Baggravation to Jumblepie

      In my continuing quest to determine how life is affected by changes in the language, I examined new entries in the dictionary.  Some of them play on me directly; others do not, but I am always ready to assess my personal station in life.  Like most of us, I have experienced “baggravation,” the feeling of annoyance and frustration at the airport when your baggage has not arrived but the other passengers' bags have.

      Most of my life I was a “nonliner;” the only line was a “party line” so I was never a “screenager.”  I learned etiquette so I didn’t have to learn “netiquette.  I was a “recessionist” dressing stylishly on a tight budget but didn’t know it. We just thought it was the sensible thing to do.  I was once a “smirt,” a smoking flirt, but fortunately never a “slumdog.”

     

      I have learned that I am a “netizen.”  We are told we live in a “meritocracy,” where individual effort determines one’s success; but we then are labeled as part of the “overworking class,” a desire or need to work long hours.  Isn’t there a Catch 22 there?  Many of us are in the “sandwich generation,” who care for their children and their elderly parents.  I split that duty, but I remember when I couldn’t keep a couple of teenagers in sandwiches.  Maybe it is because they never got to be “screenagers” more interested in their computers than food.

      I have always said that I am a vegetarian unless there is meat, poultry or fish around.  Now I find out I am a “Flexitarian.”  I thought I was layed off, let go, fired, not invited back, or at least retired, but what really happened is that I was “decruited.”  My generation had “near beer;” this generation has “mocktails.”  That must be some form of “bartini” that you can only get at “Shirley’s Temple’s.”

      I have been waiting for my first “greycation,” going on holiday or vacation with grandparents in order to reduce the cost.  I hope that would be my cost.  As it is I am relegated to “staycations.”  I thought I would go to a hotspot.  Now, I find out there are “hotspots” and “notspots.”  Hot spots used to be great night clubs, and I thought “notspots were the place in the brain where “senior moments” occur.

      Some words catch on others don’t, “Dramedy,” and “Infotainment” have great appeal but “infoetry” has yet to catch on. I wonder why.  “My son Drew learned this at an early age.  In the era of the Six Million Dollar Man his word “gionic” for big and strong didn’t make it.  He thought if we have an armpit, we should have a “kneepit.”  You haven’t heard runners using that one much.  I do give him credit though for once describing “bling-bling” as ebonomatopoeia.

      Not all new words are new or improved.  “Infomaniacs” are constantly checking and responding to email and text messages. It was easier when infomaniacs were just the geeks among us.  We are in the “Noughties,” the years between 2000 and 2009 which contain a 'nought' (zero) like the 'thirties', 'sixties', etc.  More creative use of that term was made when it referred to ladies’ lacey underwear, or better yet to the women who wore them. “Buskers” are performers on the streets and other public places while soliciting donations. I think we called them hookers.  Yes, I took license with that one, but hookers have been known to sing, play and juggle.

      During staycations I go to restaurants that have “jumbrellas.”  If things keep enlarging, will we soon be seeing “Jumbrian” immigrants, immense fellows from central Italy or “jumbrage,” taking great offense at something?   Will jumbilical be the condition of having a humungous belly button?  I better get out of this or I might be eating jumblepie. These are hardly serious questions and certainly deserve less than serious answers.  I would love to hear your best.

“Baggravation to Jumblepie”

Copyright © 2010 Michael J. McCabe

All Right Reserved.

Seeds in the Garden

God sows seeds of joy

in my heart

Everlasting joy

to nurture

          acceptance

love

Tend the shoots

care

understanding

Tend my garden

with the hands

                of the Father.

Brought to full bloom 

Still

the fruit

of my labor

            withers and dies.

So shall the laborer.

Only

to be reborn

in

My Father’s garden.

God Plays With Us - A Brief Encounter

There is a scene from the story “Out of Africa” in which Karen Blixen, played by Meryl Streep in the movie, gets one of life’s messages from her manservant, Farrah.  She has set out on a three month trip to take supplies to the army on the border. 

One night mid-trip while lying by the fire in the middle of the wilderness she confesses to Farrah, “I may have gotten us lost.”  He leans up onto his elbow and replies, “God is great Memsahib; He plays with us.”  God does play with us, and He has creative ways of applying the rules of the game. 

