The Good Ol’ Days

I was talking to my highschooler the other day and he said something I’ve been holding onto. I guess his physics teacher mentioned subatomic particles while talking about atoms, and my kid asks, “Where does it stop?”

“What do you mean?” goes the teacher.

And my kid goes, “I thought atoms were the smallest things in the Universe, but now we’re saying there’s things smaller than that. Where does it stop? Are there things smaller than those particles?”

And bless him, his teacher goes, “Y’know, we don’t know yet, but probably.”

So he comes home and now we’re talking about it. And we start talking about how, well, the Universe is infinite, right? It doesn’t have an end. It almost can’t, because even that thing we call the end is just edge of the Observable Universe, because if it has an end, and if it’s expanding, the obvious question is “What’s it expanding into?” Even if it’s empty nothingness, that nothingness is still something, in the end, if it’s space to be expanded into.

And this is all him saying this, but he goes, “If it goes infinitely out, why can’t it go infinitely in?”

And I ask him what he means, and he says that, well, if space goes infinitely out, it doesn’t make sense that it stops going the other way. Like, it seems less likely that we’ve found the starting point – atoms at first, now subatomic particles, maybe later something smaller than that – and everything else just gets bigger from there. So what if there’s an infinite smallness too?

He said he tried telling his friends this stuff and you know how kids are. They tell him stuff they heard in Ant Man, then google some stuff about quantum this and that without understanding what they heck they’re talking about. But, I mean, come on. We do it too.

But then he goes, “Is Time the same way?”

And again, I ask him what he means.

And he goes, “Well, it didn’t start, right? Because how would Time start if there’s a time without…Time?”

And I tell him I don’t think it works that way. He asks me why not, and I tell him that, I guess, I don’t really know.

“So, for argument’s sake,” he goes, “what if there’s always been Time? Like a Forever Past. There’s never been a time without Time and without Stuff. No beginning to it, there’s just always been Stuff, whatever that is.”

Okay…I say.

And he goes, “So then what about the future?”

“Well it hasn’t happened yet,” I tell him.

He says, “Sure,” but in that way you say things when you’re just being polite, and then he goes, “But why not?”

I ask him to explain, and this is what he gives me.

He says that to people in the past, like the 1800’s, we’re living in their future, and it’s real to us, so why wouldn’t it be as real for them, even if it hadn’t happened yet, because bottom line, our present, their future, is a real thing, and right now proves that. So why not the same for our own future? If Time goes back forever, without a Beginning, just always being, why wouldn’t it be the same for the future? The same way there’s an infinite expansion to space, going forever outward, getting bigger, why can’t there be an infinite smallness?

So, he says, the same thing we did for space, accepting that it goes infinite in both directions instead of just the one, what if we say the same for Time? There is no end to it. There will never be an End to it, just like there was no Beginning. It just…is. Everything didn’t just Begin, it always Was.

It’s had me messed up. He’s at his mom’s now, but I’m still up thinking about all this. It’s changed how I look at the Future. I used to think that determinism or Fate was at odds with Free Will, but I don’t know so much anymore. Maybe we’re just characters in a movie, everything in every way already determined in some unknowable way, but us, here, now, in our freedom to choose, are going to make it that way. It’s got me thinking about when I die, however that’s gonna happen, and wondering if when it happens, I’ll experience it with a wonder like, “Ah, wow. So this is what it’s gonna be like.”

But mostly, it has me thinking about now differently. Like, if Now isn’t the vanguard of the timeline like I’ve thought, the place where the Future becomes the Now, and instead it’s just somewhere in the infinite middle with the Future set, as real now as it will be when it happens…

I don’t know, I guess it makes me feel like I’m living inside my own memory. I look around and go, “Huh, a lot of this I’m going to forget. But what I’m looking at right now. Feeling right now, hearing, smelling. Sometime, I’m going to be remembering this moment. It’s like I’m alive in the Memory of Some Day, all the time. Makes me remember that even when times get tough, the Good Old Days are happening right now.

…

That, or he got into some reeeaaally good weed, and I need to call his teacher.

The Window Seat

“Sir?”

