Author: thegraymaniac

I don’t get to take my wife out near as often as she deserves, but we did get take in lunch and a movie this past week. It was “Guardians of the Galaxy” a very fun flic.

I always notice how comfortable and secure I feel in a theatre. Guess almost all of us my age and a little older get that warmth. For me, it all stems from being “movie goer” since….well I can’t remember how long ago. I still remember walking from our house on Simmons street in 1959 to watch the cowboy movies at the old Trion Cinema. What a wonderful place that was.

Mom and Dad never thought a thing about letting a 9 year old boy walk by himself to the “show” back then. Something parents are more careful about nowadays.

So when I would sink down in those old deep cushioned chairs back then it was a wonderful feeling.

That’s never ever gone away, not in all those 54 years since. Even now, just as soon as the movie starts, I’m magically transported away from the reality of who I am and what’s bothering me, to whatever world is on that huge screen. From Roy Rogers, to Clark Gable and Vivian Leigh in GWTW. From “2001” to “Star Wars” and “LOTR” Saw a lot of movies I loved, some I hated, and some I was just downright indifferent to…

I know a lot of people wait for movies to be released to the “home screen” but it’s just not the same. I’m not so sure about this 3D thing though. If I had wanted to be IN the movie I woulda auditioned! I guess it’s kinda fun though.

We are living in the golden age of mankind right now. Despite what you hear, despite what some would like you to think, humans are better off in all aspects of life now than at any point in history.

The only other era which could even come close was the most austere days of the Roman Republic…even over the so called “Pax Romana” because even during that time Rome was ruled by a dictator.

If humanity were not living in our greatest age ever, there would certainly be fewer of us! Our health is better. A smaller percentage of us die from war and famine. We are better educated. Our food and homes are better. Etcetera. Oh, there are still many who require help…but the many could assist the few if they had a mind to do it, coupled with a compassionate, giving spirit.

We are all in the midst of an instant communication age with no constraints to prevent even the most blatant of lies from being told…and believed by many.

Certain people and groups want us all to live in fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of those who are different. Fear of pain or death. Death will come to us all, but in it’s own time. We cannot let the fear of it paralyze us.

Refuse to listen to the fear-mongers and hate sowers. Live with at least a little optimism that there will be a tomorrow for us, and for our children and grandchildren.

Let us not become self fulfilling prophecy “pawns” for the chess-masters of chaos who bombard us with their doomsday BS day in and day out. Reject them. It’s in your power to do so.

I think the biggest fear of dying, at least in my mind is the basic human fear that almost all of us grow up with….fear of the dark.  Not just the dark as in a darkened room…but the dark as in the total absence of light of any kind.  It’s a scary thing to me.  To be conscious and in total darkness and not be able to do anything about it….

That’s terrifying to me.

I’ve had it happen to me on one occasion.  Back in my first year of college, the first time I ever went caving.  We used carbide lamps back then.  A carbide lamp is a two chambered light where calcium carbide is placed in the lower chamber and water in the top chamber.  The water is set to drip down on the CaC2, and produces acetylene gas, which comes up through the burner mechanism and is lit to produce light and a bit of heat.  They’ve been using these types of lamps in mines and caves for a long time.

We had tiny ones affixed to the front of our helmets, and with the reflectors behind them, they produced a fair amount of light.

I was the last one coming out of a small cave we were in on Pigeon mountain, and I got a little behind the rest of the group…not a long way, but just dragging behind like I sometimes do.  My gas ran out on my light and the light went out.  I was still about 50 or 60 feet inside the cave and no light penetrated down that far.  The darkness was as total as I have ever experienced.  All I had to do was to yell really loud, and the two other guys who were with me came quickly back down.  It was only about five minutes.  I’d hate to have been there any longer than that.

I don’t know if I could survive the ordeal of the two boys who discovered Linville Caverns in North Carolina.  Legend has it that they got 600 feet down into that cave using only an oil lamp, which they broke.  This was around 1900 or so.  It took them two days to find their way back out by following a little creek.

I guess the first thing we see after coming through our Mother’s birth canal is the light.  Usually bright lights in some hospital  OBGYN ward nowadays.  Probably less than that back in the old days, but always moving towards some type of light. After that, unless there is some type of vision impairment, we are around light every day of the rest of our lives.  Light is everything.  It is the sustainer of life.  Without it, life as we know it would cease to exist.

In our modern world light has become pretty pervasive.  It’s hard to get totally away from light nowadays, even if you try.  I opened my eyes last night as I lay in bed trying to sleep and saw little lights coming from all around.  Little digital lights on the DVD and the TV which are in our room, and a tiny red light on our TV receiver.  The Fitbit I wear lights up when I move around, and the phone I have which lays on the side table next to my bed, will light up at a touch.  Last weekend when I went outside late at night to try and see some meteors, I had to move to the South side of our patio, because all of the ambient light coming from the City of Chattanooga and the Airport just north of us were so bright they lit up the night sky to the north.  In a way, it’s aggravating, but in another way, it is comforting.  You know you are still alive, when you open your eyes at night and look around you and see all the tiny lights.

