The Trump Card

The Trump Card

There is no reason to go into details, as this is part of my retirement routine, and is my way of fighting off the urge to go back to sleep and just get it over with.    Not induced by anything specific like drugs or alcohol or PSTD or any of the complimentary LSTD-like coded words that might bring you up to speed and enable one to say, “Oh he is living that kind of existence.”

 

More like I have been going over and over the same territory, staring at my fingertips as I examine myself for flaws and signs of breakdown and decomposing elements of the essential kind. 

Staring at my hands, and up the arm, and now consider another 10 minutes looking at my feet, but know that if this is my final act in this morning ritual, then I will have no will nor energy to complete the thoughts I am having as I start my day.    Which as I see it will culminate in the endless cycle of inconsequential actions that map the territory of an expended individual and the experience of retired that teeters on the edge of extreme contradiction. 

So head to toe, or more like finger nail to toe nail examination of my body is an option, but as I stated at the start, 

I decline.

I am warming to the task.  Slept in late and spent the first hour thinking I may have missed something.  Again it would be harmful to go into detail, as this is what I have done all my life, and where it has gotten me, teeters on the cusp of forces external to me taking over, and there is nothing I can rationalize and transform into positive action in the opposite direction of what others do.

 

 So here I am, caught in a mass movement that I elect to ignore.  Without details it all becomes a matter of conjecture.  Just exactly what is the situation a retired person faces?   Might be his platform of protection to say,  “ Wait For It.  It is one of those experiences you have go through on your own.”

 

Of course we know that this phase of his life and reading about it as he writes another daily blog, is one of those tricky passages of word play that is or could be hard to understand.  The story is his cover.  It acts as a subdivision of his intentions to share all of this with you, but without the agony that comes with the thousand yard stare, starting at his fingertips and going as far as possible without using instruments of detail.  Instruments of disclosure that might exaggerate and distort the grossness of his toe nails in full review on the Internet, and posted as a graphic that often accompanies the narrative of his blog.

 

It is just one day.  One blog.  One in a constant flow of too-many to share and make sense of.   Hate to continue on and pester you with a blog that is meant for my amusement only.  Is an instrument of play for me, and the interplay with an interested party  that might even be an avid reader of this blog, is included in the range of vision I have, as I try to reduce this 1000 yard state to something useful in the moment.

 

Off on my own tangent and thoughts, covering the space between us is all but impossible.  Is why I say, “No details.  Just words as he decides to put them on this page.”  Helps me be clear about the need to cultivate suspense about the outcome and more so, about his intent of involving others.  I like it when people read my blog. 

Simple like that.

 

There was a time when I played the game just for fun.  First wife was gone and I had no children at the time.  Had time on my hands and did experiment with the details and meaning of life.  Small and exciting it was.  Technology was not what it is today.  Small steps and we had time to enjoy what we were doing.  Played a game.  It was called Bridge.  Had something to do with Trump Cards and making your bid.  It was fun.  I played only with loved ones and family and friends, so close we could not tell ourselves apart.  But that was in the old days.  Now our phone is also a camera.  Details expose me in the picture that is displayed instantly with a click of a button.  Click.  Click.  All is known.  No mystery, as you can see it for what it is.

Not sure what I am leading up to.  Has been a frantic pervious year.  2015.  It has been like a take-over of my senses and the world I once was part of.  Seems like I am going through a cycle of misunderstanding.  Not sure what others are doing, nor what they want, and how any of what is going on around me is to impact the current day I find myself with.   So I have developed and have this 1000 yard stare.  Blog and emphasize my insufficient commitment to the world-at-large and my state of affairs,  caught between what is important to you, and what is incomprehensible to me.  A balance and it  is time to play my Trump Card.

 

Not sure what the outcome will be.  The 1000 yard stare comes when I find myself at war with everyone and everything.   The power centers are shifting.  The enemy is elusive and difficult to find, even with today’s technology.  And so it is,  I see the world as fat pigs, dogs and slobs and disgusting.” And when that happens it is time to pack it up, go home and say in a defiant voice.  “I am retired.  It is okay to ignore me.”   Seems like a vulgar way  to make a simple point.  Time has taken me away.  It is not something I will debate.

And that brings me back to The Trump Card.  Is Thursday and am reading how there will be a final Republican Debate before the Iowa Vote, which is but the start of a process that interests me.  Democracy.  Voting.  Power.    Muscle in the system that has powered me to where I am today.  Retired.  Safe.  Content.  Staring at my hands and possibly my feet, asking myself, “What adventure awaits me today?”  And this is my Trump Card, and it gives me comfort  to lay it on the table and escalate the attack in the game I play.  Now I wait.  To see what happens.  Is it enough.  Did I win?

