New Year ...Old Problems

The world has begun to slide into 2014 -- without malice, with some joy, with continuing optimism balancing ongoing pessimism. 

I wish all my loved ones: family, friends, enemies, old lovers, wouldbe lovers -- the same sentiment.  Happy New Year and a Blessed 2014!

Playing the Villain

When a relationship ends -- there is always one partner left to "play the villain."  The "other" tries to re-establish the relationship, sometimes after some time has passed, or sometimes over time -- but the "villain" steadfastly retains the villain status.  It is not easy to play or "be" the villain.  But it is a necessary function.

Someone has to be there to say "you can't go home again," "you can't step twice into the same river," "you can't recreate the magic that once existed," etc. etc. etc.  All true -- but it still earns that person the trophy for villain of the year. For whatever seems to get in the way of a possible love -- must be villainy, right? It can't just be common sense -- stating the obvious -- or telling it like it is. It must be villainy to stand in the way on one partner's imagined or desired love. Even if that love is made impossible by the very nature of the complaining lover. I am, once again, the villain. 

On Being Last and Perhaps...Least

Sometimes I am the last person out of the building. Sometimes I "closed" that bar by being the last one to leave. Sometimes I have been the last love of someone's life -- like with my beloved Sheila.

Sometimes I am the last person that someone thinks of -- like my relationship with Tina, with Maureen, etc. etc. etc. I used to say that I loved all women -- and that is absolutely true. Yet I think that I am continually and consistently forgotten as a potential date, mate, or even friend -- by nearly every women I know. How sad!

These are the days I miss having someone -- someone close, someone dear, someone to hang on to when dark thoughts encroach.  Just someone... who likes me maybe... or tolerates me... or even loves me.  That would be nice. 

Why Do "Bad" Things Reoccur?

My sister is currently being treated for perhaps a return of her "staph" infection -- which a year ago at this time caused: a large non-healing oozing wound, a skin graft from another part of her body, a huge amount of discomfort, a year-long healing process (which still hasn't finished), and just general low-level depression.  The oozing sore(s) have begun again -- and now the future is in terrible doubt.  Talk about "bad karma, " or just plain "bad luck."

She certainly didn't deserve all that bad luck to happen to her -- and to have it happen twice -- no explanation can cover it.

People in relationships also have this kind of "bad karma." But perhaps it is because in both cases we tend to do the same things, to make the same decisions, to abide by the same rules and principles -- and proceed accordingly.  Are we our own worst nightmare?

Desire is ...Crazy!

To really desire someone means that the "butterflies in the stomach" go nuts. You are thrust into an illusion of hope, of having, of wanting -- no matter what the obstacles.

Many people think that they can "desire" something other than sex. I think they're wrong. You can "want" a new car, a new home, or lots of money. But you can only truly "desire" another person. When that hope springs up within your chest (or wherever) it takes over the whole body, the way of thinking, the way of being.

Passion overcomes complacency. Most people will do anything to get that "desirable" other person. In the inflamed mind the "desire" takes over, becomes paramount, and displaces any other "wants." It consumes time and energy. It "eats" the stuff we live on -- our energy, our "chi."

Exam Days

For every process, there is a time of crisis. For every struggle, there is a moment of standoff. For every course, there is an exam. For every relationship, there is a time of reckoning.  For every every love affair, there is time of parting. For every day, there is a time to think.

In the Midst...

I like words. I like ideas. I like the confusion and humor of "double entendres." I enjoy people who can laugh at words, and people, and themselves.

Laughing at myself is the most serious thing I do. And I do it often. Sometimes in the "midst" of trying to cover my butt in some matter; I realize it truly doesn't matter. It truly doesn't.

And why are we all so "stressed' by how we look to the world, how the world views us, what others think of us? Why?

In the "midst" of all this simple thinking -- I am struck with thoughts of someone I love. Perhaps someone who is now gone, or someone I have put aside. It doesn't matter: gone is gone! But when that someone is gone, I miss their touch, their smile, their closeness, their interest in me and in us, their life in all its fullness.  

On a Life Well-Lived

Being young a person just naturally has high hopes. Things will go well. Dreams will be accomplished. Wants will be satisfied. And then time begins to weave its continuous web -- and everything changes. 

Problems and obstacles spring up like thorns. Goals are sometimes met, and rewards are earned. But often only more obstacles arise. And that is life. A series of small goals met, and larger goals still out there to be met. And a maelstrom of flying obstacles in between.

And in all that, if one chooses to live simply -- to live without causing pain, or spending too much time getting out of the way of it -- one feels the inadequacy of our position. We are free-willed enough to live as we choose; be we perhaps shall never achieve what we truly want. Is that the life I signed up for?

Friday the 13th

Triskaidekaphobia --or the fear of the number 13 -- afflicts many black-cat fanciers. It is often extended to the fear of the date -- Friday the 13th -- an application from at least medieval times. Well, I have a sibling who was born on that date so the family has had fun giving her many birthdays, every time that Friday the 13th shows up on the calendar as a matter of fact. 

Fears like this one abound in American society: old wives' tales, cultural traditions, colonial traditions, family quirks, all dating back well before anyone can actually remember when they began. I realized the other day that I like to "attack" and "confront" such traditions. The "black cat crossing one's path" being bad luck -- is a good example. I often look for that black cat, or wait until it crosses my path, to actually experience it visually -- and note any changes in luck, karma, future thinking, nervousness, etc. As a kid I was always like that -- "challenge the convention and find a new meaning" was always a kind of hidden perspective I had on all such situations and moments. 

