Sword Fight

Three equal length boxes arrived at the house last week. Narrow, about three feet long.

I pondered. Golf clubs?

They were addressed to my oldest, so I texted him from work.

Boxes for you at house.

Yes!  he texted, and he told me that they were birthday presents for himself and his brothers.

I was filled with dread. You don’t understand his style in gift giving. He gives things like Bernese puppies. Forts. Sprinkler systems. Trips to places like Auschwitz, and Machu Picchu. Gift cards for experiences like combing the cashmere off the bellies of Angora goats in the Himalayas. His gifts should come with things like warranties. Flight plans. Insurance policies.

When I arrived home, the outer boxes were on the floor, and one inner box.

Game of Thrones, the box said.

I called Tommy down, and he emerged off the stairs holding a sword. A real sword, the sharp kind that disembowels villains in Shakespearean tragedies.

I stared and asked.

But why? Why do you need that? What will you do with it?

He shrugged, and offered:

Hang it on my wall at school? Have a sword fight?

Jesus, I said. No. That’s a real sword.

He scoffed. That’s the point, Mom. This is a Game of Thrones sword. You wouldn’t understand.

Obviously not.

Then it was the night of our big family dinner at our favorite restaurant, and we were all gathered at the house. It was time for John to give his twin brother Dustin his sword. I wondered how it would go over, Mr. Conservative Hospital Corners getting a sword for his birthday. I hoped he didn’t hurt his brother’s feelings when he opened it.

When I heard him whoop and holler, I knew I still didn’t get it. I’ve never seen him happier with a gift in my life. They showed me some “Game of Thrones” video, some battle scene where some leader who doesn’t want to be a leader but who is a leader anyway charges thousands of barbarians all shooting arrows at him. He thinks he is alone, when he suddenly turns around, and realizes his own army has been behind him the whole time. He draws his sword.

The Sword. The one that they all now own, the sword they are whispering about. I hear only snippets of their conversation.

Fight…Yard…Cousins…Thanksgiving.

God, I hope they are going to use the swords to cut the turkey.

Thoughts on Purpose

Yes, I’m going to plagiarize again. Gimme a break, my semester is starting, and I’m up to my neck in clerical tasks. So here is a lovely quote from the late Mr. Wayne Dyer:

Somewhere, buried deep within each of us, is a call to purpose. It’s not always rational, not always clearly delineated, and sometimes even seemingly absurd, but the knowing is there. There’s a silent something within that intends you to express yourself. That something in your soul telling you to listen and connect through love, kindness, and receptivity to the power of intention. That silent inner knowing will never leave you alone. You may try to ignore it and pretend it doesn’t exist, but in honest, alone moments of contemplative communion with yourself, you sense the emptiness, waiting for you to fill it with your music. It wants you to take the risks involved, and to ignore your ego and the egos of others who tell you that an easier, safer, or more secure path is best for you.

Ironically, it’s not necessarily about performing a specific task or being in a certain occupation or living in a specific location. It’s about sharing yourself in a creative, loving way using the skills and interests that are inherently part of you. It can involve any activity: dancing, writing, healing, gardening, cooking, parenting, teaching, composing, singing, surfing- whatever. There’s no limit to this list. But everything on this list can be done to pump up your ego or to serve others.

Satisfying your ego ultimately means being unfulfilled and questioning your purpose. This is because your Source is egoless, and you’re attempting to connect to your Source, where your purpose originates. If the activities on the list are in service to others, you feel the bliss of purposeful living, while paradoxically attracting more of what you’d like to have in your life.

Sigh. Miss you.

5 Ugly Truths

Thank you to Mark Manson, the current reigning king of not giving a f***, for these five truths that he says are hard to hear:

  1.  At some point we must all admit the inevitable: life is short, not all of our dreams can come true, so we should carefully pick and choose what we have the best shot at and then commit.

2. We try things. Some of them go well. Some of them don’t. The point is to stick with the ones that go well and move on, not get upset about every little thing that didn’t go our way.

3. What we don’t realize is that there is a fine art of non-fuck-giving. People aren’t born not giving a fuck. Not giving a fuck must be honed over years of deliberate practice.

4. Finding meaning and purpose is not a five-day spa retreat. It’s a fucking hike through mud and shit with golf-ball sized hail pelting you in the face. And you have to love it. You have to laugh about it. To show the world your gleaming bruises and scars and say, “I stood for THIS.”

