Invitation

I know some of you who have wandered past the throne have also taken the time to visit Ryan's blog "His Shadow Paces the Floor". Not only is Ryan my son, reason enough for me to plug his site, but he has a unique vision and his writing will leave you with a million and one thoughts running through your head.

As anyone who has blogged for any length of time knows the blog god's are a fickle lot and some of their actions are unexplainable. A few months back for no reason "His Shadow Paces the Floor" disapeared from the blogscape. Ryan tried to recover it but to no avail it was just gone.

So he has taken the opportunity to reinvent his blog. If you have a chance drop in at
Fear and Loathing in Orange County and say hello.

Dusting Off The Throne

Two months can pass in the wink of an eye. One minute it was mid October and suddenly I find myself in mid December.

The throne is dusty, ensnared in cobwebs and showing signs of sixty days worth of neglect.

Is there a story behind by recent absence. Not really. Nothing that explains my lack of postings nor my hermit like existence that has even sapped the energy needed to visit my favorite blogger's.

The best explanation would be that I have been sans muse. My robes of creativity have gone missing and I have found myself wandering naked through a wilderness of tangled thoughts. Caught in the briar's and brush of complacency. Without compass and without the wherewithal to continue the journey without direction.

So without any motivation I sat on my writer's block and pondered. Than pondered some more.

Did I find any answers? Well no not really. I am still lost in the mundane desert but I am feeling at least the echo of a spark. Just a brief glow somewhere within that says it is time to try again.

Not sure how it will work. How much I will post nor how often.

Maybe at this point it does not matter.

Maybe, just maybe it is enough to try.

anonymous

i thought i had been visiting my pharmacy to frequently when the pharmacist herself began to recognize me. i chalked it up to having dealt with her during several rather stressful situations when approvals were pending on various medications i needed. she was always more than helpful. including printing out yearly lists of prescriptions filled for my records.

now that thought has been confirmed. even the girls on the register not only recognize me but if they see me in line they pull my filled prescription and have it waiting for me.

while the quick service is appreciated i would much rather spread my visits far apart and go back to being anonymous.......

invasion of the body snatcher's

fall.....the air is crisp. the leaves are turning. and there is a sense of something ominous on the horizon. flu season is just around the corner. or in my case residing within my home.

first sabrina came down with the flu. i assumed that cristian would soon follow. usually when their are multiple children in a household they will fall like domino's. one brings home the bug and soon a feverish hush falls in what are normally sonic dens of noise and activity.

and this time was no different except for one minor twist in the plot. cristian got sick......with the stomach flu not the expected flu..flu.

in one part of the house was sabrina snorkling and coughing, in the other was cristian feverishly clutching the porcelain throne doing his best to keep his organ's where god intended them to remain.

i am sure without much thought you can see where this is going.

with my lousy immune system i ended up with the trifecta.

my normal ickiness wheezing and coughing, sabrina's flu and cristian's stomach flu. my body was being pulled in so many directions i felt like stretch armstrong in the hands of a five year old.

one benefit of having been sick for so long though is recognizing the early warning signs. as soon as my stomach began rebelling and my bones began aching i was on the phone with my doctor. with prescriptions of compazine and tamiflu in hand i was able to avoid the most severe symptoms.

while i am still feeling less than stellar i am doing better than i expected when i first realized what was heading my way.

1959

Original post October 2004.

1959, the evening of October 1^st, somewhere around 10:00 PM. The young mother to be was sure that after nearly a month of false starts that the consistent, savage pain had to be the beginning of labor. She bit her lip to the point of drawing blood as another wave of pain crashed over her.

She knew the pain would be beyond description but this pain was almost beyond reason. Advice concerning both carrying and delivering a baby had come at her like raindrops in a summer squall. Even customer customers at the diner felt compelled beyond acceptable social norms to reach out and pat the belly tossing advice like tips her way.

“Your carrying high it will be a boy.”

“Your carrying high it will be a girl.”

“Your so big you must be carrying twins.”

“You shouldn’t be working deary, bed rest is the key to a healthy, happy baby.”

“Good for you sweetie, work is the best thing for expectant moms.”

Of course the most difficult of the unsolicited advice always came from dear sweet mom.

“Twenty is much to young to be a mother. You are still a baby yourself.”

“You and Wayne have been married near two years and you have had a miscarriage and now you’re close to being a mom. What’s the hurry? Why in my day…”

“You should have gone to college, met a nice professional man. Traveled had babies later. But no you never listen to me.”

She was startled back to the present by the horn of the Cadillac as Wayne pulled up to take her to the hospital. He said he had been working late; working on another hangover was closer to the truth. She could smell the beer on his breath, a smell he had tried to cover with the smell of several stick of gum. The mixture of scents brought her to the brink of nausea. Throwing up in the front seat was only prevented by another wave of pain, which nearly doubled her over.

The maternity ward at the hospital was rather quiet. Which in and of itself was not surprising since the grand opening of this wing had been two days ago. She had never expected to give birth here. Her due date had been the first week of September and arrangements had been made for her to deliver at the new hospital in the next town over. Despite the worry she was secretly glad she was late, she new the staff at this hospital and felt much more at home.

With I’s dotted and t’s crossed, Wayne ensconced in the waiting room the duty nurse escorted her to the labor room. She helped her to clumsily change out of the tent that was laughingly called a maternity dress, kept her from falling when the next wave hit and made her as comfortable as possible when she climbed into bed.

The pain was coming fast and furious and the young mother was sure that within hours she would be the proud new mother of a beautiful baby. Those hopes were dashed when the doctor informed her after an examination that she was barely two centimeters dilated and there was a ways to go before the actual birthing process began.

Hours passed with a slowness that only comes with a combination of anticipation and fear. Each visit from the doctor brought the anticipation of childbirth only to have her hopes dashed by the iceberg like slowness of her body’s response to task at hand.

October 2^nd five o’clock in the afternoon and the faint glow of a light at the end of a very long and dark tunnel appeared on her horizon. Exhaustion wrapped her body in a cocoon of sweat combined with random tremors wracking muscles that before today she would have sworn were not part of her physiology.

Hope swelled within as she imagined in mere moments nuzzling the neck of her child.

The delivery room was cold, white and sterile. Dominated by a device that only the Marquis de Sade could have imagined. The nurse explained to her that it was a bed designed to assist in the delivery process. In her mind all she saw was a massive device of inhuman torture.

Several nurses assisted has she was moved from her bed to this remnant of the Spanish Inquisition. They took her legs, strapping them onto metal like arms, which left her spread-eagled for the world to see.

At this point she was beyond caring. Labor pains were mere minutes apart. Sweat was pouring from every pore. Her hair was stuck to her head in clumps and her face was white from the strain of contractions.

Finally the doctor made his grand appearance. Robed, masked and gloved a conductor prepared to lead the symphony. He directed the various nurses to their stations pulled up a stool and proceeded to perform a thorough examination. With new vigor he announced that the magic number of ten centimeters had been reached and that I was now allowed to push with controlled abandon.

One nurse held my hand with each painful push as another angel wiped my clammy feverish forehead with a cold cloth. One push followed another like clockwork. Hours seemed to pass in minutes yet no progress was made. The doctor could be heard cursing under his breath. Mumbling something about the baby’s head.

Ten o’clock and the new mother was close to exhaustion. Contractions on top of contraction had brought her to a new chasm from which she was not sure she could return.

She may have passed out for a moment, when she came to she was looking in to the concerned eyes of her doctor.

“We have a serious situation on our hands. Your child’s head seams to have become stuck in the canal. You have begun to bleed which is not a good sign. We are doing our best to keep the two you with us but it is touch and go. If we do not get this baby out soon he could suffocate and/or you could bleed to death. You need to stay with us, focus, lets get that baby out for both of your sakes.”

They gave her a brief respite from pushing. Allowing her some ice chips and some tortured breaths between contractions. The doctor took advantage of the diversion and went to the waiting room to speak to her husband.

He found him on the sidewalk in front of the hospital nervously pacing the sidewalk with a Camel clenched between his thumb and index finger. Upon seeing the doctor his face grew pale and he ground his half smoked cigarette into the sidewalk. The doctor explained the situation with the added caveat that at some point a choice may have to be made as who to save the unborn child or his wife. In his heart he selfishly wanted to say his wife but he knew that without blinking she would of said their child so that was what he told the doctor save the child.

Returning to the delivery room the doctor soon found the delivery going from bad to worse. The baby was still in the canal. The mother was bleeding and her blood pressure was dangerously low. At this point he was not sure he could save either.

Stepping to the head of the table he gripped her hand for one final pep talk. “I know you are beyond exhaustion and that you just want to sleep. Most would have given up by now. Your will to live is strong and I refuse to lose either of you. So what I want you to do is dig deep and find some reserve of energy buried deep within. Use that energy to give me one last series of strong pushes. It will hurt like hell but we will save you and your baby”

Weakly she squeezed his hand in agreement and geared herself for one last try.