Often times, right in the middle of an experience -- whether ecstatic or abysmal -- I find myself watching the moment and gauging the immediate impact on my life: living the moment and preserving it while I am living it. Don't know where this came from but I do know I always have had this capacity (or is it just a strange weakness?).

Viable Endings

When a semester ends in college -- it ends. When a relationship sputters, flares up, and then out -- is it truly over? That is the question. What remains of a relationship -- after death, let us say (I hope a lot)? What remains after a long time away? What remains if the people get busy and "go" elsewhere?

When a person dies -- what is left for them? Where do they go? How are they? Are they? All big questions that are answer-resistant until we achieve our own end.

On Saving the World...and Love

Nelson Mandela -- one of the great heroes of the human race, was memorialized today by world leaders in South Africa. Leaders from every kind of country attended -- and many types of people were allowed to speak at the Memorial. Symbolic of the strands of humanity that Mandela touched -- from every walk of life, from every economic stripe, from every family in the family of nations. 

Mandela was among the best of men.

He joins the ranks of Gandhi, King, and Tutu -- men who worked tirelessly for other men, for the good of all men. 

The Cockroach that Loves the Cold

Just in time for winter in the Northeast -- a species of cockroach, hitherto unknown in America, that can thrive in cold weather. Well, isn't that just wonderful. One more thing to worry about in the icy streets of NYC -- rats, traffic, muggers, and now cockroaches. Kafka would be soooo pleased!

Well, news never ceases to amaze. Nature never ceases to amaze. Life never ceases to amaze.

Metamorphosis was always one of my favorite stories: Gregor Samsa I think was the name of the character, transformed into a cockroach -- story about life, prospects, fears, and realities. And of course the way people react to the changing realities of others, even their closest relatives and friends. Who is my "Gregor" -- is it some woman who has become only cruel and unthinking towards me? Is it Tina?    

The Tragedy in Some Lives

I teach in a diverse human biosphere. There are people of all ilks, types, and genres -- with an endlessly diverse set of obstacles, problems and deficits in their lives.

Why is it that some people get loads of obstacles set in front of them -- while others get only a very few.  I have known well a woman who was the victim of incest, then drug abuse, alcoholism, and now the gritty remains of all the previous problems.  These problems have caused social difficulties, self-esteem issues, and a complete failure to form healthy relationships on an intimate level. The problems themselves must have fed upon each other until finally the chance for a normal life was gone.

This same woman had "relationships" that quickly became bizarre (or at least uncomfortable by normal standards) and did not ever result in the fulfillment of the happy expectations of a fuller life. This woman even became "lost" in her own partial fulfillment and angry about inadequacies at the same time. For the reformed alcoholic there is no rest; no expectation of ease about the problem. The fear of breakdown is always present. For one who has turned to religion -- any doubt is "of the devil," shows evil, or at the best is a noxious challenge to one's known truth.

As for me I was never ever trying to challenge someone else's truth -- I only know what I am, and what I hope for; and I understand and accept the weaknesses of my own knowledge. How could I do other?

Truth

What is the "truth" of a person's life? There is so much clutter, so much hyperbole, so much confusion -- in every story, every incident, every memory recreated -- that truth becomes near-impossible to find. Because of our fallibility -- our sloppiness -- our lack of mechanical rigor in our memories and recreations; we must always assume that we are probably wrong about them -- either in a minor way, a major way, or both.

Truth is an absolute in some people's minds.  It is unvarying and unforgiving to those who don't honor it. But I don't believe that. Truth for me is the varying, the changes, the differences -- but also the "kernel' of the experience. The essence and its existence at the same time. 

There is always a flap in philosophy about the "essence" and its practical "existence" being two differing versions of a thing. But for me they are the same. The existence is the essence; the essence is and must be its existence. Neither completes the other; but each totally confines the other. 

What Does The Blog Title Really Mean?

A long, long, long, time ago--so what does that really mean? Yesterday? Another lifetime ago? A not-to-be-thought-of recent past? A decisive moment of "getting past it" whatever it was? A memory made larger by time? A lie? A fabrication? A "could have been but wasn't"?

Does it suggest to anyone else that the past is not a place to dwell, but only visit? To use but not to relive? To understand but not necessarily to repeat? The past is and can continue to be powerful in our lives -- but it can never be the present? (You cannot step into the same river twice.) The past is the story -- the present is the ending -- the future is a new story! 

On Regrets both Real and Imagined

There are regrets and there are regrets.  There are people I wanted to stay with, and people I wanted to leave.  There are jobs that I should have stuck with, and those I should have left earlier. There are places that I might still want to visit, and those that I wouldn't be caught dead in. 

There are incidents in my past that I wish I had had a chance to think about while they were happening -- I would have reacted differently perhaps. I would have taken advantage of the situation; I might have left myself more open and more vulnerable.

Some of the people I have known wanted to know me better, and I reneged. Some people I have worked with, wanted to work with me on a deeper level; and I reneged again. Some of the people I have known loved me deeper than I did them, and I am sorry about all of that. I loved them and all the opportunities I have had, even the missed ones. Odd irony of existence!!

Memorial Days

These days in early December have taken on a new and terrible meaning in my life. It was these first few days, the last of many at Hospice Savannah (Rms 22 and 4), that were the end of someone dear to me.

