My pretty new friend

Trying to practice my new philosophy, which is to stop worrying about the future, and being alone, and just accept whatever comes my way, I still often get frustrated and start to backslide.

Backsliding, for me, is reverting to a place of yearning for a partner, a soulmate, and in the extreme case, another spouse. As regards the latter, since I've already had two, and they both remain very present in my life, especially as the mothers of my children, I'm still re-examining my impulse to do it again.

Of course, first there has to be likely candidate! And for that to even be a possibility, she has to be in the same mood, on the same quest, and see in me (us) a family structure she could embrace as her own.

All of this has seemed extremely unlikely to ever occur. Instead, what seems possible are loving friendships with a variety of special people. Even if the right one comes along, I can see now it will be a long, complicated process before any kind of formal partnership could emerge.

Not backsliging, for me, means staying in the moment and recognizing surprises for what they are and beauty in all of its natural forms. This very morning a new friend came over to visit, for the very first time. I hope it is not the last...

It's 4 a.m. and...

No, I'm not in line at Safeway, noticing that beautiful security guard again, and this probably isn't as good as it gets, because I've had, maybe, two hours of fitful sleep.

The streets are dark and empty. I'm on my way across town, up and over Bernal Hill to serve as airport taxi. My little guys and their Mom make their annual pilgrimage back to Connecticut around this time each year, where their grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins all gather. Where they will help care for miniature horses, drive around a tractor, swim in a pool as well as the Atlantic, ride in their grandfather's motor boat out to Fishers Island, visit the local ice cream shop, and generally experience the East Coast summer, so different in look and feel than here on the West Coast.

Once when they were much younger, maybe 3 and 4, the boys were at a beach and they wanted to get out of their wet, sandy bathing suits and into something drier and more comfortable. So, like the good northern Californians they are, they stripped off their suits, toweled off, and changed, oblivious to the people around them, all Easterners. The Eastern children sniggered and pointed and laughed and generally made us all aware we were definitely out of place. Apparently a place where innocent little children are never seen naked. That's quite a change from here, where God's children of all ages take casual nudity in public pretty much in stride.

Anyway, I got them there on time, and they schlepped their bags into SFO, while I parked on the roof. When I came back inside and located them, there was a slight problem. Their tickets were for tomorrow, not today. While we made our way through the slow-moving line to the ticket agent, the kids laughed and joked but also were wringing their hands nervously. They've traveled often enough to know they might well face delays, or maybe even have to return home, only to repeat the whole process of getting here 24 hours hence.

I knew that if that happened, they would have to hire as real taxi, because I also am leaving town later today for a brief respite.

The agent put on her best firm bureaucratic face when Connie asked whether it would be possible to get on today's flight, even though the tickets clearly were for tomorrow's. "Nope," the woman answered. "It costs $100 to change your ticket."

Everyone's shoulders slumped. The woman, so far, had barely glanced up from her computer screen, and seemed not to have yet noticed the three anxious little faces looking up at her -- just the blond woman, whose face was reddening with a mixture of disappointment, anger, and frustration.

"I guess we'll all have to go home and drag ourselves back here tomorrow then?" Connie pressed.

"How many are you?" said the agent.

"Four of us."

"We have seats, but it will cost you $400."

"That's two much, we can't afford it. Sorry, kids."

At this the stern agent looked up, saw the children, and her manner softened. "How about if I do this -- just charge you $25 per ticket for a total of $100?"

The tiniest person in sight, Julia, beamed and was the first to answer, "Oh, thank you!" The boys broke into huge grins and thanked her. Connie thanked her. I even thanked her, though I am only the taxi driver.

So, off they went on their adventure.

***

The glow of last night's game still hovers over San Francisco. As I enjoyed the game, I was thinking that if I were to find a dream friend for my future, she would love baseball as I do, and love the Internet as I do. As I've said before, I write here because I need to, but I hope it is obvious I also love to. And I love meeting others who share this passion.


No matter what our backgrounds, we are all simple bloggers -- one-(wo)man operations lacking marketing teams, lawyers, accountants, offices, publishing contracts, advertising sales teams, or any of the accoutrements of the big media operations. The only reason any of us have ads on our sites is that Google makes that so easy for us, and then shares the clickthrough revenue with us on a per click basis.

Trust me, nobody gets rich by blogging!

But, perhaps, something much more valuable can eventually be found. New friendships, new communities, a new sense of meaning.

A rebirth of hope, which in baseball terms, springs eternally...


-30-

Noboby Knows

Can you see? The face of the artist is always there, partly obscured and partly revealed, by her creation.

Is it funny? In our age, the layers of irony that need to be unpeeled to locate the soul of an artist would make an onion blush. Not to mention The Onion.

What does the artist have to say about love? She is more than silent on this question. Love is an artifact now, a thing of her past. If she put her faith in love and it was misplaced, she hardens her heart. Why bother thinking about love when so many other matters require her urgent attention?

Why are modern women becoming so unromantic? Why are men so out of touch with this development -- why do we (some of us) continue to seek romance when the message shouted back to us, loud and clear, by almost all women is "that's what I used to believe, but no longer."

What is happening to all of us? What will be left if we can no longer trust in the instinct that allows us to fall in love? How many times can a man turn his head, pretending he just doesn't see? *

I don't blog for the fun of it. These are not specious questions, but ones to which I urgently seek answers, not just for myself, but also for many (not all) of us. Cynics should not read my blog, nor judge me harshly for my naiveté. I still believe in the magic of suddenly meeting somebody and falling in love, but I am getting a bad feeling that this is not one of my strengths.