With hands and medical tools at the ready he gave the nurses the signal for her to begin. She screamed with the effort and pushed with every last ounce of reserve. Flesh tore but by some miracle the doctor was finally able to see the crown of the child’s head. Another push more screaming and tearing and better than half of the head was through the canal. A final scream and prolonged push and like a cork the baby shot out into the doctors waiting arms. He handed the baby to the nurses who informed the exhausted mother that she had a baby boy.

The doctor was more concerned about the damage done to the woman’s body. In the background he could here the angry cry of the newborn as his airway was cleaned and he was wrapped in warm blankets. For his part needle and thread in hand he began the long process of sewing the torn pieces of her body back together.

In the end close to two hundred stitches were needed to repair the damage to her young body. Her boy’s head had been too big for the canal due to the lateness of the delivery. In 1959 the technology did not exist to identify these problems in vitro. By the grace of God and the skill of the hospital staff both mother and son survived.

And by the way the mother in question was my very own who I love honor and cherish to this day. Before you ask yes the bigheaded baby was me.

Thanks Mom.

chimney

spent the past few days in bullhead city, arizona visiting my mother. considering the various health issues that she is dealing with her energy and vitality came as quite a surprise. without questions she is not as vibrant as she was pre-cancer yet she still manages to kick ass and take names most days.

since the age of seventeen mom has been a smoker. unfiltered camel's her poison of choice. when she was diagnosed with the bone cancer (after a heart attack and two battles with breast cancer) she said she was quitting.

and for the most part she did.

yet the scent of tobacco was like the cloud of dust following pigpen she could never shake it. i knew she was sneaking cigarettes, yet when we discussed it she always swore she was not.

every once in awhile i would almost catch her in the act. we would be out someplace and she would excuse herself. more than once i went looking for her and observed her from a distance sneaking a drag or two. i never walked up to her with a loud gotcha. i figured she was an adult and if a cigaretter here or there helped her to relax where was the harm. it is not as if stopping smoking would have solved the whole terminal cancer problem.

that being said this past may when i was visiting her we were at the casino's and i again saw her sneaking a cigaretter. i felt bad for her, it was as if she was a teenager again hiding her habit from mom and dad.

so i walked up and sat down next to her while she was still taking a drag and she quickly went to hide the smoking butt.

i told her it was okay. i was not going to lecture her. if she needed to smoke, than smoke. she said it was only once in awhile when she was at the casino and that it helped her to relax. we left it at that and the rest of my visit i never saw her smoke another one.

what a difference a few months makes. this past weekend we were once again at the casino's and she has graduated from sneaking one now or than to a virtual human smokestack. i cannot remember the last time i saw her smoke this much. it has been years.

it is a rather odd situation. on one hand i want to grab her and ask her what the hell she is doing that much smoking cannot be good for her. on the other i understand that being in constant pain and dealing with not knowing when the cancer might take another leap maybe just to stressful for her and the cigarettes are what she uses to calm her nerves.

the saddest part is that while we were at the casino's i spent less time with her than usual because my lungs just cannot handle the smoke.......

intimidation

rumors of me leaving the digital world of blogging for the old fashioned world of hand written journals are greatly exaggerated. i for one can barely decipher my own handwriting which would leave me with entries that i could not read with no clue as to what i was thinking. than there was the practicality of snail mailing copies of the journal entries to interested parties. the cost alone would have left me wanting in the finance department. not to mention the blow to my ego when no one wanted a copy.

in reality i have been fighting through a bit of writer's block and a whole lot of intimidation.

the writer's block has been riding my back sucking my imagination dry for almost two months now. as evidenced by my very inconsistant postings. an entry followed by days of silence. hours spent avoiding the creative process. finding any excuse not to write or even attempt to write. i had nothing.

about two weeks ago the parasite on my back faded to black. it seemed as if the writer's block without warning had left as quietly as it had come. i was ready. i wanted to write. i wanted to go back to the time where daily posts were more near the norm.

than disaster struck. not huge and explosive disasters in the biblical since. no voice of god. no floods. no ark. no, the disaster was in a much more personal sense.

i found myself intimidated by the prospect of writing and of blogging.

a million and a half ideas were fighting to be first in line and yet i could not get one idea written. not by hand. nor by keyboard.

sure in my head each and everyone was an award winning kick ass piece. the problem was that the translation was failing. i was unable to take the seed from my brain creating magic in the process. i would sit and stare at the monitor unable to commit to any combination of words that might have a chance of working.

writer's block i can deal with. been there and done that hundreds of times. intimidation though was new. i have enough anxiety in my life without writing, which has been my escape, becoming entangled in my cornucopia of fears.

i figured i had two choices give up writing or fight through this and not be intimidated. i chose the latter. fighting through it means that some of what i post will at least in my eyes be crap. which is where the problem lies my internal editor is the one who is intimidated and rejecting everything. i have no clue at this point what is good and what isn't. therefore i will toss my words onto the blogger breeze and let them fall where they may.

tossing jesus

each sunday finds the kids in sunday school. their mornings are spent learning about jesus and completing various arts and crafts projects. what a picture frame made from wooden tongue depressers has to do with the bible i have no clue. i have read the book and as far as i can remember noah built an ark not a picture frame for his dad. regardless the kids have learned quite a bit, made new friends and in the process have had lots of fun.

yesterday was rally day at the church. food, games and music a g-rated afternoon appropriate for the entire family.

the food was typical church fare. overcooked hotdogs, chips and enough soda to send the entire children's congregation into overdrive.

the music was mixture of church favorites and good old fashioned sing-a-longs. i am sure as they warbled along the older members of the audience were flashing back to the many hours spent watching lawrence welk.

the games to were of the safe and sane variety. a water balloon toss. a bean bag basket toss. a throw the bean bag through the eyes, nose and mouth of a poorly drawn dragon, at least i think it was a dragon the seven legs kind of threw me off. and of course everyones childhood favorite: the jesus toss.

you remember the jesus toss don't you. everybodies favorite bible school game. you don't, well don't feel bad neither do i.

my first thought, before i remembered that i try not to take life to seriously, was what kind of sick and twisted game is this.

the object of the game was to toss the baby jesus into a wooden crib such as the one found in nativity scenes around the world. you won i baby jesus landed in the crib and i am sure you were going straight to hell when jesus hit the floor. and with the arms on those kids jesus hit the floor a lot.

i kept waiting for someone to overreact and put a stop to the fun and games. much to their credit the church members just laughed it off and let the kid have their fun.

imagine that a church with a sense of humor.

death warmed over with a side of fries

not a very optomistic sounding title but that is what a weeks worth of pneumonia will do to a person.

body pain and the overwhelming feeling i have that when i am sleeping the entire offensive line for the chiefs is using my chest as a stand in for their blocking dummy. not exactly a prescription for a good nights sleep.

the week included another round of x-rays which rad by rad are bringing me to my ultimate goal of permanently glowing in the dark and therefore eliminating the need for a reading light.

another round of antibiotics killing all of the good bacteria in my gut and allowing my stomach to digest itself.

another week of writer's block as a lack of oxygen to the few functioning brain cells i have left precludes anything resembling creativity from occuring.

on the bright side my mood is good and anxiety has been kept at bay for several weeks now. of course with the pneumonia creating a need for the ingesting of steroids the anxiety free zone may also become a thing of the past.

now where did i leave my xanex......

sound bytes

in the darkness
it is the silence
i miss most
the evening air
opressive
bearing the weight
of eternal noise
overflowing with
sounds of civilization
engines growl
motors race
sirens howl
mournful trains
car alarms
televisions scream
radios hiss
doorbells ring
echoing
in the canyons
of my world
reminding me
how much
i miss
the silence found
on the road
in the middle
of nowhere

F*Bombs in the Morning

Morning in San Dimas. The sky is hazy above with just a delicate wisp of brownish-grey smog clinging to the hills. Traffic on the nearby freeway is a symphony of horns honking, brakes grinding, engines purring music to an oil executives ears.

Outside my window the dogs are greeting each other with news of the evening past. The birds are singing in their sarcastic way reminding the cat why he will never catch them. And the complex is alive with the lovely sound of F*Bombs in the morning.

No I have not purchased a sattelite radio subscription.

At least if I had I could turn it off.

It seems my neighbor's son is visiting them from out of state. I do not know all the details and frankly after this mornings tirade I am quite sure that I have no desire to have the blanks filled in for me.

Suffice it to say. Said son is having marital problems. He has an assortment of children two of which are here with grandma and grandpa. The rest are back in Georgia, at least that is what I have heard.

He arrived sometime yesterday. And apparently he failed to realize that there was a three hour time difference between California and the east coast. As he was quite obviously working under the assumption that was 9:00 AM here as well as in Georgia.

