daneallred

Snow Day

I live where there are seasons. I really do feel sorry for people who don’t. The seasons really do help me mark time, and are a reminder of how little time we really have on this wildly spinning planet. You may sit on the beach in California thinking you have all the time in the world, but remember we are flying through space at 67,000 miles per hour on our yearly journey around the sun, and each day we have to spin at 1000 miles per hour to make it from night to day.

A reminder about the passing of each season is a great thing. I lived in California for two years, making the mistake of moving there in August. It was August there for two years. This winter, we have been blessed with great snow, both the light, powdery kind and the heavy, sticking kind. I’ve shoveled snow already, and at least once before the winter ends, I will have to go skiing.

It took me almost 18 years to ski. My friends took me to the top of the lift and left me. I made it down somehow. I try to ski every year, especially when I am getting really down about the cold and the snow. It changes my attitude about how wonderful snow can be.

When you are falling down the mountain, without falling, but are controlling that fall by using a couple of boards strapped to your feet, with the wind rushing in your face and the snow blowing around you, well, there really is no way to describe the feeling. It’s an exciting, compelling rush of a feeling much like those times you sped down the hill on a sled or a tube. It’s a way of being cold without feeling the cold, of feeling the exhilaration of gravity, speed and control.

So later, when you are shoveling another foot or two of snow, it’s a good reminder of the great reason for snow. And at least once this winter, I will see two or three frozen road workers trying to put some asphalt in a hole in the road, I’ll utter thanks that I get to work in a warm building all day. So why is it so exciting to make yourself cold by sliding down a mountain?

It’s a great reminder of how most of the things in life are relative. It’s a great reminder our attitude usually dictates how we are feeling about any particular moment. We can be strapped to skis and enjoying the ride, or we can be freezing on the way to work in a less than warm car with a soft top. It’s still the same weather, climate, temperature. It’s an arbitrary decision we make when we decide to hate Monday’s, and one of my colleagues has correctly pointed out it’s a miserable way to spend one-fifth of our working years. Bill Cosby has observed that his employees are in pretty bad shape by Monday, and it’s probably a good thing the weekend isn’t longer. Just remember, it really isn’t a Monday, but just an arbitrary name we gave an arbitrary part of what we call a week. We pass from one season to another without even paying attention at times. Don’t let the wonder of winter pass you by without some kind of acknowledgement. We are put here to pay attention.

Don’t get me wrong. There are times when we need to pay attention or we will end up doing cart-wheels down the mountain in the snow. Not a metaphor, by the way. And this was back in the day when skis were attached to you by short cords – not designed with snow brakes. This means as I was cart-wheeling down the mountain my skis were flying around my head, banging me on the back and my knees. It was only my second time skiing, and my ski pass was also scraped off my jacket. I went home and lived to ski another day.

But there are days where you are standing on the top of the mountain, looking down into the valley miles below, thinking about the hustle and bustle going on in every office, on every road, in everyday life. The wind is blowing lightly up from the slope below, and some of the loose snow is blowing into your face – normally not a very pleasant thing. But since you are about to hurtle down the mountain at slower speeds than most on the hill, but it still feels very fast to you, it is a time to realize there is more to life than complaining about the snow, or the wind, or the rain, or the heat. Try to enjoy the wintery frostiness – in six months it will be 101 degrees.

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Snow Day

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Another episode from "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Dane Allred".

Clock time

Clocks are a reminder of where we are in our day. I wonder what it must have been like when there were only ten clocks in a village, instead of ten clocks in my kitchen. None of them have the same time. I wonder if listening to the town clock tower ring the parts of each hour gave villagers a comfort of the exactness of time.

I like the movie “The Gods Must Be Crazy”. There is one part where the narrator talks about the concept of time to a Kalahari bushman. There is no Monday, no 8:00 A.M. no quitting time. No deadlines about this hour, this day, this minute. Some things can be done this week; some can wait until next week. No rush hour, no such thing as late to work, no overtime, and no such thing as clocks.

Clocks have been a useful thing to standardize our world. How can you leave Japan at such and such an hour and arrive in New York at a particular time unless there is way to keep track of the seconds, the minutes, the hours and the days.