I think instead I am rapidly getting out of date. Anyone who is cool knows you don't go about your life in this way anymore. Nothing good can last. Live ONLY in the moment. Never consider the future.

Do you know why I care about the future? Because I have a little grandson who is planning on joining this world sometime around New Year's Day, 2007. And I have six children, each capable of contributing wonderful things to this world. All but the youngest of them realizes that global warming, to cite one salient example, will be wreaking havoc during their own lifespan, and therefore is not some future generation's problem.

And what has my generation, the 60's activists, done about this fundamental issue? Precious little. Yes, some of us have been writing and agitating about this issue for over 30 years but we've had almost no impact on U.S., let alone global policies. By the time humanity gets its act together, I am afraid it will be way too late.

That makes me sad for my unborn grandson, and the other lovely girls and boys who will soon follow, in our family and in others. We are all in this together, yet we proceed as if we are disconnected parts of a dysfunctional machine. As if nothing we do or don't do matters. As if love is irrelevant.

***

Tonight was a very nice night for San Francisco Giants fans. But you have to be a rather hopeless idealist to think that this season, very likely Barry Bonds' last as a Giant, will end with a World Series ring. For that to be even a statistical probability, the Giants have to win tomorrow and again on Sunday, as they did tonight (7-3, we were there) over their archrivals, the first-place Dodgers.

They are now five games behind the Dodgers with 40 games to play. The trouble is that three other teams are still in between these two old franchises.

I was explaining to my friend that there probably isn't any rivalry greater than that between the Giants and the Dodgers. It's written in their histories rooted in separate boroughs of New York City; then shockingly transported west to California almost a half-century ago.

The first time they met out here, the Giants beat the Dodgers 8-0.

Tonight, Omar Vizquel hit a huge homerun early that pulled the Giants to victory. But they have to do it again and again, tomorrow and Sunday, to really have a chance this season. Tonight, at least, people like me can hope.

But I have a bad feeling about their chances. I fear they will end up a little short of the playoffs, and that will signal the end of the Barry Bonds era. It's hard to watch the old superstar struggle; tonight he hit three weak groundouts and then struck out. He no longer carries his team. He has become an artifact, which is why, if he asked me, it is time for him to retire.

He just can't do it anymore.

As for me, it may be that it is getting close to the time I should retire from the game of pursuing love, no? If women no longer believe my words, then I will have nothing left to say.

Except, of course, to my grandson. And for his sake, I promise to not become a cynic myself, despite what life experiences suggest to me.

All we have, I believe, is our sense of hope. Therefore, the only thing I have of any value to impart to the little ones who follow us is hope. Go ahead and hope, little children. Don't give up, not yet.

And, of course, that includes young Giants' fans. They may well yet pull it off...this old team of veterans, battling time and their broken bodies. The greatest sports story of our time, for San Franciscans, would be if Barry Bonds hit one into the Bay one last time, in the seventh game of a World Series, to bring this city its first baseball championship.

So, who am I? I am the little boy in the last row, squeezing his ticket, still believing that the impossible might come true.

Still believing in love. But summer is soon coming to an end.

* Bob Dylan (of course)

-30-

Sex, Lies, and the Internet

When the Wall Street Journal recently analyzed what people search for on the Internet, Link to article, it found that the most commonly used word is "free." The second-most common word is "new."

And what is it people are looking for? According to the Journal, number one is entertainment. Number two is shopping and number three is sex. About one in seven searches explicitly involves sex, and it is ranked 44th on the "greatest hits" word list. (This compares to ~2500th in common usage.)

In any event, sex apart from love isn't interesting to me; maybe it once was, when I was young, I suppose. But, in the midst of breaking up with J last spring, I asked her whether I should change my attitudes about sex and love, specifically whether I should learn how to disassociate the two, since it's my impression that casual dating has replaced a search for love among most single people one "meets" through the Internet.

I hope none of this sounds judgmental, because I'm not. I support people finding what they desire or think they desire by whatever means necessary, as long as nobody gets hurt. But for me as a single man, I'm not drawn to that avenue, at least not yet. Maybe it will come to that later on, when I've been alone too long.

For now, life keeps bringing me too many pleasant surprises, including chances to meet new people, learn new things, and have new experiences. I may have been a bit too active late at night recently, given how groggy I felt yesterday, but one good sleep fixed that, and tonight, after all, is another Friday night...

***

A new book by neuropsychiatrist Louann Brizendine called "The Female Brain" will be released soon. In it she argues that there's empirical evidence that women see the world differently than men, and that at least part of this difference involves brain chemistry.

A review of the book in Newsweek reports that "advances in neuroimaging and neuro-endocrinology [offer] exciting new insights into how women and men use their brains differently. For example, different levels of estrogen, cortisol and dopamine, she says, can cause a female to be more stressed by emotional conflict than her male counterpart. A few unpaid bills can set off a cascade of hormones in a woman that can catapult her into a fear of impending catastrophe, a reaction triggered in men only by physical danger. Women have 11 percent more neurons in the area of the brain devoted to emotions and memory. Because they have more "mirror neurons" they are also better at observing emotions in others, [Brizendine] says."