5. No one is going to stand up at your funeral and say, “He fucked like a wildebeest and had the best golf swing I’ve ever seen.” Life is about loving people, not impressing them.

And if #5 describes you even slightly, call me. Lol

Hoowah

The most hate mail I ever received as an op-ed writer for The Philadelphia Inquirer was when I said I liked the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition.

Yowza, did I get in trouble.

Getting to be a woman is such an honor, was my point. And I recently ran across the movie scene in “Scent of a Woman” that reminded me:

Al Pacino, playing that part, articulates it perfectly. So take it away, Al, I’m too hot to think and write.

(Oh, and a warning: this video has the “T” word, and the “P” word when referring to women. Don’t watch if easily offended. If you watch, and you get offended, you’re completely missing the point of the speech. You’ve been warned. Oh, and grow up. Sheesh).

Mas Jim

Busy week. Here’s another gem from my main man Jim Rohn:

Become a ghost for six months.

Make everything your fault.

Find the beast within you.

Throw yourself into the pain.

Cut out all the excuses.

Go all in on yourself.

Train like a warrior.

Work like a robot.

Eat like a king.

Reject vices.

Transform.

Upgrade.

Create.

Thrive.

Win.

You Had to Be There

My son and I went out for dinner and a horror flick last week. I guess I embarrassed him at the hibachi restaurant because I asked the server if we could order right away, rather than being forced to wait for the badly-dressed family “sitting” at our hibachi table to stop wandering through the restaurant while talking on their phones.

Who came up with these hibachi rules?

We got to the movie theater TOO early, a fact that he was quick to point out with the appropriate amount of dripping contempt for my earlier behavior. We got in line for snacks, and the rest of this post is about my humor breakdown. You know, when something strikes you as so funny, you just lose it, but no one else sees the humor.

Me (to young counter person): Small popcorn, a diet Coke, and Raisinets.

CP (gestures to shelf in back of me, filled with gummy candy): We don’t have Raisinets, just what’s on that shelf.

Me (scanning shelf): No chocolate at all?

CP: Just what’s on that shelf.

Me (points to Raisinets under counter glass): What about those?

CP: Those are just display.

Me: (Staring at them) You mean I can’t have them?

CP: I don’t think so.

Me: Why?

Son: Mom, stop.

Supervisor (walks up, overhears conversation): Oh, ma’am, those are like ten years old.

Me: (the laughter begins, because I’m starting to think of Seinfeld episode embedded below): I don’t care.

Supervisor: (Walking away sounding jaded, but she’s too young to be jaded, and this makes me laugh even harder) They’re probably the consistency of dust.

The humor of the situation really getting to me now, laughing hard, my son and people behind us getting annoyed.

Me: Can I please have them? I’ll take my chances.

CP: (looks down at glass counter) I don’t even know how to open it.

Me: (I’m laughing really hard now) Let’s crack it open, I have a multi-purpose tool in my purse.

Son: Why do you have that?

People behind us: (Making impatient snuffing sounds)

Me laughing harder, tears rolling down my face, my son finally breaking out in laughter, just from my amusement.

People behind us: Lady, you can’t have them. Move on with your life.

CP: (wishing he were dead, or better yet, that I was) Look, I’m sorry. It’s only my second day.

Can’t breathe now. Laughing as he hands us our snacks, laughing as I grab straws and napkins, laughing as I turn the wrong way towards the wrong theater, laughing as we enter the empty theater a half hour early.

Son: Gee, I’m glad you harassed that waitress at hibachi, so we could get here to an ice-cold movie theater a half hour early to do nothing.

Me: (Still laughing, walking towards good seats)

Son: Those aren’t our seats.

Me: Who cares?

Son: These are handicapped seats.

Me: No, they’re not (laughing through every syllable).

Son: Yes, they are. We’re up further.

Me: But I don’t have my glasses.

Son: (Considers) Fine, let’s see what happens, but we might be asked to move.

Me: (Laughing, laughing, laughing)

Son: Mother, calm down.

Me: I’m trying….

People begin filtering in, looking askance at me because I’m still laughing really hard….

At the end of the movie, as we filter out, I notice that our seats WERE handicapped accessible. Feeling shame, I look at my son.

Me: Now might be a good time to pretend to be handicapped.

Son: Is it gonna be me or you?

Me: (Laughter starts all over again)

(People staring at me oddly as they walk down the aisle).

Son: You. Definitely you.