If I were to tell you that this encounter happened to my friend Jason, you would choose to assume a ruse and place me into the story instead.  Such scenes are played in movies and books in which a character seeks advice from another claiming it is for a friend.  The audience knows the reality of the scene, but this actually is Jason’s story.

Jason had a party to attend and was anticipating the Friday night out.  He has been widowed for years.  He’s been “out there,” as some are apt to call it.  He has been on numerous dates and “dumped” twice.  He has begun to believe that he is destined to live the rest of his life alone.  Jason once told me that “God places women in my path, and then teaches them to dodge.”

He has reconstructed his life; Jason is successful, affable, and confident except maybe when it comes to understanding women.  He knows himself and his path.  The trauma of his wife’s death and his Christian beliefs combine to create a sense of clarity that men his age strive to have.  It was while we were seeking our individual paths that we met and formed a common bond.  In brief Jason knows who he is, what he wants, and where he is heading.

That particular evening he was heading to the local supermarket to get something for the party, and while there he decided to stage a brief shopping foray.  Somewhere between the meat counter and the frozen food section he became aware of her.  She had a quiet mien and was as beautiful as she was tall.  She possessed a casual self-assurance without any artifice.  As a bonus she was of “mature” age.  She was a goddess in denim, and he was smitten.

Jason continued his mission winding through the aisles with heightened peripheral attention.  Still, he lost track of her and eventually moved to the checkout counter.  He told me later that he was half-way out the door when he decided to go back.  He had to meet her. 

He headed to the left in the direction she had been shopping and spied her in the bakery section. Jason decided that she would likely exit past the deli and that he would intercept her there.  Stationing himself before the lunch meat counter, he waited.  He thought that his was a good plan except that having already checked out he was holding a bag in each hand.  He wished that he had thought at least to ask for paper to better appeal to an earthy quality in the goddess.

Jason has the knack of knowing what to say; but this time he was ill prepared for what was to come.  When the goddess arrived it was she who first spoke to him.  Startled, he fumbled the ball and mumbled something about the party and the deli meats.  He was further unsettled when he saw what he had missed earlier, the slimmest of bands around her left hand ring finger.  Without hesitation, for at his age there is no time to lose, he queried, “Is that a wedding ring?”

“Yes, it is,” she responded with a nervous laugh.

Undaunted, “So, you are married?”

 

“Not exactly” the reply again accompanied with the giggle.

When she replied that she “not exactly married” Jason took a flying leap of faith and jumped in with “Do you want to be?  I can skip the party, cancel tomorrow’s meeting, and we can be in Vegas by morning.  With an afternoon wedding and an overnight honeymoon we can be back Sunday in time for church.”

When he told me this I thought, “That has to be the most creative pickup line ever.”  Jason tells me lots of things only some of which I choose to believe.  He once said a magazine article included grocery stores in the top ten places to meet the opposite sex.  I must be starting to believe him because I have been eating more. 

Jason’s hope, placed in his intuition and brash approach, soared as the goddess replied, “That is a wonderful offer, and the part about being back Sunday for church is particularly appealing.”  Jason’s heart raced only to crash with, “But I have to decline because though I am not married in the conventional sense, without meaning to, I have misled you. I am married, married to Jesus.  I am a nun.” He had met another dodger. 

God is great.  

He plays with us.

“God Plays With Us - A Brief Encounter”

Copyright 2006 © Michael J. McCabe.

All rights reserved.

Seeds of Joy

Plant seeds of joy in your life. 

Sow them in the lives of others.

* * * * *

Sometimes we scatter seed broadly, not knowing where it will land. 

      A television commercial showed a man and woman walking side-by-side in a park, trailing a short distance behind an elderly couple.  It was autumn and the older couple, holding hands, strolled in the measured steps of their companionship.  The younger couple walking more briskly approached their elders and separated, glancing over as they passed.  Rejoining they clasped hands and slowed their pace. 

      I have forgotten what the advertisers were selling, but to me they conveyed the need for the connection and contentment portrayed in the relationship of the elderly lovers.

* * * * *

At other times we place a single seed into a specific spot.