The entire neighborhood woke up to the joyous sound of him exchanging four letter expletives with his beloved Mrs. And this was not a whispered conversation between two concerned adults but a conversation conducted at decibles that have been know to cause permanent damage to the ear drums of pets and young children.

Apparently my new (and I pray temporary neighbor) feels that he has been wronged. It was difficult to translate at first but it seems that not only was he using the F*Bombs in anger but also to describe what he felt his wife had been doing with everyone in town. Before you feel any sympathy for him he also in response to her admitted that yes he had been as he put it "forced to use violence" in response to her behavior which resulted in the law deciding that he needed to spend some time in a government run facility.

That was the basic conversation for the better part of a half hour before his father finally decided that he had alienated enough of the neighbors and removed the phone from his ear.

elvis and star wars

29 years ago today elvis died and i saw star wars for the first time. neither events changed my life to any great degree. i was never a big elvis fan nor do i worship at the altar of star wars. george lucas is not my guru and the force does not rule my life.

on the surface it would seem that other than being two of the big news stories of 1977 that star wars and elvis would have little in common. below the surface there may be more than meets the eye.

elvis defined a generation. once he burst on to the scene neither music nor america were ever the same.

star wars also defined a generation. once the first movie grabbed hold of the culture the movie industry and how america viewed entertainment has never been the same.

in the fifties and the sixties elvis was the true king. he set the standard that few were able to match. by the seventies he had except for brief moments become a parody of what he once was. a bloated ego where once stood a creative genius.

in the seventies and early eighties george lucas was the king of cinema. the star wars triology ruled the roost and the herd of wanna be's who attempted to match his success were mere echoes unable to go where the master had gone. fast forward to the nineties and into the new milineum. like the king lucas's bloated ego left his films little more than a parody of what they once were.

yet despite the egos and lack of later creativity both have a strong legion of followers.

29 years have passed since elvis died yet his memory lives on. his records still sell. graceland is a huge tourist attraction. and untold amounts of impersonators make a living vainly attempting to capture the essence of elvis. performing before seas of spandex a generation trying to recapture a moment in time.

star wars is no different. despite the universal dislike of the second triology the movies went on to make millions. people waited in line for weeks to see the films. books from the basic continuation of the story to ones teaching the force with reliogous furur fly off the shelves. dvd's of various incarnations of the original films including coming soon the original, original without lucas's ego infested edits. the list goes on and on.

the elvis generation and the star wars generation would seem on the surface to have little in common. except for the millions they spend each year trying to return to a time that for them at least in their memories was a time of innoncence.

a piece of home

with time to kill in indiana we found ourselves in fort wayne. visiting my friend who lived there had been postponed for at least a day. not sure what to do, i turned to the web in hopes of finding something interesting.

turns out that the Allen County Public Library has the second largest genealogy collection in the united states. that was enough to sell me.

upon arrival the one downside of the library became apparent. they were preparing to move into a new building and their temporary quarters while huge was not set up for wi/fi. this put it an immediate damper on my hopes of doing extensive research and entering it immediately into the computer.

other than that the library was a book lovers paradise. four stories worth of books with an entire floor dedicated to geneology.

for cristian there was an entire floor of childrens and teen books with tons of activities. i left him to his fun. and headed to family history heaven.

the entire floor was filled with books, microfiche, newspaper logs and computer terminals the few hours i had would not even make a dent in what was available.

so i did my best to brush the surface.

the brueckner side of the family is the one with the least amount of available data. all i knew was that at one point they came from cinncinati. i went to the ohio section and spent an hour or two looking for information on brueckner's. i found two possible connections through wedding announcements and death notices that bore further research. which will require the ordering of certificates from the state. not much but it was as a start.

without realizing hours had passed and my time was running short. so i decided to do a quick run through the california section.

there i found a treasure. a book published in 1927. History of Monrovia is the early history of my hometown. lots of cool information including the story of the great forest fire of 1924. i had never even heard of the fire. the author though presented the story in a matter of fact yet dramatic presentation. what struck me the most was that just like today the fire was caused by carelessness. a gentleman was walking with his family, paused to light a cigarette and tossed the match to the ground. he continued on his way for ten feet or so and woosh he looked behind him and fire was racing up the hillside.

i only had to travel 2000 miles to find a little piece of home.

4th of july

the 4th of july presented us with a wide variety of choices.

we could go to philadelphia.

we could visit washington dc.

we could visit boston.

all wildly tempting with their richness in history especially as it relates to the founding of our nation.

the problem lay in my desire to avoid big cities. and in the reality that all of those cities would require multi-day visits to satisfy my history bug.

instead we opted for a more small town, traditional 4th.

and of course not being locals we did the only thing we could. we climbed in the car and drove around.

gettysburg would have been our first choice but lo and behold they held celebration on the 1st while we were galavanting around other parts of the state.

we finally settled on the town of fairfield, pa. with a population of a bit more than 600 souls.

it was the traffic sign that caught our eye. warning drivers of potentially heavy traffic due to the annual 4th of july picnic. how much traffic is a town of 600 going to generate i thought.

the gathering was held in a large park on the outskirts of town.

there were the usual suspects. bbq'd dogs, burgers and sausages. sno-cones. pop and kettle corn. there was a battle of local bands to raise money for breast cancer research.

at one end of the park was a rather large stream. teeming with children doing their best to catch the few bedraggled crayfish who had somehow failed to find adequate hiding places. cristian, as he has been apt to do on this trip, ran over and jumped right in. before long his new friends had taught him the ends and outs of catching crayfish.

i for my part pulled up a chair and spent the afternoon just being.

towards dusk the band battle was replaced by a patriotic song sing-a-long. while not a raging success i enjoyed listening to the large group of mostly seniors stumble their way through the songs. what they lacked in talent they made up for with heart.

the fireworks while not wrapped in the glitziness of some of the bigger displays i have seen were still exceptional.

across the street from the park was a large hill that in the winter passed for the towns ski resort. the fireworks were launched from the top of the hill. which in turn ensured that everyone had a great view of the celebration.

as we walked back to the car i remembered the sign warning of heavy traffic. i was reminded again of the difference between the big city and a small town when the heavy traffic took all of five minutes to negotiate before we hit the open road once more.

the return

we arrived back in la this evening after a final marathon of close to 42 hours in the car.

rather than camping or motel rooms, i just let cristian sleep while i drove and i took cat naps as needed.

we covered half of iowa, nebraska, wyoming, utah, arizona, nevada and finally once again california.

once we passed salt lake city there were several areas we drove through with active brush fires. so my lungs began to feel it even before we hit a major city.

las vegas was a rude awakening after so much time spent on the backroads of america. the air was so thick with smog i could cut it with a knife. it was even worse than on the drive out. and after so much time spent in uncrowded places the mass of humanity occupying the freeway near drove me out of my skin.

i discovered that i had forgotten how to drive in the big city. politely leaving space between my car and the one in front of me only gave every semi the idea that it was reserved for them and that i would back off. i was being cut off so often that i am surprised that my car was still in one peace.

the final stretch from barstow to la was even worse because the air quality mixed with the humidiy left much to be desired.

being back is taking quite a bit adjustment.

everyone is too loud.

everything moves too fast.

there are too many people.

on the positive side i saw jessica my doctor upon my return and thirty seven days off of the paxeva contributed to a net weight loss of 18 pounds. i feel so much better without the meds. and i will move from this place before i return to them. if i can be anxiety free somewhere else than that is where i need to be.

on the negative side there was not as much improvement in my lungs as i had hoped. breathing was easier obviously away from the bad air but when she listened to my lungs they were still constricted and wheezy. so my inhaler and i must remain tight for now.

of course there are many tales from the road still to share and they will find there way into these pages sooner or later.

34 and counting down

this morning begins day 34 of the 7 day road trip.

