Dealing with Traffic

I lost my bank card today. It's not a big deal since I had only used it once and that was just to see if it worked. It certainly wasn't as bad as losing my keys with my security password generator thing which according to a vaguely remembered news byte claimed that this extra security feature was breakable anyway. Then again, I had only used that once too. I'm starting to sound like a scattered loser of things. Perhaps that is true, but the bank card isn't really lost; I know where it is. It's just lost to me. It's a little like my american bank account. It's still there but that bank card expired sometime this summer. But that's a different story.

This bank card is stuck in a ATM in Marina mall. It didn't seem to like that I used the wrong pin number. I guess it's not that great a loss really. But it is a bit disconcerting. It's Eid or at least one of them. The one that follows Ramadan by a month or two. I'm a bad tourist. I should know more about these things. I know that Eid means festival but that's it. Anyway, my local bank won't be open until after Eid. So no local money for me. Probably for the best, really.

I came to the mall to shop for furniture. My place is as spartan as they come. Bugs don't even stick around because it's not welcoming enough. Even though it's mostly empty, my kitchen is well stocked: knives, stainless steal pots, convection-microwave oven, pie plates, rice cooker, fresh vegetables, flour, tins of tomatoes, spices.... I don't have a set of dishes though. I have been making-do. Aside from making pies, the pie plates have been used as my dinner plates. I do have a table and chairs to eat on. I have exactly two forks, two spoons, and two dining knives which forces me to do dishes regularly.

Well, I guess where I'm going with this is that I'm a make-do kind of guy and one who puts off purchases until they're needed concretely. I like to cook so I stocked my kitchen. I like to cook from scratch so I need some things. My gas stove is a bit flaky (perhaps I should have spent more that 50 dirhams on a stove--that's under 15 dollars), so I wanted a more reliable way to make pies--hence the convection-microwave oven.

Perhaps this is not really about being a make-do guy and more about being careless or carefree. It's funny how you know people's intents by their choice of words. Careless says, "shame on you." Carefree says, "aren't you healthily chilled out." Perspective is everything. One take is overly critical, the other is too generous. Maybe their needs more neutral choices that leaves judgement out. Or perhaps it's better to simply not get too attached with connotations and let context fill in the meaning.

What draws us in to judging everything? Was losing my bank card for the best? No. Really that's just a coping mechanism. Realistically, I should have commented simply that it is better to not get caught up in the frenzy of shopping. The best? That's too extreme. Our minds seem hard-wired to polarize. It seems that simplifying everything down to this-or-that, yes-or-no helps us deal with the world. The real world of grays leaves us in a car without streets--our lives would degenerate into a crazed smash-up derby. Everyone wants the constraints of streets so that we can say, "Are you going my way or the opposite way?" The discrete choices define us. Without our streets, our shared directions, with-or-against, we would be amoebas: shapeless adrift in a world beyond understanding.

Then again, these streets aren't real. Perhaps our lives need a little off-roading from time to time. Maybe just as much as we need to have the streets of society to function among the teeming hordes, we also need to disengage from society's grid of rules and understandings and just be. Influences, implied restrictions, conventions, projected judgements, and the lot need to be left behind and an open expanse explored and experienced.

Like everything, it's about balance. Living on the boundary, comfortable in either realm, playing hopscotching leaping between society's impositions and community and reality's chaos and freedom. Yin and Yang.

Although I must put off my nesting plans of constructing a bat-cave, where I can hide from the pressures of the unreal rules that people live by. After Eid, I'm sure that Ikea will still have a desk, a chair, and a pseudo-avant garde light fixture that says, "whoa deep." Now, I will just have to sit back and spend my limited, though ample, funds on coffee and watch the hordes feasting and dancing around their consumeristic idols.

As long as I don't lose my keys again, all will be well till my local bank grants me access to my money. I'm sure they will chide me about being more careful with my new card. Soon, I too will join in this dance, plastic in hand. Until then, I remain outside, looking in; sober amidst the drunk; a pedestrian J-walking with cars.

My bat cave

I've been toying with developing a bat cave. My own space where I can do research and work on my stuff. My need for a bat cave has to do with shutting out the world. Should I call it my fortress of solitude, instead? Perhaps since I probably won't be engaging in heroic feats, I need to dump epic theme. Or is it the secret theme that my subconscious is in tune with? Maybe I should dub my space the bat caveat. It sounds more french but caveat is not a small cave, it's a warning. I wonder what kind of warning, though? Your echolocation won't work in here? The belfry is full? I'm bat shit crazy? Or perhaps it would be more apt to tone down this connection. It'll be more of a mouse grotto where thoughts don't take flight and instead of bat shit I'll have mouse turds. Lower highs but higher lows. Mediocrity lives here. Sigh.

I think I'll keep the blindness of the bat and the might of the mouse. I shall dub my den the "mole hole". Hidden from sight, where I can dig at the truth of things blindly. A male mole is a boar. I, too, will be a bore. When I retire to my mole hole, I will dig deeply under the streets and find the forgotten and discarded and bring it to the light of day.