      A young man and woman walked hand-in-hand into the discount hotel.  He went to the desk, she to a couch in the tiny lobby.  As I passed him, I stopped and said, “Never quit holding hands when you walk together; you'll come to regret the moment you did.”  Diffidently, he nodded in response; then his eyes opened with a hint of recognition.  Later, I saw them leave to their room, her hand folded into his.

     Will he remember that moment in years to come?  Perhaps, but moments later the event may have been forgotten or attributed to the eccentric ravings of a stranger.  Yet maybe, just maybe, a seed of joy was sown.

* * * * *

We are but moments in each other’s lives.  Sow positive moments.

      The young professional strode down the concourse of the Kansas City convention center carrying a large stuffed bear that I imagined she had won in a raffle.  Her face blushed with the glee of the child in her, and she wore a tinge of embarrassment that adorned her glow.  If only she knew of her beauty in that moment and how her presence touched me.  Unknowingly, she had sown a seed of joy in my heart.

* * * * *

"Seeds of Joy"

Copyright © 2010
Michael J. McCabe

All Rights Reserved

The Journey

 Today's post includes the third in the trilogy of poems taken from “The Journey” collection.   Each was written in response to an experience at the beach.  The first, Beach Walk, about Cat was written in 2005 at Mission Beach, San Diego, Beach Ride at Klalaloch Beach, pronounced Klay-Lock, on the Washington Coast in 2007; and Beyond the Beach  I wrote for BJ this year at Moonlight Beach in Encinitas, California.  Each is a touchstone on the byways of my journey over the last seven years.

Beach Walk

Days have turned twice through the seasons,

but seasons of sorrow have an order of their own.

Winter endures beyond its snows

blanketing my heart.

I walk alone.

Like a wisp of her hair, a dawn breeze

brushes my face touching the moment.

The thought of her smile draws back

the curtain of my memory slowing my pace.

I walk back in time.

A rising fog offering a summer sky

lifts me into the present.

I let her go

until we walk together.

I walk on.

Beach Ride

I ride on the edge of the world.

A rising tide laps at my wheels

like a spaniel at my feet.

An endless line of cedars silhouetted

against the eastern sky points to the future.

At their feet lay a jumble of giant pickup sticks

strewn by the sea as testament to its might.

An open sky is punctuated

by the occasional winged hunt for breakfast.

Into it the towering candle

of the Destruction Island lighthouse

stands sentinel warning ships of disaster,

but who is there to warn me?

The broad expanse of the beach beckons,

but with no trail marked.

The sand, washed smooth by the night tide,

is devoid of track or print.

My path is limited only

by the hazards of soft sand and the ocean.

I must choose.

Beyond the Beach

Consumed by endless tides

The sand slips away unseen

Beckoned by time.

I walk back into the future.

In the atlas of my mind

I bolt over the miles

Seeking your presence.

You are my destination.

Away from the setting sun

I journey into new moments

Buoyed by the light of your spirit.

My path is straight.

My heart leaps across a desert

Shrouded by the pale of nightfall

Closing on the past.

I am going home.

From the visages of yesterdays

I emerge to embrace you

To be swathed in love.

“Beach Trilogy”

From The Journey

Copyright © Michael J. McCabe

All Rights Reserved



Hardcopy

Yesterday, I posted a blog link in Facebook that stated, "You have heard of ‘Infomercials;’ I think I may have created the first instance of the genre ‘Infoetry,’ though it is decent information but bad poetry." In retrospect I realized that I have been using this genre for years and with reasonable effectiveness. This infoetry thing might just catch on. I have included some examples though some will take explanation.

"Sluffeed": A note sent to Jon re getting roped into a leadership position

Some definitions:
     Sluff: verb, to dispose or get rid of, avoid work,
     Sluffer: noun, one who dumps a task on another
     Sluffee: noun, the person who got the task (got dumped on; whoops – got the job)

      Sluffeed
(Or how I Became the Sluffee)

I chose to join to see what I’d see,
     Though the video wasn’t but sound in a box.

Biding my time, low profile that’s me;
     Cagey I thought to use my e-mox.

Little did I know, there the Sluffer would be.
     Gaining my trust to me outfox.