 

A Deliberate Vagueness

A Deliberate Vagueness

 

I am not saying that the storm of the century that occurred this last weekend had any measurable effect on me.  Not like I checked the measuring stick and I had accumulated another two inches.  There is something wonderful about the white-stuff accumulating, and the ordinary drabness of my surroundings being covered up, even if we can also anticipate a meltdown and that mess of circumstances that depressed me in the first place, returning. 

 Has been a while since I have blogged, and see a pattern of doing it once a month.  Pay the rent.  Once a month.  Take out the garbage, and that should be a daily task, but am waiting for the snow to go away, so that I can make my way to the alley.  In some ways, I am being deliberately vague about some things.  Why would a couple of inches or wait are we in the 13 inch range now, impact little old me?  

Don’t think so.  Not important.  Avoid details.

 

Seems there is a certain degree of exaggeration when it comes to expectations and then the reality of delivery and what actually found its way to me.  Having said that, it seems it is over before I can get a measurement that convinces me, this really did happen.  The scope of it all was truly enormous.  And still I am deliberately vague.

Not sure if it is stupor or a fog that comes with the falling snow.  White-Out and I find myself inside,  and suddenly blogging, because I can and because I have time on my hands.  Regular exercise is postponed.  Best to recover slowly and venture out later, when the uncertainty has passed and nobody seems to care that the white stuff has turned to slush and is what it is, and about all that is a deliberate vagueness, which is my blog topic for today.

 

I have myself suspended in a mystical state of debrief, as I ask, but come up with no answer, “Did this really happen?”   Based on my past performance, I may have another month or more to come up with a satisfactory explanation as to why any of this is important.  Winter happens each year.  In Los Angles 13 inches might happen on the Hollywood Movie Screen, but in real life we tend to be content with the national average.  Give or take 2 inches and we can manage.  Rain.  Snow.  Something else, and this is where I keep a deliberate vagueness in mind.

Imaginative suggestion, and have decided this is what I have become accustomed to because of the digital nature of the news and weather and sports.  Fact checking might happen, but before it does and reaches me in any significant proportion, such that the impact is measurable, the act or event is over.  Obsolete or melted before I can decide for myself how often I should expose myself to all of this.

Not sure why any of this has taken over and made my blog space.  Certainly it is not that I have lost interest.  Stamina being what it is,  I can understand the hesitation that I display, when others say,  “This is the big one.”  And again I am being cautious with a deliberate vagueness and missing a step or two when I tell myself, “It is okay if you are disappointed.”    Not sure if I have decided or things just happen and I learn to live with it.  But in this modern period I find myself lacking conviction and incentive to blog more,  enjoy more, or even do more.  Once a month.  Twice a week.  Three times a day.  Frequency and duration and wonder if it matters to spell it out the specific activity and specific requirement of what is the makeup of  the perfect snowfall or storm or personal experience forecast-ed to happen .

 

Seems it is over before I can actually get a grip, balance myself on slippery ground, and embrace the moment for better or worse.  To make it worse, it seems it happened everywhere I was not, and I seeing pictures and hearing the stories that are out there.  Storm of the Century  and just a few days ago I was concerned.  But not now, and for reasons I will not  repeat  I will voice a certain frustration and disappointment that you were able to experience that 13 inches or more, while I had to settle for the normal amount or none at all.

Happens when we live local and interact globally or at a distance greater than our immediate self and place of being.  Local and global and in some ways I am tired of hearing about all of this, when it seems to pass me by and leaves me wanting.  Wanting what you have, and when it comes down to details there is a deliberate vagueness as to what I mean.  Local and Global and one step removed from the everyday me, and this has me thinking.  “Should I blog more or less.  Will it help?”

Copious Amounts

Copious Amounts

 

I am going into the New Years 2016 with a split-vision perspective, and remind myself that the world as I know it is an acquired taste.  Seems silly to me that I would blow myself up like a puffer fish and try to scare the big fish away, but is what I am doing these days.  Seems I am dropping back and punting, putting the ball in somebody elses hands, and let them run the distance for a score, or for some other goal that is just not realistic for me at the time and place I find myself in these days.

 

Find myself with copious amounts of humor and humility and humble estate in a wind-swept landscape of my own making.  Having said that, I brace myself against the winds of change, and accept the challenge.  And what might that challenge be?   For starters I suggest that I go it alone, side stepping the incongruities of time warp and just not feeling it, as I am faced with a new plane of reality that comes with smart phones and dumbed-down humans, forced to taking things as they come, for better or worse.