The atomic clock keeps track of microseconds, and every year or two we have to adjust the “world clock” because the earth doesn’t spin in a orderly and timely manner. It doesn’t know that slowing down a bit screws up our clock, but then, the earth probably doesn’t care if we have to reset our clocks.

Here’s the problem with time. I teach students who are three times younger than me, and I like to play a mind game with time with them. Here’s the scenario. Say I am your teacher and I am 45 years old. If you are 15, then I am three times your age. If you add 15 years to both of our ages, then I will be 60 and you will be 30. I am only twice as old as you. I tell my students, if I live long enough, you will catch up, and maybe even pass me.

I wait for them to try to understand how I can be three times as old, and then only twice as old. They start to fear I might be right, that they would continue to age and pass me by. I even say to them I will patiently wait while eventually they get older than me. They look skeptical.

I don’t really carry a watch. I do have the time on my phone, which is another strange development. When you ask someone what time it is, now instead of looking at their wrists, they dig out the cell phone and tell me the time. One cool feature is that my phone can be updated with the “correct” time. What is the correct time? It’s beamed to my cell phone from some cell tower which gets it from some satellite somewhere or something like that. I still don’t trust it, but it is the “official” time.

It still makes me wonder what happened back in the day. I can see the close approximation of noon – the sun is straight above. You could use a sundial if the sun was shining. I really don’t know when we became so pre-occupied with time, but as we mark the new year, just remember, it’s just an artificial date chosen from all of the available dates we could have begun our calendar with.

If January 1^st, is too soon for you, then celebrate the Chinese New Year on the 26^th of January. Sorry, that was 2009. The Chinese New Year begins on February 14^th in 2010. It can be anytime between late January and late February. It’s the year of the Tiger in case you were wondering.

There are New Year’s celebrations in March, April, in the fall, and there were even two in the Islamic calendar in 2008. Well, not two for them. They had one, but during our year, they had two. See how confusing it can be.

Even worse, if you are paying attention on New Year’s Eve, you will realize many, many people will celebrate the arrival of that fateful hour before you. Time zones are another thing I really wonder about. You step one direction and it’s an hour later or earlier. One step one way or the other and it’s another day? This is why those who are really wise tell us to live in the moment. That way, you’re never late since that moment is now, I mean now, I mean now.

Really, living in the moment means paying attention, and if that means enjoying the tradition of marking a new year, you will have to pay attention to that moment. May your new year bring all the hopes and joys you desire.

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Clock Time

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Unharmonious Match

In the play “Our Town”, the narrator says most people go to their graves “two by two”, but there are some who are not meant to stay together. The bliss of early love wears off, and to prevent a murder, the couple separates. My mother doesn’t like me to tell this story, but it will serve as an illustration that some people are better off apart. My mother divorced my father when I was ten. She has been married twice more, and I need to say she is very happy at this point in her life and I am happy to have an excellent step-father. I have had a couple. But Dad has pursued the legal route to polygamy by marrying and divorcing several times. My sister and I think the count is up to 15 marriages and 14 divorces, but some of these are to the same person. When I harassed my mom about this she was not very happy.

I told her between my two parents, there were almost 20 marriages. “With the divorce rate at 50 percent”, I continued, “that means 40 couples have had to stay married so you guys could get divorced.” Like I said, she was not very happy with me. I hope she doesn’t hear this on the air.

There are many people who agree an amicable parting is probably best. Here are some of our most famous writers with their mostly negative views on marriage

Anton Chekhov: If you are afraid of loneliness, do not marry.

Benjamin Disraeli: Every woman should marry -- and no man.

Sydney Smith said: Marriage resembles a pair of shears; so joined that they cannot be separated, often moving in opposite directions, yet always punishing everyone who comes between them.

This quote by Socrates may surprise you: By all means marry; if you get a good wife, you'll become happy; if you get a bad one, you'll become a philosopher.

Socrates also said this about marriage: Call no man unhappy until he is married.

Herbert Spencer said: Marriage: a ceremony in which rings are put on the finger of the lady and through the nose of the gentleman.

Stephen Butler Leacock said this of marriage: Many a man in love with a dimple makes the mistake of marrying the whole girl.