–

I read once that astronauts experience this thing called ‘the overview effect’. They get up there, into space, and they look back down at the Earth. And all in one frame they see their home. All of it. Everything they’ve ever known, all in one spot. And behind it is this endless, limitless, boundless, timeless, infinite expanse of empty black. It’s the closest thing to seeing the face of God itself.

And in that black, distance suddenly means everything and absolutely nothing at all. Miles no longer matter. And everything that maybe seemed so foreign or strange as a different country or culture on Earth is suddenly realized to have been so embarrassingly close by this whole time. There’s no such thing as an Other, or a Them, or a fight that’s at all worth fighting over when you see it from up above.

It’s why I like having the window seat on airplanes. When it’s taking off or coming in, and you’re just a few thousand feet above a major city, and you get to see it all while still being close to it. See all the cars on the highways, see all the streets winding like veins through business centers and neighborhoods, seeing all those houses, each with a family or two inside…

I read about another term too, called “sonder”, out of the Dictionary of Dark and Nameless Things. It’s the term for that existential feeling you can get when you realize that everyone you meet, everyone you come into contact with, even if it’s just a glancing one on the sidewalk or in a restaurant, they each have a story and an inner life that’s at least as rich and complex and complicated as your own, with thoughts, observations, dreams, lessons, experiences, wants, pains, et cetera.

However complicated my life may feel sometimes, or how drowning or urgent it may seem to me some nights, seeing all of those streets, those houses, those lives, those souls and lived experiences remind me how many of us there are. They remind me how incalculably many of our stories there have been throughout history, each and every one as meaningful or tragic or triumphant as the next. It reminds me that I am a drop within an ocean, one star inside a galaxy, no less phenomenal for my smallness nor my brevity on this planet, which itself is one among untold billions. And in that brevity and in that smallness comes the privilege of ever being.

And that, in itself, is pretty great.

–

“Sir?”
“Oh! Uh, yes? Sorry. Yes, what? Sorry.”
“Would you like anything from the drink cart?”
“Ah, a Sprite. Thank you.”

A Council of Husbands Convenes over ‘The Bread Incident’ (+ a quick promo)

Since getting married last year, I like to think I’ve grown into the role of ‘husband’ rather well. It was a long road getting to matrimony, and my now-wife continues to be patient with me as I learn the in’s and out’s of my new job. Seeing as half of that job is knowing what to say and what not to say, suffice it to know that it’s been a learning process.

Some months ago we had a disagreement (what I like to call episodes where I earn her ire), and we’ve since laughed about it, so I feel somewhat free to discuss it here. As with any good disagreement of this kind, I have almost no idea what started it. But what I can say is that I didn’t help matters. The short version:

I said words about something, then she said words about that thing, after which I uttered sounds, whereupon one of us was grumpy with the other. We had plans to be at a friend’s that evening, and I was making flatbread to take with us. It’s a super simple recipe, dough gets squished, says hello to a skillet, boom – done. I think there was some lingering tension in the air, which led to some anxiety over us being punctual, and so with regards to my food prep and time management she asked, “Well, does it need to rise?”

I couldn’t help myself.

“I mean,” I half-snorted, “it is called flatbread.”

#comedylegend #foreverfunny #got’em

She gave me a look. And long story short, she was mad at me for about the next thirty-six hours. I went in to work a couple days later perplexed, and so asked my married friends. In short order, I was surrounded in a half-circle of other husbands, trying to decode where I went wrong. My friend Kopa mostly laughed, either at my misfortune or in sympathy, I could never really tell. Brad, the longest-married and most experienced of us broke it down for me like a coach reviewing a play, capping it off with a ‘better luck next time, champ’ kind of attitude. My friend Jason, though? He gave it to me straight.

“I thought it was pretty funny,” I argued.

“Oh, it was, but you called her stupid.”

“I categorically did not!”

“I get it, but yes you did. ‘It’s called flatbread, you idiot, no it doesn’t rise. How could you be such a dumb person to think that?’ That’s what she heard.”

“It was a play on words. Nothing more!”

“And it was cute, clever. But you shouldn’t have said it. In that moment, all it sounded like was, ‘Duh. It’s called flat, so no, it doesn’t rise, you dumb dummy.’

I took his wisdom to heart, went home, and apologized. We’ve been best friends ever since.