34 days........

i never expected or planned to be gone this long.

there have been many adventures both excellent and disapointing.

i have changed in ways i never imagined nor expected.

i have been inspired by some people i have met and left in fear for the future of the human race by others.

i have come to realize that what may good for others is not good for me. come hell or high water i have to leave los angeles for both my health and my sanity.

and cristian, cristian has changed more than i thought possible in such a short period of time. he has become more of a 13 year old. which as any parent knows can be a good thing and a bad thing. in my eyes it is all good because he appears to be enjoying life for the first time in a long, long time.

today is day 34 and we are only 3 to 4 days away from returning to la.

from returning to bad air made worse by raging brush fires less than 30 miles from my home.

from returning to all the stresses and issues that have contributed to my anxiety and panic disorder.

from returning to overpriced homes and over crowded freeways.

yet though as recently as a few days ago i dreaded this moment, i know now that i am ready. i refuse to take steps back. returning to medication and half living.

i know it will be hard but i also know that surrender is not an option. that i am stronger than i realize and that i will get my butt out of hell before the devil even knows i am there.

piece's of eight

in los angeles one is rarely exposed to the kindness of strangers.

a kind word is a myth.

a kind gesture seldom seen.

sharing amongst strangers is limited for the most part to four letter words and one finger gestures.

while rudeness can be found anywhere, i find that living in la has left me jaded and expecting the worst from people.

as often happens though when you come to expect the worst a stranger will remind you that kindness does exist still in this world.

we are in garrett, indiana at the moment. our plans for the area fell through and we found ourselves with extra time on our hands.

i am not a big movie theater person but cristian was dying to see pirates so to kill some time and surprise the kid we went to the movies.

in la two tickets for a movie will run you eight dollars a piece for a matinee and ten or more for an evening show. here in indiana it was ten total for the two of us.

than the problem arose. they were having problems with my debit card. after several tries i took my card back intending to head for the nearest atm which as luck would have it was down the street inside of the wal-mart. we hit the parking lot and the skies opened up. between the rain and the time i knew we would miss the beginning of the movie if we tried for the atm. as it was the last showing of the night we scrounged all of the change we could from the car and hoped that it was enough.

by the time we reentered the lobby we were soaked to the bone. cristian had all the ones and coins clutched between his dripping fingers. the kid at the box office helped him count it out and when it was all said and done we were a dollar short.

i figured we would have to run to wal-mart and miss the first few minutes of the movie. that was before the kid selling us the ticket reached into his own wallet and pulled out a dollar bill making up the difference. all he said when we thanked him was that he would hate for us to miss the beginning of the movie.

i did not get his name.

i do know that through his unsolicited gesture he made my son's night and restored a bit of my faith in the human race.

etiquette of the road

having spent the better part of the month on the road i have have had the misfortune to see some of america at its worst. not the towns or cities per se, though they have done their part, i am refering more to the individual citizens of our fair land.

eating lunch is not the place one wants to discover their fellow humans fascination for what they can pull out of their noses. it is bad enough, looking up from my sandwich to the site of a middle aged biker chick with her index finger buried knuckle deep in her nostril than to be exposed to her inspecting her discovery before she wipes it in on her significent other's vest. needless to say my burger lost its attraction after witnessing that scene.

then there was another biker who was staying at our campground in gettysburg. he was friendly enough. sat down where i was vainly attempting to get the wifi connection to last for more than ten minutes.

he chatted away and did not seem to require the occaisonal grunt so i he was not really bothering me. that was until he pulled out his canister of chewing tobacco. to each his own i thought and continued minding my own business. that was until he decided that the gravel at my feet was the best place for a natural spittoon and he started leaving nasty brown blobs around my feet.

come on people. i know our society is not one built upon the etiquette of other era's. we live in a kind of live and let live world. that does not mean though that we should just ignore the basics.

is it too much to ask for you to keep your knuckles out of your nose and your tobacco juice away from my feet.

please.........

yes, we have monuments and tshirts and keychains and .....

gettysburg is the good, the bad and the commercial of tourism all wrapped up into one gaudy package.

we began our extended tour on the 21st with a visit to downtown gettysburg. not surprisingly my first impression was of how disneyesque the area was. pristine building after pristine building. employee's dressed in period costumes. every store selling the same knick knacks from the same overseas sweatshop. just what you would expect from a "tourist destination".

some of the "junk" was more unique than others. many stores have various debris collected from the battlefield. pieces of cannonball's, grapeshot fragments, old bullets. boxes and boxes of the stuff. and all well overpriced.

instead of cartoon characters like mickey and donald the t-shirts all feature your favorite civil war general. anyone from lee to lincoln can be found.

further away from downtown near the national cemetary is where the tackiness is displayed proudly. circa 1890's houses have now become bastions of the bad tshirt and dull postcard. the fronts of most are haunted by the purveyors of gettysburg ghost tours. as featured on a&e or the history channel or the discovery channel or the local channel. every tour has been featured on some channel or another. it may have even reached the point where the tours outnumber the ghosts because i am sure that most of them have left the area in search of peace and quiet.

the big debate in the area is the possible development of a casino complex. the no's seem to carry a lot of weight with their concerns that a casino would take away from the history of the area. preserving historical areas is very important so there are places where future generation can go to learn. yet when the entire area is already commercialized what is left to be preserved.

it is rather ironic that the confederate army moved into the gettysburg area because of a rumor that they would be able to find much needed clothing and supplies. instead they found the turning point of the war and the beginning of the end for the confederacy. if they had only waited one hundred and forty years they would have been able to shop to their hearts content.

what the wifi

contrary to rumor we did not drive into the atlantic ocean. nor were we washed away in any of the recent storms that hit the east coast. we are alive and well i only wish i could say the same for the wifi connection.

blogging from the road becomes neigh on impossible when the wifi connection fails to cooperate.

for the past week or so the connection has been hit or miss at best. the campground we were staying at promised free wifi. it was free but despite the claim that my connection was good to very good i was barely able to check my email on a regular basis.

our new location though seems to have a much more consistent connection. if all goes according to plan i should be updating again in no time.

rain the newest four letter word!

we have been in gettysburg since the 20th. what was going to be a two day visit became much more when cristian discovered that the 4th of july weekend would be dominated by reenactments of the famous battle. intrigued myself we chose to hang out and see the sites.

of course there are many tales to share but for this post i am fast fowarding to the present.

since sunday there has been wave after wave of storm. thunder filled skies. campground illuminated by bolts of lightning. followed by the flood gates of heaven opening upon the earth.

i know i began this journey in awe of nature's powere. thrilled to be experiencing real weather for the first time.

i guess there really can be too much of a good thing. in the future when i make a request of god i believe i will be a tad more specific.

car camping presents its own challenges in stormy weather. minor things like keeping dry and preventing gear and car alike being overpowered by dank boy smell.

these minor concerns eventually became more major concerns last night when the entire county of adams was under flashflood alerts.

what had once been an oasis of calm was awash in flood waters. the playground where cristian and his buddies hung out became a raging river. small nearby cabins lay in seige surrounded by a ton of sand.

lightning bolts, immediately followed by explosions of thunder centered right above the camp.

trees back in the darkness crashed to the ground roots unable to find security in the suddenly liquified ground.

fortunately other than minor flood damage the camp made it through the night.

this morning cristian and i awoke to sunshine and birds singing.

the real downside to all of this rain is that the reenactments scheduled for this weekend have been postponed until the 7th.

so once again we are faced by a choice. give up and miss the reenactments or hang for another week and see it all.

i know what the old darrell would have done. worried himself to death and headed back not ready to step into the unknown.

the new darrell though, the new darrell along with cristian have decided to move down the road a bit for a few days to college park, maryland. there is a campsite within walking distance of public transportation and we are going to the nations capitol. in fact at this point we are debating where to spend the 4th. washington d.c., philadelphia or someplace we have yet to thinkg of .

east or west?

monday june 19th:

at some point during our iowa escape cristian and i began discussing our trip home. originally our plan was to be gone three maybe four days and here we were on the eve of week two.

cristian broke out the mapbook and after a few moments said dad, you know we are really not that far from gettysburg.

how far was far in his mind only about a thousand miles.

the look on his face told me all i needed to know we were going to gettysburg.

back in california he has done civil war reenactments and has well over thirty books on the subject. visiting gettysburg was something he had dreamt about but thought he would not get to do until he was an adult.

what the hell i thought.

sure cristian we can go to gettysburg.

don't joke around dad that's not funny.

i'm not joking if you want to go to gettysburg we will head for points east on the map.

by this point he was bouncing off the dq wall in disbelief.

life has not always been easy for him. with the pressure his mom has him under. with my illnesses. no life has not been easy.

i may not be able to give him the world but at least i can give him gettysburg.

is this heaven?

monday june 19th:

my only previous knowledge of iowa came from the movie field of dreams, which has a lot of meaning for me. like kevin costner's character in the movie the only connection i ever really had with my biological father was the game of baseball. what little relationship we had was going to a one or two dodger games a year. in fact the last time we did something together we flew to dodger/padre game in san diego. the game was fun but my father neglected to inform my mom so like most things he attempted it blew up in his face.

even though iowa was not on the agenda i was tempted to visit. add an invitation from amanda to see how the other side lived and how could i say no.

driving away from sioux city after the storm i knew i was not in california anymore. wide open space in every direction. dotted by a farm here a silo there and every once in a great while a small, small town.

after life in overcrowded los angeles this was heaven.

the air was crisp and clear.

the only noise was the tires on the highway.

no sirens, no screaming, no horns honking.

and a sky that went on forever and a day.

i could grow to like it here, i thought to myself.

after checking into our motel we were to meet up with amanda at the local park.

we arrived first and i knew immediately i was in heaven.

it was not the air, the blue sky, the wide open spaces, no it was a.............merry-go-round.

