few weeks ago. He mentioned that he doesn’t read many, if any, nonfiction novels. As he put it, he prefers reality.

I used to read a lots of fantasy/sci-fi/adventure novels. And the Bible, which contains all three of those genres. I’ve never been a big fan of reality. I mostly find it very confusing. I rarely need help to be confused. So much of what we deem to be reality may be nothing more than fantasy anyway, so I try not to split hairs over what’s really real and what isn’t.

About a year before I retired, one of my patients was a young man who thought he was being watched by the government.

“It’s not just you.” I told him. “The government is watching all of us. There are cameras on almost every street, and spy satellites everywhere.”

“Yeah, that’s what my dad says, too.”

“Listen to your dad. He’s probably smarter than you give him credit for.”

One of my colleagues overheard me, and suggested that my interaction might not have been the best thing I could’ve said in that circumstance.

“So, you think the government isn’t watching what we do?”

“I’m not saying that, but maybe you shouldn’t have fed into his paranoia…”

“Yeah, but if it’s really happening, it’s not paranoia, is it.”

* * * *

I rarely read anything anymore. If I didn’t have to write my blog posts, I probably wouldn’t even read them. I’m not sure what happened to me; why I developed an aversion to reading. I haven’t tried to analyze it until this precise moment. Most likely I lack the ability to make a long-term commitment to a novel right now. Another reason is the fantasy genre storylines are all essentially the same.

And then, along came Game of Thrones. Because of my current inability to read, I started watching it on TV last week. I was hooked in about five minutes.

Somewhat fortunately for me, TV and movies have jumped on the bandwagon and there’s a lots of fantasy/adventure shows out there for my viewing pleasure. I can’t say that I watch a lots of these shows, but I will l admit that I’ve kind of become addicted to the Marvel Universe. And Star Wars®.

Thanks to technological improvements in CGI, the cinematic versions of these stories are visual tours de force. Superheroes versus supervillains. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Newton’s Third Law of Motion is also Stan Lee’s and George Lucas’s First Law of Storytelling.

But it’s not just computer generated action scenes and explosions. The Marvel Universe movies, and the latest Star Wars® movies are very well written, and the dialogue actually makes you think.

Perhaps the biggest attraction for fans of the Fantasy/Sci-fi/Adventure genre is that we’re transported to a world vastly different from the world in which we live. It’s not necessarily a better world. I mean, there’s no WiFi in Middle Earth.

However, there’s plenty of ale. And pipeweed. Two things I once was very fond of.

These alien dimensions or worlds are populated with exotic alien races, plus Men, Elves and Dwarves. And mythological monsters, beasts and creatures. And dragons.

Dragons are without a doubt the coolest of all the mythical creatures. There are hundreds of legends and tales about dragons from dozens of races and cultures. Asia, India, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Europe and Mesoamerica all have dragon myths.

My personal favorite is Tiamat, a Babylonian goddess who took on the form of a massive sea dragon to wage war on her enemies.

And there’s always the Dark Entity of Ultimate Evil who wants to conquer and subjugate the entire world. I guess we have one of those here, though by Evil Dark Entity standards, Satan appears to be more of an underachiever than anything else.

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Ephesians 6:12.

Angels. Demons. God only knows what else. There’s evidently a war going on all around us that we can’t see. I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen an actual angel. I sincerely doubt that I’ve ever met a demon. But I have encountered more than a few evil human beings.

I don’t have a lots of faith in God. I don’t believe in the devil. But I do believe in Good and Evil. And who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows…

I’m trying to remember a fantasy novel that doesn’t have a bad-ass bad guy, and I can’t. Probably because if there wasn’t an evil villain, there’d be no need for a hero to step up and save the day. That’s one thing you can always count on in fantasy adventures. Good always triumphs over evil.

I never imagine myself as the hero in these stories. I’m the least heroic person I know. For one thing, deep inside of my chest beats the heart of a fucking coward. I’m not especially skilled at sword fighting, or any other type of fighting for that matter. I don’t have any magical powers. If I actually found myself in one of these stories, I’d probably be a red shirt guy in Star Trek.

In an epic battle between Good and Evil, there are going to be a few casualties of war. I’ve almost died to death a few times for significantly lesser causes.

Be that as it may, I’m sure part of the reason I originally wanted to be a prophet was I thought I’d end up with a whole lots of magical superpowers.

If there’s anything to be learned from this, it’s this: Never read the Book of Revelation after you’ve dropped a few hits of acid.

* * * *

My lovely supermodel wife is a huge fan of the Crime/Mystery genre. Shortly after we got married, I jokingly told Lea the only reason she watched those shows was to figure out how to kill me and collect my life insurance.