Historically, these kinds of differences have been used to put women down. I hope that is changing. These kinds of differences are, after all, what makes the world go 'round.

I can't believe I wrote that -- how corny! This may be my most embarassing post yet...

(Note: If you have trouble following links, please let me know.)

Old clips, new stories

Peter brought over an ancient oversized scrapbook that has been drying out in storage in Florida ever since we sold our cottage in 1999. Truth is, it was drying out in the attic of the cottage for probably 15 or more years before that.

Every summer, when we'd fly across the country, it was the end of a long day by the time we finally got a rental car at a south Florida airport and drove out to the island. Unless there was a full moon, the night sky was black, though speckled with stars. The old doors to the cottage creaked as we entered. The lights flickered on. The old black dial phone still sat on the kitchen table. Familiar items from decades -- paintings, dishes, books, shells, chairs, dressers -- greeted us. Out front, the dock beckoned, stretching out into the San Carlos Bay.It always swayed as we walked on it, farther out in the Bay than any other dock. It predated any codes, installed as it had been by Alison's grandfather in the '20s. At the very end of the dock, we could hear porpoises breathing, mullet jumping, and other, mysterious creatures surfacing, spitting, diving, and scattering. The waters were alive with rays, crabs, octopus, eels, sharks, tortoises, and hundreds of types of birds.

As the years came and went, both of her parents died, everyone moved away, and relatives sold off their cottages for the value of the beachfront land underneath. The old houses were demolished until our cottage was the last one on that little strip of Bayfront sand. Behind us were canals and then jungle, with spiders, snakes, alligators, and other creatures ready to pounce on unsuspecting pets that strayed too far from home. The wildness of the place was palpable.

Tonight, Peter helped Dylan direct a home movie of Aidan. Julia was part of the team, too, and made a cameo appearance in the film. Afterwards, all four kids gathered around the computer to edit the footage down into a coherent story -- one of the series of short films they've made this summer.

As they did so, I glanced through the old scrapbook. I realized what it was -- a collection of my early writing put together by my father. Starting with my sports articles in The Michigan Daily, he had laboriously taped in clip after clip from the copies of newspapers and magazines I'd mail him whenever I published. The clippings are yellowed and crumbling now, but among them is an article I mentioned here once before: "The Violent Death of Non-Violence," co-authored from Memphis by Alison and me, following the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.


Maybe I'll scan some of these old articles, and try to create a better repository than this crumbling scrapbook. It touched me tonight to think of my father carefully preserving my writings -- many of which he could not have agreed with politically -- in the storage method of choice in those days.

It's a gift from him to me seven and a half years after he died.

Dreaming

Lately, I've begun to imagine a new future for myself and the people I love. A little voice tells me it is worth it to pay attention to when, where and how these visions occur, since most of the time, I'm just living day to day. Like most people trying to balance work, kids, bills, schedule conflicts, friends, and intimacy (not to mention baseball) I rarely have time to dream about the future.

The first element of being able to dream again seems to be having someone to share that dream with. I remember all the dreams my wife and I shared from the ages of 20 to 40. Many of them centered on living on tropical islands, and we were able to do so, part-time, as we raised our three kids partly in San Francisco and partly (2-3 months per year) on Sanibel Island, Florida.

The demands of careers, education, political and community involvements, and the children's own social networks dictated that the Bay Area remain the center of our family's geographic focus. It is ironic to me, at least, that of all five of us, I am the only one remaining in San Francisco. Laila and Loic live in Santiago, Chile; Sarah and Larry are in Portland (University of Oregon Med School), Peter leaves soon for Pasadena (Cal Tech PhD program in neuroscience); Alison lives in Washington, D.C.

My second wife lives a mile away, on Bernal Heights. Our little kids shuttle back and forth. Mom's House, Dad's House. They seem to love this.

This summmer has been a monster-sized learning process for me, as I recovered from a series of painful losses, and created a new lifestyle. An act as simple as putting up a basketball hoop drew in dozens of people, mainly kids, who rarely visited before. We may have had more parties and barbecues in two months' time than in the previous two years.

Work, meanwhile, has escalated into a fast-paced experience more in line with the early days of HotWired and Salon. I love working hard on things that are stimulating, like almost anything involving content and technology is these days. It's exciting to see the emergence of a newly connected world and the opportunities that presents. This is the age of the networked entrepreneur.

My vision of a future starts with the ability to periodically host everyone in my extended network of family and friends. I like how it feels to have a lot of people coming and going, with me pretty much a stable object at home base, most of the time. The vision continues to include growing flowers and vegetables and fruits. In other words, it is a semi-agricultural environment or at least a large gardening environment that I seek.

With me, in this vision, is a partner -- lovely, gentle, committed to me as I am to her, somebody who values language and writing as much as I do, or who brings other creative pursuits (art, design, culture) to the party.

This may all seem like a simple dream for the future. I assume I will keep workming well into my 70s, if I can, in order to continue to generate resources to support my children. In less than five months, I am slated to become a grandfather. He's a boy!

I'd love my "work" in the future, when I'm old, to revolve around writing like in this blog -- semi-biographical story telling -- if I ever figure out how to monetize it. Living where I do, this vision implies financial resources, not all of which are readily apparent to me at this point in time.