Probably, my mole hole idea needs some time to ferment and then join my atm card in the lost void of "one day..." I'll end up with a pressboard boxy desk, a swivel chair designed to look good but cripple its occupant, and a grey ink jet printer with no ink. Maybe it'll be decorated with a poster of bathroom wall; moldy white tiles--bland dinginess without the associated health issues. Perhaps in a corner there will be an empty water cooler that is still plugged in to the wall. Visitors will look in and say, "I have a home office too". At some point I will have a luke-warm home office warming party. I'll time it so that all the balloon decorations are half deflated and the potato chips are stale and the beer is warm. But the lacklusterest of all will be the wash of fluorescent lights.

Then after the party I can leave it as a shrine devoted to decay and half heartedness; a dilapidated dust bunny ranch that will fool me every other month into sitting down and putting in some work before I remember that the printer is out of ink. I'll write a little stick em' note and just before I put it on the wall, I'll see there is already a few there that say the same thing. The de-motivational message will hit home and I'll close up the ranch for another season of disuse.

Perhaps I'll just on work on the kitchen table.

Another failed dream

Nothing says failed dream like home gym equipment. It's amazing how something that sounds so promising can be so misguided. Imagine staying fit in the comfort of your own home. Let's say you are home and need a bit of a tummy tightening, a quick 5k, or perhaps a 30min cardio break. No problem. You've got your overpriced weird looking contraption that was paid for by 12 easy payments.

Wrong. Don't be a sucker. There are no gimmicks. You can't make staying fit easy. It is not a pill you take that burns off all your worries. Exercise is work. You don't want to make it easy. It'll defeat the purpose. You need to make it hard otherwise there is no benefit. Your muscles need to engage and sweat and get fatigued.

The key is not the device but the reward for the work. It's about the meaning of effort. It should not be too many steps removed from your actions. Otherwise you can short circuit the whole thing. 20 sit-ups for a cup cake? Why not stop at 10 and have 2 cupcakes? I like somewhat more authentic activities where I bike 5 miles for a coffee and a bagel. There's a logic to it that it is too hard to self negotiate with. You can't stop short since you won't be at the coffee place.

I used to bike to work. It was great. My only other option was to walk so I stayed in shape. This worked for me. Of course, I had to deal with sweat and other issues but it was worth it. Now, my workable fitness plan is dead. I moved to a life-draining desert and my bike was stolen not that it would do much good here--at least not for commuting. My weekly soccer and basketball pickup games dried-up. So now, I'm mooching rides to work and staring at my softening Budha bulge slowly swallow my belly button.

Desperately lethargic, I'm now grasping at a false hope since it is better than having no hope. I understand its pitfalls and its misconceptions. But I'd rather grasp at straws than for a remote. I have a new-to-me broken elliptical machine that is now dominating my apartment. There are many issues that doom this initiative. Without an intrinsic purpose, it'll be like the sit-ups. I wish I could have a dead man switch attached to it so that if I fall short of some desirable rate that sudden the video I'm watching pauses. It wouldn't be that hard to do but it does require a number of things that aren't in place: a sensor for the elliptical, a means of setting a desirable rate, a means of sending a message to a dvd player, and most of all a dvd player that would listen to messages that can be sent in the fashion. I guess a number of these steps can be made simpler by using an iPad and some bluetooth signalling, but still, it's hardly a weekend project.

I guess if I can fix this machine so that it isn't broken, then I will just have to somehow get my willpower on board so that I can save my belly button from its demise. The only other possibility that I have been working on is getting some new blades which apparently means that I will need to work on stopping with out the back break. The only descent blades here don't have back breaks... I guess my best option is to live the dream of never stopping.

Who would have guessed that trying to stay in shape would be such a nightmare of pitfalls?

Ghosts of gatherings past

I was having some thoughts about how sometimes previous gatherings affects current gatherings. For instance, some people manipulate situations to try recreate a previous gathering. In a way, it's like ghosts floating around that only a few people are aware of. These sensitive mystics react to things that aren't there or perhaps can prevent bad outcomes.

This is my proposal for the next challenge: something related to Ghosts of gatherings past. Take it where you want to go.

The portrait

Her hands gently caressed the head and arms of the plush toy laid out at the end of the bed. She paused, for a moment, as if to lift the lifeless being placed in her care. Her eyes, glazed over, instead looked up to see that I had entered the room.

"Hello," I muttered. "How are you feeling today?" I questioned. There was no reply. There had not been a reply for years though it did not matter. I felt the body language was enough to communicate some sort of feeling.

I walked past the antique armoir and stopped at the pictures lined up on the top shelf of the in-laid desk. There were so many; remarkably many people who had come and gone in her life. One picture in particular always caught my eye everytime I paid a visit. A young man, dressed in a World War II uniform, with silent eyes and inauspicious smile. I knew this picture had been taken during the war due to the signature and date written across the bottom left hand corner.