The creature Woman yet remains a mystery to me. At one moment, she stands clear as glass, transparent with her feelings and intentions. The next, she conflagrates, and stands aflame in righteous fury that is somehow your fault. Beautiful, deadly, she stands as an enigma to me, but one in whose aura I know only awe…

Anyhoo, if love stories like the above are your jam, go check out Twenty-Two Twenty-Eight Magazine and my story “Just Like Old Times” with them. It’s a cute little ditty about a love like we should all hope for. I should have more news soon too, been a busy year.

Bye now ❤

A Quiet Strength

A few of us had nothing to do so we just decided to skate at the middle school until it got too dark. We headed out the gate out past the soccer field and saw a bunch of fire trucks in front of one of Michael’s neighbor’s place. No fire or anything, but there were a bunch of people standing around and we wanted to see what was up. We texted Buzza to meet up, saying we were probably going to go get stuff at the corner store before heading to Austin’s for some Gears. Then we just killed time, talking shit, laughing, until he got back to us.

After a while, this guy comes up to us. He has his hands in his jacket pockets all casual-like and nods to us with his head. He looks like he’s forty or something.

“Hey guys,” he says with a little laugh. “How’s it goin’?”

“Not much, just hangin’ out,” says Riley. But nobody really says anything else. The dude is weird.

“Right on,” he chuckles, then nods his head at the scene. “Any idea what happened?”

“No,” we tell him, but he sounds like he does. “What’s up?” we ask.

“Ah, right on. Yeah, no, I guess Nancy got a call – that’s the lady on the front lawn there – yeah, she got a call from her kid, Jess. I guess she came home from a friend’s and found her dad after he put a gun in his mouth. Redecorated the kitchen wall with it, too.”

“Damn,” Michael answers. “No shit.”

“Yeah,” says the guy easy enough. “That’s why she’s on the lawn now, coroner’s dealing with the body, you know?” I mean, we didn’t, so no one says anything. He sort of sighs. “She’s probably wondering what to do now. Besides losing him like this, she’s got the two kids, her job she might need time from to sort things out, probably wondering how she’s going to keep the house now without him…but once she’s pulled herself together, she’ll probably focus on the kids first and foremost, and the rest will follow from there. But her life’s going to change now, a lot, that’s for certain. Can’t hardly imagine what she’s going through right now.”

The group was pretty quiet. The guy was making his point.

“Yep, anyway,” he sighs. “You guys were being pretty loud. Might be good not to do that here. Have a good night, though.” And with that, he brought his shoulders up against the cold and walked back to the house.

Oof.

So, while fictitious here, it’s based as faithfully as I can remember on a conversation that actually happened. We were the gaggle of teenagers, hanging out together and thinking the world was ours, when that guy approached. And I remember specifically that Austin and I afterwards talked about how much like utter crap we felt, rightfully so. It wasn’t on purpose, but we were being assholes, given what was going on, whether we knew it or not; and that guy did everything right.
He approached us, informed us in his own way the severity of what was happening and that which we were unwittingly taking lightly, and asked us (without asking us) to leave. If he’d come down on us with fire and brimstone and “Get the hell out of here!” we wouldn’t have listened, and I’m sure he’d calculated it that way. Rather than leaving with a good lesson seared into our brains, we just would have felt like hooligans that had gotten away with something and talked about “how much of a dick that guy was.”
It was also an excellent demonstration of strength, one that’s quiet, sure of itself, and calm, and I think about that guy every now and then, some fifteen years later. I don’t get angry or blustery very often (and if I do, 99% of the time it’s over something dumb and in a fun way, like over a game of Catan) mostly because when a feeling like that would start to swell, a wave of embarrassment washes over me first, prompting me to measure out my response and consider how I want to be perceived or have my point taken.
And now, looking back on this little memory, that nameless, calm, sure, compassionate guy probably had a part to play in it.

A Brief Discussion About JOMO

I’m not a hermit, I don’t play one on TV, but I do sometimes fantasize about being one.

Of course, when I say that, I’m sure I do mean “not a real hermit,” but a squishy kind. I fantasize about a cozy, far-away cabin, tucked away in the cradling arms of some distant mountain, where I could spend my days as I wished in pleasant solitude. Of course, in that daydream, that cabin also has central heating and WiFi.

