These are difficult days.
I feel torn by wanting to disconnect completely, and feeling responsible for being somewhat aware of the basic downfall of our country.
Mostly I watch winter go by outside the front window, and in our living room all is quiet and calm. It feels selfish. It also feels like survival.
There is an infuriating isolation of watching what you predicted so tragically playing out.
And there is a loneliness in being right that diminishes any joy in it.
Every once in a while I’ll call my friend Chris for no substantial reason other than to tell him I made a killer breakfast or some other insignificant and largely mundane bit of information (often the call goes out after a therapy session when I’m in a rare mood to talk). Here’s how a recent check-in went:
ME: I just made the most amazing French toast, using egg nog! And it’s a life-changing experience.
CHRIS: I’m a father who has to drop off his kid at school.
ME: I know… why did you choose that life?
That was actually the end of the conversation.
At this time in our country’s history, remember to check on your friends – they’re hurting, and they’re people too.
Winter has been having its way with me, and rather than fight that, or work on embracing it, I’ve lately been letting it simply flow. I feel my body slowing down a bit, and I’ve been taking time to simply watch winter as it goes by. A certain bit of slumber and hibernation often come into play during this season, and I lean into this sense of nesting; staying home becomes comfortable habit, one that I’ll have to break when spring comes again. For now, I go with my sedentary heart and mind, lounging and cuddling into our unmade bed.
I’ll sink into the couch in late afternoon, as the last rays of sunlight fall into the living room, and read a little, or go into my daily meditation. It is a place of peace, and a time of tranquility, somewhat at odds with the rest of the world, and that’s always been my way.
Even the prickliest among us, and I acknowledge I may one of them, deserve some love. We don’t always mean to attack, it’s just our armor, and some of us needed that armor to survive. If you were lucky enough not to need any, consider yourself fortunate. As for those who make others go through a little more to love them, I choose to think that sometimes it’s worth the effort. Love is always worth the effort.
We’ve had several beautiful sunsets this past week, a gift in January when skies are typically gray and drab. With everything happening in the world right now, such a scene is worthy of gratitude, worthy of noting, worthy of a blog post without much else.
God knows I’ve been a prick in the past, and in many instances I’ve been largely sorry for it. Sometimes, however, it’s been a matter of survival – emotional survival – when being anything other than a prick would have resulted in someone walking all over my ass. Thankfully, those days are mostly done – both of me being a prick, and of needing to be a prick. When you get to a certain point in your life, you’re either ok with who you’ve become, or you work to be something better than you are today. Dangling somewhere between the two is where I find myself now, and it’s not a bad place to be.
Two candles burn on a winter’s night. One end at a time – as there are two we need not burn one at both ends. That’s the quickest way to burn a candle out, and make a mess in the process. Instead, two are better than one, and the glow of a duo makes quick work of the darkness, even on a Monday night, which is when this is being written.
My friend Ann once remarked that she loves Monday as it offers the chance to start again fresh. I love the sentiment, even as I find it difficult to love the Monday aspect. I went into the day with that mindset, however and for whatever reason the day wasn’t as bad as it usually is. The sun and slightly warmer temps no doubt helped contribute to the change in attitude, but maybe we have more of a say in any given day than we think we do. I’m going to try it again today; Tuesdays are always more trying than Mondays because we think they won’t be.
In the meantime, before the light of the day really kicks in, there is candlelight.
Lacoste was the lucky company who snagged Taylor Zakhar Perez as their underwear model, and he fronts this weekly recap – hot enough to thaw out our frigid January space…
Last week began with a snowy, cozy night.
Nobody bothered to tell me the best and easier way to peel potatoes, so I still don’t know.
While outside a winter raged, this daily meditation was dappled in green light.
Is no one else bothered by the no-bake cookie?
This Tom knows how to keep me warm in the winter.
Sad & pretty, pretty & sad.
A message to the Fraternal Order of Police from the husband of a retired police officer.
A gratuitous Tom Holland shirtless post.
Now found is the fairest – the fairest of them all.
Taylor Zakhar Perez in his underwear for Lacoste.
At the close of a winter day, music by the Danish String Quartet.
Holy shit, can you believe this?!?
Scaring away the Sunday scaries.
Our Dazzlers of the Day were Michelle Obama and Mariann Edgar Budde.
In this age of misinformation, FaceBook or Meta or whatever the stupid fucks have named it now has decided to do away with fact-checkers, because who needs them?
Incidentally, it seems that Mark Zuckerberg is reportedly and allegedly a pedophile. Oh, and dead. This is what is being reported and I only wish there was a fact-checker to disprove it.
Thoughts and prayers.
(And no community notes here, sorry!)