I suppose that my focus….some might say my obsession with sunrises and sunsets has to do with my love of light, and what it does to the world around me.  I’ve always been fascinated by the light at those times of day.  It plays with the world in such delicate ways, and sometimes in such extreme and colorful ways. It all depends on the factors and conditions in our atmosphere.  I love to capture some of these moments with a camera, as anyone who knows me can attest….to capture these striking and sometimes marvelous moments in time in perpetuity, to enjoy later and to share with other human beings, my contemporaries, who are inhabiting this place now at the same time as me. There is not much that I can do in this world to try and bring a little bit of joy or gladness, but those captured moments in time are an effort on my part.

That brings me back to where I started.  What happens when we die?

I am not sure.  Nobody is sure.  With the exception of some religious figures, nobody has ever come back from the dead to tell us what happens after we breath our last breath.

I have read of people who have “near death” experiences who talk about moving towards the light when they “die”, only to be pulled back to this side in order to go on living this human life.  Their descriptions of what lays beyond are comforting to be sure.

I’m not stressed about it all the time, but it’s a concerning thing.  It’s something that has always lurked in the periphery of my subconscious and sometimes comes bursting to the surface at unexpected times.

People of faith will say that they will see the light of the world once they cross over.  Some talk of heavenly cities with streets of gold.

Of all of these things I ponder and wonder.  These years I have spent in the light have been wonderful, marvelous and glorious.  What more could any being ask then to be able to live in the warmth and light of the Universe and to love and hold onto those around them?

If there is nothing beyond here except for a lasting and eternal peace of blissful non existence, it will still have been so worth it to have been here.

Going through things trying to decide: keep, sell, give away?

I come across a hot wheels container with multiple used…some well used, toy die cast cars. I recognize some of them. They are left overs from pre 1987, when we lived at 35 9th street. They belonged to Teddy and Matthew.

I posted a few weeks ago about finding all my tax returns from way back in the day. In 1982 through 1987 we were a one paycheck family, and it wasn’t anything to brag about dollar wise. But we got by.

However, every payday I’d take the kids to the store for a toy. Most of the time the boys bought hot wheels. More bang for the buck at .99 cents each. I can’t remember exactly what Kisi got…by 1987 it was probably teen magazine, with Menudo, Cyndi Lauper and Madonna pictures.

But the boys pretty much stuck to the hot wheels during that era. I can’t tell you how many times I’d clean up their room and put stuff into their big old basketball shaped toy box, and there would be dozens of hot wheels in the bottom. They buried them, burned them, and blew them up…but some still survived. They made roads in the dirt for them, dropped rocks and bricks on them, and let Junior have some. Some still survived. Ted started wanting the ones with electric motors, and even cleverly wired one of them up to an electrical cord one day, and plugged it into a 110 outlet. That little motor ran 1000 miles an hour til it started smoking like a bomb, and blew the fuse.

Ted and I moved on to baseball cards in 1988, and Matt started wanting spider man comic books, so one day before we moved to Elm street in 1987, I cleaned the bottom of the old toy box out one last time and put what was left in the box I found today.

After a little reflection, I decided to put them in the “keep” pile. What else could I do??

I cannot reconcile some of the posts I read with the commandment that Jesus gave: “A new command I give you. Love one another. As I have loved you, you must love one another”. You must…he…said…

He didn’t say love the sinner, but hate the sin. What nonsense!

He didn’t say justify your lack of love due to mitigating factors of your own invention.

He didn’t say to cherry pick this verse, nor that verse, and use it out of context to make some convoluted point that proves absolutely nothing.

I’ll tell you this. I have not melted myself down to the dregs in a hot cauldron these past five years…tortured and searching, and repoured myself into a new mold, to see and hear people say up is down, and wrong is right.

It’s not. You can’t make it so just by thinking it.

Can a person be spiritual without being religious? Can you be a good and loving person? Can you follow your own heart and be respected for your actions, without detailed instructions and indoctrinations from others who claim to know more than you do about how to love your fellow man?

Change comes hard for me. It’s the Scottish blood I think. At least that’s what I’ll blame anyway.

My Grandpa was a Stewart. About as Scottish as it gets. He loved his old home place at the end of Snake nation road. I can only remember him being talked into riding the 100 mile trip to Trion just a few times during our time together on Earth. Fewer than you could count on one hand. Most weeks while he was living at the “old” place you were lucky to get him to go to town on Saturday and to church on Sunday. Actually going to church was voluntary on his part, while going to town was something Grandma had to fuss at him in order to get him to do it.