But precisely what makes that a daydream is that that isn’t the real world. In the real world we have responsibilities, obligations, endure a constant barrage of attention-grabbing things and whatnot. In a world where we lead our lives in a seemingly increasingly faster and faster manner with so much going on, I’ve no doubt at least some of you have heard of the term FOMO: a Fear Of Missing Out.

If you don’t suffer from it yourself, I’m willing to bet you know someone who does. They always need the new thing on its release, or better yet they preorder it. They want to be a part of conversations they would/should otherwise pass by, and they anguish the thought of missing an event or announcement that’s got any degree of public interest. And sometimes, either feeling eroded by the anxiety of FOMO or being surrounded by those afflicted by it, it can feel like you’re on the outside.

Well, please allow me to enlighten you.

I’ve never really felt the pull of FOMO, but as I’ve gotten older (I’m 30 now, yeesh), I’ve it’s become even less so. I never would have thought to describe myself as a private person, but evidence builds more and more to the contrary. I love my friends, I love my family, I like going out and doing stuff – I do. But I also kind of love not. It makes me feel like a boring lump to say it, but dang, I enjoy quiet afternoons or evenings after work just spent at my desk, by myself in the kitchen, or on the couch. In the earlier paragraph where I described the cabin daydream as providing “pleasant solitude”, that was a careful word choice. Solitude, not isolation.

If this sounds like you at all, allow me to present to you the delightful cousin to FOMO-

JOMO: The Joy of Missing Out

Just as schadenfreude describes the tiny inner thrill at another’s pain, JOMO is the tiny inner thrill one might experience when plans get cancelled or postponed. Have dinner plans with a friend or for a beer after work with a colleague that fall through? Mmm, nice. Had plans to see a movie with your cousin but something came up and now you have the afternoon free? Cooool.

It doesn’t at all mean you didn’t want to do those things or that you dislike those activities or the people involved. You very much were happy to grab that beer, get that dinner, see that movie, socialize and all the rest, and for sure maybe there’s a pang of disappointment in there. Totally.

But that little breeze of freedom you feel now too? Aaaah, that shit’s JOMO.

So there, hopefully if you’ve felt the same way, or have wanted a way to express it but couldn’t quite find the way, now you have a word for it. And with words come power.

Go forth an enjoy life with the power of JOMO as you wish, you triumphant bastards.

The Meaning of Life has Four Legs

I’m willing to bet you read that and thought, “Dog. It’s a dog. He’s gonna say dog.”

Or maybe you’re more of a cat person. Or something weird and adorable like a capybara.

After announcing my blissful marriage a couple of weeks ago, I’d expected to follow that up with a travel blog-style round up of the adventures that were our honeymoon – which were awesome. But in the couple of weeks since, telling those stories to friends and family is all I have been freaking doing. And I have more of it ahead of me. Don’t get me wrong, I have loved recounting the tale and reliving it each time with the retellings; and in fact, that’s sort of our point here today. But I’m going to take a breath and enjoy talking/writing about something else for a second while I recharge.

In any case, with regard to all the above hypothetical answers I’m positing then taking upon myself to shoot down: No. You have a guess of your own? Give up?

…

It’s a table. The meaning of life is a table.

When I was in my early twenties, I was taking an English class, and as an icebreaker the professor had us pick a question for the rest of the class to answer. It was a good way to get a feel for personalities, both in the asking and in the answers that followed. Some were pretty creative, too, and others ran a bit of the usual gamut, one such being: “What is the meaning of life?”

Well’p, the young lady who’d gone and asked that had messed up, because I was a pretentious 20-something who’d done some “deep thinking” and had an answer for her. Now, I denigrate younger me a little, but I feel now still as I answered then: Life doesn’t have any inherent meaning, and the question itself assumes too much. It assumes there is a meaning to this life, it assumes there’s only a singular one, and it implies (at least to me) a bit of universality to it, like it’s a one-size-fits-all.

Now, ironically, around that same time I’d come across someone else’s definition of their meaning of life, which I’ve gone onto adopt as my own, and that is a table.

A table where folk sit together and swap stories – about their day, about crazy things they’ve done, confessions, adventures, complete fiction! – is the meaning of this life, in the best way. A table, laden with food, drink, cards, etc, shared with loved ones or new friends, is a place that brings together the things that matter most in this human experience. When I imagine that, I imagine a safe, warm place together with people who matter to me.