Edward Verrall Lucas said: The trouble with marriage is that, while every woman is at heart a mother, every man is at heart a bachelor.

Helen Rowland said this of marriage: In olden times sacrifices were made at the altar -- a custom which is still continued.

and she also said: When you see a married couple walking down the street, the one who is two or three steps ahead is the one who's mad.

George Bernard Shaw tells us: It is a woman's business to get married as soon as possible, and a man's to keep unmarried as long as he can.

William Makepeace Thackeray’s view: Remember, it is as easy to marry a rich woman as a poor one.

Artemus Ward said: He is dreadfully married. He's the most married man I ever saw in my life.

Zsa Zsa Gabor is an expert on marriage. She’s been married nine times. She said: A man in love is incomplete until he has married; then he's finished.

Speaking of divorce, some of our more expert celebrities have weighed in, including Zsa Zsa.

She said: He taught me housekeeping, when I divorce I keep the house.

Sancha Guitry said: When a man steals your wife, there is no better revenge than to let him keep her.

Kin Hubbard said: Nobody works as hard for money as the man who marries it.

Carolyn Wells understands divorce. She said: The wages of sin is alimony.

Oscar Wilde: Divorces are made in heaven.

Arthur Baer: Alimony is like buying oats for a dead horse.

John Barrymore: You never realize how short a month is until you pay alimony.

It really does seem some people can’t stay married, and psychologists tell us many people continue to marry the same kind of person they just divorced. With a divorce rate of 50 percent, maybe we should just shuffle the deck and move down the road. You move next door, and the guy there moves down to the next house. It makes me think arranged marriages might not be so bad. If you didn’t like who was chosen, you could divorce, and the rate might still be fifty percent. Maybe you’d do better choosing on your own later if someone chose for you first. It couldn’t turn out much worse.

If you are married, I hope you are as happily married. Samuel Taylor Coleridge thought this: The happiest marriage I can picture would be the union of a deaf man to a blind woman.

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Unharmonious Match

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Harmonious Match

It’s sad to watch the dating commercials on television. Everyone has a perfect match or they are looking for that one person who they can find harmony with, and live happily ever after. It seems to me that much of the romance in the world happens by accident, and you just have to be in the right place at the right time. Helen Reddy said it this way, “There is no magic person out there, no perfect human being out there waiting for you.” Sometimes it happens, and sometimes it doesn’t. Can computer dating find the perfect person for you?

A sad statistic was revealed recently which show from 20 to 40 percent of those registered for online dating services were already married. The other sad statistic is that 70 percent of those who use computers have tried the online dating sites. Maybe they work for some people, but I’m too old to know anything about computer dating.

I’m from the old school where chance encounters and random events seemed to draw two people together. I could have attended three different colleges, but I could only meet my wife at one of them. She had to stay in school a little longer than usual so I could show up. We happened to be in a live stage musical together and became friends. We were in another show later during the year. We started dating the next summer when we had a class together. There are so many random events, I don’t know I can say it was fate for us to be together. It just happened to work out.

If you are a female and looking to attract that special guy, I have only one piece of serious advice. Don’t play coy; let the guy know you are interested. Pay attention to him; touch his elbow, his arm, his back. Speaking as a man, we are pretty dense, and unless we are practically hit over the head, we really don’t think anyone is interested in us.

If you don’t believe this little admonition, look around at all those guys you think are great looking arm in arm with a female you think is ugly. It’s the only way to explain it. I taught a guy who sat by the same two girls every class. I wondered if there was something serious going on, but the girl I thought would be his first choice lost out to the girl I thought was less attractive. How? She let him know she was interested, and once a man knows there is a possibility of a relationship, we are pretty much sunk.

Ogden Nash has a nice saying about marriage and incompatibility. He said, “A little incompatibility is the spice of life, particularly if he has income and she is pattable.” That quote does give us a nice mental picture, and who is to say the rich man and the pattable woman can’t find perfect happiness together. Samuel Rogers has a warning for those who decide to marry. He said, “It doesn't much signify whom one marries, for one is sure to find the next morning that it is someone

else.” If you don’t believe this saying, just talk to anyone who has been together longer than 10 years. We can all change enough in 10 years to become a completely, totally unrecognizable person. My wife put our wedding picture up on the mantle recently, and I asked her to introduce me to the blond skinny guy she is next to in the picture. I told her that wasn’t me anymore. Luckily, she has adapted to the changes. Or as Nancy Astor said of marriage, “I married beneath me -- all women do.”

