I got nothin'

I write less than I used to. As time goes by I am becoming convinced that I don't have anything original or interesting to say.

When I was young I was much smarter. Wisdom came to me so fast I couldn't explain it all.

But, over the years I've come to realize the older I get and the more I learn, the more I realize how little I know.

That was an original thought when I thunk it. Nobody enlightened me. I had never heard or read anything like it. I thought it was a brilliant original epiphany. But now we have the Internet and ego crushing reality is just a search away.

A minute ago I typed "The more I learn..." into Google and here's what popped up:

The more you learn, the more you know. The more you know, the more you forget. The more you forget, the less you know. So why bother to learn? -- George Bernard Shaw

And,

The more you know, the less you understand. -- Lao-Tse

And the real stunner:

The more I learn, the more I learn how little I know. -- Socrates

Socrates had my original thought some 2,400 years before I did and said it more crisply!

AND, in ancient Greek!

Worse yet, I'll bet he wasn't the first guy to figure this out, either. He just had a tremendous publicist.

I suppose having an idea expressed by one of the great thinkers in history come to me all by itself is cool but there's no point in my passing it along. It obviously occurs to everybody eventually.

Plus, if we all ran around regurgitating every brilliantly mundane original thought we have what would become of the poor philosophy majors who have nothing else to do with their educations?

The other reason I don't write much anymore is because Americans don't read much anymore.

We don't consume information, we spew it.

We Tweet. We text. We spend our days expressing every banal thought that crosses our mind in such a way that we don't have to bother hearing or reading a response.

I could be wrong about this. Or, maybe it's a trend that will reverse itself.

Maybe, but how can I know?

I've learned so much, so fast, I'm rushing toward total ignorance.

Christmas in perspective

A message has been making the rounds on Facebook lately urging people to remember the less fortunate at Christmas. You've probably seen it. It was one of those, “if you agree, post this to your timeline for at least one hour” messages. Like all of those posts that insist you “share” the message I found it annoying. Many of them say something like, "We'll see how many people have their hearts in the right place. I'll bet 97% of you won't re-post this."

You win. I won't.

In this case I “liked” the post because I like the poster but I but didn't share it. Aside from my personal annoyance, like many social media notes it attacked a huge issue with cursory, superficial and ignorant observations.

That's how we roll in 21st Century America.

This particular message was well-intended but not very well written. It not only urges us to think of the hungry, the homeless and those who are facing great physical or emotional challenges and to count our blessings, it kind of makes you feel guilty for being happy.

That's a uniquely American social problem right now. But, I digress...

The message did make me think back to Christmas seasons in my life that were less than completely joyous. There was one in particular.

December 1981: My first wife and I had split up less than a month earlier. I didn't want the divorce but I had to move out of our home, away from the life I still loved and our four-year-old son. I spent that Christmas in an apartment more alone and lonely than I had ever been in my life. I wasn't hungry, homeless or without friends but I was a young man who had always been blessed with a large, loving family, and now my immediate family had splintered. It was not the Christmas I had always been promised.

I was shattered.

Time, as they say, heals all wounds. It also gives us perspective. That lonely Christmas 33 years ago taught me the most important lesson of my life:

Happiness and misery are transitory. Neither will last forever.

In December 1981 I learned that we don't live in a Norman Rockwell world. Christmas isn't filled with nonstop love and joy. Most of us don't have movie-beautiful homes in a soft snowfall with Grandma and Grandpa arriving on the front porch, smiles on their faces, bearing beautifully wrapped gifts and warm hugs.

Some Christmases are happier than others. Some are tragic. Mostly, they are times in our years when our exaggerated expectations fail to meet reality, and yet, we still love them.

As long as a child lives in you there is hope and happiness.

Help the needy when you can. Pray for the less fortunate if you are one who prays, but never let despair or guilt of your blessings mark your joy.

If you agree, share this message. 

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good life!

I need a break

You ever get tired of yourself?

We get tired of constantly being around other people. Not always or often, but just occasionally we all need a break from even the people we love most in life: our spouse, our kids, our best buddy. They're not doing anything wrong or bothering you. You love them more than life itself but still, occasionally, you just get a bit weary. We all do. I'm no psychologist but I'm absolutely sure that it's normal and healthy and nothing to worry about. After all, absence makes the heart grow fonder, right? Or, as Dan Hicks put it in his song by the same name: How Can I Miss You If You Won't Go Away?