One last piece, and that is travel. I want to start taking trips again. It's been over four months since I visited New York; seven months since Biloxi, thirteen months since Hawaii, ninewteen since Mexico. First, baby steps. I've resolved this weekend to drive out of the city, which I did once before this summer, to somewhere that is hot and quiet, somewhere not unlike the vision I've had for my future.

Though it may be true that none of the pieces I need are in place yet -- the money, the free time, the land, let alone the partner -- at least the dream is emerging. Maybe the others will follow in time...

All Night Long

Most nights, I literally blog myself to sleep. That's why I sometimes need to make corrections in the morning. But when morning comes, I prefer to stumble out back to check in on the most aggressive pumpkin plant it's ever been my pleasure to know. It is determined to use its large leaves to block the sun from everything else in this overgrown (and untended) garden. Here I thought it would need my tender, loving care and attention!

To make the analogy more explicit than is probably necessary, my first impulse -- to try and take care of those I love -- has been known to backfire. I may do too much, offer help that is not wanted, for example. There can be elements of what is known as "rescue" in my approach.

I'd hate to come off as somehow like this pumpkin, however. Hey, I don't want to block anyone from her sunshine (read: freedom). After all, my favorite song, has always been listed in my Profile here as "Freebird." Now, I have specific reasons to so fondly remembering that song. Yet, sometimes I admit, my anthem would better be called "Freefalling," not to mention the ubiquitous "Everything is Broken," which plays night after night in my quiet house.

Night after night ends with me and my computer, sharing the bed, interacting. I keypunch, it displays. We seem to have a perfect relationship, wouldn't you agree? Not at all like relating to a bird, even a lovely one, such as the morning dove pictured here on a fence (click on the photos to enlarge them, of course.) I was very taken with this one and her chirp. But she is shy. When I snapped her photo she flew away, with only a final chirp floating in the morning air back to me, alone as usual, in my garden.

Clearly, I still have so much to learn. You can't confine what has to be free; you can't hold tightly what needs to be let go lightly. None of this ever changes my feelings -- I continue to love those I love without qualification.

That's one thing I've learned. You can't turn off love. No, that's not quite right. What I've leaarned is that I can't turn off love.

You, on the other hand, may well be capable of that.

Only the future knows, but I'm not sure we were ever meant to be in the future. Maybe all we have is now.

Closer than close

So, let me ask you something, dear reader. Do you like the Spanish translations I've been including this past week, or do they simply irritate you? Does it seem like a goofy thing for me to have done?

I suppose I should explain how this came about. Through the magic of technology, I occasionally peruse a report that lists the countries where visitors access my blog, and at last count, at least 40 countries were represented, from every part of the populated world. (In a very few cases, readers have taken the extra trouble to contact me about what I write here, and this always touches me deeply.)

It reminds me that we are all in this together, no matter our ethnicity, age, gender, sexual orientation, appearance, religion, or location. Although many languages are represented among my visitors, Spanish is easily the second-most common after English. One visitor pointed me to an easily accessible Spanish version of everything I post, so I've been copying and pasting it these past few nights, hoping it makes stopping by this blogspace slightly easier for those one in 25 whose first language is Spanish.

Also, it is one of many languages I love, and one of a handful I have a working knowledge of, largely because of my past reporting trips to Mexico, Spain, and Central America. It also came in handy in Italy, parts of Switzerland, and with a few Brazilians I've known in this country, including a translator and two babysitters, (even though it does not match up perfectly with Italian or Portuguese, of course).

Anyone who has spent any time at all with me knows how much I love languages, how each yields a different array of words and images that divide up reality into uneven chunks, much like white chocolate and nuts populating an especially yummy cookie. Which brings me to the photos I've included tonight of the cover (above) and opening pages (below) to one of my favorite books, The English Language by Ernest Weekly. It is an updated version of a volume written in 1928 by one Ernest Been.

I can't go into detail now about what I love about this slender volume, because I must get on to something that feels much more urgent. But I'll say this: It is the best overview of the evolution of the English that has come down to us over the centuries that I've yet found, much as Karl Marx's summation of the agricultural stage of human development was one of his most brilliant (if somewhat overlooked) contributions in the mid-19th century.

Anyway, I found Weekly's book, its aged pages yellowed yet sturdy in a wonderful old used bookstore near the corner of Haight and Ashbury over 20 years ago, when Alison and I were raising our three kids a few steps away. I didn't realize it at the time, but the great muckraker, Communist and British Royal Family member, Jessica "Decca" Mitford, had settled in near this very spot as a single mother in the 40s.

Later, when we became friends, I was able to connect up these dots. Especially, when at age 11, my daughter Laila and her best friend Cristina became two of the youngest writers in the history of The Nation to ever publish an article in that 1.5 century-old magazine -- their interview of Jessica Mitford.

Talk about a woman who knew how to use the language!

***

Tonight was not a hot summer's night, but a cool, foggy San Francisco night, more what we are used to here. My dinner companion charmed me with stories of her adventures between cultures and languages, and it struck me, as I watched her dark, sparkling eyes, and the way she used her left arm, hand and fingers to ever so gracefully illustrate her points, that I might well have felt at home in Babylon.

Okay, probably not, but I do love languages, and the particular way each of us uses ours. My companion tonight rued her difficulty with the "r" and "l" sounds, but of course, since she is Japanese, these feel unpronounceable to her, much as the guttural "kh," "gh," and "q" sounds create challenges for those westerners who try to learn Persian, Arabic, and to a lesser extent, Hebrew.