an honest to god merry-go-round. kid powered. all steel. and the most fun i ever had as a kid.

in california you see merry-go-rounds have been legislated right off the playgrounds. someone decided they were too dangerous. it had been years since i seen one.

this was never clearer than when cristian asked me what it was i was so excited about.

the state had so overprotected my son that he did not even know what he was missing.

i ran straight for the merry-go-round. got a good spin going and leapt on for the ride. the world was spinning out of control and i was in seventh heaven.

i am sure i made a hell of a first impression when amanda showed up with nathan only to find me spinning out of control and laughing like a kid at christmas.

the rest of the visit was made up of similar moments.

watching softball in the park: just being.

observing what appeared to be a million butterflies flutter through the pavillion at idaho state university: just being.
(i know we were in iowa as amanda just so politely pointed out. in my defense we have made so many iowa/idaho cracks that mr. freud snuck by my editor.)

wandering the gardens admiring the creativity of the designers: just being.

laying in the grass seeing more stars in one night than i had in the previous ten year in los angeles: just being.

losing myself in fields filled with fireflies. outshing any light show i ever saw in hollywood.: just being.

watching the kids bond, run, jump, swim and just enjoy themselves. something cristian rarely gets to do back at home.: just being.

in the end that was what was iowa was for me a place of just being, rediscovering the simple things in life.

is iowa heaven......who knows......but for four days it might have been.

a brief intermission

what originally began has a short jaunt through the nevada, utah and colorado triangle has become something far more surprising and life changing. i may be behind the wheel but i am no longer driving the car.

day 12 is looming and i still have no clue as to when i am returning to california or for how long.

a lark of a journey has turned into a journey of reself discovery.

i believe i knew this darrell many years ago. before life had worn down his pride. before compromise had led him into a dungeon of darkness built by his own two hands. before he had become but one of the walking dead, alive but not really living. before anxiety, ill health and so very many other issues had ground out his spark for life.

when did i decide enough was enough i am not sure i could pinpoint a date.

i do know that my psychologist jackie has been planting the seeds of change in barren ground for going on four years with no results. she has put up with a lot of wallowing and whining from me i hope she likes the results.

i do know that carrie over at echomouse and karen at ksquest, have taught me how to face life's difficulties with class and dignity. to accept the good and the bad with head held high and to never give up the fight.

i do know that sue over at torn pages has taught me through her deeply personal posts and her friendship that there is light and hope at the end of the tunnel. that i will get through the rough spots, that i deserve to be happy and that i will be a better person for it when i emerge on the other side.

two weeks ago i began this journey on a whim. at that time i made some decision's that did not make it into the earlier posts.

on tuesday when i left california i stopped taking my anxiety meds. period. end of story. no tapering off. no discussion with my doctors. i decided i wanted to see life through undrugged eyes for once.

i also stopped using my inhaler's while i have them with me i again wanted to see how i felt without any meds.

i have been told by so many doctor's that while i may not be cured, the elimination of stress and los angeles air would go a long way towards improving my quality of life.

now this may sound well thought out and planned. it was not. just like this trip i had no idea what i was doing until i did it.

i am going on 12 days without anxiety meds. in that time i have no experienced a single panic attack. while i did experience some of the expected chemical reactions to flushing the meds from my body i have survived.

it has taken some getting used to though. i have forgotten what real emotions felt like. the every day joys of a summer storm. the tears that may well up just because i need to cry. the laughter out of nowhere that is just the joy to be alive erupting from within.

while my breathing is not perfect my lungs are doing much better without los angeles air. little or no coughing, little or no wheezing, just basic pulmonary function. maybe the doctor's are right and all my problems are stress related

which brings me to the point i must have been heading all along with this post. thanking the person whose friendship, understanding and unconditional support unlocked the vault where my courage was hiding giving me the strength to face the road.

before january i only really knew of her existense through her mother's blog torn pages.

once amanda began her own blog at curious are we. we exchanged a few comments. nothing earth shattering. nothing mind blowing. nothing life changing. the usual mix of blogging comments.

sparky(my nickname for her it fits) and her mother were both playing world of warcraft. they seemed to be having so much fun I decided I would give it a try. The game is okay but it is the people you play with that make it worthwhile.

has time has progressed amanda and i have developed a real world friendship through blogging, world of warcraft, email and eventually phone calls.

in a remarkably short time she has become one of those friends we often dream about having but rarely find. she listens. she advises. she supports. she gives of herself unselfishly and without conditions.

through her friendship i have rediscovered what it means to be a friend and what it means to live rather than watch life from the sidelines. i have learned that it is much more fun to be off the bench and living than on the bench reading about living.

as my road trip progressed amanda invited cristian and i to iowa. where we met her, her son nathan (a credit to his mom) her husband greg and of course her mother sue. we spent four days in iowa visiting and sue had us out to her place for a bbq, where we all talked for hours, while the boys chased fireflies across the field.

thank you sue for the grub, hospitality, your friendship and for welcoming cristian and i into your home.

thank you amanda for being your sparky self and the most amazing friend i could have ever hoped to find.

the chorus from a recent garth brooks song describes her friendship perfectly.

Sometimes the best cowboys
Ain't cowboys at all
She's got my back
Even when it's against the wall
When I need a friend
She's the guy I call
'Cause sometimes the best cowboys
Ain't cowboys at all

so that is the long and the short of where i am at the moment.

the chorus of a recent gary allan song says in part "life ain't always beautiful, but it's a beautiful ride." in many ways my life has not been beautiful in recent years. yet i would not change a thing. it took the struggles of the journey for me to appreciate where i am today.

god love's me, he really love's me

as we drove across nebraska i was content listening to cristian breath, watching the electrical activity in the distance and feeling the breeze of the road rush through the open window.

four days prior i could not have imagined being here on the plains in the middle of the night. losing myself in the music of life. but life is funny that way and sometimes you are surprised when you least expect it.

as the hours passed the storms seem to fade beyond the horizon. i was content in the moment, seeing and enjoying the weather.

we approached the nebraska border with cristian mumbling in his sleep. thought he was having a bad dream but he was just changing position. i mussed his hair to annoy him and turned back to the road in time to catch a brilliant flash of light off to the east.

our destination for the evening or should i say morning was a campground just outside sioux city, iowa. the lightening appeared to be in that direction but i was not about to get my hopes up.

crossing into iowa and heading northeast the storm was suddenly in front of us. the road appeared to have split the front in two and lightning battled earth on both sides of the highway.

all i could think was wow. i had seen lightning on national geographic or discover that was this brilliant. but never ever in person. the closer we drew to the campground the brighter the sky became. thunderbolts of the god's dancing to the primordial rhythm of old.

i am sure that my jaw was in my lap.

i was a kid in a candy store.

a six year old seeing disneyland for the first time.

a teen ager experiencing his first kiss.

a man losing himself in the eternal beauty of his eternal love for the first time.

it was all of this and so much more.

and yet words do not do justice for what was still to come.

we pulled into the campground early in the AM. i found a spot with a clear view expecting a continuation of what had guided us here.

god though, god had other ideas.

he was probably sick and tired of hearing me whine for decades about the lack of weather in california. so he looked down at me, chuckled and said you want weather boy....i got your weather right here.

within seconds of parking the sky exploded with all of natures fury.

not just in front of us. not just behind us. everywhere.

the electrical activity surrounded my car. immersing us in a surround sound experience that technology could never duplicate.

i was speechless.

i was raw.

it was as if the hand of god was reaching into my soul and turning my world inside out.

i asked for a storm and god as he often does went above and beyond giving me back my life...........

wacky wednesday wanderings

passing through denver was far, far from the end of our wednesday wanderings. our goal was the colorado/nebraska border and the town of gothenburg. the koa guide proudly proclaimed that we would be treated to a taste of british hospitality on the western edge of the nebraska frontier.

the flatlands of colorado were rather dull and uneventful after the thrills and chills of the new age age clone atecture dominating the beauty of god's mountains. mile after mile of rather mundane scenery. a landscape dominated by the sites and smells of cattle feeding on the prairie grass providing the once sweet air with a brand new perfume.

