Never Ask a Question Unless You Are Sure You Can Live With the Answer

For years, I have cherished the memory of how a friend, about to leave the country, had kissed me, her impulsive expression of the sincere affection and unspoken sexual tension between us.  I remembered the pressure of her arms around me, the tiny flick of her tongue against mine, how I felt warmed inside afterward, knowing that she had affirmed that never-expressed connection between us.

The other day, I asked her why I didn't hear from her anymore.  She told me that recent events, some personal and some public, had enabled her to admit that she had never felt the same towards me after that time I grabbed her and forced my tongue into her mouth.

It would be easy for me to angrily deny that it had happened the way she recounted it, but I can see that no good would come of doing so.  It would not restore the friendship I had damaged so carelessly, nor would it restore the illusion I had before.

Often, when someone asks me a rhetorical question in an argument, I am able to provide a non-rhetorical answer, to my great amusement.  I will often follow that reply (with links to documentation supporting my claim) by saying, "Never ask a  question if you aren't sure you can live with the answer."

Still My Favorite Valentine

Definitely, and by a long chalk: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlequin_Valentine

The McCloud Challenge -- Accepted!

I found an interesting item posted here http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2011/04/ha-ha-ha-not-funny#more-21080 pertaining to a challenge posted here: http://acephalous.typepad.com/acephalous/2011/04/every-quarter-i-present-my-students-with-five-panels-from-mccloud.html and took it up, with results that should be visible at this post.

Not particularly funny, but at least it messes with your expectations, and I think it's not bad for something done off the top of my head.

And generally speaking, I am always up for a chance to plug either Scott McCloud or Acephalous.

The Woman Who Received Many Blessings

Once there was a woman who received many blessings in her life, so let us call her Deo Gratia. "D.G." is a suitable name for her.

D.G. received many blessings, but she was only allowed to keep two of them.

The first thing that happened to her was that she received the gift of life, and that is not a small thing.

She had a fiance who loved her and gave her two daughters. But first her fiance was taken from her, and then her girls.

She suffered for years from a terrible disease, but one day her doctor delivered two blessings: not only had her disease gone into remission, but her disease was one which, if it went away, it never came back.

This was an especial blessing because she was still young enough to have another child, now that she knew she would live long enough to raise it.

She had a boy, and then she learned that the disease which would never come back, had.

D.G. had another man, and he said he would marry her, but when it came down to it, he let her down.

She had a profession which brought her satisfaction and money, but there came a time when she could not work at her trade, so she worked at jobs which gave her too little satisfaction, and far too little money.

In the end, there were only two blessings which would not be taken from her:

First, her son. Even death would not separate them, because he would love his mother forever.

Second, all suffering eventually comes to an end.

Playing Cat and Mouse (Over and Over In My Head)

For several years I have been haunted1 by "Cat and Mouse"2, an episode of The Twilight Zone3 in which a woman invites a stray cat into her home and learns that he is a man who has lived for centuries cursed to spend every day as a cat.4
They become lovers, which is beneficial to her since she has hitherto been crippled by extreme shyness (she is the "mouse" of the title), and he makes it clear from the beginning that he is interested only in a very casual relationship. Even so, she is crushed when she learns he has had sex with a friend of hers. So much that she decides to drug him, and he wakes up the next day in a cat-carrier at a veterinary clinic, where she is arranging to have him "fixed".

1 No, that is not too strong a term.
2 Which never should have occupied so much space in my head, but there it is.
3 And not even the classic Rod Serling series, but the 1980s color revival.
4 At night, he can change voluntarily between cat and man.

So why does this story keep coming back into my mind? Specifically, why did it climb into my head when I woke up at 3:00 AM and prevent me from getting back to sleep before the alarm went at 4 and I had to get up?

What does it mean to me? Do I feel as though I am in danger of being emasculated -- sexually, or socially, or . . . what? I don't get it.

My sex life is actually pretty good right now, and I seem to have better control over my sexuality than before -- it's been quite awhile since I did anything stupid and destructive on account of listening to my dick.

Not having regular work bothers me a lot. That could be it. It certainly makes me feel weak and helpless and impotent, and it prevents me from "doing my duty" by my wife and to a lesser extent by other people I care about.

Do I feel as though I am, like the cat-man, the victim of some immense, cruel, disproportionate revenge?

Possibly. Several times recently I have felt ill-used by demands and complaints that seem irrational and arbitrary.

I don't know. And I don't know why I have been feeling so irritable all morning when it has actually been a very enjoyable and undemanding day.

I've been feeling very pleased with myself over my increased self-awareness since I went through therapy, but times like this show me that there will always be limits to it. But at least I am noticing that my feelings are irrational, and not trying to blame them on someone or some circumstance around me.

Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

Maybe it's been a long year for you. A hard one. A disappointing one.

Maybe you lost someone -- to death, or circumstance, or estrangement.

Maybe you didn't do something you wanted to. Maybe you didn't stop doing something you shouldn't do.

Maybe you are far from home, or someone close to you is far from home. Maybe home doesn't feel like home anymore.

Hang up a string of lights anyway. Listen to happy music. Or if you can't bear to, at least listen to something encouraging.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5g4lY8Y3eoo

The year is ending. A new year is coming. It's going to be different from last year, one way or another.