Honore de Balzac said it this way: “Marriage is the end of man.” It sure was the end of that man I was, and I have to tell you, I am a lot happier after 30 years of marriage than I was after being single for the first 20 years. It’s like Benjamin Franklin was talking to my wife when he said, “Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, and half-shut afterwards.” Speaking as a man with imperfections, I want to tell my wife how glad I am she keeps her eyes half-shut. I also like what Benjamin Franklin said about husbands, “One good husband is worth two good wives; for the scarcer things are, the more they’re valued.” I just hope I fit into the “good husband” category.

As Helen Rowland put it, “When a girl marries, she exchanges the attentions of many men for the inattention of one.” I wish I was more attentive. But you may be more like Mae West. She said, “Marriage is a great institution, but I'm not ready for an institution yet.” Maybe you aren’t either.

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Junk Food Junkie

I love food. My wife doesn’t really get how much I like being able to buy any kind of food I want and eat it anytime I want. She always tells me I should spend the money on clothes or knick-knacks. But that is where she gets her satisfaction, from being able to afford nice clothes and other things she wants. I just like to eat.

I’m not sure why I like buying food so much. It must be the consumer in me. I really don’t like to fix my own food and eat it. It would make a lot more sense to make my own food because then I could eat even more food.

But there is only so much food one person can eat, and I’m not sure why I like prepared food better. I think it must just be junk food that I like the best. When I was small, I loved to go to the convenience store and buy candy and pop. I finagled for every penny I could get; cashing pop bottles, selling off stuff I didn’t want any more to neighborhood kids, and even charging them to look through my telescope. My favorite part of the week was when I had enough to go buy something and eat it.

I could have saved up money and bought something to keep, but I just love to buy something and eat it. I think it makes me feel rich. If I can spend money on something like junk food, I must be rich.

There really are only three or four categories of junk food I really crave. I think I could eat potato chips every meal if my health would allow it. A real treat for me is a bag of Lay’s Potato Chips – the real ones, not the baked ones. The greasier my fingers get the better I feel. The saltier my mouth gets the more I like it. Once my face is puckered up from the salty greasiness, I really like to chase those lovely chips down with some kind of carbonated drink, especially Pepsi, or ideally Wild Cherry Pepsi. I used to drink the diet stuff, but now I’m back on full sugar dosage at every drink. It really doesn’t seem to make a difference in my weight, and the great satisfaction that sugar rush gives me is really worth more than I pay. But don’t tell the companies.

I think there really is a plan behind the management of my junk food eating habits. I even read a book decades ago which predicted just this kind of corporate manipulation of my tastes. The title of the book I can’t even remember, but I do remember the pattern the book talked about. Get the customer to eat something salty, then something sugary, and then something salty again. Sounds like my daily routine, doesn’t it.

I really don’t believe there is a conspiracy out there to get me to each chips and drink pop, but I there is, it is certainly working. I don’t mind admitting I’m a willing participant, and I really don’t think I’ll be changing my snacking habits any time soon. But I have cut back and I think the real reason I like fast food and junk food is not just that it easy and available, but I think I use these tasty treats as a reward for myself.

These little rewards are a strange thing. They really don’t amount to much, but I have found if I do those things I know I need to do each day, and then reward myself with a little treat, I feel better. Then I want to do more of those things I know I need to do, and another little reward greases the wheel again. It’s an automatic feedback loop which has worked very well for me, and I don’t plan to change the way I get things done anytime soon.

The simple things in life seem to me to be some of the most satisfying. Seeing a sunrise or a sunset, accomplishing the little things that need to get done so the big things also get done, and rewarding that good behavior with a bag of chips might seem like a simplistic approach to life. But I like it and encourage you to do the same. Looking to the future, I can see a happy group of over-achievers eagerly munching junk food as the progress of the world is measured in chips and pop. It seems like a simple solution to encourage all of us to do that little bit more which makes all the difference in the world. We may be a bag of potato chips and a soft drink away from solving your most important problem. Long live junk food!!