If you want to try to learn a difficult language, try Mandarin. So lovely and so unattainable. It is the Arabic of East Asia (I can hear my Beijing friend moaning in disagreement; she would say Arabic is the Mandarin of the Middle East), but no matter, both sing the human condition in tones no listener could miss. The prayer calls from mosques in Afghanistan at sundown have always been sung in Arabic -- it is as lovely a sound to welcome the night as any I've ever heard.

On the other hand, if you don't expose your child to Mandarin by the age of one, (s)he will never properly master the four tonal zones that Chinese people employ to convey their endlessly subtle messages. (Please visit my friend Brad's blog Esmond's Cool Blog to learn how to help your child learn Chinese at an early age.)

Which brings me to Japanese, a somewhat more accessible language for Americans, who account for, after all, 87.51% of my 2,000+ readers (you know how much I love math!) I had the memorable experience of traveling throughout Japan giving speeches that had to be translated a couple decades ago. That was the first time I had visited that country, though since Alison, as an Air Force brat, had spent her formative years growing up there, my curiosity had long since been sparked by the stories she and her mother had told me over the years.

But nothing anyone can tell you will provide adequate preparation for an American visiting Japan for the first time. Every time since, and I'm sure in the future, that I go there, I will re-experience the cross-cultural dilemma of witnessing two peoples with languages that simply do not mesh. Translation between them is so hard!

***

Tonight, the park was lit, busy, and a bit too bright. Nevertheless, it provided a place to stop for a while, much as Robert Frost wrote about in his "snowy woods" poem, only in this context, it was the opposite of his contemplation of the sweet comfort of suicide, since I was contemplating instead the promise of new hopes and future dreams.

And that is how this story must end, for now...

***

Outside in the city (Exterior en la ciudad)

Last night, around 8 pm, I was on the phone in my backyard. A misunderstanding had occurred and I had an angry friend on the line. At 8:30 we met and she showed me some things she'd described but never shown me before. By 9 pm we were eating some yummy Thai food and we'd made up. At 10 pm, Stow Lake was so peaceful you could sit outside on a bench. Twin Peaks was hopping at 11 pm.

My own apartment was empty and quiet by the time I parked and walked in there at midnight. This morning I went out to survey the aftermath of Dylan's "war" on Sunday.
It was a foggy morning. The pumpkin plant's many yellow blooms were afraid to open, since as yet there was no sun.


Out front, the recycling people had come and gone, spewing trash in their wake: I saw an envelope marked "Dad" lying in the street, a crumpled train ticket, and somebody's torn-up Lottery ticket. Here a broken beer bottle; there a condom ad. There a cast-off cigarette butt, here a piece of aluminum foil, folded just so, with burn marks around it.

The detritis of urban life.

There probably is no purpose in searching for meaning in these tiny, everyday details, but in my heightened state of alertness, I can't help but do so. Little seems to escape my attention now. The kids startle as I brake the car, back up a few feet, and pick up a faded dollar bill I'd noticed just as I was about to run it over. A small bird flies to the edge of the window in my office, flutters noiselessly until it realizes I am staring at it. On my computer screen, as I sort through hundreds of incoming news headlines, many catch my eye, for all sorts of reasons.

First, I always need to evaluate what is in the news, journalistically. Anything flagged Biloxi or Katrina invariably catches my eye. The first big claim filed against the insurance companies that refused to cover homeowners whose homes were destroyed by the storm has been rejected by a federal judge.Reuters Story Link. Chalk one up for Big Insurance and another bad day for the little people along the Gulf Coast.

Here, my mind wanders. The sun is out. The workday is winding to a close.

I wonder what tonight may bring?

-30-

***

Martes 15 de agosto de 2006
Exterior en la ciudad

El ayer por la noche, alrededor 8 P.M., estaba en el teléfono en mi patio trasero. Un malentendido había ocurrido y tenía un amigo enojado en la línea. En 8:30 satisficimos y ella me demostró algunas cosas que ella me había descrito pero nunca que había demostrado antes. Por 9 P.M. comíamos un poco de alimento tailandés delicioso y habíamos compuesto. En 10 P.M., el lago stow estaba así que pacífico podrías sentarse afuera en un banco. Los picos gemelos saltaban en 11 P.M.

Mi propio apartamento era vacío y reservado para el momento en que parqueara y caminara adentro allí en la medianoche. Esta mañana salí examinar las consecuencias de la “guerra” de Dylan el domingo.
Era una mañana brumosa. Muchas floraciones amarillas de la planta de la calabaza estaban asustadas abrirse, desde hasta ahora allí no eran ningún sol.


Hacia fuera afrontar, la gente de reciclaje había venido y basura ida, que arroga en tu estela: Vi a “papá marcado sobre” el mentir en la calle, un boleto arrugado del tren, y alguien boleto rasgado-para arriba de la lotería. Aquí una botella de cerveza quebrada; allí un anuncio del condón. Allí un extremo de cigarrillo cast-off, aquí un pedazo del papel de aluminio, doblado apenas así pues, con las marcas de la quemadura alrededor de él.

El detritis de la vida urbana.