8:00 p.m. arrived with the weather promising electrical storm activity along the nebraska border. which of course just happened to be our evening destination.

anxious anticipation did not begin to describe the sense of adventure i was feeling at the moment. in my spare time i am a weather junky which does not mix well with living in california as there are only two types of weather. clear or wet. sure every once in a great while mother nature tossed a rather dull electrical storm my way or a good windstorm for my entertainment. in reality the only way to be a weather freak in california was to get my fix from national geographic or the discovery channel.

this would be my first opportunity to experience weather, real weather that my friends in the prairie states had promised was a normal occurance this time of year.

of course with every cloud comes not only a silver lining but a change of plans. our intended campground appeared to be directly in the storms path and a tent beneath a tree did not seem to be the safest of choices for riding out the electrical outbursts.

we had been on the road since 2:00 p.m. so a good six hours of driving had been completed.

with the anticipation of storm activity i chose to continue driving rather than pay at this point for a motel room. checking the map i made the rather ambitious decision to cover the entire state of nebraska in one night and arrive at our thursday campground early in the a.m.

best laid plans of mice and men have a way of changing right before our eyes. little did i know what the morning had in store for us.

clones, moss face and john denver's ghost

day two found us waking up in a koa campground somewhere on the outskirts of grand junction, colorado. well maintained and peaceful the campground was a perfect distraction before the next driving leg began. over seven hundred miles had left me a bit road weary but more than willing to face what the day had to offer.

we backtracked about eleven miles to the small town of fruita, colorado home to the world famous mike the headless chicken. we payed homage to the statue of mike and began a fruitless search for mike tshirts. for a town that has built a thriving tourism business on the back of dinosaurs and headless chickens the whole missing tshirt adventure was about the only disapointment of the trip so far. i know tshirts can be ordered from the website but i had my heart set on an in town purchase.

next we visited the dinosaur museum on the edge of town. rather small but a surprising about of information on the entire species.

one thing that has surprised me so far is that in california there seems to be a mcdonalds on every other corner. for whatever reason in utah and now colorado there appears to be a wendy's in every one horse town while mcdonalds are not quite as frequent.

after lunch we began the long drive through the rocky mountains. the landscape had a certain beauty that was lost in the over development of everything. snow still clung to the upper elevations refusing to give up the last vestiges of existance.

we eventually came across the first of many mountain crawl traffic jams. turning a three lane road into a quagmire with anxious drivers cutting right and left. as we approached the sign man directing traffic i had to do a double talk as he appeared to have some form of scraggly moss clinging to his chin. some mean have beardable faces this man was just moss faced soul out of place. i should have takend his appearance has a fortelling of the rest of the day but as usual i ignored the clues.

it was just after passing moss face that i had my first clue that these were no longer john denver's rockies. each new town that has been built with the same clone planning that has gripped america for years. i expect it in la but not the rockies. town after town dominated by the urban clone villages.

the more we drove the more cloned villages we saw and the more angst was building from within.

i did however relish the joy of passing through huge tunnels blasted through the mountain face that appeared to stretch on and on for miles.

as we had suffered through many miles of the clone a techture. we chose to reward ourselves by ignoring denver and moving on.

smog, wind and the long arm of the utah law

day one of the trip is behind us. leaving la behind me and heading off into the unknow woke up emotions and feeling that i have not experienced for many years. freedom, untethered joy and the wonder of the great unknown.

driving out of the desert and into vegas almost ruined the first day for me. my son being to young to remember the vegas of the seventies had no clue. and my most recent visits had come from the hoover damn side and i was not driving so there was a lot i missed. following rte 15 i came to realize how much a city which was never great in the first place had been over commercialized, overbuilt and overpopulated.

the traffic sucked.

the over crowding sucked.

and the air sucked worst of all. in la. my eyes watered. my throat burned and i wondered aloud to my son who in their right mind would want to live here. a nasty, nasty place. of course i will visit again for a day here and there. all that money has created art exhibits that never make it to la.

after crossing the nevada we began a long, long stretch of desert. i am not a desert person but my son the future paleontologist/geologist was in his element. rock formation of every size, shape and color dominated the horizon. cliff faces with colorful geologic era's stratus reflecting the sunlight.

of course my imagination is a bit more vivid than my sons and some what i saw embarrassed him to no end. at least he pretended to be but he did not hide his amusement very well.

soon we came upon one of those famous desert sand storms which quickly reduced the visibility to less than one hundred yards.

it was at this point that one of utah's finest saw fit to flash his lights and pull me over. i was beyond clueless i had no idea why i was being pulled over.

seatbelts on, check.

lights on in sandstorm, check.

registration current, check.

suffice it to say that i was beyond shocked when he informed me that i was clocked at 99mph.

i glanced at the sandstorm rocking my car, the lack of visibility and brown glow of my headlights and thought to myself what the hell is this guy thinking.

outloud i said officer if i was clocked at 99mph than there is something wrong with my speedometer.

the speed limit on the highway was 75mph and i doubt i was making that. he just shook his head and asked for my liscence and registration.

even my son was aghast. dad there was no way you were doing 99mph he is crazy.

of course the fact that i was driving a '95 dodge neon should have given the officer of a clue. i doubt there is a stock neon around doing 99mph on the open highway. just the weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee (thanks to sparky for the high tech special effects)sound of a little engine straining to keep up with the big guys.

the long arm of the utah law soon returned with my ticket to sign. it seems that the money they are making off speeders was put to use for in car printers and computers as the ticket was computer generated.

once we were sent on our way cristian observed that the only reason we were chosen from the masses was because of our california plates. smart kid if i do say so myself.

we ended the day at a koa campground in grand junction colorado. after driving over seven hundred miles i should have been exhausted and fallen immediately into a deep sleep. instead i lay beneath the infinite sky wondering where this seemingly new darrell had come from. footloose and stress free on the nations and hiways and biways.

On the Road

When I was a child my grandfather used to watch a travel show on one of the local channels. It was a husband and wife driving around the country in their R.V. They would share there adventures with the viewing audience. In the days before satellite, cable and a zillion channels this was interesting stuff. Bringing the back roads of the country into our living rooms.

Tomorrow I am setting out on my own happy wanderer road trip. Just my 13 year old son and I for a minimum of ten days. Not sure of all my destinations. Though I do have a few in mind. I could give them away here but that would take the fun out of blogging from the road.

Mayo on Rye (yuck)

Mayo you were good to me or so I thought no I know that my health cannot be bought.

It seems the Dr. Golf (he always looked ready for tee time)was not the doctor I believed him to be. I received his report in the mail this past week and there were a few items he neglected to disclose.

He also gave less credence to my asthma/chronic bronchitis in his written report than in person. In writing he focused more on anxiety and stress as my primary health issue.

1 - My cholesterol was above 240. Not the end of the world but something we should have discussed. My heart is in good shape and I do not want to mess with high cholesterol. Jessic gave me a prescription for one of the standard meds.

2. My white blood cell count continues at a high level. I was feeling rather well in Arizona yet my count was 15. It has been high for a bit and we have been monitoring it. Dr. Golf should have mentioned it though. If the count hits the 20's it could be a sign of leukemia.

3. My diaphragm on the right side is displaced and pushing into the lower lobe of my right lung. This can effect how the lung functions and could be keeping the lung from expanding. This is usually caused by a weakened muscle at birth and can be repaired surgically.

4. I have a small fibrosis infiltration of the lower right lung. Not serious yet but could lead to pulmonary fibrosis or something similar. Two of the primary symptoms are shortness of breath when exercising and a general feeling of unwellness.

A bit more to worry about on the health menu but not the end of the world. I just hope Jessica never stops practicing medicine because if she did I would not know who to trust.

Send in the Clowns

My apologies to one and all for the mini drama of yesterday's post.

I did what I have never really done before and posted something mid anxiety attack. No editing, no thinking just a quick mental dump.

In rereading it this morning I realized that what I wrote was easy to interpet one hundred and one different ways.

No one died.

No one is sick.

No tragedy of any kind occured.

Sometimes a week at my mom's is like a week in some fictional world. Problems slip away and anxiety takes a back seat for a few days. Than something happens to bring me back to reality. And boom anxiety attack city.

At this point the anxiety has subsided. I drove back from mom's today. And was greeted by something that used to be air but now resembles something from a low grade godzilla knockoff.

I will do my best to keep anxiety attacks from bleeding into Murmur's.

Now will someone please send in the clowns.

out of the clear blue sky
a hand reaches down
and slaps the smile
right off my face

Shhhhhhhhhhh

11o degree temps do not lend themselves to creative postings. i have been at my mom's in bullhead since tuesday and creativity seems to have melted in the heat.

i was hoping that a week out of the smog pool would make a marked difference in my breathing but so far i have failed to notice any change.

of course the primary reason for my exodus to arizona is spending time with mom. other than pain and sleepiness she appears to be doing well all things considered. her appetite is good and her spirits are high.

all things considered a good week.

In Memoriam

Darrell Wayne Brueckner
Darrell Samual Brueckner
Dolores Finn Brueckner
Grandma Finn
Jay Ray Hunter
Scott Hunter
Peggy Hunter
Tommy Hunter
Arthur Herman Pankopf
Elda Virginia Spelta Pankopf
Maude Pankopf
Waldo Spelta
Pearl Spelta
Eligio Spelta
Julie Spelta
Bobby Spelta
Vera Spelta
Adrianna Spelta
Mary Spelta Denton
Harold Denton
Maria Scribanti Spelta
William Boardman
Keith and Norma
Norm Banns
Don "Moose"
David Smith
Jim "Hawk" Organ
Lee Tisdale
Barbara Moss
Peter Becker

The loved ones of all who pass through this page.