The leader now he wants me to be
     To see with me how his group rocks.

Sure enough, I became the Sluffee;
     And I could ‘a stayed home with my Net Cox.
                    ~ Mr. Sluff-a-luff-a-guess


This was a note to a fellow teacher on borrowing and returning one of her laptops in her absence. I needed it for a Creighton Education Association meeting. The computer was #3, and the note begins with the date.
　
The Borrowed Computer

Two Twenty Six O Three
     +
Mc & CEA = #3

Purloined again
     Without remorse
Returned in the a.m.
     Promptly of course.
               --Michael


An Emmaus R.S.V.P


Ah Janet, you're so on top of it.
Soup ‘n salad is just the right fit.
You lead our tribe with a gentle flair,
Nudging us forward with agape care.

To meet March 8th would be great;
Let's make it an Emmaus date.
Coffee, too, I will bring
Beause you know, I need it to sing

The singing sessions are truly fine
And fit right in after we dine,
But games? Aghast! Oh no!
'Taint a Tupperware party, don’t you know.

To you ladies they’re a delight,
But to the guys they’re another fright.
Save us from that ceremony;
Leave more time for testimony.

We can listen to Eloise and Laurie,
As each has a turn to share their story
While the reflections of Todd and Paul
Can regale our midst as they tell all.

These are my thoughts on the Emmaus gathering
Though to no one else it might be mattering,
And even if I can’t avoid that game,
I will be there just the same.
               ~ Michael


A thank you note to a techie at work:

Up on the Desktop


When what to my wondering eyes did appear,
But a phone on my desk through which I could hear
Those messages so frequent as part of my employment,
To be answered so swiftly for my colleagues enjoyment.

Santa came early, so stealthy it seems
That from ear to ear my smile just beams.
Not in my wildest dreams did I expect such a prize;
Caught without knowing, you took me by surprise.

Tim, thank you so much, you Wichita lineman,
In spite of my cajoling you are quite a fine man.
Installed lickity-split, I’m happy indeed;
The phone on my desk will increase my phone speed.

And you’ll hear me exclaim as I drive out of sight
My phone’s on my desk, and it sits there just right.
May you be equally blessed this holiday season
For just who you are, if for no other reason.

               Merry Christmas,
               ~ Michael

So, maybe there is something to this "infoetry." In our world of mass communications we are beset daily with more information, requests and messages than we can count. Cell phones, texting, Facebook, Twitter, instant messaging, e-cards, and Utube, plus traditional the media of newspapers, magazines, radio, and TV barrage us with messages, sound bites and images. Facebook alone provides a constant influx of information often created not by the person posting it, but by someone else who is generally unknown to us.

We are competing for each other’s attention in our work places, organizations and even in our relationships. Families, friends and certainly colleagues are now spread not just across the country but around the world. Gaining some else’s attention much less interest in what is important to us is becoming increasingly difficult. Yet, there are other ways, some of which are very traditional.

I know of a P.E. teacher who hand wrote all her messages. They were so beautiful that teachers would keep them hanging on their walls long after the content of the message was relevant. She never had difficulty getting others to attend to her concerns. My way is to write jingles or what I call ditties. One man I know buys desktop calendar pads on different interests. He sends notes on the backs of "Far Side" cartoons, mini crossword puzzles, or golf tips. These are devices to get someone’s attention, and they work; but they are only attention-getters. It is still the message that counts. What if the medium itself could convey a message as important as what is written? Wouldn’t that be worth your time?

Remember the "letter"? How special it has become to receive a printed card and even more so to get a letter. Receiving a hand-made card is now a rarity in most of our lives. Each of the mediums described earlier can send the same content, but the very nature of the card or letter conveys the message that you care. You took the time and effort to buy or make, write, stamp, and send the message. It is written by your hand in your own handwriting.

You might argue about the quality of your penmanship, but believe me, upon receipt no one cares about that. You may have had to go to the store to get a card or buy stamps; you may have had to walk to all the way to the mailbox or drive to the post office. You wrote the message and maybe rewrote it. Each of these time consuming acts in our busy lives connotes care or concern and love for the recipient of the message. As Hallmark used to say, "You care enough to send the very best."