Have you ever wondered how you can go through your entire life without feeling that way about yourself?

Geez! Everywhere you go, there you are! You wake up and you're there. You go to bed and you go with you. You know everything you're thinking and everything you're going to say before you say it! Doesn't that make you just a little crazy every once in awhile?

You understand yourself better than anybody else. You talk to yourself but you never, I mean NEVER, have an argument. You like the same foods, watch the same TV shows, laugh and cry at the same things and you love the same people.

I swear, sometimes I just need a short break from me. I need to send myself away or take a short vacation and be somebody I never met before.

Admit it, the thought of being with me 24/7 for 62 years is unimaginable, right? Sure it is! You couldn't do it, so why should I be expected to?

I know what you're thinking and, NO! Both of me assures you emphatically I am not having a break down or bordering on being dangerous to myself. I love every moment of this glorious and divine gift we call life. Why would I kill myself? I love me!

Still, sometimes I begin to have a thought and then cut it off with, "Yeah, I know, I know."

Ever feel like that?

Miley Cyrus and Sgt. Carter

I find the public reaction to the Miley Cyrus performance on the Video Music Awards Sunday night both, hopeful and fascinating. Hopeful because it seems we might finally be getting to a point where even the target audience for such acts is getting annoyed, and fascinating because Americans still don't seem to understand why this story lights us up.

In the past couple of days I have seen hundreds of negative reactions to Miley's writhing and grinding and a handful of of opposition postings on Facebook asking why we can't pay more attention to wholesome news, like President Obama's awarding of the Medal of Honor to Sgt. Ty Carter for heroism on the battlefield in Afghanistan. (For the record, we at KLIF in Dallas did talk about Sgt. Carter and his amazing story of bravery but it wasn't an easy story to stumble across. On the other hand, Miley's flesh colored bikini and giant rubber finger was absolutely everywhere.)

From where I sit, Americans have a pretty good handle on what matters in their personal lives and know when their families are under assault. Sgt. Carter is protecting us while Miley is violating our collective sense of decency.

Sgt. Carter stands for the best of all things in this country. He's the latest in a 250 year heritage of heroes we've learned to count on to protect our families and the freedoms we cherish. That's not to say he is taken for granted. He will tell you himself he was doing a job that was expected of him. And he knows we love him for it.

Miley is another matter. She, too, is the latest in a long string of Americans standing up for freedom but the freedom she has embraced is one that threatens our instinctive human modesty. Parents and grandparents see this sort of thing as an assault on the values they've accepted from their own ancestors and are trying to pass on to the next generation. Chief among those values are personal dignity and respect for others.

Sunday night Miley Cyrus tried to advance her career at the expense of little American girls everywhere, teaching them that their primary personal value lies below the waist and between their legs.

I know I sound like my own parents' parents when Elvis first shook his hips onstage in the fifties. My mom and dad had the same problem with the Beatles' outlandish shaking of their famous mop-tops. (It was just their heads, for heaven's sake!) The annoyance of parents is a social tradition. The problem is, as performers push that envelope to more blatant sexuality in order to outdo Gaga and Madonna, as we allow the margin between self respect and self abuse to be blurred, we are allowing one person's freedom of expression to set the tone of acceptability for an entire society.

These days we sometimes forget that freedom of speech includes the right to stand up and say, “Enough!” 

The death of a word

I'm one of those word nerds who drives his family crazy by correcting their speech and writing. I do it to be helpful, I really do. I've learned to lay off my friends in public because people are embarrassed if you point out an error in spelling, punctuation, pronunciation or word choice. They protest, "You know what I mean!", but they're really just embarrassed by their ignorance.

Why, then, are dictionaries enabling rather than challenging them?

English is said to be the most difficult language in the world to master. But, for its complexity it is also the most glorious. There are no true English language synonyms. Every word that essentially means the same as another has its own unique feeling and implication. These implied emotions and judgments allow really good writers to write between the lines, to manipulate perspective and emotions by inference rather than directive.