“Oh, I figured that out a long time ago.” she replied, with a totally serious look on her face. I don’t think I slept well for a month.

Law and Order. The Closer. Major Crimes. CSI:, NCIS, and Inspector Gadget. We’ve watched those shows so many times we both know the dialogue of almost every episode. I would never want to be questioned by any of those spooky smart TV cops. I’d probably confess to the Kennedy assassination, even though I was only seven years old when it happened.

We started binge watching True Detective yesterday. Apparently you don’t have to travel to another dimension to find monsters…

* * * *

I used to watch a lots of TV. I loved The History Channel back when they used to air shows about, you know, history. Now their programming is a bunch pseudohistorical, quasi-reality-based crap.

People will always debate what caused the demise of modern day civilization, but for my money it all started with the creation of Reality TV.

Nowadays I mostly listen to the TV. There are very few things that I actually watch. To me, television is essentially radio, with occasional pictures. It’s mostly white noise to me. I use the TV to distract me from the ringing in my left ear. The medical term is tinnitus. I developed it after I was assaulted at work and my jaw was broken.

See? I told you I wasn’t any good at fighting.

The ringing in my ear might be lessening. More than likely I’ve just gotten used to it and it doesn’t bother me as much as it used to. I’ve come to terms with the fact that it’ll never go away. It’s a reminder of how parts of me are broken and will never work the way that they used to.

Don’t get me wrong, most of me still works pretty good. Like me, the world is certainly less pristine than it once was. I’m concerned about the reality I perceive, and I’m not sure it’s going to change for the better.

But the last scene in Episode 8 of the first season of True Detective gave me a glimmer of hope.

Marty Hart and Rust Cohle have just closed the case on a crime they had started investigating seventeen years earlier. Their personal lives have been all but destroyed in the process of solving a heinous and horrific crime that turned out to be a series of heinous and horrific crimes. And they were both almost killed to death.

* * * *

Rust: “I tell you Marty I been up in that room looking out those windows every night here just thinking, it’s just one story. The oldest.”

Marty: “What’s that?”

Rust: “Light versus dark.”

Marty: “Well, I know we ain’t in Alaska, but it appears to me that the dark has a lot more territory.”

Rust: “Yeah, you’re right about that…  You’re looking at it wrong, the sky thing.”

Marty: “How’s that?”

Rust: “Well, once there was only dark. You ask me, the light’s winning.”

* * * *

I hope that’s true. The light is winning…

I can’t tell anymore.

Home For The Holidays

¡Feliz Navidad!

My lovely supermodel wife and I want to take this opportunity to wish you a blessed and joyful Christmas season. Well, and probably any other season too, for that matter. Unless it’s football season. If you’re a Packers fan, or a Bears fan–all bets are off.

In that instance, we hope that your team sucks and that you, as a fan, are miserable every time your team plays our team.

Despite a mediocre record this year, the Vikings still have a chance to make it to the playoffs as a wild card team. I had pretty much given up on them, and didn’t even bother to watch their game last week. So they played their best game of the season and clobbered the Miami Dolphins.

We’ll probably watch the game today. They’re playing the Detroit Lions. Besides, we’ve already watched every Hallmark Christmas movie at least five times. I’ve written about the Hallmark movies before. Despite the fact that they’re all essentially the same movie, we’ve apparently become addicted to them.

I’ve had my heartstrings pulled a few times watching them this year. As predictable as they all are, it’s Christmas. And everyone loves a happy ending at Christmas. 🎄🎅

* * * *

This will be our third Christmas in Mexico, but it’ll be the first Christmas in our new home. It actually feels like Christmas this year. For one thing, it’s freezing inside of our cavernous abode. Lea and I are from Minnesota, and Christmas is almost always cold there. Like, below fucking zero cold. It’s one of the reasons we moved to Arizona.

We have a couple of portable propane heaters at the new house, and we’re getting good use out of them. They kick out a lots of heat, until their tanks run out of fuel. The propane guys who fill the two big tanks that supply the main house and the casita can fill the portable tanks whenever they’re in the neighborhood, but I hate to request a special delivery from them if I only need a few liters of propane.

There’s a place called Zeta Gas about a mile west of here. They have a drive through facility. You pull up to the pump, hand the guy your tank, and he fills it up for you. It’s a minor hassle in the Big Scheme of Life, but the last two times our heaters died, they died on a Sunday. The one day of the week that Zeta Gas is closed.

Back in the States, you don’t actually buy propane tanks. You more or less rent the canister, and when it’s empty you take it back to the store and rent another full one. And you can do that at probably a dozen different places any day of the week. Here, you buy an empty tank at the hardware store. It’s up to you to get it filled and keep it filled.

