Paradigms...where shift happens!

There's good news tonight...

...and it's better than finding a $20 bill in your clean laundry...

My oldest daughter, the mother of my grandchildren, was born with an aortic stenosis. It was surgically repaired with something called a 'Ross Procedure' when she was 23. This procedure, we were told at the time has a 7 to 10 year life expectancy before it will have to be re-done. In her case they did not use mechanical valves for the initial valve replacement so that she would not have to take blood thinners which would have kept her from having children.

Last year she began to notice some fatigue and her annual heart check up indicated that the time was near that the procedure would have to be repeated. Since she had given birth to my youngest two granddaughters, this time they were going to use a mechanical valve.

Well, she went for her pre-op cardiac cath procedure today. As it turns out, they are only going to have to repair the aortic valve root and not the valve itself. It's a less serious operation amd she will not have to be on blood thinners.

I was really scared about this but now the sun is shining again on a very relieved dad.

They say that fathers are the daughter's dragon slayers...well bring those scaly fire breathing bastards on...I will happily kick their green dragon asses.

That's my story and I'm stickin' to it...

The Search

Searching and listening through the days,
Searching for wheat amongst the chaff,
Listening for a bell tone in the white noise
That floods my consciousness.

The mountain peak beckons
Above the secret horizon,
Calling me to the search
For love in life’s chaos.

Is the search so precious,
It blinds me to the truth,
And masks the spectre of formless life,
Endured but not savored?

Disturbance & Tranquility

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I don't know if I wrote this for me or for you:

Where careless force
Disturbs your peace,
May tranquility claim the day
And calm subsume your soul.

Separation anxiety?

It was a Saturday morning
and as I puttered around my apartment I wondered how you were doing.

I gather chaff to fill the hours,
You are away from me
But not from my heart,
Not from my thoughts,
And not from feelings for you
That threaten to flood my soul.

Posted on 8/19/2004 at 12:20:08 PM

Contentment can help build emotional health.

The more things change the more they...blah..blah...blah  It took almost a year after my marriage ended in 1993 before I realized my basic truth that before I could ever again be in a life partnership I would have to become content as a single person, not resigned to being single but truly content. I had to be OK by myself before I would ever be good for anyone else. I remember that line from “Jerry McGuire” where Renee Zelwigger said to Tom Cruise, “You complete me!” (At least I think it was her line.) That seemed to me then and still does seem like an awfully dysfunctional view. If I am not complete by myself, I had better not expect anyone else to complete me. Perhaps they can complete my life in the sense that they make it more full but I, as a person had damn well better be better be whole on my own. It wasn’t until sometime well into 1995 that it dawned on me “Hey, I can do this!” and I did do it for the next 8 or 9 years but recently things have changed. The last year or so when I am out I see couples and I find myself envious of the togetherness some of them are enjoying and appalled at the way others who are obviously together are ignoring each other. I find myself wondering if I have regressed to a ‘can’t be alone’ state or am I finally mature enough (age 58, it’s about time, right?) to be able to sustain and thrive in a healthy relationship. I would like to think it is the latter, of course. And speaking of movie lines, I much prefer Jack Nicholson’s line in “As Good As It Gets”. When Helen Hunt asked him why he couldn’t just pay her a simple compliment, he did those wonderful Nicholsonian facial contortions before he said, “You make me want to be a better man.” I think that’s the kind of partner I would like to find. (Not Nicholson, for crying out loud...the kind of woman who would make want to be a better man!) Finally for today, a note of explanation as to why I write this stuff here. By and large, guys don’t have an outlet for these sorts of ruminations unless they have a female friend to talk to. I am very fortunate though, I do have a guy friend that I can have conversations like this with, but in general, guys don’t talk to other guys about the things I write about . Can you see Chuck lining up a putt on the 16th green while Larry adjusts himself, maybe spits once or twice and talks like this. Or Bubba and Junior, waiting in a deer blind for a big buck, passing around the Red Man and trading thoughts about NASCAR racing and their emotions. Anyway, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it… Posted 8/16/2004 at 03:47:29 PM

posted by: JimBrodhead | 1 comments (view/add)

Making Choices

The Washington Post has weekly feature entitled "Autobiography As Haiku". It's my first read every Sunday. Sometimes the short pieces there are humorous, sometimes not. This one was uncomfortably honest:

"I debate which path I'll take to the Metro. I can go straight and pass the man waving his paper cup, calling out "nickels or quarters." Or I can go through the park where the men eat food from the white, beaten-up van. The eating men remind me of babies drinking their mothers' milk. I want to go through the park. I want to feel their humanness and witness their existence. I want to acknowledge they were born and will die. I want to love them. But I go straight. The nickel-and-quarter man is much easier to ignore."