Sheila Nassif Mrochinski died on December 6th, 2006. She died a loving and caring person, a beautiful and hard-wrung soul, a talented and complete human being. She was kinder, gentler, and more loving than anyone I have ever known. She was the best of her family, and the best of mine. She was kind to everyone -- without flinching or reservation. She lived the kind of life that most of us envy -- but, it was too short, too tragically short.\

She was unlucky to have died so young, and from such a hideous disease. Her breast cancer came upon her nearly unawares: a rash, a sore back, a lack of energy -- you wouldn't think these would add up to breast cancer.  But they did. The sore back was the result of a metastatic tumor at the base of her spine. Her lack of energy came from her body fighting so hard to maintain normalcy under the relentless onslaught of cancer. Her rash -- on the upper back and extending under one arm to her left breast -- was the quick rush of IBC, Inflammatory Breast Cancer.

There is no tumor large enough to be discovered by self-examination of the breasts. There is only the virulent growth of cancer cells already metastasized throughout the body.

Sheila was unlucky. Whether it came from environmental causes in the cotton fields (clouds of DDT to play in when she was a little girl at Wagram School in North Carolina) -- or genetic or environmental causes down the line (or too much work, as she would gently tease me with after the diagnosis) -- it came. And IBC was no soft
enemy. It was an unfair, unlucky, and unwelcome killer. 

On the Near Time of Death

This is a week that is burned into my memory.  In 2006 I was witnessing and experiencing the final days of Sheila's life under hospice care at Hospice Savannah.  She knew she was terminal and she finally took herself off the pills that were shrinking her brain (and allowing her to live) and signalled to me to have her Mom -- Millie return to Savannah. 

Millie returned -- had a few good days with Sheila (and me, and the cousin) and then just as suddenly as the first incident of aphasia on the Cancer Ward of Candler Hospital occurred -- Sheila was in the final hours of her life. I will never forget that last night/morning: being awakened by what I thought was Sheila's "call to me" to "wake up"; our last few hours together, and the day of her passing.  It was a "passing" into what I hope was a much happier life for She, though not for me (or Millie, or so many others).  I wish I could have been a better, more understanding person to respond to Millie's odd grief behaviors -- but I was not.  I was selfish -- so selfish that I thought that this was my death too.  It was not; nor was it Millie's death.  It was Sheila's passing --pure and simple, pure and beautiful, pure and final. I love her still. 

On Trembling in Time

Listened to a serious make-up speech on "physician-assisted suicide" today from a young African-American single Mom. Not only was it a good speech technically -- it also exuded thought, seriousness of purpose, and a wealth of experiences with life and death.

I enjoyed the speech -- but more than that, I enjoyed the humanity of the person delivering it -- and my own humanity in understanding the concepts and measuring them with the yardsticks of: faith, truth, compassion, and understanding. We are seemingly but poor creatures ultimately dependent on a much larger hand (God, god, time, karma, fate, what-have-you).

But whatever we are -- and wherever we stand -- we are human; and free; and good; and able to deal with our "present" if not our future. We are what we are.

Thanks!

All a person can do sometimes is just say "thanks." Thanks for my past failures, and successes. Thanks for my friends then, and now.  Thanks for all the love that has been lavished on me, and all that I have lavished on others.

Thanks for another day, another minute, another hour. Thanks for allowing me to speak my mind, and suffer the consequences for it. 

Thanks for being alive. 

Tosha -- Another Victory

I'm pleased enough right now to write one of those horrible overblown family Christmas letters featuring my daughter Tosha -- achieving in theatre, but now on a regional stage in Chicago.  Tosha is a wonderful person and a blooming artist -- with plenty of administrative skills to fall back on.

Her entry into the mid-level of Chicago theatre politics should bring her enough "name recognition" to parlay into a real sustainable career over the next few years.  In addition to that -- she just does not "settle" for less than the best -- what a testament to her self-honed aesthetics. 

Of course I am biased -- she is my daughter and I love her. But my bias does not have blinders -- I have seen the sweat, the work, the angst, the heartbreak and the triumph. And at least for now, all of them seem worth the opportunity (to risk everything and succeed or fail on a higher level). 

Still Sick But...Getting Better

This post will have nothing to do with "getting sick" or "being sick!"  It is all about being ready for the next step -- no matter where you are, or what you are doing.  The next step is always, by comparison, a kind of "getting better." 
Some things are always "getting better" but are never "good enough...!"

Being Sick

Being physically ill and still performing all my various duties at school, and after school, is not an easy matter. At one time in my youth I could continue to move by sheer focus of will and forgetting all obstacles. Not so now.

I need to drag my feverish body along -- pick it up -- and just keep myself playing, the game, of life, and death. My eyes are watering and I continue to move -- forward, every forward.  Trying always to do my best -- to achieve -- to help.  Trying...always. 

Dreamlog

I have a cold -- and I have DayQuil. And it appears that I am in a slightly hazy dream. It is warm outside -- nearly 80 degrees, and not quite right for November 18th -- but there it is. 

And this is my Dreamlog. What or Who am I dreaming of? Skirt sliding down over new tights/hose; a woman too pretty to be alone; all in black. With a cold, like mine.  I know her name but it is not for this blog -- taboo. 

Not Knowing the Game

As a small child I suffered mightily with a condition known as dyslexia.  I could not read, and I seemingly could not learn to read. All the little markings on the page either appeared fuzzy or cloudy to my eyes, or they made no sense at all to others when I tried to reproduce them by rote copying. My grade school teachers, mostly nuns, appeared to assume I was not trying hard enough and found numerous ways to punish me: dunce caps, sitting in the corner, keeping my hands on the front of my desk, going to the dreaded Vice-Principal's office, etc.  Life was hell -- every day, for me, in those horrible days.

Nuns sometimes tried to be "nice" and "patient" with me but soon gave up because of my total inability to concentrate  (ADD as well I fear). So I got in trouble; lots of trouble.  I got sent home; my parents had to come in; I got expelled. More than once.