No hay probablemente propósito en buscar para significar en estos detalles minúsculos, diarios, pero en mi estado aumentado de la vigilancia, no puedo dejar tan. Poco se parece ahora escapar mi atención. Los cabritos asustan como freno el coche, sostengo algunos pies, y toman una cuenta de dólar descolorada que había notado apenas pues estaba a punto de funcionarlo encima. Un pájaro pequeño vuela al borde de la ventana en mi oficina, agita silenciosamente hasta que realiza que estoy mirando fijamente ella. En mi pantalla de computadora, como clasifico con centenares de títulos entrantes de las noticias, muchos cogen mi ojo, para todas las clases de razones.

Primero, necesito siempre evaluar cuál está en las noticias, periodísticamente. Cualquier cosa Biloxi o Katrina señalado por medio de una bandera coge invariable mi ojo. La primera demanda grande archivada contra las compañías de seguros que rechazaron cubrir a los dueños de una casa que hogares fueron destruidos por la tormenta ha sido rechazada por un juez federal. Acoplamiento de la historia de Reuters. Marcar uno con tiza para arriba para el seguro grande y otro mal día para la pequeña gente a lo largo de la costa del golfo.

Aquí, mi mente vaga. El sol está hacia fuera. El día laborable es bobina a un cierre.

¿Me pregunto qué puede traer esta noche?

fijado por los comentarios de David Weir @ 3:08 P.M. 0 se liga a este poste

Aloneness/Togetherness

It must be true. Too many women I respect have told me the same thing now: Men need to be together with women more than women need to be with men, as we age. Men do much worse living alone than do women. Men suffer from loneliness and isolation more than women do. These things I am told over and over, as common wisdom, from women.

Most men don't have as much to say about this but they often admit to women friends that they are pretty unhappy being alone. I think in my case there is a fundamental disconnect in that I love being in a relationship but am invariably attracted to strong, independent women who are in the midst of change, often seeking something they cannot necessarily name.

By the time I've given my heart away, they may have started to disengage, on some level, as they sense the need to remain independent would be compromised by getting entangled with me and my complicated family life. One step in, two steps out; that's how they dance away from me. I always try to explain to a new woman how difficult it is for me to find true intimacy on all three levels --intellectual, physical, and most importantly, emotional.

But invariably they underestimate their effect on me. They always seem to think that another, more appropriate mate will come along for me, somehow. Maybe they are right, but when they say this, it feels like they are more interested in handing me off, much like a relay racer hands off her baton, to the next woman who runs into view.

I fear this says something rather sad about me, or rather the experience of being my partner. It certainly is not the best way for me to advertise myself for some future partner! My dinner companion tonight said, "You're attracted to women going through their middle life crisis, David." She said it takes 4-5 years for a woman to complete this stage of her development, and by the time she is done, who knows whether she will want to be with me.

I hope she is wrong about me in this respect: Even though I agree people are often the most interesting when they are "broken," I'd like to think my willingness to engage with the melancholic side of a woman would allow her to share her joyful side with me as well.

My friend also said men like younger women mainly because they are happier -- they laugh more than older women tend to. No one feels attracted to cynicism unless it is a mask for hope, and you can intuitively decode that. Many older women, for good reasons, no doubt, have become cynical about men in a way I find completely off-putting; I admit it. I could never be with someone like that.

For me, youthfulness is an attitude, a personality characteristic that is only partly measured in years. Being curious, hopeful, idealistic and remaining open to learning new things and having new experiences is the way I'd like to be myself, and invariably it's the way the women I find attractive are, as well.

I've figured out this much. Life, like stories, ideally has three acts. I'd hoped I'd met my Act Three when I got involved with my ex-girlfriend. But I realize she was clear with me that I am not the right person for her, for specific reasons I've disclosed here in the past. Therefore, how could I have imagined she would be the right person for me?

Because for a while, she really tried to be. I don't know what exactly went wrong, or why she got tired of what we had, but she did. And she is gone from me.

My realization is that Act Three, for me, will probably involve meeting the right person to do what I've twice before done, quite successfully, really. And that is to get married. She will have to like my children, but by all accounts that is not a difficult assignment. Beyond that one requirement, she has to want to be with a man who is as willing to see her cry as to laugh.

In other words, she has to want to actually be seen by me, as she is, not as the world would have her be...

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***


En Espanol: Aloneness/Togetherness

Debe ser verdad. Demasiadas mujeres que respeto me han dicho la misma cosa ahora: Los hombres necesitan ser junto con mujeres más que las mujeres necesitan estar con los hombres, pues envejecemos. Los hombres hacen solo vivo mucho peor que las mujeres. Los hombres sufren de soledad y el aislamiento más que mujeres. Estas cosas me dicen repetidamente, como sabiduría común, de mujeres.

La mayoría de los hombres no tienen tanto a decir sobre esto sino que admiten a menudo a los amigos de las mujeres que son el estar bastante infeliz solos. Pienso en mi caso allí soy una desconexión fundamental en que amo el estar en una relación pero la atraída invariable a las mujeres fuertes, independientes que están en el medio del cambio, buscando a menudo algo ella no puede nombrar necesariamente.

Para el momento en que haya dado mi corazón lejos, ella pudo haber comenzado a desunir, en un cierto nivel, pues ella detecta la necesidad de seguir siendo independiente sería comprometida consiguiendo enredada con mí y mi vida de familia complicada. Un paso adentro, dos pasos hacia fuera; ése es cómo bailan lejos de mí. Intento siempre explicar a una nueva mujer cómo es difícil está para que encuentre intimidad verdadera en los tres niveles --intelectual, físico, y más importante, emocional.