And the thing about stories like that is that the best ones come from experiences you gather from getting out there and living life. I have legitimately made decisions, gone and done adventurous, memorable things I might not have otherwise, and vastly more for the better than for the worse, off of the motivation that “this will be really cool to tell my friends at a dinner party.” With the prize of that story awaiting you, it can get you to go and live your freaking life, which is the whole point!

Tables are magical things. They represent togetherness, shared times, a motivation to go on adventures and a safe place to come back to when those adventures are had. And to counter the title, not every table needs to have four legs. Sometimes it’s a campfire, or the cab of a car during a road trip or move, or even a journal or postcard.

And I think I came just shy of a proper rant. So we done good today.

So yeah. Get out there, do stuff, try new things, surprise yourself, then tell people about it.

Like What You Like, a Pirate Taught me That

I don’t know why I was thinking of this earlier today, but I’m glad I was. And don’t get ahead of me thinking there was some clutch moment where that life lesson of self-acceptance saved the day. Nope, just a mundane day at work where the thought caught me and it made me smile. In fact, with this lengthy preamble, I’m already treating this nugget of life advice like it’s some unknowable secret I’ve mastered that you probably haven’t figured out yet. Psh.

It was a scholastic book faire, circa 2006. I’m in middle school, and I should preface (some more) that I went to a tiny, tiny Lutheran private school – and yes, it was about as cool as that sounds. It wasn’t because of any sort of privileged position, either. Just that it was right by our house and my mom wanted to do her best as a parent. In truth, I would now as I would have then traded in my time for the same years spent at a public school where I could have begun cultivating meaningful friendships sooner.

At the Lutheran school I attended, it was Kindergarten through 8th Grade with around 120 kids – total. TOTAL. That meant that if you didn’t fit in with your 15 or so classmates, it was tough nuts, because you were stuck with those same 15 kids your entire time there.

I did not fit in with my classmates.

By my memory, their interests largely ranged between baseball, horror movies, Top-40 pop music, none of which interested me. Baseball? Not a sports guy. Horror movies? I’ll take a comedy, thank you. Pop music? I like Metallica. And I played D&D and read manga, things that only nowadays are sniffing “cool” territory (except you, manga, you’re still a pariah from what I hear).

So yeah, book faire.

We peruse the pencils, browse the books, and excavate the piles of colorful erasers looking for favorites, and exit into the gymnasium. Two other boys, we’ll call them Jimmy and Timmy, are poring over their haul, namely a couple of sports magazines. They ask what I came out with, and I show them: an issue of Shonen Jump with Monkey D. Luffy on the cover.

For those not in The Know, One Piece was a cartoony pirate adventure, and that grinning doof in the middle is Luffy, the happy-go-lucky pirate captain protagonist

I still remember the looks on their faces and the sound of them laughing at me. And especially as an eleven-year-old, I’d been defensive and embarrassed before. I knew the reflex to hide it in my backpack and say, “Yeah, no, it’s kinda dumb. It’s for my-” blah blah blah.

But today was different.

I don’t know where it came from or why, but a muse of some kind came out of the ether, broke into my thoughts, and said, “You know what? No. Fuck these guys. One Piece is cool, and I like this.”

It wasn’t anger behind the thought, either, just complete and total dismissal. Their thoughts and opinions on my interests could NOT bother me one bit. And I credit Luffy’s dorky grin, now that I think back on it. He felt like backup, telling me it was totally alright to enjoy the things I found enjoyable, other people’s thoughts on the matter be damned.

And good goddamn am I ever grateful that lesson occurred to me as a kid. I think we all know someone who – or maybe ourselves struggle with this – lets the opinions of others dictate their interests and pastimes.

Bottom line is this: Like what you like, be secure in your opinions because your the one who they’re for. Try new things, sure. And if someone wants to disparage your interests, like your an adult who likes video games and cartoons or someone in a biker gang that enjoys crochet, just realize it’s the limitation of that person’s worldview. Take pleasure in the things you like.

Or else, hell, what else are we even here for?

Ciao for now.