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In Love With Being Alive

I love life. There really is nothing like experiencing a perfect day, hour or minute. I know life can’t be bliss every moment, but it really is worth those times we get to feel that all is right with ourselves, the world, and the universe.

There are some that stand out in my mind as I contemplate the times I really felt at one with the universe. The birth of my daughters are moments I will never forget, and welcoming them into this world was extraordinary. Running a marathon may seem like a strange way to experience the bliss of the universe, but it really is an amazing experience. Walking up a mountain and admiring the beauty of nature is another way. When the day is not going so well, it may be time to reflect back on the best of times.

Having daughters may be much easier than having sons, but there’s a tremendous amount of worry that comes with female offspring. Maybe because fathers were once young men, and they are familiar with the thought patterns and habits of the boys in the world. Let’s just say it’s not all purity and light. Now that my daughters are in their twenties, I feel much more comfortable with their ability to deal with the world. Sadly, they seem to grow up way too fast, and while we try to enjoy them while they are growing up, it all happens much too fast. We don’t really seem to understand they won’t stay young forever. But that doesn’t stop us from reflecting back and remembering how sweet it is to see your children mature into adulthood.

Running three marathons may seem a strange way to celebrate the bounty of the universe, but after 26.2 grueling miles, your mind has overcome the complaints of your body and you are sure you can do anything you try to do. It is a life affirming action, and the number of people who are participating in marathons grew 11 percent last year. The finishing time for runners is slower, which show an expansion in the sport for those running for the experience, and not necessarily to win the race. They want to see what they are made of, if they can accomplish something most other people consider crazy. Over a million people finished marathons last year, and the other road races showed growth as well. The average number of people finishing each race was over 4000 people.

Think about that number. Here are 4000 people all trying to do the same thing. They encourage each other as they run along, and the support staff all along the way cheer them on, too. It really is like a giant party celebrating just what the human body can accomplish. When it’s your body which has run 26.2 miles, it can be quite a celebration indeed.

But I really love what I experience when I am in nature. It could be just digging in the dirt in my yard and planting another seedling, hoping it will grow and flourish. I was even insane enough one summer to actually climb the mountain behind my house instead of just looking at it and wondering what it was really like up there. I didn’t use the right shoes; I didn’t train correctly for it; it didn’t take enough water with me; so it’s amazing I survived to tell the story. But on the way up the mountain I found a penny left by someone else two-thirds of the way to the top. I walked by a swarm of bumblebees, who weren’t afraid of me, so I wasn’t afraid of them, and they walked on my hands and arm, then flew away. I saw a field full of wild flowers and was probably the only person that summer to walk through them. At the top of the mountain, six thousand feet from where I started; I saw the massive trees which looked like twigs from the valley floor. They had been burned, or had become diseased, and had died.

But here they were at the top of the mountain, defying gravity and age to pull them down. When I look at them from the valley now, I know I’m not looking at small sticks on a peak. I’ve stood next to them and wondered just what they had seen happening down in the valley floor as we inhabited and once barren desert valley and made it bloom.

Perhaps lightning had struck these mighty giants. But they still stand today as a witness of the incredible grandeur of what this world really is. If we can only look up from our daily trudge, we might be able to see the splendor of the universe, and our place in it.

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Love is Green

Love is a strange word. When we think of the things we love, usually family is first on our list. Some people are easy to love, while some others make it difficult for anyone to love them. But when I started thinking about things I love, after my family, I think I would have to say I love tinkering.

I would have to say I get my love of tinkering from my father. I didn’t think we had much in common until someone reminded me I didn’t fall far from the tinkering tree. It’s true we both have cut trees in the forest, and I do like gardening while he prefers ranching, but when it comes to tinkering, I admit I may have the same bug. We are both bargain hunters, too.

