toilet paper

A Few of the Many Things I Don’t Understand

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Why do things fall from my hands so easily? It was much easier to pick them up when I was younger, so why didn’t they fall, then?

With a population of 340 million people, why do 77 million voters keep saying they “represent all of America”? Don’t the other 263 million people matter?

Where DOES time go? I’ve never heard anyone answer.

Could there be more than one “soulmate” in someone’s life? Follow up question (FUQ): How could a man get married a THIRD time without learning his lesson after the second?

Why does a person who does something stupid work so hard to deny it? FUQ (Yes, I know what it sounds like. Stop giggling.): Is it because they are stupid?

Why do we elect popular people for Prom King and President? FUQ: Are females just not popular? Are smart, intelligent, experienced candidates persona non grata? Like the television show, “Survivor”, are they too much of a threat?

A baseball player for “the other New York Team” will make $51 million dollars per year to play baseball. Is it a coincidence it is same amount as the entire annual budget for the city in Upstate NY where I live? Definite FUQ up: Could the player adopt the city and support us?

When someone says, “be cool”, do they have a specific temperature in mind? FUQ: Be “chill”? I’ve never been able to agree on temperature with anyone I ever lived with so…

Why do conservatives whine so much about “Main Stream” and “Legacy Media”? Isn’t Fox News Legacy Media? Fox is definitely “main stream”. Okay, Fox is lame. FUQ: Do Fox viewers know Fox was designed to be biased. On purpose. To counter other bias. Another FUQ: Do two wrong bias’ make a right? Do they offset? Should we be watching the cartoon network for news?

Why are sports teams so insensitive? March Madness is here. I predict two teams will fight like cats and dogs during a hard-fought, entertaining, exhausting game and when it’s over,…hate each other. In the old days (OD), in the YMCA gyms, we fought like cats and dogs and then went out for beers. Ah, the OD.

When did money take over the world? At least the American world. There are more ways to make money without making anything, now. They call it passive income. In the OD if you couldn’t shoe a horse, sew up as wound, or kill another man before he killed you, you were out of luck. Now, if you put some horse-shoeing income in a tax-deferred account, invest it in ETF’s, and sell high and buy low…huh. Maybe that is productive work.

Why does the body fall apart, wither, and die? FUQ: Is there any way to guarantee our mind won’t leave us before the body does?

Sorry about those two…

Why do all the people in old photographs look so unhappy? Was it their nature or the inconvenience of having to stay immobile long enough for the film to work?

Life must have been hard in the real OD. Thinking of how hard it would be, for example, to wipe your butt with a Montgomery Ward Catalogue page. Or a leaf. Maybe they never went to the bathroom. Ken Burns could make a documentary about defecation and urination. FUQ: How many people have died over the course of history?

Enough. It’s sad to write about some things…

Repair and Recovery

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The removal of natural bone and replacing it with titanium made a vast improvement in my quality of life. The surgery inspired a reassessment of a past, the re-measure of the present, and realignment of goals for the future. Doesn’t that sound nifty?

Before anyone asks me to write a self-help book, it should be noted the biggest driver of the self-examination has been the “down time” associated with recovery. The operation removing years of pain came with a requirement to sit and not move, not do anything, really, for “several” weeks as the incision heals, bruised tissues return to their original color, and the therapeutic drugs work their magic preventing clots and excessive bleeding.

There’s nothing to do but reflect, and it’s been fun to sit in The Chair and watch and read and think.

But the world didn’t stop and wait for me to get better. The world didn’t know I was recovering. It went on without me, all the while shoving its onward motion in my face with news and stories I couldn’t help but read. Some scientists want to “inject” diamond dust into the atmosphere to reflect sunlight and lower the Earth’s temperature. Trump wants to take The Panama Canal Back and annex Greenland. An 81 year old politician not named Biden stopped legislating and entered a nursing home, or “memory center”, without telling anyone. Soto signed with the Mets for a salary higher than some countries GDP. Musk…well, Musk is busy being Musk, an easily distracted, bored, multi-billionaire who knows how to fix America. BTW, if he gave $3 Billion to each state to do with what they want, it might make a difference.

All in all, the month of December has been an example of how important we think we are, followed by the sharp, direct, reminder of how important we aren’t. Sprinkled in this life lesson is some exceptions. For example, how important is toilet paper? Don’t answer, but I now know the man who invented one of the most important things in EVERYONE’S life was Joseph Gayetty, in 1857. His “invention” was “sold in flat sheets watermarked with his name.” It was also medicated to prevent hemorrhoids. His contribution to life is celebrated every minute of every day all over the world, and I’ll bet no one knows his name. For some really good reading about how the cleaning of our butts has changed through the ages, google it. If you have time…like I do.

So is this essay a lament or what? A celebration? A reveal of anything most of us don’t know already?

It is nothing. It is simply a grown man, sitting in a recliner, with nothing to do but ponder.

James Thurber would be proud. (Google him, too.)