My First Encounter with Cannabis

I’ve become a pretty reliable user of edibles at this point in my life. Not constantly, or even really all too often, but I do enjoy that it’s a regular, easy part of life now. And, as with anything, everyone has their first time with it – “it” being whatever is in question, not just cannabis. Mine was in probably the best of all possible circumstances: it was Game Night at my aunt and uncle’s house, and it was enchilada night. D&D was the game, and Grognak, the Ghostblade was my name.

To that point, I’d never tried cannabis, period; and I think this was within a year of its full legalization in California, so dispensaries were popping up all over the place. My aunt Steph had come home with a number of baggies of cannabis cookies which was, just as a concept, entirely new to me. I didn’t even know you could do that sort of thing with weed. Cookies? F**kin’ love cookies.

So at some point in the night, I wander into the kitchen to re-up on enchiladas, and Steph enters to walk over to the refrigerator. I look over to see her grab the baggy, take out a cookie, nom on said cookie, and then look over to make eye contact with me. Without saying a word, she holds the bag out to me by way of offer. I’ll be honest, I don’t have any heavenly idea why, but I took it as a challenge. There in that moment, she didn’t actually think I’d accept a cookie and she was betting on it. (She totally wasn’t, but that’s how my brain chose to interpret the moment.) So, while maintaining eye contact and just as wordless, I reach my hand into the bag and draw out a cookie. Her eyebrows shoot up (which is the lone thing supporting my it-was-a-challenge theory), and she watches intently as I pop it into my mouth and chew. Then, still a mute, she shrugs her shoulders and leaves the kitchen.

That felt weird, to feel like I won a chemical game of chicken without even a word between us, but I took it as a win, gathered my enchiladas, and went back to the gaming table.

Here was where I began to really draw on what knowledge I had of cannabis experience from the things I’d heard. I was sitting there, hacking apart harpies or whatever our monster of the evening was, when I had the passing thought that maybe I was immune to THC, because I wasn’t feeling anything. So then, naturally, it was precisely then that I noticed the leg warmers I had on my calves.

For the record, I wasn’t actually wearing leg warmers (duh). But it felt like my legs below the knee felt slightly, comfortably compressed, like I was wearing socks made of Heaven’s light; which, actually, is how I picture it too, like my calves were glowing a pale golden color. At the same time, I fell the halo that’s formed around my head, like I’m wearing a headband of the same light, and a number of other sensations all hit my perception at once.

First, do me a favor, and think about where in your mouth your tongue is right now. You know how when you think about it, you can suddenly feel the boundries of your tongue? The grooves of the roof of your mouth, the edges of your teeth, and all that. Mmhm, I had that with my brain. I suddenly felt, in strange detail, the boundary of my brain within my skull. And as I noticed that, it felt like it was subtly waving or pulsing, like a fish splashing out of water, but in super slow-mo.

There was also a bit of sensory overload besides my sense of feel. Colors seemed brighter and more vibrant, smells and tastes were deeper, and I felt like my range of earshot had gained ten or so feet to its radius. It was like my perceptions had all gone up a tick on their respective dials.

But the “paranoia” was where I was glad to have heard about it before. My breathing had quickened and my heart rate was noticeably up, and I could feel all the physical sensations of a mild panic attack, though none of the associated panic or thoughts. It was like my mind was taking a back seat to my body freaking out a bit and thinking, “Huh, is this what people mean when they say they get paranoid?” Some self-conscious thoughts hit me too, like what I must be looking like and a pressure to act normal; but it was like my awareness watched those thoughts float by from an exterior point of view.

By the end of the night, the sensations calmed down and everybody made it home safe, but I always kind of relish that that was my first encounter with the Devil’s Lettuce.

In freakin’ cookies!

Getting Laughs

“Heh heh, I’m funny.”

I don’t think it’s a wild assumption to think most of us have uttered those words at one point or another while spending time with friends or family. And if you think you are, you are. There will be different styles, different audiences our humors are best suited for, different approaches, but most folks have a good sense of humor.

And there’s a reason people pursue comedy as a way to make a living. When a joke hits, when it really hits, it can make you feel like SUCH a SORCEROR.