Pero subestiman invariable su efecto sobre mí. Se parecen siempre pensar que otros, un compañero más apropiado vendrán adelante para mí, de alguna manera. Tienen quizá razón, pero cuando dicen esto, se siente como están más interesada en darme apagado, como un corredor del relais da de su bastón de mando, a la mujer siguiente que funciona en la visión.

Temo que esto diga algo algo triste sobre mí, o algo la experiencia de ser mi socio. ¡No es ciertamente la mejor manera para que se anuncie para algún socio futuro! Mi compañero de la cena dicho esta noche, “te atraen a las mujeres que pasan con su crisis media de la vida, David.” Ella dijo que toma 4-5 años para que una mujer termine esta etapa de su desarrollo, y para el momento en que la hacen, que sabe si ella deseará estar con mí.

Espero que ella sea incorrecta sobre mí a este respecto: Aun cuando convengo la gente es la más interesante cuando ella “está rota,” yo quisiera a menudo pensar mi buena voluntad de enganchar con el lado melancholic de una mujer permitiera que ella compartiera su lado alegre con mí también.

Mi amigo también dijo a hombres como mujeres más jóvenes principalmente porque son más felices -- ríen más que más viejas mujeres tienden a. Nadie se siente atraída al cinismo a menos que sea una máscara para la esperanza, y puedes intuitivo descifrar eso. Muchas más viejas mujeres, por buenas razones, ninguna duda, han hecho cínicas sobre hombres de una manera que encuentro totalmente off-putting; La admito. Podría nunca estar con alguien como eso.

Para mí, la juventud es una actitud, una característica de la personalidad que se mida solamente en parte en años. Siendo curioso, esperanzado, idealista y restante abrirte en aprender nuevas cosas y tener nuevas experiencias es la manera que quisiera ser mismo, y es invariable la manera las mujeres encuentro atractivo soy, también.

He calculado hacia fuera este mucho. La vida, como historias, tiene idealmente tres actos. Había esperado que había resuelto mi acto tres cuando conseguí implicado con mi ex-novia. Pero realizo que ella estaba clara con mí que no soy la persona adecuada para ella, porque razones específicas que he divulgado aquí en el pasado. ¿Por lo tanto, cómo podría tenerla imaginado sería la persona adecuada para mí?

Porque durante algún tiempo, ella realmente intentó ser. No sé qué fueron exactamente mal, o porqué ella consiguió cansado de lo que teníamos, pero ella hizo. Y la van de mí.

Mi realización es ese acto tres, para mí, implicará probablemente el satisfacer de la persona adecuada para hacer lo que tengo dos veces antes de hecho, absolutamente con éxito, realmente. Y ése es conseguir casado. Ella tuvo que como mis niños, pero por todas las cuentas que no es una asignación difícil. Más allá de ese un requisito, ella tiene que desear estar con un hombre que esté como queriendo ver su grito en cuanto a risa.

Es decir ella tiene que desear ser visto realmente por mí, pues ella es, no pues el mundo hizo que ella fuera…

fijado por los comentarios de David Weir @ 7:16 P.M. 0 se liga a este poste

Nothing Doin' (Nada Doin')

Yesterday ten-year-old Dylan told me he was happy being "lazy." What he meant was that on the final day of a nine-day stay with me, he was resisting my attempts to organize everyone to go to the beach.

Instead, he spent part of his day swinging in the hammock in the sun, part of it reading the comics in the newspaper, part of it blogging at his new site Link to Dylan's Humor... not to mention all the normal stuff like playing basketball (he beat his brother at "21"!), playing with Legos and Star Wars miniatures, snacking, telling jokes, and helping me with various tasks and errands around the house and around town.

Midway through this lazy summer's day, he hit on his favorite idea of the day: staging a "war" with his toy soldiers in the backyard. Before long, he had all of us involved, his two big brothers, his little sister, and me. I joined when I went to to see what all the racket was about.

***

Vivid among my childhood memories are going to work with my father, and lying around on lazy summer days withing nothing structured to do. It's widely lamented among parents today how "scheduled" our children's lives have become. They race from school to soccer to aikido to piano to plays to basketball to the movies to library to baseball practice to overnights and playdates, rarely taking a break.

All too often, American kids say they don't know what to do when confronted with 30 minutes of unstructured time.

My childhood was much different. With fewer organized activities, I spent most of my time inventing games, like Dylan's "war."

Looking back on it, those were the best games of all.


An earlier war (Feb.'05)


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Lunes 14 de agosto de 2006
Nada Doin

Ayer diez-año-viejo Dylan me dijo que él fuera el ser feliz “perezoso.” Qué él significó estaba ése en el día final de una estancia de nueve días con mí, él resistía mis tentativas de organizar cada uno para ir a la playa.

En lugar, él pasó la parte de su día que hacía pivotar en la hamaca en el sol, parte de él leyendo los tebeos en el periódico, parte de él blogging en su nuevo acoplamiento del sitio al humor de Dylan… para no mencionar toda la materia normal como jugar al baloncesto (él batió a su hermano en “21”!), jugando con Legos y las miniaturas de las guerras de la estrella, snacking, contando bromas, y ayudándome con varias tareas y diligencias alrededor de la casa y alrededor de ciudad.