My life with women was similar.  I have always been fascinated by women, and respectful of them (that was one lesson that took, probably in high school), and even slightly amazed by them. They thought differently -- in some areas of life (like sensually or even sexually) they were bolder, much bolder, than I was.

And I was incapable of really figuring them out -- making sense of them in my terms.
With some women (like the infamous Bertina) I was powerless to figure out the game -- so I just "played it straight" and said what I thought. And was misinterpreted, resisted, condemned -- for my stupid simplicity. But that was all I ever had -- simple truth. And it never, ever worked. 

Why Men Mainipulate Women

Power, sex, control -- and maybe even some understanding of a gender they cannot quite comprehend.  I don't believe men (even those who think themselves superior in all or some respects, i.e. chauvinists) really know what women are about.  Women have always had to use guile and stealth and circuitous thinking to secure what they want.

Men typically try to use logic (often flawed) and then loudness of voice  or simple "miles gloriosus" kind of energy to secure what they want. I am a man -- I know how we think. I know the kinds of strategies we fall back on. And many of our strategies (as many of the female kind) make me just a bit ashamed of being quite so flawed and inauthentic. 

I am pretty sure I have lost the will to manipulate women -- even though I can still notice when they are trying to manipulate me. 

Why Women Manipulate

Recently I watched a colleague "work the system" so that she could appear to get sympathy, while she secretly finally got her work done.  I bear no animosity for such behavior -- I just shudder to think about it. Why? Because even though it solves several problems at once, and seems justified give our over-scheduled and over-demanding jobs -- it is at once both inauthentic and an outright lie.

In personal relationships as well women can sometimes "play the expectations game" and withhold friendship, love, or even simple communication while they "work the system" with someone else first. I have had that happen to me too many times. Now, as a man, have I also "worked the system" in the love/friendship world. I don't think I ever have. Why? Authenticity is important to me -- not for purposes of "self-aggrandizement" or arrogant sophistry, but for real reasons like "being true to one's own nature."

Is it in the nature of women to manipulate?  As long as I have studied women (my entire life) I think I can now come to the conclusion, albeit reluctantly, that women do manipulate, and they appear to love doing it. It is their way perhaps to beat the male-dominated and controlled "system."

Complexification

Life gets more and more wound up -- events clash with other -- opinions, even of enemies, at times melt into each other and at other times seem to signal all-out conflagration. The world seems at war with itself.

And no one person can apparently offset the mayhem.  No loving relationship can survive the carnage. No single thought can inspire the nations. There is always an alternative view; always a new way that doesn't require the same discipline; always a time for exercising your option. Life doesn't get better (or worse) only more so...

And we are left alone to ponder the outcome -- and pray for calm. 

Sex and Work

No, not "sex at work" but "sex and work!"  Two activities that clutter the mind most of the time and take up any usable energy the rest of it -- sex and work define us.  How we handle our sex lives determines how happy we can be, or will be. How we handle our work ethic pretty much determines whether or not we can achieve our goals with an open and clear mind. 

Sex and work.  I like them both and would willingly spend all my time on either of them, if I would not somehow be deprived of the other. 

De Chardin Was Right

Pierre Teillhard de Chardin was right. Things are getting more and more complex, more and more intertwined. As life increases in speed things begin to connect at more and more common points, and life just seems to spiral in on itself. Amazingly human beings don't keep up with the complexification, they just seem to endure it without really noticing. 

And the upshot of all this speed and over-connecting? Human beings often cannot make distinct decisions without impacting every other part of their lives, and the lives of nearly everyone they are connected to. This evolution is a stunning look at progress in a very inhibiting environment. As we crowd in upon each other we connect, as we connect we become a part of each other, as we become part of each other we either accept or reject our new status. We become altruistic, or solipsistic. The choice is ours.    

In Confusion There is ...More Confusion

This is the "craziness" part of the semester; when students suddenly get very unsatisfied about their classes, their grades, their schedules, their work, and the results of all of the previous on their lives. Students complain about their teachers; teachers complain about their students. 

Yikes.

The world has NOT gone mad; it has just gotten tired from too many school days in a row, with too little time off. Don't let the motif upset the focus; don't let the tail wag the dog. Do what you always do, and do it as well as you can. 

The Incredible Lightness of Absence

Missing people in your life is a very normal thing. Death separates us; distance separates us; time separates us. All these elements of their nature are difficult. Our emotional ties to those who have died, and to those who have moved on or moved away (out of our lives) remain -- but are blocked by elements beyond our control.

I miss Sheila every day -- in a hundred ways. Visions and moments of deja vu scatter across my daily life like leafy shadows in a forest. I also miss close friends, former lovers, friends who are "not to be" and categories of acquaintances, either momentary or extended, who have somehow had an impact on my life. Certainly Tosha, Tina, (in different ways obviously), Maureen, and even those who never became more than spectres (and so shall go unnamed) are there as well. 

Absence does not make the "heart grow fonder" -- it only makes for a more solitary life. I miss them all.   

Karma, Tolerance, Love

Some people don't believe in altruism. I do.  I believe in giving to someone: a friend, an acquaintance, even a stranger -- with perhaps no hope or even any desire to get something in return.  Sometimes people just "need" a gift -- they always deserve one. 

Life is a difficult climb. We balance ourselves on our tensions, on our anxieties, on our many many pressures. We float in a sea of vibrations all threatening to change us, to disrupt us, to harm us. Some of us even make more tensions for ourselves -- by trial and error we determine that Sartre was right (Hell is other people), and we believe in what we sow. We accept that it is better to resist than to go along; it is better to fight or curse than it is to touch or love. Humans are a sad lot in that way. 