I’m sure he would have gladly drawn his last breath in that old house…but the tornado of ’73 blew it off it’s foundation, and in the end Grandpa got sick and lost his memory, and ended up in the nursing home. I still think of him and Grandma quite often, as anyone who reads what I write can tell.

We had a lot of good memories in the old house. Almost all our Christmases were spent there. I gave Eli the last physical thing I had left from those Christmases the other day. It was a tin box which candy canes had come in that had a lion on it. I still have most all my memories from there and then though. Sometimes it takes a little digging to uncover them. I’ll keep doing that now and then as I can.

As Paula and I move from this old house in which we have lived for most of the past 29 years (with a two year hiatus on 7th street) I’m taking many of the familiar things which surround me that trigger memories. Some little physical things which will inhabit our new space with us.

But most of all I’m taking my memories. Raising three kids here…all the joys, and a few sorrows. The get togethers and the holiday festivities. The “long” hallway. The kids and grandkids coming and going. It’s been a pretty good run, and I’m hoping the coming years will be full of new memories…good memories! The only thing changing is just my abode. My love is not changing. My caring is not changing. My heart is not changing. These things will always remain the same…constant…towards those I love.

As Paula Neurauter Bowers says, soon the things which are changing will just become the new normal. We will remain Mom and Dad, Papa and Nana…for as long as we live.

This is simply my little soliloquy for this epoch of my life.

Now…I gotta quit cause my eyes are leaking.

Peace and Love…

I know that many people hope and pray for better things beyond this mortal life. A lot of the World’s religions promise such in their teachings. I’m not debating or demeaning anyone’s beliefs. I’m coming to think that sometimes hoping for great things in the afterlife blinds us to the possibility of the great things humans might do in the here and now, and in our future.

I know I sometimes steer my boat a little to the negative, but the more I watch the babies of the world and see how smart they are, how quickly they pick things up…the more hope I have for humanities future. I hope for a new paradigm which allows humans to live together without hate and war, with cures for dread diseases, with mankind reaching out for the stars to find and populate new worlds. I think it is within the grasp of the many tiny hands now out there learning to navigate themselves through a world of technology which is already here, and a more complex and wondrous one which they themselves will create…it is within their ability to perform magical works.

So, let us love them. Let us teach them tolerance and virtue. Let us tell them they have no limitations. Let us entrust to them all of humanities tomorrow’s, and I swear they will succeed where we have failed. “You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one.”

It is not easy to explain how a person’s feelings and psyche change over the decades of their life. It’s hard to describe. If you are lucky enough to live a long life, or are getting there like I am, you will know what I mean.

It’s not just the loss of some of the physical attributes, like taste, smell, vision problems due to cataracts and macular degeneration, and other often taken for granted functions of the body.

There is also a change of the way we older folk fit into society, and in my mind at least, an altered perception of the way the Universe around me feels. Somehow this all feels different than it did 55 years ago when I was running around as a ten year old. The newness of life has worn off, and although I still enjoy life immensely, it seems the the sharp, crisp corners of existence are now a little rounded.

Life often seems a quarter bubble off from being level.

I just can’t quite put my finger on it to say what I really mean!

My mechanism is winding down, the boiling water is settling down to a simmer.

And, the strangest thing of all is that I can now accept this outcome, where once I would have denied it…..

Does anyone else out there get what I am saying…?

My Dad’s nickname was “Tarp”. His friends and brothers gave him the name because he used to catch a lot of terrapin turtles when he was a little kid. It certainly wasn’t because he was slow. J.W. Greenwood was Dad’s good friend when they were young. He once told me that Daddy was the “quickest” man he ever saw, and also the most accurate rock thrower he ever knew.

My Dad told me himself that he had beaten many a big bully by “rocking them” then running away….then rocking them again. They finally gave up and ran when they had too many knots on the noggin’ to count….and they never caught him. If they came around the house where my Daddy lived, they risked getting their butts kicked by my Uncle “Curly” or by the oldest brother Robert…who everybody called “lightning” because he could hit so hard and so fast. Fighting was a pretty common pastime during the Great Depression.

My Mom had three different versions of my Dad’s name. When she was just commonly addressing him…she would just say: Tarp

If she wanted something, as in getting him go to the store it would be: “Tarpie will you go get us some frozen yogurt?” Mom loved that frozen yogurt.

The most fearsome of the versions was when we….my brother and I, were kids and did something wrong. Then it would be: “Tarrr…up! Come and give this kid a whooping.”

Strangely enough, that happened more often than I needed it to up until I turned 13, after which Daddy said I was too old to whup anymore. I guess he figured I could be talked to, and have some “privileges” taken away….with the same effect.

My Mom, on the other hand, continued to chase me around be the house with the wire handled fly flap!

Ahh..the memories.