And of course all of the service men and women who have given their lives in the service of their country.

late night thoughts......

things i miss:

my grandmother's snoring. she could vibrate the paint off a battleship with her snores but they were comforting in their own way.

the scent of camel's on my grandfather's clothes. not very politically correct to miss the scent of what probably killed him. yet i cannot think of the man without the remembering how his clothes smelled.

the smell of open liquer bottles behind the bar at the elk's lodge. the only time i ever really spent with my stepfather was helping him bartend various events. could not stand the taste of the contents but the smell of an open bottle still reminds me of him.

waking up to the smell of fresh brewed coffee. not a coffee drinker myself. if i need a caffine fix it comes from a soda bottle. yet whenever i am visiting my mom i wake up to the smell of her fresh brewed coffee.

and finally, the scent of strawberry perfume on an 18 year old hostess i crushed on too many years ago to count. obviously my tastes in fragrances over the years have changed yet the smell of fresh strawberries brings me back to the cask and cleaver and a hostess two years older than me to whom i could barely stammer out a hello.

mayo on rye

life in scottsdale was full of adventure and new experiences.

you have not lived until a balding, chunky, sweaty, twenty-something man shaves your chest. that being said it beat having the hair ripped out by ekg tabs taped to the skin.

i am sure that somewhere near half the population would be thrilled if a succesful doctor gestured to them and said come have a seat next to my desk big boy. in my case he was the wrong sex and type.

watched a condo tower being built beside a concrete canal with the selling point being billed as waterfront property. the canal is about thirty feet across at best. shockingly at least to me each unit was selling for a million plus and they were almost all sold.

ordering a cheeseburger from a usually reliable diner and finding much to my surprise that their idea of a cheeseburger was cold cheese added along with the other condiments.

with all of the above excitemet it is a wonder that i actually found time to visit the mayo and go through the testing process.

i was poked and prodded by the best of them. bloodwork, pulmonary function test, cardiac stress test, ct scans of the sinuses and lungs, exploration of the nasal cavities and ear canals by a doctor actually wearing one of those silver discs on his forehead.

ten days and who know's how many thousands of dollars later this is what i know.

my heart is healthy, no blockage etc so no immediate risk of heart attack.

sinuses and ear canal's are good.

oxygen levels low normal but overall not horribly bad.

lungs clear of any horrible disease.

diagnosis: asthma and chronic bronchitis aggrevated by severe anxiety and stress.

solution: reduce stress and move someplace with cleaner air.

surgery would have been easier.

speaking of which. when i returned home i was having a great deal of abdominal pain. after another visit to the doctor i was informed that i have developed a ventral hernia which requires surgery. it is 10 cm long by 3 cm wide. the cause of such hernias chronic coughs.

at least it will give me something else to blog about.

Vacant Throne

Life has been busy here in the land of the throne.

Running around to the various doctors, hospitals and testing facilities that I have visited since April of 2003. Collecting records, x-rays, phone numbers all required for a visit to the Mayo Clinic.

I also made a run to Palmdale which is northwest of Los Angeles to exchange cars with my brother. My beloved 1977 Blue Cadillac Coup de Ville is now in his garage where he can do what I was never able and that is restore it to its original glory. He has other cars so the blue bomber can receive all the tlc it deserves.

In return I drove off in his 1995 Neon. Value wise I got the best part of the deal. Family history and sentiment wise he got the best end of the deal.

It became necessary though when I calculated that just driving to Scottsdale and back would cost almost two hundred dollars. Leaving me to choose between a roof over my head or a meal in my stomach while going through all of the testing. This way I don't have to choose I can have cracker's and a bed.

I leave in the morning and the throne will be vacant for a minimum of five days maybe longer if I run into extended testing or treatment.

If I am lucky when I return I will have found some answers to the health issues that have been dogging me for so long.

fishing

sometimes i feel as if i am a fish out of water. i watch the world around me rushing around filled with self important ideas to explain their frenzy. never stopping to smell a rose. never stooping to put their hands in the soil and feel the earth. more interested in strip malls, shopping malls, movie theaters, traffic jams. anything the steps between self and communication with another human being. what twist of fate landed me in a land where i feel more and more out of step. where isolation has become second nature. where a sunset is just a divider between night and day. hurry up and go here. hurry up and go there. never stop. never contemplate. be careful you might discover another human with real ideas. someone that will actually understand you for who you are.

lake no more

random formations of
migrating geese
circled the lake
honking in tune
to a song
only the geese
could here
attempting to communicate
their story
their history
of the generations
born and reared
on the shores
of a lake
no longer home
mud flats
catfish bones
crows searching for
forgotten tidbits
of flesh
the geese sing
of sadness
of the loss of their home
of the future
that may not be

mia

i have not been posting as often as i would like.

prepping for my trip to the mayo clinic. which will lead to more days without blogging as i will not have computer access while in Arizona. dealing with doctor's here. being tortured by a sadistic chiropractor have all eaten into my days.

plus my muse seems to have gone mia herself. many times i have sat before the computer or a blank piece of paper. seed of an idea caught up in a whirlwind with my mind. yet nothing falls to the paper. the storm disipates. thunder and lightening passes me by.

maybe i am preoccupied with the tests and all. this to will pass i am sure. if not i am going to have to find me a new muse who keeps better hours.

It's a Boy.......

or a girl, or maybe some new and rather bizarre life form left behind by my alien abducters.

At least that was what I kept telling myself as I lay on the table while the tech rubbed warm, greasy gel around my abdomen.

My doctor ordered an ultrasound in order to investigate recent and past ailments. Primarly localized pain on my right side that could be gallstones or possibly something related to the liver. Since I was having the test anyway she decided to take advantage of the opportunity and look at my left kidney.

Intellectually I understood that an ultrasound was a diagnostic tool used to detect all forms of illness. Emotionally though I was having a difficult time seeing it as anything other than a baby detection tool.

Silly I know. But if they do discover a new life form in there I am going to name it George and I am going to hold him and squeeze him......

PoP

POP! POP! POP!!!!!!!!!

At the sound of the pop I attempted to throw myself to the floor in my best effort to avoid the obvious gunfire. This proved to be impossible as I was gently, but firmly being held to the table.

I turned to my chiropractor and in all seriousness asked her if there was a military installation near by or had that explosive sound come from within me.

She laughed assuring me that while rather loud the sound had come from within and that there was nothing to worry about.

Nothing to worry about she says. In all the years I have walked this planet I had never heard such loud and potentially damaging noises coming from my own body.

The last month or so the pain in my back, hips, neck and shoulders had me dreaming of large bottles of pain relievers. Alas, due to some of my other ailments it was best for me to avoid downing handfuls of the stuff.

Having had more than my fill of mainstream medicine I decided that for the first time in my life I would pay the chiropractor a visit.

I approached the appointment with an open mind but almost cut and ran before I even saw the doctor. After completing the usual multitudes of forms the receptionist informed me that I was required to watch an introductry video.

The film confirmed all of the stereotypical information floating around about the chiropractic practices. The spokespeople on the video talked about the miracle cures that awaited anyone who visited a chiropractor. Everything from high blood pressure to respitory ailments could be chased away with a few timely pops of the spine.

Tempted though I was to leave I chose to stick it out and see what would happen.

The chiropractor I was seeing turned out to be a bit more grounded than the one in the video. While making no promises she said that with chiropractic treatment the overall health of the body could improve.

She went through a series of measurements and proceeded to explain where she thought my pain was originating. A tweaked neck. Hips out of alignment. And shoulders that were not sitting in a proper position.

She than proceeded to pop and twist me like a pretzel. Some positions more painful than others. This was followed up by twenty minutes on a heated table with a huge roller that ran up and down my back.