Two stories will illustrate what I mean. First, and I love to tell this story, my father once found a great deal on a couple of pontoons. For the uninitiated, pontoon boats have these floating devices that hold the boat up. Dad got pretty excited since he is handy and creative, so he decided to build a house boat. When he was finished, it was very nice, with a bathroom, kitchen, and places to fish both fore and aft. The great part about his ambition with this boat happens when it finally meets water.

Dad had over-estimated the weight the pontoons could float, and the boat didn’t even make it out of the trailer. He could see there was a problem, and the way to fix it was to get bigger pontoons. Now, remember, the reason for the boat was the good deal on the pontoons. So he had to buy bigger ones and the boat turned out fine.

What to do with the smaller pontoons? Only one thing, of course. Build another, smaller pontoon boat, which also worked fine.

So I made the connection when one of my friends pointed out my proclivity for tinkering. One of my favorite projects involved the windows we had replaced for our house. One of the employees of the window company asked me if I wanted the old windows hauled away. If you listen closely to questions like these, the natural reaction is to say “sure”. But you should always try to find out the real answer to the question. I asked the guy, “How much to haul them away?” He said, “A hundred bucks.” I said, “Leave them.” I knew I could find something to use them for, and I had a vague idea floating around in the back of my brain.

I have always wanted a greenhouse. If you’ve ever priced them, you would know they tend to be very expensive. Now I had windows, and they were nice double pane windows which were still in good shape. So my tinkering mind began to plan, and after looking at some designs on the internet, I decided to design a greenhouse around the windows. That meant measuring, calculating, and trying to decide just how big a greenhouse I could build. I had to decide if I wanted it tall enough to stand inside, and if I had enough glass to make it work.

Designing around existing pieces of glass isn’t much different than building a boat from the pontoons up. I decided on the shape I wanted it to be, and after making some pretty detailed plans, I began to build. I have never built a greenhouse before, and as the sides began to rise, I wondered how to make it all stand up so I could screw it together.

There probably are easier ways to build a greenhouse, and anyone watching must have wondered what I thought I was doing. There was one point I didn’t know if it would work, but with about a hundred dollars worth of lumber, mostly two by fours, I had a perfectly serviceable greenhouse.

It’s not the most appealing looking thing in the world, but it works. It does need a little bit of heat assistance in the winter, but it stays 51 degrees even in the coldest winter day. I installed a little adjustable wooden window which opens and closes if it gets too hot. It’s controlled by a little metal lever which is heat activated.

I’ve grown flowers for the spring, banana plants, tangerine and lemon trees in the greenhouse. I usually start some of the plants for the garden in the cold of winter, and I’ve even sold some of them on EBay.

Love is a strange thing. I love to stand surrounded by flowers and green plants in the middle of January with snow and ice all around the greenhouse I tinkered with until it was done.