Sarah Smiles

Some people just don't read "other people" (usually men of women, or women of men) all that well.  What that means is they mistake dyspeptic remarks made by someone else for their own dry-witted cynicism. Or they interpret laughter as being because of their own inherent wit, rather than being aimed directly at them. 

Usually men are the stupid ones. Often egocentric men are so concerned with their own importance that they fail to see they have been "out-verbalized" or "hung out to dry" by some witty young female. It can get worse if the man is older as well as being insensitive. That is the paradox of the "commedia character"-- the cuckolded foolish old man!

This is the idyllic old man's foolishness that glistened eyes lead us into. So be wary when Sarah smiles.   

Sarah's Song

Precocious, fiery, angry, rough, yet soft, yielding, compassionate; funny; verbal, intellectual, offbeat, yet traditional, normal, orderly,doctrinaire. A paradox walking!
A sinuous sylph sitting! Who is she?

Is she the administrative cruel taskmaster? Or is she the confident and laughing facilitator? Is she tough, stern, and misanthropic? Or the softly helping partner? What is she?

Does she know her own age? Does she understand her own life? Is she introspective as her love of reading suggests? Or an extroverted party-er -- as her stories detail?

She is Sarah, nonetheless.

Cogito Ergo Sum

Writing and teaching are professions that could really feed off of one another.  I find my teaching to be a rigorous taskmaster to my own abilities to think and write concisely. The things that I want to say, to others, via my blog -- are for the most part not petty, nor are they prurient, nor vengeful, nor even particularly current. They are for me, though, important enough to warrant saying.  Just to make sure the ideas are out there -- are acknowledged -- and understood. 

I understand that for some my exercise on this blog might seem a particularly vain or even arrogant exercise. Not so in my mind! I write to keep my brain focused and reactive to all things going on around me. Not because my ideas are superior, or better in any way; but simply because they will add to the foment. 

Descartes was right:"I think, therefore I am." And Shakespeare was also right -- "to be or not to be" is the question; and thinking will provide us with the correct answer, eventually. And it could go either way.

Sarah, Camille, Tosha, Mary, Christina...

I am convinced now that any blog that mentions a woman's name in the title is much more likely to be picked up by the "zombie searchers" on the Internet (as a possible source for erotic literature or even porn perhaps?).  After having now written more than a hundred posts I find that only the titles that could be considered "double entendres" or cute sexual jokes or just naming a female -- are picked up like gold.

That says not so much about the Internet, or humans -- but more about the way search "spiders" are set up to reel in salacious material. So far I have written no salacious material and I probably never well --- by anyone's standards. Nonetheless there are searchers (ZOMBIE SEARCHERS, I call them) who are just seeking smut in some form or way. It is part of the sensual dumbing down of our time, or our "generations:" specifically, the age of the Internet troll, the Internet voyeur, the Internet loser. 

It is a testament to our times -- to our ignorance, to our appetite for the lusty (without the honor of the actual completed desire). We are becoming less and less capable, and more and more voyeuristic. We are wasting time watching the world go by. How sad!
My apologies to all the names in my title -- whether I know them or not. 

The Female Psyche

Have you ever seen (or heard) a woman dominate a room at a party just by sheer energy combined with focused humor, volume, and an ability to say something just shocking enough to turn every one's head? Well of course you have. Many women, especially after a glass of two of wine (but some without any alcoholic encouragement) just naturally dominate any "scene" they are part of. Their stories do it. Their viewpoint does it. Their humor does it. 

Being the life of the party -- being the center of attention -- wanting to have people play off of their words, and with their words  -- comes in perfect stride for many women. Women in their forties, who still have the pinch of youth in their attitude and manner, often use their "dominance" to control an entire get-together. That is "fun" for them; or maybe it is a necessity. It is sometimes difficult to say which.

Actually I admire this trait, this skill -- as I see it engaged by some gifted individuals.  I realize that their are personal and/or psychological reasons for their zesty control. But whatever the reasons, it is still an interesting rite to observe. It makes me love women all the more. 

To Tosha

Somewhere along in time -- whenever I decide to open up this blog a bit, you will read this one post. Tosha, you have been a joy to me for many years now -- even before you selflessly gave Sheila and I more than a year of your time -- to soften the ending of that beautiful woman.

While you were my student I found you to be intelligent, questioning, hard-working, more capable than most at close examination, open to learning from all sources, and sincerely and completely interested in acting, theatre, and the arts. Your marriage at the time could not stand up to your intense growth and artistic inquiry. For that I am sorry for you. Robert is and was a good man -- but he was not to be a "permanent man" for you, just the first. And you will always love him for that, and you should.

Now as your career in Chicago begins to mushroom into a "real vocation" -- whether it is primarily as a teacher or an artistic director (you could do and succeed at both, or either) -- you still remain a woman of intensity, focus, and compassion.  I like to think you learned some of that from your family, and perhaps some from Sheila -- who was all that. Whatever the source -- it is in you; and you are the more-rounded for it.

Your artistic life in theatre will have up's and down's, just as your normal life has had
--  but you are a success story no matter what the outcome of a show, or a season, or a career.  You are a success as a human being -- full of drive, desire, focus, and confusion -- just as all the best of humankind. You are a peach (a Georgia Peach) but you are just as surely an apple (of many men's eyes), a rose (by every name, sweet), a
labyrinth (lost and found within many times over), a picture of simplicity (like the Mona Lisa, and as unreadable), a calm sea (swirling beneath). You are wonderful -- to me. I feel a paternal pride for you that even I don't understand or completely comprehend. Thank you for your love.   