The real meaning of "the very best" is your time and effort in personalizing a message. You may not know calligraphy or be an infoet, but you can make someone’s day by just sending a message in what we now almost derisively refer to as hard copy. Is this important? I can tell for certain that it is. My daughter-in-law’s birthday just passed, and I didn’t send her a card. Try that writer’s guilt trip on for size.

The weekend is approaching; take the time to send someone a message that by the very act of doing so says, "I care about you." "I love you." Take the time to make someone’s day. You will be glad you did. You will love the result. You have the time. I know you are "busy," but you have the time; you really do.  

Can You RaeD Tihs?

For those of you concerned about your own spelling and the skills being developed by the younger generation through their text messaging read this:

i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg.  The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheeardh sduty at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't maetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a srod are, the olny improamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae.  The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm.  Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a slohe.  Azanmig huh?  Yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt.

You can see more of this at: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=219x10196

Curriously, this sign was found at Sidney Sussex College in Cambridge.

Now taht gveis me pusae to tnhik.

Is it time to start worrying yet? 

I Said It. Didn't You Hear Me?

I said what I meant.  Why can’t you understand me? Well, at least I thought I said what I meant.

      Speaking and listening should be an easy, obvious interchange of the language.  Oh yeah!  Try that one your spouse, girl or boy friend, kids, or better yet mother-in-law.  Try listening to a politician.   Remember Alan Greenspan?  Wasn’t he perfectly clear in everything he said?

      Communication should be easy, but the obvious part?  That definitely is obviously NOT.  The interplay of conversation though intended to be direct seldom is so.  There are just too many variables.  Look at the following combinations of just a one-way conversation.

I said . . . You heard.

I thought I said . . . You thought you heard.                         

I meant . . . You thought I meant.

      There are nine combinations here, and eight of them lead to miscommunication.  There is only an 11% chance of communicating in a single statement.  That is not real reassuring.  Communicating in this context means “common understanding.”  When engaged in a dialogue of two statements the chances double, or is it triple?  I am a writer not a statistician. 

      The point is that in on-going conversations the opportunities for misunderstanding expand astronomically.  This does not even take into consideration differences in background, region, experience, expectations, much less gender.  Yes, folks there are gender differences in how we listen just like there are cultural differences.  There are at least a gazillion influences that can facilitate or impede our understanding of each other.  I imagine that gender inclusion will raise some hackles.  That's probably fodder for another post.

Don’t you wonder how people ever communicate at all?  Consider the following:

You heard what I said.  OR

You heard what you thought I said.   OR

You heard what you thought I meant.

You heard what I said … possibly.

You heard what you thought I said … likely.

You heard what you thought I meant … even more likely.

You heard what I said, 

            but thought I meant something else 

                         for whatever reason.

I thought I said what I meant, 

            but I didn’t; and            

                          you only heard what I said.

You heard what I thought I said

            and meant, and

                          you thought what I said is what I meant.                                                              

Can you spell blue moon?  . . .

Can            you          imagine
trying    to         communicate
               solely            through 
the      written            word?

Scary thought, isn’t it?

Have a great day communicating out there.

It makes me wonder, "Why is it that I became a writer? 

“I Said It. Didn’t You Hear Me?”

Copyright © 2010  Michael J. McCabe

All Rights Reserved

The Mantle

There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its hands.

You seek problems because you need their gifts. ~ Richard Bach

     

     Two teachers arrived at school on a Monday morning.  Each had contended the previous week with classes too large, changing schedules, interruptions, a demanding principal, and the burden of the paperwork of description, compliance and accountability.  Compounding the expectations was the press of challenges the children brought with them to school.   It was an old tape: too many kids, too little time, too many problems, and too few resources.

      Ms. Grumper groused that it certainly would be another week of problems complete with fussing, fuming and frustration.  “School isn’t what it used to be,” she railed.  “I don’t know how I can get done everything they expect me to do.”  So what’s new?  Teachers never do.  “The kids today don’t act like kids used to act,” meaning they aren’t as polite and respectful to her and she doesn’t like them.  I don’t wonder why.  Her glass was half empty, drained by her past.