¯\_(?)_/¯
Just to be fair, let’s give Zuck the last word, though I’m not sure how it supports his fact-free stance for FaceBook, as it seems that {consults notes} fact-checking might solve his issue?
Writing this blog post on a Saturday morning, scheduling it for a Sunday morning, and titling it ‘A Sunny Sunday Beginning’ takes a big old set of foolish balls, especially without having consulted any sort of weather app to even attempt something with any accuracy, but such recklessness is what makes writing this ridiculous blog so much fun sometimes. (As does a wildly unwieldy run-on sentence – it’s my blog and I’ll run on if I want to. I’ll even wrongfully end a sentence with a proposition if I want to. Twice.)
Playfulness rears its welcome head when the possibility of a sunny day approaches – and given the meteorologists lately, we just don’t know when that might be, so I’m taking this as that possibility. If it’s dark and dreary, so be it – no sense in worrying about that until it’s actually happening – and even then, what can we possibly change about the weather? What I can do is focus on the diagram presented here – one that dissects the fact that we have finished out the ten darkest days of the past year. It’s only getting lighter until summer, and maybe that’s the energy, and preposition, to end on.
Taylor Zakhar Perez is no stranger to fronting popular pictorial posts in these precious parts, as evidenced by the multiple examples starting with this one right here (click it to flick it). While romantic comedies are not exactly my favorite genre, I absolutely adored ‘Red, White and Blue’ (a rare breed of a movie that might surpass the magic of the original book). It helped that Perez briefly paraded his naked butt in a memorable hotel scene, but his chemistry with Nicholas Galitzine was palpably enchanting. Of course, if it’s gratuitous pictures you seek, look no further than this post.
As our country continues its descent toward fascism, I originally intended for this website to operate as it always had – with an eye toward escapism and amusement with the odd and only very occasional political post. Andy and I have totally turned off the news as it continues to normalize the convicted felon that half of the country supposedly elected, and that has made a profound improvement in our daily existence. Still, turning a blind eye to egregious assaults on the country we love can only go on for so long, and every once in a while I will have to take a stand and make a post as I did yesterday, if only so that future generations know that not all of us are cool with what’s happening.
None of this is ok, and simply going back to making frivolous or cute comments about Melania’s wardrobe or Elon’s weird moves will not cut it. One day your children are going to look back at this time and ask what you did or said or wrote – I don’t want my electronic footprint to show me critiquing the First Lady’s fucking hat or fashion like the rest of it doesn’t matter (or like she wasn’t monstrous enough to say “who gives a fuck about the Christmas stuff” while her supporters craft some false-narrative about a War on Christmas – classy elegance my ass).
That said, I will largely be back to the non-political in a very intentional effort to offer some sort of escapism from what is happening in the world. This website was only ever about me entertaining myself, and in the process perhaps entertaining others. It will be about what inspires or moves me, what I find interesting and beautiful and important. At the same time, it will not operate in a complete vacuum and bubble. I’m too honest to pretend everything is ok, and I’m not evolved enough to let those who set this into motion off without accountability.
Outside, the icicles are either growing or diminishing, melting or amassing greater girth, and it’s not quite clear which. The sun is strong but the icy wind chill feels stronger. There is balance somewhere, I just don’t have the discernment to determine exactly where it lies.
Through the fronds of a Norfolk Island pine, I sit lotus-style as the ringing of a Tibetan singing bowl slowly fades into silence. Outside, a snow-covered world of white and blue sends light ricocheting throughout the room, while the sun itself pours in through the green branches of this little tree – beauty in dappled light reminiscent of summer and sunny days. This is the room and space in which I do my daily meditation – and it’s the moment of the day I find myself craving and enjoying, so I’m slowly going to elongate these sessions as a way of getting through the winter.
While the floral bombast of an orchid may steal the show for a week or two, and the re-budding of a Thanksgiving/Christmas/Easter cactus might shift focus, the greenery of this Norfolk Island pine is something to which I return most. Its green glow in the early afternoon is a happy reminder that the outside world will be green again too; it is a promise and covenant as powerful and reassuring as any rainbow – perhaps even more-so with its consistency and fortitude.
Here is where I find peace, and shutting out the world is the surest way to reconnect with calm.
Try it – you’ll like it.
A Sunday night snowstorm with a Monday holiday made for a cozy, comfortable evening at home with Andy. As he finished putting together a pasta dinner and warming a loaf of bread in the oven, I did a meditation in the living room. With Monday off, there were no Sunday scaries, a relief in itself, and this further embrace of a winter night kept the evening warm. As we have done for almost twenty-five years, we will continue to find comfort in such cozy evenings, no matter what madness swirls in the outside world. Sometimes I think the colder things get there, the cozier we make it inside our home. A lesson and blueprint for the next few years…