Today the picture left a sense of foreboding. She had often talked about the man in a favourable light. The correspondence during these years was always intriguing to me. Even enlightening. Now, the silent eyes looked back at her in the dim light as her hands reached out in what felt to be the barenness of this seclusion.

I decided at that moment to place the portrait at the back of the shelf. I then walked over to the bed and in customary habit, kissed her ashen, delicate cheek.

Retirement

I knew the day was coming.  It was inevitable.   All that time... round round it went.  It felt like I was going to be breaking up the team.  Then again, it should probably should have happened a long time ago.

It is funny how at the beginning you never really think the end is around the corner. You're too caught up in the moment.  Sure everyone knows that nothing last forever.  It's a process of slow erosion.  Then you start to notice things start to slip. The first few times you can explain it away.  But after a while it becomes all too clear. People help you dance around the truth.  They'll say things like you got a few good miles left. But there is something no one can dance around.  One word that is unavoidable: balding.  A sign of wear and tear, or simply age.

It didn't have to be emotional.  Sure, the first thing on everyone's mind is money.  But I had planned ahead.  By putting a little away each month, I was ready.  It's amazing how quickly it adds up.  There was a bit of knot in my throat when I thought of the money.  Everyone always says you can live with less money.  Maybe it wasn't the money.  Maybe it was more the feeling of loss.

Retirement.  After all those years, I was finally retiring my car.  Too many miles on those original tires.  Probably it was best to think about my tires for what they had given me:  no flats.

Retirement

Due to the recent news of the retirement of my mother-in-law, I decided that the next blog challenge should be dedicated to her. Happy writing!

The Visit

"Barney" she announced. Is that a treat? I wonder. I start to salavate and the uncontrollable tail wagging begins. I bound for the kitchen mat and wait in anticipation.

This was definitely my favourite spot in the whole house. On this very mat I could catch mid-air tiny scraps of meat and vegetables which always impressed the owners. And let's not forget the unrelenting praise and ear scratching received at this very spot. Yes, this place was the congregation area for the entire family; here I would find the answer to the daunting declaration that had made my owner so excitable.

Once more I hear the word "Barney." And then she moves quickly for the front door. Again, I leap to the mat in the hallway where I can look out the tiny window at the bottom of the door.

I loved this mat as well. From here I could see the comings and goings of strangers and friends alike. At this spot, I could provide a very important service for my owners: home security and protection. I would not receive a treat here, however, and so I was beginning to doubt my earlier intuition that Barney was a new brand of doggy treat.

I change my position, nose pressed against the glass to see if I could get a better look at what was happening outside. Just beyond the white bars and down the steep stairs I could see a funny-looking, bearded dog. As the grey-haired dog approached the house, I came to the realization that this was a dog to remember; a childhood buddy perhaps, a bretheren and mentor who had come for a visit.

Meat dreams

I'm running. Catching up but just out of reach, I envision my canines sinking into my quarry. I anticipate the warm pulsing taste and crunching sound. If only I could get another few inches, a little faster, a spurt of speed... but it turns right, then darts left. That fluffy tail deceptively hints one way, while my quarry goes the other way. I wish I could run up the trees like he does. What magic does he have? Maybe that tail holds all the magic. If only I had one of those. If only.

Escaping into a tree, my quarry suddenly appears twenty feet behind me. His magic tail turns to wings. But I know it's him.  I'm not so easily fooled. I bolt straight at him like an arrow. I fly, only brief moments does the ground contact my paws. Both front legs in sync, with my back legs following closely behind.  I see my teeth reflected in my quarry's eye. But magic saves him. He disappears behind the cape of wings and is gone.

With watering jaws, I find myself lying on my side in the sun.  I'm at my lookout spot. The portal to the outside is creaking open. The bringer of meat has arrived. The master hunter, who always has fresh quarry. Sometimes after his fill, he shares his plunder. I ask him for meat. He understands my desires and asks me to worship the God of the Hunt, Ball. I retrieve the idol so we can begin the rites.

He takes the idol, gives it life. It flies and bounds. I give chase. It veers and tries to allude me, but I catch it mid leap. I hold it until it dies. Sometimes it feigns death and breaks my vise-like hold and gets free for a short time. Not this time. I bring it back to the master. He once again brings it back to life.

The ceremony goes on endlessly, until it ends. Maybe the master has run out of magic. Maybe he needs meat to make magic. Or maybe the God of the Hunt has been satisfied and delivered us manna, Greenies.   The master goes to the window to watch his quarry.  His paws twitch a lot while he looks out the window.  Maybe his clicking noises bring the quarry to him. I've heard the quarry making noises too. They are not really the same.  His paws continue to click.  Someday I will learn that magic.  My master will stare out his window forever.

I want meat. I better get back to my lookout. Maybe magic will take me outside to the chase and the meat of my quarry.  I rest and await the magic.