Four days since my appointment and I am not sure that I feel any better. Still I will return Friday for a follow up, even if it is only to nap on the roller table for another twenty minutes.

storm

i found myself in the living room
of a house i have never known
a fireplace, a grandfather clock
a few photos fade to black
i am drawn to one window
which covers half a wall
there is a love seat
and two end tables
facing a view i cannot see
i am drawn to the window
and settle down with a sigh
it is than that i realize
that something isn't right
the night explodes with silence
in the house a sense of peace
within me there is no tension
anxiety but a dream
i sense someone sit next to me
without words or games
a hand offers a champagne glass
filled with my favorite cola
i wonder who could know me so well
yet i never sneak a peak
because the evening sky
is filled with light
thunder echoes across the land
the wind picks up
and whips the trees
into a frenzy of trembling leaves
hail the size of golf balls
and rain from a thousand lakes
it is a storm i have always dreamt of
a house surrounded by lightening
thunder and howling wind
for hours it seems or maybe days
rain collides with earth
electricity dances across the plains
to a rhythm only thunder can play
i fall asleep with a gently sigh
unable to recall such peace
i wish it could last forever
yet i know it is just a dream..........

shadow

his shadow has aged
reflecting the years he has trod this earth
edges frayed
his shadow seems to rise from the earth
caught in the fingers
of a mild summer breeze
though his shadow has never loved
there is but darkness
where its heart should be
though his shadow has never cried a tear
moisture appears to seep
from eyes that have never seen
though his shadow has never walked
it trembles from the effort
of a midday walk
his shadow has lived a lifetime
of could of beens
should of beens and might of beens
his shadow bears the burden
of dreams long forgotten
promises built upon fields of sand
his shadow grows tired
losing substance
in the fading light
his shadow slips into the past
filed away in a forgotten drawer
never to be seen again

People Suck (present company excluded)

Picture the following: your spouse just found out that one of their parents had suddenly passed. It is a holiday and life must go on so visits etc are made. Your spouses parents live outside the country so they have to catch a late flight to make it home in time for the services. You arrive at the airport near midnight only to find you missed their scheduled flight. They are placed on standby and told it may be as many as five hours before a seat opens up.

Now I am sure that most of you reading this would do the following. Take your spouse to Starbuck's or some other establishment. You would sit with them. Comfort them. Listen to stories of life with parental unit. Regardless of your schedule. If it took all night you would be their offering whatever solace you could.

If you were normal that is.

This happened to someone I know yesterday. While I am not very fond of the husband I did not realize what a heartless bastard he was. His wife's father passed away Easter morning. For the entire day he complained about how this dying business was imposing difficulty on his life.

He did take her and her four year old son from a previous relationship to the airport at midnight. She missed her flight and rather than wait with her and the child offering solace, he left claiming he needed to sleep because he had to go to work in the morning.

The depths that some people stoop in how they treat other's should no longer surprise me. I should expect it but a part of me keeps looking for the good in everyone and I am feeling quite naive.

failure

"can you repeat the question please?" he was speaking to a recruiter from an online university he had once expressed an interest in. life passing changes intent and he was no longer interested. she had begun her sales pitch, lacking the energy to interupt he allowed her to ramble on.

"no problem sir. what i asked was how do you define success?"

success for him was never about the stereotypes you heard everyday.

it was never about the most money. it was never about the newest car. it was never about the biggest house. or the country club. or the private jet. or the yearly cruises with the chad's of the world.

enough money for comfort. a car he could depend on. a home where the family was safe and warm. he never played golf. he hated to fly. and he had never been on a cruise.

his measure of success had always been easily defined. being the best husband, father and friend he could be. if he could not live up to those standards, well than none of the other things really mattered.

later that evening, a particularly stressful evening he sat in the darkness contemplating his standard answer.

with tear filled eyes and a heavy heart he realized the he had condemmed himself to failure with his own words. the material world aside he had failed to achieve the standards he had set for himself.

he was lost.

he was alone.

he had no answers.

his first marriage lasted long enough to produce a son. when the marriage failed so had he. he failed as a husband unable to even avoid divorce as he had once promised himself on a long forgotten dark and stormy night.

after several years of trial and error he failed as a father. he drifted away caught in the rapids of a changing life and though he claimed to have fought the tide he had fought hard enough because over a decade would pass before he saw his boy again.

he swore if he ever married again it would last. he swore if he ever had children again he would be a better father.

he kept his promise for more than a decade. even as the relationship began to unravel he fought to hold it together refusing to surrender.

there were two children involved this time and come hell or highwater he was going to do right by those kids. whatever sacrifice. whatever price. those children were not growing up without a father.

what foolishness. what a joke. promises made before the god's or nothing more than raindrops blown across the ocean by hurrican force winds. they mean nothing. darkness goes where darkness chooses and man foolishly thinks a candle of hope will resist even the most gentle of breezes. a damp finger though makes quick work of any flame.

who was he really protecting: his children from emotional abuse or his ego from another failure label. he could swear it was the former but he was beginning to believe it was the latter.

protection actually entails your presence making a difference, but was he. labels like fat, lazy, stupid, worthless etc were thrown around on a daily basis. screaming was the accepted form of conversation. tears from one or both children was a daily occurance. was his remaining helping his children in any way? honestly he could not see it.

his poor boy swore one night that he had the most wonderful family in the world. between chest aching sobs and tears of pure youthful anguish. it was all his fault no one elses. he was a bad kid. he was a slob. he was fat. he was lazy. someday he was going to weigh four hundred pounds.

each word of anguish was another nail in his personal cross of failure. his boy had been so upset that his sister had come down stairs and whispered in a tear filled voice. i'm scared my brother says he is going to run away.

what a joke he had become. what a failure. he swore he stayed to save a family and instead he had condemned them all.

he sat in the dark and cried.

perfidious

gloom and angst
dance a waltz
upon the ceiling
of my waking dream
in lock step
and rhythm
perfect partners
lost in a song
beyond time
hollow and haunting
a melody
without words
capturing the dreamer
in bitter tides
of a perfidious sea

forest primeval

a full moon smothers the sky
wrapping the stars
in a blanket of light
a primal urge rises
from deep within
my soul
fear of the unknown
the unknowable
a sob catches in my throat
a desire is born
to raise my voice
in unison
with a pack of wolves
howling a chorus
of primeval beauty
older than mankind
an offering sung
for the gods of darkness

Disturbed

Somewhere in America tonight, there is a man or woman who is in very desperate need of services that can only be provided by a mental health professional. I do not know the name or location of this individual but it should be the sworn duty of each and every citizen of this country to identify them and get them the help that they so obviously require.

Who is this individual and what have they done?

The person I am refering to created the latest advertising campaign for Burger King. The commercial's can only be seen as a desperate cry for help.

If you have had the good fortune to miss them, they feature a person in a king's costume with what can only be described as a demented and overly large fake head.

The latest instalment featured the "king" jumping up and down on a bed surrounded by characters who must have been the rejects from a "Village People" movie casting call. The king was having a pillow fight and his frozen demented smile was so bizarre that I am afraid to sleep tonight for fear that my dreams will be filled with screaming "king" heads.

Your Birthdate: October 2

You're so intuitive, it's like you have a sixth, seventh, and eighth sense. You connect with others freely and easily - and you tend to have many best friends. Warm and caring, it's hard for you to close your heart to anyone. Affection is like air for you - you need to give and receive it to survive. Your strength: Your universal compassion Your weakness: Your unpredictable mood swings Your power color: Mauve Your power symbol: Butterfly Your power month: February

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?

Never Been.........Until

A year ago the 15th of April on the advice of an old blogger buddy I contacted the Mayo Clinic/Scottsdale Campus regarding my ongoing respitory issues. At the time I was informed that I would be put on a waiting list and that someone would contact me when my name came up.

I figured if was lucky, maybe a month or two would pass before I heard from them.

Of course I have never been lucky. Never win raffles. Never wind drawings. Never won the lottery.

After three months with no phone call the whole Mayo Clinic idea soon slipped into the background noise of life eventually to be forgotten.

Imagine my surprise than when last week a phone call was received from the Mayo Clinic. Seems I was not forgotten afterall. Only that there are quite a few people like myself with long term respitory issues.

Bottom line is that I have my appointment on May 10th. Since Scottsdale is five hours highway time away I will be driving in on the 9th.

My stay could be short as a day or as long as several weeks. All depends on the initial testing.

Momdate 3.29.06

Been away from the throne for the better part of a week. Took a quick jaunt across the desert to visit mom in her Bullhead home.

Overall she is doing well. The various meds have improved her red blood cell count and she is beginning to have more energy. Her appetite was little better this visit as I actually witnessed her eating more than one meal.

The cancer is still limited to her bones. A recent scan showed that all of her organs are clear of the disease.

Her heart continues to be a concern. The inflammation is under control but the meds will not last forever.

Mom insists that the cancer does not worry her at all that it is her heart that will do her in.

Her attitude is good. In all honesty she is dealing with her own mortality better than I or my siblings are. I asked her how come she was always upbeat with the grim reaper somewhere in the neighborhood. She actually laughed at me and told me that she could either live and enjoy her remaining time or worry and not. She chose to live.

God bless her.

waiting room

poor fluorescent lighting
casts a pallor of doom
through out the lab
one could almost picture
igor hissing a yes master
passing you in the hall
patients slump in worn furniture
sagging with age
smothered in fabrics
recovered from dumpsters
behind the remnant store
windowless
there is a sense of seperation
as the minutes pass
the real world slips into
mythology
the waiting room
become the ying and the yang
the alpha and omega
the beginning and the end
a timeless stretch
of linear space
dimensionless existance
the only reality
the holiest of all grails
a name called
out of the darkness
another one
chosen by the most high
allowed to escape
the purgatory
of the waiting room