Tag Lines & Friendship

Hang on...I'm changing lanes here... 

I love tag lines, those quotes people use after their signatures in e-mails or on bulletin boards. Sometimes there is attribution and sometimes not (a more polite way of saying we stole them from somewhere). They can be humorous, inspiring or a wake up call regarding things we may have neglected in our lives. I don’t know about women so much but I can tell you that guys need wake up calls from time to time.

What got me thinking about this was a quote I saw this morning on a most excellent blog, “The Illusive Life”. (link is just to the right on this screen) It went as follows: “Friendship is a single soul residing in two bodies” and is attributed to Aristotle.

What a neat measure to keep in mind and apply to our own relationships. Whether it’s a golfing buddy, a spouse or a relative, isn’t it a good idea to have some sort of mental standard to which we can refer as a gauge of how we are doing in our relationships on a day to day basis?

Using it is another matter I suppose. This one would seem to be most useful as a negative measure maybe in that it’s easier to tell what actions or behavior are not conducive to two souls becoming one.

And then there are the humorous tags. They usually wear out after a while and need to be changed. I’m using this one right now on a bulletin board:
“If you can’t be kind, at least have the decency to be vague.”
Sounds very English somehow.

From the same board another writer uses:
“Never debate with idiots, they drag you down to their level then beat you with experience.”

And this one I saw somewhere years ago on an e-mail”
“I am Dyslexic of Borg. Your ass will be laminated.”
Guess you need to have watched a few Star Trek episodes to appreciate that one.

Anyway, that’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it…

Baseball...not just for Americans!

I took friends of mine and their kids to a minor league baseball game yesterday down in Richmond. What fun that was! The kids live in Lithuania and are visiting here for the summer. This was their first American baseball game.

We had a great trip, The weather was perfect, the seats were good, great in fact, and by the time the game started the sun was low enough that we were shaded nicely by the stadium roof. Lukas and Tina quickly caught on that for kids a ball game is not about watching the game but about getting a game ball as a souvenir. By about half way through the game they had realized that the place to be was down at the railing next to the field so they spotted a couple of unclaimed seats and planted themselves there. Neither of them was successful which is probably just as well. The chances of them both getting a ball were really slim so one of them getting one would have created another source of sibling discontent.

They had cotton candy and some kind of ice cream thing that looked like a cross between pelletized limestone and kitty litter. They seemed to enjoy that but then they are kids so allowances must be made I suppose.

I had a contact in the fan relations office who was going to put together a package of team goodies for them and also put their names up on the big electric sign board. Turned out that she was no longer working there so that fell through but they were giving away backpacks to all the kids so my two little Lithuanian tourists will go back to school this fall in Vilnius sporting Richmond Braves backpacks. I got them two “previously enjoyed baseball gloves which were a big hit with them well. They got them autographed by a couple of players and the team mascot, the “Diamond Duck”. Their English is very very good. They had even learned the words to “Take Me Out To The Ballgame” and sang it with us during the 7th inning stretch.

So all was well.

That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it….

Anger and Recovery

To thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
thou canst not then be false to any man.

A young acquaintance of mine was recently dumped by her significant other who apparently decided that he, age 37, no longer needed or wanted her, age 25, in his life. She was taken quite by surprise by all this and of course was hurt. I offered the following by way of support, with the caveat that advice is worth exactly what you pay for it. I have edited out two words to respect her privacy:

“I wish I had some recovery type advice that might be useful to you. The only thoughts I have to offer are that it’s better it happened now than 5 years from now and that if you look deep inside yourself at the vital woman you are, you will discover that he did not deserve a person such as you as a partner.

It’s OK, in fact it’s healthy for you I think, to be a little angry about this. Anger can be destructive if it gets out of control but a little bit is good and is restorative for the soul.

I remember looking at your little tag line that you use on the board, “I belong to ****” and being a little disturbed by it. I believe that we only belong to ourselves and that especially applies to women who are still blanketed, in many cases smothered, by the vestiges of a male dominated society. Anything which detracts from your humanity and your ability to live the potential filled life that you deserve is wrong. You may give of yourself as you choose but no one has a right to take anything from you.

Keep faith with yourself and you will certainly find the life that you deserve. You owe yourself and your Creator not one iota less.

Thinking of you and hoping that the healing has begun.”

Re-reading this I realized I may well have been giving myself advice…..

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it…. posted by: JimBrodhead | 1 comments (view/add) StaticLink eSend