Kerfuffle Over Sex

Most of the strangest conflicts in my life have been over sex. How well are you doing it? Who's doing it to whom? Do you want me to do it? Did you want me to do more?
Am I capable of doing more? Can you move while we do this? Why don't you want to talk while/during/after we do this? Are you lying just to please me? Are you pleasing me -- and it's all a lie? Do you care? Do I?

A "kerfuffle" is a disagreement over something -- resulting in two different views of the same situation. Sex breeds kerfuffles. Mostly though, people don't want to and simply don't talk about them. On the opposite side, some people only want to talk about those kerfuffles, even if they only occur infrequently. The amount and extent of these kerfuffles indicates the degree of incompatibility, I think. If the argument is always "the thing" on someone's mind -- than perhaps that's all there is: the argument.

Jennifer Star Trek -- take note! 

All in the Game

Fighting for a fair salary for a fair amount of work for the faculty, both full time and adjuncts -- that is key to being an honest administrator.  Today was a kind of "showdown" day for keeping the lid on three now initiatives at STC -- the ECCA, the LCCA, and the W-T accelerated college programs.

We shall see if STC lives up to its commitments and actually pays people what it said it would -- or whether the Master Professor is right about the duplicity. 

A Female Society

No man is an expert in the trappings of the female society. The female society operates under very different rules than society as a whole. Females value different elements of life -- they have different priorities, different endgames, than any other gender (male, humanoid, robot, transgender, other?). Females have the clearest notion of a society that is effective and will provide nurture for all. 

Females also rule the interplay between genders -- though sometimes they either don't take advantage of that rule, or they don't recognize that they have the advantage. I love females -- I love their strength and their reserve, their savagery and their comportment, their intelligence and their emotional power -- but I do confess to a total inability to understand them even though I have been studying them assiduously for my entire life.
Females rule.  I understand that. But that is pretty much the extent of my understanding. 

About the Future

When thinking about the future -- one always runs directly into the present.  The present situation in most things is: outrageous, unthinkable before now, stupid, self-defeating, confused, jumbled, inauthentic, worthy of note, crazy, unimaginable, and just plain ordinary.

"Ordinary" in the sense that the present day is always "out of whack." Or is it our view of the "present?" Are we unable to accept the present because we live in an ever-moving past, basing our observations on change on our recollections of how things were (or how we thought they "should be")? I think human beings truly resist change.
We just can't handle it. We rebel. We hold out for something better, a return to something better, when the past was not "better" at all, only just the past where we were oh-so-comfortable.

My future is my present. What I need to do is accept what is -- and smooth out the edges where I am most affected; and not worry so much about a new condition, especially one that may seem to diminish my standing somehow. I don't want to get into a semantic tongue-tie-off, but change is inevitable; change is happening right now; change is moving the world; and I can move along with it, or die off resisting it.
Which will it be? 

Gone are Summer Dresses

When summer fades in Savannah, so do bikinis on the Forsyth Park promenade, short shorts on Broughton on weekends, and summer dresses all about town. The scene shifts to practicality -- warmth -- comfort: and away from the idea of just keeping cool. I love Summer, even when it is too hot.

And I love Fall too -- it brings other pleasures, other comforts, other gifts. But I cannot wait for Summer to come again. 

Administrivia

Sometimes we get what we didn't bargain for.  When Sheila and I first bought our Bed and Breakfast property in Savannah in 1996-7--we did not expect her to get sick and pass away so prematurely; we also didn't expect that I would be struggling to sell this same beautiful property seven years after her death in 2006. The Great Recession intervened -- and the rest is local economic history. 

Administering to this house -- and my several jobs, is a difficult task for a 60-something year old guy, but I try to keep going.  In the absolutely impossible moments -- I seek and find support from the past, from my life with Sheila, from the help of Tosha, from the distant support of Kate, and Linda, and even, yes even, Tina.  Memories bolster the spirit under duress. Friendships bolster memories. Communication bolsters friendships. 

Being Alone

I have made many decisions in my life: this most recent one has been the most complete and complex one to date. As life has gone along I have fallen into and out of love, into and out of relationships, even into and out of friendships. Deciding to be alone is independent of all of those. Being along is not solipsism so much as it is deciding not to burden others, or myself with others. 

This is never an easy decision -- and it made more complicated by the fact that others are always present even after the decision is made. Then why make such a decision? You make this decision when you decide that you can make no other decision; that life has left you with no real tools to allow you to be a part of another's life, when age has promised you only a few simple pleasures -- and none of them needs to or can involve other people. You make the decision when it is the best decision available. 

Does that mean that sexuality is finished for you? Or that life ceases to have any promise, any future, any fun? No to all of these. It just means that, on average, it is better for you to do all things that you might do, alone. 

Caring

No one should really care about what I might have to say. Only the strength and honesty of my words are enough to merit an honest hearing. Just by whom I am and what I have done -- there in nothing spectacular in what I have done. Over time my life has evened out to be, I think, more positive than negative -- but not extraordinarily so. I have done some things, many of them good -- in the artistic realm, in the moral realm, in the human realm.  I have tried to help much more than I have tried to hurt, and no matter what some might say, I have not planned and done anything evil -- towards anyone, on any level. 

So that is my declaration. There is no one really who should care what I might have to say: about things, about them, about myself. But I will keep writing nonetheless. Why? On the chance that my words someday, sometime may soften the experiences someone else is undergoing; that somehow, in some strange way, knowing what I did might help them to survive, and conquer. I myself will always "care for" those that I love; and there are many such. Death's oracle may let them know who they are. 