It was one of those “on the job training/This is Mexico” things for me. We didn’t have this issue at our last house. So I bought a backup tank the other day, and filled it right away. Take that, Sunday! I’m ready for you now.

* * * *

Second, our Christmas decorations are on display. We even have a Christmas tree, thanks to Al and Jane Castleman. They loaned us one of theirs. It even looks fairly festive. We set it up on the patio so our kit-tens, Mika and Mollie, can’t destroy it.

Kit-tens. I don’t remember our last kit-tens being so…mischievous. I struggle to find the right word to describe their antics. From their point of view, all they’re doing is what comes naturally to them. They’re smart, they’re curious, and they’re very good at jumping. And they like us, so of course they want to help us, no matter what it is we’re trying to do.

I’ve discovered I spend quite a bit of time talking to our growing furbabies.

“Mollie! Get off of the table!” 

“Mika! How the hell did you get up there?”

“Don’t make me get the squirt bottle!!”

I don’t like having to use the squirt bottle on the kit-tens, but it’s the most effective tool in feline behavior modification, ever.

* * * *

And thirdly, we have guests this year. Gwen and John Henson flew down from Austin, TX to celebrate the holiday with us. Gwen is Lea’s oldest daughter. She’s also our brilliant financial planner. John is her loving husband. He’s a very good man.

Historically, Gwen and John have always traveled back to Minnesota for Christmas. I’m not sure why they decided to come here this year; I’m just glad they did. And Lea is thrilled beyond words.

Other than Lea’s boyfriend, Todd, they’re probably the only people who actually like us. They’ve come to visit us more than anyone else.

* * * *

We’re finally settled in at our new house. It feels like home. We’ve been here about two months, but it seems somehow longer. Like, this is the place we were supposed to be when we moved here. All of the big things we wanted to do when we moved in have been crossed off the list. Pretty much all of the little things that needed to be done have been taken care of, too.

I can get back to resting on my…laurels…again. And playing golf.

I went golfing last week with the guy who painted our house. Francisco Flores Bernini is a caddy at Vista del Lago, the country club that I’m a member of. He showed me several of the houses he had painted out there. That’s why I decided to hire him to paint our new house.

Francisco is a very good caddy, which has been good for me. He’s also a very good golfer, which wasn’t so good for me last Thursday. I played the best round of golf I’ve ever played in my life, and Francisco still beat me by seventeen strokes. He gave me a lots of tips while we golfed, and some of them even worked when I tried them. I might end up being a decent golfer someday if all of his suggestions work.

But my favorite best memory of that day was buying coffee from Luli, the refreshment cart girl. I was paying for our drinks, and I gave Luli a nice tip. You know, it’s Christmas…

“Do you want to give her a hug?” Francisco asked me in English, but the way he said it made it more of a suggestion than a question.

“Sure. Why not.” I replied. Francisco told Luli that I wanted to give her a hug, in Spanish. She speaks some English, but I guess he didn’t want there to be any confusion about this. Luli giggled, and she hugged me. That’s when I figured out why Francisco wanted me to hug her.

Luli has what we call in America an epic set of tits.

“¿Puedo tener un abrazo también?” Francisco asked Luli, and she smiled and hugged him, too. “Man, I’ve been wanting to do that for a long time.” Francisco confessed, as we drove to the next tee box. “When I’m caddying out here, she won’t give me the time of day. But today, I’m a golfer. After you gave her that tip, I knew she wouldn’t say no to hugging you.

“I was just hoping she wouldn’t say no to hugging me. I’m never going to forget this day. I’m going to remember this as one of the best days in my life.”

Because of Francisco, I’m going to remember it that way, too.

* * * *

Christmas, as every Hallmark movie will tell you, is a time for family. I can tell you it doesn’t always work out that way in real life. The last time my entire family got together for Christmas was 2006 when my mother was dying to death from cancer.

It’s not one of those warm, fuzzy memories for me.

Given the fact that Lea and I are now living deep in the heart of Mexico, it’s not likely that we’ll travel to the Great White North. Lea has sworn that she will never go back to Minnesota during the winter. To be honest, it’s not something I would look forward to either. It’s even less likely that anyone in my family would come down here to see us.

That’s the reality of life. Even so, if I don’t spend another Christmas with my family, it won’t be the worst thing that will ever happen to me. Or them. We still love each other. Well, most of us still love each other. I can always call them. Or at the very least, send them a deeply affectionate text.

Once you grow up, you realize that family is a word that can have multiple layers. There’s the family you were born into. There’s the family you make when you get married. There’s the family you make with friends, co-workers; pretty much any group of people you want.

Family, much like unto reality, can be anything you imagine it to be.

So, Merry Christmas to us. Merry Christmas to you. And as Tiny Tim so eloquently stated, “A Merry Christmas to us all; God bless us every one.”