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Birthday Bash

Okay, it time for another birthday. I was kind of excited when I found out I would be on the air on my birthday. I checked to see how many years it would be before my birthday would be on a Sunday again, and it won’t be until 2016. I think this is because of leap year, since it should happen in seven years instead of six. But I don’t know what I’m going to be doing in six years, so we may as well celebrate it together. I don’t want phone calls or congratulations, because I have officially become an old fart. We don’t like to be reminded of our age. I’m fifty-two, and I don’t need another solicitation from AARP to join. I don’t need any more gray hair, and I don’t need more nose and ear hair, but it seems that is what is destined for the future. I don’t want to be asked if I want the senior discount, and even worse, I don’t plan on retiring. Ever. There are a couple of reasons. I don’t expect Social Security or even my pensions to be around when I’m old enough to collect them. I know my wife won’t let me retire, and to tell the truth, I don’t think I’ll let myself retire either. The Social Security promise was made when hardly anyone lived to be 65. Now almost all of us will make it. What does that mean? As there are more of us retirees, it will take more people working to support us since none of the money is actually saved for us anywhere. Back in the fifty’s, 16 people paid for one person’s retirement. Now it’s down to about 3.3 workers paying for one person. Soon it might be 2 people working to pay my retirement. I hope those two people are making lots of money. I feel the same way about my pension. It’s much too tempting for fat cats to run off with that accumulated money. Call me a pessimist about retirement, but it really doesn’t bother me. I’ll just keeping working. My wife will make sure of that. I have been informed she wants to be living in the future in the “manner to which she has become accustomed”. This doesn’t really leave much room in my future for retiring on a reduced income. I know that when we are home on the weekends I spend a lot more than I do when I am working. Here’s an example from last Saturday. I had an audition and invited my wife to go along to the big city. I thought maybe we could have lunch. The audition took so long she called the daughter who lives there, and invited her to come eat with us. Her friend was also invited. That was a seventy-five dollar meal. Then mom became worried our daughter is a starving student, so we then made a trip to the grocery store. Sixty-eight dollars. We had to get gas for the car, and stop at that excellent bakery on the way home. Thirty more dollars. I’m not brave enough to total the cost. When I spend the day at work, I might spend a couple of bucks for gas, a couple for breakfast and a couple more for lunch. I might even earn more money than I spend. At least that’s the way it’s supposed to work. But when we are out and about, the money disappears. Retirement would only be a daily drain on the cash. Finally, I really don’t want to retire. I really do hope to be able to do the things I do now until they carry me out of the room. I teach, I act, I write, and generally perform every day of my life. Why would I want to stop? I know I will slow down, and I might not be able to do all the things I “used ta could”, but I am amazed at how productive my life has become. I have heard that your fifty’s and sixty’s are supposed to be your most productive years. So far, well, at least two years in, I do believe I am the most productive I’ve ever been. At least I feel like I’m working harder than I ever have before. I feel kind of like that rat on the treadmill. The only problem is the treadmill seems to trail forever behind me, and I’m falling behind a couple of inches every day. I wonder what happens when I fall off the end? So I probably won’t retire. I really don’t want to, but we don’t always get what we want. Between financial demands and the need for attention, I think I could do this for another fifty-two years. Well, maybe just fifty.

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Floor It

One of the reasons I believe we live in abundance is I look around and see so many wonderful things in this world. Even the mundane things we take for granted everyday are miracles compared with only 100 years ago. I thought about this as I was driving with dozens of other people on one of our modern freeways. Someone thought most of us were going to slow, and as he zoomed past me I marveled at the fact something like this was even possible.

We live in a society where affordable and dependable transportation is available to nearly every one who needs it. Where I live a car is almost a necessity, but there is also public transportation available for those who need to get from here to there. We even have “on demand” transportation for those people who may not be able to use a bus or a train. But the point is, we can get from A to B and make a living, make a purchase, or visit those far away.

When you thing about it, a car shouldn’t really be necessary for someone to work, but out here in the wide open spaces, there is definitely a need for many people. For example, my work involves driving twenty miles south. There is a bus which could get me there, but twice a week I also need to travel north thirty miles for one of my part-time jobs. Once a week I make a trip here to the radio station, and there really isn’t public transportation available on the weekend from where I live to where the radio station is. So for the purposes of everything I do, some kind of dependable transportation is a necessity. Multiply that by the thousands of people who work every day, and there will also be a need for roads and ways to keep all of us crazy drivers safe.

I really don’t think it will change any time soon, but I am looking forward to the cars that climb up the sides of buildings like in Minority Report. The cars drive themselves and with the help of computer controls, the traffic should be much better. But there is something to be said for being caught in a traffic jam. When the freeway turns into a parking lot, I like looking around and trying to notice the other people, cars, and sights I usually drive past as fast as I can go. It really makes you appreciate the days when there isn’t a traffic jam and everything is going great.

Commerce also drives what we drive. If you think about all of the business which is done and is centered around the flights of fancy we take in our cars and trucks, it is an amazing array of products and services never available to anyone in the past in the quantity and quality we enjoy today. A visitor from 1776 would be amazed to know today I travelled sixty miles north, audition for a movie, went to a fine restaurant, shopped at a well supplied grocery store and also stopped and buy some really excellent cookies before driving sixty miles south back to my home. In the day of the horse and buggy, thirty miles in an entire day would be a very good day of travelling indeed. And to get a delicious chicken dinner with mashed potatoes and asparagus, plus buy fresh oranges, yogurt, Pepsi – which I don’t think they would appreciate like I do – canned chili, a dozen frozen pre-prepared meals, and a big bag of pancake mix; well, I just don’t think they would believe you. I don’t think I would even mention the excellent bakery we also stopped at to get some delicious éclairs and roles.