The first time that comparison really settled on me was at a live performance. My fiance Amanda had scored tickets to the Oddball Comedy Festival down in Mountain View, CA in the Fall of 2016. One of the performers that night was Demetri Martin, and if you don’t know him, he’s almost more of a comedic-one-man-show performer. He uses props, posters, instruments, and one-liners a lot, but this night he delivered a pure stand-up set.

What draws out the sorcerer comparison was his posture. He stood on stage without any props, any music, or much energy at all. He had on a pull-over hoodie, jeans, Vans, and hung out with his hands in his pockets. Straight up, I don’t remember his jokes, but I remember their impact. Whatever he said was so f***ing funny that my body contorted in on itself. You know what a spider looks like when it dies, the way it just withers and its limbs curl in towards the center? My abdomen hurt so much from laughing that I looked like that, only spasming with laughs, too.

I have no interest in being a stand-up performer. Not really much interest in the being The Funny Guy in the group, either. But I enjoy having a sense of humor. And like Mr. Martin demonstrated to me five years ago, when properly sculpted, words have power. Like Friggin’ Magic levels of power. And while I get a good, solid joke to land from time to time that starts a chuckle fit, I recall two moments where it made a palpable difference. On the outside looking in, the moments may not have appeared to be much if anything, and maybe their significance didn’t extend beyond my own perception of them, but…

Well, maybe you’ll see what I mean.

The first time was at an office job I held a few years ago. There was a woman who worked at the company who for the purposes of this we’ll call Olga. Only way I’ve ever found myself able to describe Olga was that she was just…Winter. It sounds overly poetic, and it might be, but it’s fitting, trust me. She was beautiful, for one thing. Her complexion was fair, but light, which isn’t to say “pale.” More like someone with fair skin who’s just come in from the cold. Her nose had a gentle point and was a shade or two more pink than her cheeks, really lending to the cold weather look, and her eyes were a deep, lapis blue that shone against her brunette hair the color of wood bark.

More to the point was her demeanor. She was a quiet person, muted and soft like fallen snow, but there was an icy…hardness to her expression at the same time. She didn’t look mean in that way or unfeeling, in fact it was a bit serene, actually; just a little cold and unreachable from the outside. Like a layer of frost, keeping with the theme here. And reading all this as I lay it out, it almost sounds like I’m making up a person or something. But you have to believe me that a lesser description wouldn’t do Olga justice.

Anyway, already-long-story-shorter, she was walking around the office trying to find something or someone I don’t remember now. I happened to be nearby and mentioned I had recently seen who or whatever she was looking for and offered to lead her to the person or place in question. I’m not always great with silence between myself and a stranger, so I took to small talk. Again, it needs to be noted that to this point we haven’t shared more than a tiny handful of words between us and I’ve never seen her expression break from a gentle neutrality.

Then, I made some joke. I don’t remember what it was about at all, but I remember the impact: Olga chuckled aloud. And not the polite, spare-your-feelings chuckle. It was genuine. (Believe me, I’ve bombed enough attempts at humor to smell the difference a mile away). It was brief, and her expression relaxed into neutrality again some seconds later, but for a moment winter had grown warm.

Like I said, magic.

The next was with a contractor I met while working on my mom’s house a couple years back. For this, we’ll say his name was Richter, because it sounds cool. In short, we had a few items around the house that needed seeing to so that it would clear a pest inspection, dry rot removal, mostly, then some stairs to build and a couple of doors to hang. Richter was similar to Olga in that his neither his expression nor the tenor of his voice rarely broke from a neutral mask. If Olga was Winter, then Richter was Stone: eternal, unmoving, silent.

And to boot, he wore reflective sunglasses.

All. The. Time.

Between his unflinching manner and his literally unreadable eyes, it was a nigh impossible task trying to relate to the guy. And in fairness, I understand. He wants to get in, detail the job, do it, and leave. The bummer is that he ran into me, and if we’re talking, I’m gonna glean a bit of humanity off you, goddammit.

And boy, did I try. Any hobbies? Nope, doesn’t have any. Interest in sports? Doesn’t touch ’em. Been doing construction long? Yeah. Period. What’d he do before this? “Nothing interesting.” Jesus Christ, travel much? Townie, born and raised. I threw jokes at him, and could watch my words glide past or bounce off him with as much impact as a ribbon on damn boulder.