Mitad del camino centraa con el día de este verano perezoso, él golpeó en su idea preferida del día: efectuando una “guerra” con sus soldados del juguete en el patio trasero. Después de poco tiempo, él tenía todos nosotros implicada, sus dos hermanos mayores, su pequeña hermana, y me. Ensamblé cuando fui a a ver sobre cuáles era toda la raqueta.

***

Vivo entre mis memorias de la niñez van a trabajar con mi padre, y están mintiendo alrededor en los días perezosos del verano withing nada estructurado para hacer. Se lamenta extensamente entre padres hoy cómo “programar” las vidas de nuestros niños se han convertido. Compiten con de escuela al fútbol al aikido al piano a los juegos al baloncesto a las películas a la biblioteca a la práctica del béisbol a los overnights y a los playdates, tomando raramente una rotura.

Todos demasiado a menudo, los cabritos americanos dicen que no saben qué hacer cuando están enfrentados con 30 minutos de tiempo no estructurado.

Mi niñez era mucho diferente. Con pocas actividades organizadas, pasé la mayor parte de mi tiempo que inventaba juegos, como guerra de Dylan la “.”

Parecían traseros en ella, ésas los mejores juegos de todos.

Sunday Morning Distractions (Distracciones de la mañana de domingo)

I took this photo in East Biloxi last November.

This Sunday morning, there is a story that reminds us that beyond the physical destruction left by Katrina, we have a huge number of our fellow Americans struggling with the mental and emotional fallout from the storm.

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - African-American ministers, accustomed to providing spiritual guidance to their congregations, are helping members cope with serious mental and emotional disorders nearly a year after Hurricane Katrina hit.

Reuters Story Link

Throughout the period I've been blogging (four months+), the twin themes of personal depression and our collection social depression run as parallel leitmotifs, week after week. Katrina tore apart so many families, including mine. It will be a long time before we can say there has been a "recovery."

At a nightclub in San Francisco's Mission District, there is a Retro crowd straight out of the Fifties. My sister Nancy would get a kick out of this place; maybe we can visit it next summer when she’s here for my daughter’s wedding.

Everyone is dressed like they were back when Nancy and her friend Judy Eaton used to tease me and call me “snake hips.” They dressed me up as a miniature hipster of that era. The sweet thing about this club is none of those kids were alive in the 50s; most of them were born in the 70s and 80s.

Then there’s the Make Out Room, another Mission establishment. And Junko’s, but that appears to be closed. Bruno’s is being refurbished. Dylan’s has transformed itself into The Homestead. My buddy Dan Kreiss Link to Dan's Blog likes to hang out there.

The City is constantly churning. With this summer’s warm nights, all the clubs are crowded and noisy when I take evening walks.

You know what I like? I like being someone’s “distraction.” That feels good to me. Not so much that she can’t get her essential work done. Just enough that I remain present in her mind.

I wish they all could be California Girls. – Brian Wilson.

A lot of them are, or will be again. – I said that.



***

Tomé a esta foto en Biloxi del este el pasado mes de noviembre.

Esta mañana de domingo, hay una historia que nos recuerda que más allá de la destrucción física se fue por Katrina, nosotros tiene un número enorme de nuestros americanos del compañero que luchan con el polvillo radiactivo mental y emocional de la tormenta.

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - ministros Africano-Americanos, acostumbrados a proporcionar la dirección espiritual a sus congregaciones, está ayudando a miembros hace frente a desórdenes mentales y emocionales serios casi un año después de que golpe de Katrina del huracán.

Acoplamiento de la historia de Reuters

A través del período blogging (cuatro months+), los temas gemelos de la depresión personal y nuestra de la depresión social funcionadas como adornos paralelos del leit, semana de la colección después de la semana. Katrina rompió en dos a tan muchas familias, incluyendo el míos. Será un de largo plazo antes de que poder decir que ha habido una “recuperación.”

En un nightclub en el districto de la misión de San Francisco, hay una muchedumbre de Retro derecho fuera de los años '50. Mi hermana Nancy conseguiría un retroceso de este lugar; podemos visitarlo quizá el verano próximo en que ella está aquí para la boda de mi hija.

Se viste cada uno como eran detrás cuando Nancy y su amigo Judy Eaton usado para embromarme y para llamarme las “caderas de la serpiente.” Me vistieron para arriba como hipster miniatura de esa era. La cosa dulce sobre este club no es ningunos de esos cabritos estaba viva en los años 50; la mayor parte de fueron llevados en los años 70 y el 80s.

Entonces hay el cuarto de la marca hacia fuera, otro establecimiento de la misión. Y Junko, pero ése aparece ser cerrado. Se está restaurando Bruno. Dylan se ha transformado en la granja. Mi acoplamiento de Dan Kreiss del compinche a Blog de Dan tiene gusto de colgar hacia fuera allí.

La ciudad está batiendo constantemente. Con las noches calientes de este verano, todos los clubs son apretados y ruidosos cuando tomo caminatas de la tarde.

¿Sabes de lo que tengo gusto? Tengo gusto de ser alguien “distracción.” Eso se siente bien yo. No tanto que ella no puede conseguir su trabajo esencial hecho. Lo suficiente que sigo siendo presente en su mente.

Deseo que todos podrían ser muchachas de California. - Brian Wilson.

Los muchos de ellas son, o estarán otra vez. - I dicho eso.