It Wasn't True

I looked at an old post today, and was shocked by what I saw there.

I wrote about how it was that, when it seemed there was no chance I would ever be reconciled with my wife, she asked me to come back and try again, and how my abrupt decision to give her a trial hurt other people.

What I wrote back then was an attempt to paint a gentler picture of what happened, out of a desire to exculpate myself for going back on my word, and to scold someone else for what I perceived as going back on hers.

What I said simply wasn't true, and I think I knew even then that it wasn't.

I was really a mess back then, but that is not an excuse for the many ways in which I hurt the people around me. Having figured out that my mind was confused and disordered, I should have withdrawn from human relationships as much as I could until I knew who I was and what I wanted. Instead, I rushed about in all directions at once, causing harm all around me.

And then I distorted and misrepresented what I had done.

I shouldn't have done that, either.

So Terribly Sorry

It is so hard to restore trust once it has been broken.

And so easy, when a person doesn't trust you, to give offense without meaning to.

So hard to rebuild a friendship.

And when your time is limited....

It Worked

The other day, while looking after my frail old father, I arranged an outing for him. I took him into town to visit his sister and her husband. Also present were my wife and her former husband, who by chance lives in the same neighborhood.

It was a pleasant, low-key event (my wife referred to it as a "tea party", and in fact tea and cookies were present). When I had taken my father home and gotten home myself, I felt inordinately good about the day's accomplishments, and wondered why.

It's not as though I had never orchestrated an event involving multiple persons, one of whom was quite dependent on me (I've raised four children, after all). But I think it's possible that this was the first time in all my five decades of life that I initiated such an event and organized it from start to finish, as opposed to having at least part of it (especially the initial idea) be someone else's work.

My Favorite Christmas Story

[This is a story I enjoy reciting aloud to groups of people. It usually gets a good reception, if they stick with it and get past an opening that sounds like it's just a rude joke. It's a retelling of a story I read in an anthology some years ago -- no idea of title, author or publishing history -- does anyone recognize it?]

Our story begins on a cold, wet, slushy Winter night, many years ago, when a group of impoverished swineherds were sitting up with their charges, cursing and quarreling and fighting over the jug, when the ground before them suddenly split open, and with a gout of flame and a roiling cloud of sulfurous smoke, a hideous demon rose before them.

"Are you scared? Good. Now listen close: five miles to the south there is the ruin of an abandoned tavern, and in it you will find a whore who has just given birth. Bow down before her child and worship him, or I'll break your heads."

The demon vanished, and the swineherds hastily hurried off. Soon they came to the ruined tavern, and in it they found a skinny, ragged girl clutching an ugly little baby covered in black hair. They bowed down before him and then hurried off as quickly as they thought safe, except for one of their number who paused to take off her shawl and tuck it around the child, saying, "The mite looks cold."

Once they were alone again, the child said, "Mother, those people bowed down before me because they were afraid of Father and Father's demon, but I don't think that is why the woman gave me her shawl."

"No, dear. I think she did that out of friendship."

"Is friendship important?"

"I think sometimes it is."

Soon after, the mother and child were joined by new visitors, this time three Princes out of the East.

They too bowed down before him, and then the first approached and set down an urn full of silver coins, saying, "People will do almost anything if you give them enough silver."

The second Prince then approached, and opened a chest of opium, saying, "People will do things for opium that they won't do for any amount of silver."

The third Prince offered the child a vial of arsenic, observing, "If you meet someone who can't be bought with silver or opium or anything else, you can always get rid of him."

Then the three Princes bowed low and retired, leaving the mother and child alone again.

Eventually, the child said, "Mother, the Princes bowed down to me and gave me gifts, but they did that because they thought they could gain power by helping Father, didn't they? I don't think any of them was a friend."

"No, dear. Princes seldom have any friends."

Last of all from out of the West came the child's father himself, a far more terrifying creature than his servant. He looked down on his son and said,

"It is good. This child will grow and be loved and feared by all for his powers of illusion-making and prophesy, and he will be sought by all kings for their courts. And soon the Great King will be born, and you my son will be his teacher and counselor, and shape him into the king I need, to conquer the realm I need, to raise the army I need for the final battle, and all will occur as I desire."

Saying this, he departed, and the mother and child knew they would not be disturbed again that night. After a long silence, the mother finally spoke, saying,

"Dear, is it true what your father said, that you have the gift of prophesy? Can you see the future?"

"Yes, Mother. I can see the future more clearly than Father can, and I know something important that Father doesn't know."

"What's that, Merlin?"

"I know that Arthur will be my friend."


[I love that story.]

See You Later...?

Little Boy, I hope I get to see you again before too much time goes by.

But I would settle for being able to write you latters, send you birthday presents, and maybe talk with you on the phone once in awhile.

So, I hope your mother relents enough to let me have a mailing address and e-mail where I can reach you.

I hope so.

And I'm not the only one.

Valentine 13

Valentine 12

Valentine 11

Valentine 10

Valentine 09

Valentine 08

Valentine 07

Valentine, Valenstein, whatever....

Valentine 05

For the hypothetical polling-station lady of my heart.

Valentine 04