But like the river carves away rock, or like the seasons will sunder stone, one of my jokes got through.

Again, I don’t remember what it was I said, who I ribbed, or the subject matter, but I got him. It wasn’t an out loud chuckle like I’d pulled from Olga, but one of those sharp exhalations through the nose followed by a lasting smile all in lieu of a proper laugh.

With words alone, I had cracked stone.

So there we have it at the end of the day, by the use of Words of Power now long forgotten, I achieved the impossible tasks of bringing warmth to winter and sundering solid rock…just if it didn’t look quite like that from the outside. The borderline between making a genuine human connection through humor however brief and being an annoying asshole can be perilously thin at times, but if the prize for managing that razor’s edge is legitimate magic like the acts heretofore described…

Worth it.

Thoughts on Pain (from a Wizard)

I’ve been binging paperbacks hard this year, and a fair amount of those have been The Dresden Files series. If you’re unfamiliar, it’s a series of novels by Jim Butcher centering around a private investigator in Chicago who’s a wizard. Or it might be more appropriate to say he’s a wizard who works as a private investigator. Either way, it’s great. I had friends recommending the series to me for years until one of them just bought me the first five (there are seventeen so far) and I’ve been cramming them almost constantly ever since.

They’re fun reads.

But you ever have one of those moments with a book that sits you down? That can either mean sits you down on your ass because it took you off your metaphorical feet, or it could mean that it sits you down, puts a hand on your shoulder, and has a talk with you. It’s one of those moments where, for a brief minute, you set aside the story the book is telling you and audibly thank the author by their first name like you’re on that kind of basis with them.

This was one of those.

It was a perspective on life that I realized I’m going to be loosely quoting, paraphrasing, and otherwise referencing in deep talks with others for a while, if not the rest of my days on this earth. And I won’t lie, I had expected something like that to come out of ‘The Art of War,’ or ‘The Book of Five Rings,’ or ‘The Alchemist’ (which is also good), or something. Not necessarily a novel about wizards, zombies, vampires, angels, warlocks, and all the rest.

I’m going to put the excerpt here, in all its glory. It’s out of the ninth book in the series, ‘White Night,’ pg. 307-309 if you nab the edition published by ROC. (I don’t know if there are other “editions,” it just sounded fancier to say that way.)

“The wisdom, maybe, was still in process, as evidenced by her choice of first lovers, but even as an adult, I was hardly in a position to cast stones, as evidenced by my pretty much everything.

What we hadn’t known about, back then, was pain.

Sure, we’d faced some things as children that a lot of kids don’t. Sure, Justin had qualified for his Junior de Sade badge in his teaching methods for dealing with pain. We still hadn’t learned, though, that growing up is all about getting hurt. And then getting over it. You hurt. You recover. You move on. Odds are pretty good you’re just going to get hurt again. But each time, you learn something.

Each time, you come out of it a little stronger, and at some point you realize that there are more flavors of pain than coffee. There’s the little empty pain of leaving something behind – graduating, taking the next step forward, walking out of something familiar and safe into the unknown. There’s the big, whirling pain of life upending all of your plans and expectations. There’s the sharp little pains of failure, and the more obscure aches of successes that didn’t give you what you thought they would. There are the vicious, stabbing pains of hopes being torn up. The sweet little pains of finding others, giving them your love, and taking joy in their life as they grow and learn. There’s the steady pain of empathy that you shrug off so you can stand beside a wounded friend and help them bear their burdens.

And if you’re very, very lucky, there are the very few blazing hot little pains you feel when you realize that you are standing in a moment of utter perfection, an instant of triumph, or happiness, or mirth which at the same time cannot possibly last – and yet will remain with you for life.

Everyone is down on pain, because they forget something important about it: Pain is for the living. Only the dead don’t feel it.

Pain is a part of life. Sometimes it’s a big part, and sometimes it isn’t, but either way, it’s part of the big puzzle, the deep music, the great game. Pain does two things: It teaches you, tells you that you’re alive. Then it passes away and leaves you changed. It leaves you wiser, sometimes. Sometimes it leaves you stronger. Either way, pain leaves its mark, and everything important that will ever happen to you in life is going to involve it in one degree or another.”

God. Damn.

Thanks, Jim.