The best writers never tell you what to think or how to feel, they merely lead the way and allow you to discover yourself in their path.

That's the power of the language. 

Words are my business. I talk on the radio for a living and write a bit on the side, so this stuff is a big deal for me. I don't expect most people to understand or care about the subtleties and nuances of the language. I don't point out slightly off target utterances, not even to my wife, just the ugly errors that may lead people to misunderstand or misjudge her. But I do ask English speakers everywhere to join with me in protest of officially redefining perfectly good, very specific words simply because so many people are too lazy to learn to use them correctly.

The Oxford English Dictionary has thrown in the towel and declared that the constant misuse of the word, 'literally' is now acceptable. It can mean literally or it can be used for emphasis as in, "It was literally raining cats and dogs."

These horribly conflicting definitions are 180 degrees out of sync. The word "literally" is effectively dead.

Education is apparently no longer the Dictionary's purpose. The arbiters of our language seem to have decided it is nobler (and perhaps, more politically correct) to reflect rather than guide communication. In doing this they leave it to the reader or listener to determine if cats and dogs are actually raining down from the sky or if it is 'literally', meaning figuratively, raining cats and dogs.

And what difference does it make, you may ask? In this example, probably none but it does empower hyperbole in ways that make purists like me panic for our sudden blindness.

If I can't trust you to say precisely what you mean or to understand what I'm saying, what is the point in either of us saying anything at all?

These days we're all giving up. We shrug and say, "Whatever." Even the Dictionary is doing it.

We all suffer when our ability to communicate with specificity and clarity is eroded.

I understand that language is fluid and always evolving. I embrace that. I ply my trade using colloquial English and I adore slang, it's the spice that enriches the language but is useless by itself.

Definitions can't be allowed to contradict themselves just because people are lazy. 

At this rate, in a couple of generations communication will have devolved to grunting and pointing at things.

(That's neither literally nor figuratively literal, it's just sarcasm.)

© D.L. Williams, August 16, 2013

King George VI

A new heir to the British throne was born yesterday. Today his royal parents revealed his name:

George Alexander Louis.

When most of us select names for our children we consider honoring our own parents or grandparents, we think about how the full name sounds in a rhythmic, musical sense. But mostly we just look for names that sound good.

I wonder if Prince William and Princess Kate talked about calling the baby Rory, Jake or Elton? I doubt it. They don't sound royal, do they? No, they certainly had to take the big picture into their thinking.

King George VI does sound richly historic. It gives the modern British monarchy the serious stature of a traditional storybook kingdom of yore.

The cynic in me wonders if William and Kate ever had a real choice at all or if royal scholars brought pressure to bear on naming the new Prince of Cambridge.

Certainly they child has no choice but to live in a fishbowl his entire life.

On one hand I love the fairy tale representation of the British royal family. But from my own, limited, American perspective, I also find it very sad.

Sensationalism

As I write this, midday on Tuesday, July 9th, country music superstar Randy Travis is lying a few miles away in a Plano, Texas, hospital fighting for his life. He was admitted last Sunday with cardiomyopathy, a weakening of the heart muscles caused by a viral infection. At last report he was listed in critical condition.

All of this is being dutifully and accurately reported by the local Dallas and national news media outlets but many of them can't stop there. They can't just tell you the guy is seriously ill and then move on to the next story. Most insist on harkening back to last year when Travis, who lives near Pilot Point, north of Dallas, was arrested twice for offenses related to public drunkenness.

Randy Travis is a very famous man. His arrests were news last year but not now.

Yet, everywhere I looked on the Internet and on TV news this morning I saw Randy's ugly mug shot, the one where he's scowling, sporting a cut over his nose and a black eye. It's a picture taken nearly a year ago when the very sad side of Randy's personal life became humiliatingly public.

It was news then. It's not now. 

Now, Randy Travis is fighting for his life and that alone is apparently not dramatic enough to satisfy the reporting instincts of people who seem to wish they were writing movies rather than news. The media accounts are conflicted, disguised as sympathy while piling on the retelling of Travis' bad behavior nearly a year ago leading the reader/viewer to tie it to his current life-threatening condition.