Each day coming up with new ways to deal with the situation as it parades itself in front of me, demanding full attention, regardless of my position in this techno-illogical of man-made constructions that tend towards legitimacy because they appear and you acknowledge it.   And that’s it.  Social media and you making your presence known, and often it leaves me wondering, “Do I know you?”  “What does this have to do with me?”

 

And of course this discussion could go on in copious amounts of word flow, except for the very fact that I have little time or energy for any of this.  You see, I have acquired one or two more devices, and each operates as a separate universe until itself.  A Kindle Fire and it came as a gift over the holidays.  Another was a tablet Kit Kat Android Tablet, with camera front and back.  And if that isn’t enough to throw the mind into delirious spin, I will continue to collect the down side of materialism as Sales and Returns add up, and on my table sit the trophies of the holidays, unwrapped.

Okay.  One last thing before I drown myself in sorrow, or as it happens in your neighborhood, the next best thing which might be drinking our favorite cocktail on New Year’s Eve.  Just reading where I can celebrate the coming of 2016 in a very special way.  Seems the USA Today is reporting that Olive Garden in Times Square is charging $400 per person for New Year’s Eve tickets.  Reading more details I find that that includes a bathroom and a buffet and an open bar, meaning it’s a pay-as-you-go Drink situation, and it costs more and more, and that of course depends on you and your budget and appetite.  Seems like in copious amounts you can party and celebrate and for New York City is relatively cheap, if you don’t worry about taxi or hotel expenses after midnight on one of the busiest times of the year.

 

It has taken me two days now to complete this blog.  Wanted it done by January 1, 2016.  Have a couple of days to get this posted, but of course I wanted it completed now.  Not sure what I should finish with.  Do not want to be dismissive of imparting both positive energy and also a grand gesture that New Year’s with family and friends drinking copious amounts of champagne and watching college football game is most important and must be done in grand style. 

Am I looking forward to 2016?  Yes and No is the answer I present here and now.  Yes, because it means I am alive and that speaks for itself.  No, because the celebration encapsulates the point that I must wash over all of this with copious amounts of alcohol and other stimulants that fortify all this as having a good time.  So that is where I am.  Familiar with the rituals of bringing in the New Years, and familiar with doing all this with the help of a designated driver, as I must not break the law, nor get a DUI, or even injure others or myself, all in the name of welcoming 2016. 

The things we do to celebrate leaves me breathless.  And yes, welcoming in the New Years can be done without drinking or drugging and all that.  Most will ignore what others do and say concerning New Year’s Day 2016.  Even so I encourage the opportunity to share this blog with you.

Copious Amounts in this case amounts to next to nothing, as I sit on my couch in a stupor on January 1^st, asking myself.  “What day is it?  Did the Eagles win?”  And that’s when I reflect back to    Times Square and the night before, and Olive Garden and being together to watch New York City drop the ball, and because it is not perfectly clear what really happened, I just have to ask for a second time. 

“Did the Eagles win?” 

 

And now it comes to me that they probably didn’t, as Philadelphia NFL just fired their coach Chip Kelly.  This is a football fact that has nothing to do with you, nor do you have interest in.  Leaving me to think that New Year’s and Football and things like that are not even related to each other at all.  And if we think this way, then it leaves me with copious amounts of yesterday that I just need to discard and not include in my baggage in the year 2016.  And yet, I am an old fashion person.  Will not feel like the job is complete until I wish you a Happy New Years.

Happy New Years.  2016.

 

Now I am done and has me thinking.  “I need a drink or something.”  Because life without you and without football is incomprehensible to me.  And there you have it.  Modern times all over the globe and it has me wondering, “Where did 2015 go?”

Happened so fast, and now I sit dizzy and wondering.  Did the Eagles Win?  Chip Kelly and he just lost his job.  And millions say, “ Eagles, Bears and Lions.  What exactly has this to do with me and a Happy New Year’s 2016.   And I possible could attempt to tell you, but then realize this is an international blog and site, going world-wide to spread the message, and for the most part the significance of it all is lost, or just lost in translation, and it is true.  We do not speak the same language.  Words flow in copious amounts, but leaves me sitting on the couch, asking.  “What just happened?  Do I care?”

Football and New Year’s celebration is still a few days in the future.  I feel better now.  Conversation about the future is senseless and about football, once what was important is no longer the case as we venture off-planet and into outer space, knowing that on the moon and on Mars, they don’t even have a team.  So no reason to go there, but we do.  And that leaves me thinking.  The year 2016 and where are you?   And more importantly I wonder.  “Are we there yet?”  And one more.  “Are we having fun?”