      Ms. Joy asked herself, “What will my children need this week?  What can I do to reach them?”  She saw problems as challenges to be surpassed in creating an environment in which her charges would thrive.  “How can I shield them from the demands and constraints and help them learn?”  “Which ones will need my healing touch today so they just can have a chance to learn?”  Her glass was full of the present.

      The two worked in the same school with the same problems.  Each made a choice about how to start her day.  One donned the mantle of teacher and became a teacher; one did not.  She chose to remain a cynic.  That it was Ms. Joy who decided to star in her role as teacher is evident.  Equally evident is the likely outcome of each of their days.

      We are not all teachers; we are not even all actively engaged in the workplace, but each of us has a role to play in the drama of life.  Each of us has the same choice to make about our day.  Our choices are influenced by the roles we play.  Most of us have multiple roles that are at times in conflict: worker-spouse-parent, student-athlete-child, volunteer, coach, sponsor, participant, caregiver, or patient.   We also take on roles arising from our experiences: strife, success, failure, leader, victim, widow, doer, listener.  Conflicting roles can challenge us in the choices we make.

      Each day we arise to the newness of the opportunities before us.  The joys and challenges of the previous day are written in our life-book and are not to be rewritten.  We may edit them in our memories, but they remain unchanged. We can create illusions of new editions to cloud our regret, guilt, or pain; but we cannot press life’s delete key and erase our memory. 

      Like it or not, rewritten or not, we carry into the day our memories of who we are, who we have been and how we have been.  We carry into each day the multiple roles we play and the conflicts and emotions they bring.  How we respond to that is the challenge.  What is new each day is who we can be and how we can be.  What is renewed is our opportunity to be a star. 

      We are the stars of our own life.  Each day is another opportunity to accept our yesterdays as nothing but practice, and to star in in today’s performance. 

      The day may be set with problems; that is a normal course of events.  Whether we view problems as problems or as challenges, we need them because it is through them that we have the opportunity to learn and to grow as humans.  Otherwise, the days remain humdrum, and we remain stagnant in our complacency.  Life does not become boring, but people can.

      Greet the day as the new opportunity to learn and grow that it is.  Don the mantle of your role; and be in the moments of your day.  Be alive.  Be a star.  For this day quickly will end and be relegated only to your memory. 

*    Bach, R. (1977). Illusions: the adventures of a reluctant messiah. New York: Delacorte Press.

The Mantle

Copyright © 2010 Michael J. McCabe

All Rights Reserved.

Labor Day

The problem with doing nothing is not knowing when you're finished. ~ Benjamin Franklin

I celebrated Labor Day, yesterday, by not laboring though I confess I did attend to a minor repair. Work is engrained in my psyche; I have worked for over half a century. It is hard to imagine not working. Americans are known for their exceptional work ethic. We put more hours into our work weeks than most western countries. It is not wonder that we accomplish so much; we work at it.

I have spent considerable time in Iowa and have always appreciated the labor of love that farming demands. The Puritan work ethic is alive and well. Iowans and their mid-western neighbors are known for their hard work so I was surprised when I observed the teenage girl in the following ditty. On this day you return to your labors I tought you might enjoy it.

To re-interpret Ben, she wasn’t doing nothing, but then again she wasn’t hurrying to finish.


The Adventures of a Reluctant Busser

Seven ladies sat at brunch,
          ready to make their leave.
Seve quarters, ‘twas my hunch,
          appeared from seven sleeves.

The waitress worked dutifully hard
          E’en knowing her tip would be small;
But the busser served with glum disregard
          as though she was paid not at all.

She sauntered about, a cyclone not she
          though her I-State shirt read so.
Her pants and laces flopped to her knee,
          and get up and gone was her go.

First trip, two plates; three cups on the second,
three glasses and syrups through four.
Trip five, two glasses, less on six I reckon,
one item per hand not more.

One final excursion, two napkins, a plate,
          a record setting trip I feared.
To the kitchen she went not too soon or too late;
          the table she finally cleared.

Seven trips it took to bus the table,
          one for each lady it seemed.
Hurrying not though apparently able,
          she was the dishwasher, too, I deemed.


Observations in an Iowa Café


"The Adventures of a Reluctant Busser"
Copyright © Michael J. McCabe, 2004
All rights reserved.