The implication is clear: Randy Travis is a drunk. He did this to himself. And, from what I can learn by researching viral cardiomyopathy, long term alcohol addiction can, in fact, be a factor. Randy's doctors haven't said that it was and by law they can't. So, without attribution the journalists just suggest it by retelling the story of Travis being cornered drunk and naked one night last year, resisting arrest. Not long after that he reportedly got in a fight.

The nasty mug shot is exciting. Let's bring that back!

And, in our reporting we must sound very sad and noble about it all because it is our uncomfortable duty to impose on this great, though tortured man's privacy and dignity and to reveal his personal demons again, with heavy judgmental implication.

These days it's not enough to simply report the facts, we must give you context and lead you toward a conclusion, suggesting what you should think and how you should feel.

You are the public, after all. You have a right to know.

Update, July 16th, reported by TMZ:

Randy Travis' heart issues which landed him in the hospital a week ago ... are NOT the result of drug or alcohol abuse, according to his doctors.

Doctors at the Texas hospital where Randy is getting treatment just said -- based on images of Randy's heart -- it's more likely that a family history of cardiomyopathy is to blame for his ongoing heart trouble.

Our Ladybug

For the second time in less than four months I find myself writing about the loss of a pet.

Lady came to CarolAnn and me a few years ago when her master died of old age. Homer was a wonderful neighbor in Glendora. Whenever he went to visit his family out of state Lady stayed with us and gradually became a member of our family. 

From the beginning she was the sweetest animal we've ever known. We loved Cricket more at first because we had loved her longer. But Lady came to us gently, quietly; satisfied with our kindness and patient with our distractions. 

When Cricket died this past February, Lady became the light of our lives.

These pets. They crawl into our hearts and nest there. They ask nothing of us except love and security. In return they give us the most purely selfless devotion that can exist in flesh and bone.

They won't quit on you, no matter what.

When your heart aches they flood it with comfort. 

Lady died as she lived: quietly, with gratitude and never a complaint.

If you ever had a dog that loved you, you know the love of God. 

  

No biggie.

May 6th - AC stops working in our Toyota Sienna minivan.
May 7th - Toyota dealership fixed AC, $759.45.
June 7th - AC stops working again.
June 8th - Toyota dealership determines the new part broke and they don't have another one. They tell me to bring it back Tuesday, June 11th.
June 7, 8, 9, 10 - Hot days, driving with no AC. Then, back to the dealership...
June 11th - They still don't have the part. Nobody ordered it. They'll call me in the morning.
June 12th - They did not call. I called them. Yes, they have the part! Bring in the van, we'll fix it and give you a free rental car.
June 12th - I take the van back to the dealership. They have the part but no rental car. Guy says they will call me tomorrow. I drive home with no AC.

...to be continued...

But here's the point:

Three or four guys dropped the ball and I will be talking with the service department manager soon. Still, this is life. Stuff happens. People screw up everyday. I sure do.

I'm home now in the air conditioned house. I'm healthy. My family loves me. I'm happy. The stupid AC will get fixed sooner rather than later.

As Jimmy Buffett said, "Life is just a tire swing."

Our silver anniversary

Our wedding carriage with the fringe on the top.

Yesterday was our silver anniversary. Carolann and I have been married for 25 years. Like everybody else who is blessed to reach this milestone we keep wondering, where did the time go?

25 years!

It sounds so long but lived so fast.

Our kids were kids. Jeremy had just turned eleven, Nathan was only seven. The four of us shared a Western wedding at Milhaus Ranch just outside of Nevada City, California, a June day that began overcast and ended with sunshine streaming through a tiny break in dark gray clouds; a single ray of sunlight that landed on nobody but the two of us standing before the covered wagon altar. At the time everybody said it was a sign of God's blessing.

Now I'm thinking maybe it was.

In our memories and photo albums 25 years is all a happy blur. We remember (or reinvent) the best of times vividly. The rough patches just seem like faint scrapes on a perfectly aging portrait.

Yesterday somebody asked the secret to our marriage. It's no secret, I said. We were good friends before we fell in love and we make each other laugh.

Milhaus Ranch, June 4, 1988

Very rarely we make each other cry.

A good marriage is like a carousel ride. You go up and down, around and around, accompanied by weird, happy music.

You laugh a lot.

And it seems like it will last forever.