Friday is Thursday at STC

There are a lot of things that just don't make sense in life. Institutions make bad use of their facilities, and their faculty. Men and women fall in love and then exist in a stasis of "roommates forever." Life hangs on for all of us until we are too frail to do much about it. Why have these become principles of life?

What a place! It makes one think that the earth and life were launched and now thunder on down through a tunnel of time with no one in charge -- a kind of "deism" without control of any kind. And then there are moments of karma and goodness, or moments of extraordinary evil -- that make one cry out for control, control of some kind. Any kind. And we as humans -- with out free will -- often feel helpless and hapless to effect a change in course. Why? Why is life the way it is? Why are some people so unfairly lucky -- and die before a decent span of life is reached? Why do people get incurable diseases? Is it just back luck? Are our lives dependent on the thrown of dice in some supra-universe?

Sexual Roles: Who's On Top?

Once again today on "Morning Joe" I heard a female expert declaiming "age old" truths stating indirectly that men are the "dominant gender." It was phrased this way on the tv show -- "if men are kept happy, everything in the home will go well."

I have become a cynic about all gender politics expressed by pundits on any side of the issue -- they all, no matter what their opinions, use uncommon common sense (or the Bible, or tradition, or customs, or whatever), to bolster a half-truth into a full one. Men are not superior; men were not created by God to be superior; men have not earned the right to be superior. Men are human -- with weaknesses and strengths; but men are not "first" no matter what the good book, the holy book, or any book has to say about the issue. 

Men have a place in life; women have a place in life. Part of that place is determined by our physical functions; part by custom and tradition; part by our particular set of skills.  A penis does not give men the right to rule over things any more that a vulva does. We are what we are physically (and psychologically as well) -- and we eke out our existence and our positions from our own peculiar standpoints. 

Tosha, the Conquerer

Tosha got her letter of approval for her company's 501(c)(3) status from the Federal Government today. Was there any doubt?

Tosha is a young woman who can master a task and survive. She is a steady, harder-working-than-most-people sort of girl, capable of completing extensive challenges.  She will do brilliant things someday; not every time, but oftener than most people would even have a chance of doing.

Tosha also has great depth: of heart, of understanding, of compassion, of joy, of love, and of all the confusion that accompanies the aforementioned. She is an amazing person in hundreds and hundreds of ways -- too many to even list, much less talk about. I know she will succeed. I know it. 

Accepting Change

Can I accept change?  If my house would sell --- could I handle the many changes that would ensue?  Would I retire?  Would I be able to retire?  Would I want to retire? 

Losing the responsibility of handling such a large property, what would I do? In which direction would I go? Renting? Buying another house? What would I do? Stay tuned -- the answer should be forthcoming soon.  Though it is so very, very nerve-wracking. 

Carey, Bertina (Part Two)

No matter what one says about a failed relationship, it comes out as "savaging" the other person. And that is never what one means to say; but just saying the truth, as objectively and coherently as one can -- belies the truth. Perhaps that is true on the positive side as well.

Way back when, in the distant reaches of time, Bertina and I wrote letters to each other. It was after she had graduated from Interlochen, and before she came to visit me at school. She wrote well -- honestly and completely about her life in college -- though she never wrote the whole and complete story; she probably didn't want to scare me away from her. There were many results of her childhood trauma -- alcohol chief among them.  There were boyfriends, and crushes, and relationships that ended horrifically -- all of them I wouldn't know about until later. And we wrote more, even after our "almost affair" in and around Grunow theatre. 

Did Bertina have a crush on me then? Did I on her? Yes, I think so -- in both directions. As I got to know her much later (after 2007 -- 30 years later) I found out details -- men who tried to control her, men whom she loved but were not quite right for her or didn't want to marry her; some good situations, some bad. All of them told to me with both the good sides and the bad, though with emphasis on the bad. All this led to the possibility of an "us"-- could we really learn to be with each other -- for the first time, for real, in a "love kind of thing."

God I hoped so at the time. Even though I thought at times our experiences had led us in such different directions, and we didn't listen to each other closely enough. 

We competed to be lovers and both of us lost a little bit in the process. I never thought of myself as a very good lover, but I was always about "the other person." In many ways Bertina thought she was a good lover -- and she was all about the other person too as a way of fulfilling her own desires. It should happen naturally (I think) in her eyes. I'm not sure it ever did. It had been a long time since I had really worked with the physical side of love. And Bertina was seemingly much more experienced than I was.
I was not jealous of that, only worried that I could never keep up, or catch up, to where she wanted to go. That brought out observations, recriminations, and judgments that neither of us were experienced enough with the other to be able to make. And that was our big mistake -- presuming what the other person was doing, and then attacking them for it. Wrong words, too harshly said, too completely closed!

Today's Impromptus

Today's speeches, in an impromptu basis, were mostly somber reflections of the events of 9/11.  My own thoughts were more macro -- the world has changed, not necessarily for the better, but for certain --- the world has changed. 

Fear has given way to caution, prejudice and racism have given way to involvement, and analysis is beginning to break down our expectations into new hopes and dreams.
This is the way of emotional or even strategic movements -- they change.  They need to change to safeguard and continue the factor of normalcy in daily life. We need change (revolution), but we also always need to find a new norm. That is the way of life, like it or not.   

9/11

This is not a piece about "where were you when?" Nor is it a piece about patriotism, war, the end times, or the "rise and fall of the American Empire." This is a piece about remembrance, and respect, and love...or our best selves.