I haven’t mentioned all the other excellent stores and entertainment opportunities we drove past and could have patronized. But think about this. My family lives an hour away; my in-laws are two hours away. In one day, we can drive, visit and return home. Two hundred years ago, visiting my relatives could have taken up to a week. As the world has become smaller and faster, it’s true the demands on our time have increased. More is expected of us, but we are also able to do more. I can’t wait for what the future brings. I know we will continue to improve the quality of life for everyone. I just can’t imagine what form it will take. The abundance we enjoy is just a taste of what things may be.

I hope you have the opportunity to enjoy all the wonderful things happening in this world today. As we pay attention and give thanks for all that we enjoy, I think you may realize what a great life you have.

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It’s Hot In Texas

As much as I love flying, there are times when it’s not so much fun. I don’t like standing in lines, and security is usually a hassle, too. I hope I never get as relaxed as the businessman I first flew next to. He was asleep before the plane took off, and woke up after we landed. One time I was on a business trip to Dallas, and it was the middle of a long hot summer. I really liked the time I spent in Texas. The people were friendly, and except for the heat, it was a nice place.

I also visited Houston. But by then I already knew how hot Texas could be. My wife and I went to MD Anderson for some of her cancer treatments. The doctor we were seeing in Houston said to us, “Welcome to the oven.” It really did feel like we were sitting in an oven. But there were some nice things about Houston, like the Miller Outdoor Theatre. They were offering a free show on one of the nights we were there, and so we went to the park to watch “Chorus Line”. Apparently, it was the same production which had just been on Broadway, so we were really excited. So we watched a really excellent show and I sat dripping in the heat. I was really excited for the night to come so things would cool off. Apparently, this is not something which happens in Houston. The sun went down. The moon came up.

I kept waiting for the cool evening breezes to blow in. But it stayed just as hot as when it was daytime. I had never experienced anything like that before, and now when people say it’s not the heat, it’s the humidity, I think I know what they mean. It was eleven o’clock at night when the show ended, and it was just as hot then as when the show had begun. But it was a really good show, and it was free. I like Houston, but I wouldn’t want to live there. I live in one of the driest states, and we have very low humidity. So when it is 105 degrees, it still doesn’t feel like you are in an oven. I work outside most of the summer, and while it may be hot, there usually is a breeze. And at night, it cools down. People who come here from places like Texas have been heard to declare, “Hey, the shade here works!” I guess that means where they are from, it’s just as hot in the shade as in the sun. Or it’s just as hot during the summer night as during the day.

Let’s just say I like my nights cooler than my days, and I like shade that works. What I learned in Dallas the first time I was in Texas is sometimes it is too hot to fly. I don’t think it affects the plane, but I found out if the runway is made of asphalt and it’s 110 degrees outside, the runway may be too soft for the plane to take off. It is not too hot for the passengers to stay on the plane. That’s right. We weren’t allowed off the plane. So it’s 110 outside, and who knows how hot it was inside that aluminum tube. We sat there sweltering and sweating. I adjusted the little fans above me, but they were only blowing more hot air onto us. Apparently, the cold air which usually comes from those vents is cold because the plane is high up in the cold air. I can’t remember how long we sat in the plane waiting for the runway to cool off enough not to melt under us as we took off. It’s one of those Catch 22 situations.

You want the plane to take off so you can stop dripping with sweat, but you also want the plane to be able to take off and not get glued to the tarmac by melting asphalt. Do I want to die from heat exhaustion, or do I want to die in a fiery plane crash? This was more than 20 years ago, and I can still feel the hot, sticky cabin we were sitting in. So I decided to check and see how things were going in Texas this last summer. Let’s talk about San Antonio, which I have never visited, and don’t think I want to see anytime soon, especially in the summer. Last year, the temperature in San Antonio was over 100 degrees. For several days. In fact, for 57 days. Multiplied out, that’s 5700 degrees. The same temperature as an acetylene torch. Let’s just say it was a record-breaking summer for San Antonio.

I’ll bet the shade doesn’t work there either.

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It's Hot In Texas

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