Most of us beyond the age of 30 remember where we were when...the Towers fell. Most of us recall the chill of changing times, when we thought about it, and so many deaths coming out of nowhere. There was heroism, and sacrifice, and sadness, and recompense, and a war or retribution that continues to this day. There were and are all those things. When the world changes -- and it often does -- new thinking is needed.

So remember, individually and collectively, how things have changed. Respect who we were and who we have become. And love...yourself, and the world as it has evolved. It is all we have. 

Before Time Finishes

We often say "he died before his time," or "he didn't know his time was up," and other such nonsense.  The future is certainly not ours to see, or ours to manipulate. Why don't we understand that we are finite, limited in time and place, but not necessarily any the lesser because of it? 

Will we "come back" as something else as the "great wheel turns" as many believe.  Or is this it? We can't know because we are trapped in time and by time. Afterwards, we don't know if there is an after-words. Will there be something of reward, or something of punishment, after our "time" here is over? What do you believe? Does belief make it so? I want Sheila to have her time of happiness -- an infinite time (contradictory, I know) of happiness -- because she is/was such a marvelous person as she lived, and as she suffered with me -- who was not quite the Mr. Wonderful that he hoped he could be. She suffered, and she died; and she deserves to be happier now because of all that.

Who determines what we deserve? "Who dat?" Who is in charge? 

Missing But Not Gone

Tosha Fowler, my S-D, starts working on Wednesday at De Paul. She will be teaching Acting for Non-Majors (non-conservatory) in two sections. Good for her.

She is certainly ready and extraordinarily able to teach these classes, and the students will be lucky to have her for their teacher. Tosha's talents in theatre have been honed by long and careful effort.  Hopefully she has taken "best practices" from all her teachers over the years, including myself. Tosha has extended herself and her skills as an actress, a director, a producer and a teacher in multiple ways over her career. Tosha is vitally concerned about process and results in all her work -- she is an ideal college teacher.

Of course I am highly prejudiced about her -- I have admired her many talents, and seen both her successes and her failures over quite a few years now. She has grown past her own college Mentors (including me) and has grasped both the teacher's and the student's roles in learning about theatre crafts. I predict that she will win again.  And the only thing missing in her work would be my ability to see it. Sigh! 

Diana, Huntress of the Moon

She has the kind of fulsome voice that is both soft and chord like -- never shrill. Though her laugh can be a bit obstreperous and overpowering by nature. You might consider her a "tough broad" if you didn't know her soft and feminine nature, revealed only in reaction to language that is too much, or too little. 

She is newly middle aged though not old, long necked but not tall, smiling but rarely gleeful.  She is a mystery to many, but a chosen course to herself. She has many friends who are artsy and feminine as she, but few who are balanced and real as she could be. She walks the night in search of pristine and untouched treasures. She herself is pristine -- and delicately beautiful. Full hips give promises fulfilled by all her hearty appetites. She is an unexpected pleasure in taking pleasure. She walks by night.  She walks in beauty like the night.

She really should consider the Moon as she walks, even though it is older and more weary than she. She should consider it; she could learn from it. Consider the Moon. Diana! Consider the Moon. 

Lives of Some Difficulty

Every time my path crosses someone who really has it tough -- illness in the family, poverty, pressures of unemployment or underemployment, etc. I stop and consider how very lucky I have been. How do some people survive, I wonder? How do they get through the days of strife and uncertainty?

Of course I have those days too, but on such a smaller scale that I think just doesn't matter somehow.  I wonder at the way life works itself out.  I consider my own blessings and wish somehow that I could just give them all away, to those in need. 
That is empathy of course, and even altruism -- but it is not the way society works for those who are not blessed. Life is fatalistic; life is fickle.   

Truce Between the Sexes

Sometimes the competition in a relationship is palpable -- and sometimes it even spills over into a kind of nastiness. If the relationship can't "right" itself it spills over into outright hatred -- or something very near to it.  To call someone a nasty name, or even "think" them a nasty name, because they will not do your bidding or because they think differently than you do, is anathema.

I have had relationship battles. Even with Sheila, my wife of almost twenty years, there were battles: over money, and direction, and focus, and even over the most intimate of elements. Certainly with other women I had been with before Sheila -- there were also battles, and rivalries, and misunderstandings, and stupid decisions -- and now, looking back, I regret most of them. Since Sheila's passing in 2006 December I have been clearer-eyed and much more honest about relationships. If I can't make it work; or if I think that I am in a situation where for the good of all I need to leave, I will do so.  Now in the very autumn of my life I am less inclined to even enter into the possibility of a relationship, ever again. It's not that I have been "burned" too often, or that I think that there is no one out there for me -- it is just that I lack the comprehensive energy to "try again" to make sense out of the senseless. I can live well even when I am in doubt -- but I cannot live when I am in crisis, and constantly so.

And that is why I said "Goodbye" to Bertina -- in spite of my feelings.    

Della Kontney Mrochinski

Remembering one's Mother on her birthday is no great show of love. Remembering her always is much better.

My Mom Della was  a memorable woman -- memorable in her humor, her attitude, her ability to react with surprising quickness, her youthful mind. Even when slowed by stroke and confined to a home in Michigan she was bright-eyed and engaging, compassionate and observing.  I still marvel at her memory of my wife Sheila when confusion was all around her towards her own children, her siblings, her friends. Della was the kind of "girl" who loved a happy time, who loved to laugh, who loved to get the joke and pass it on. She was a person "easy to love" even if she wasn't my Mother -- but she was. 

She gave much to many for a long period of time -- unabashedly. I loved her and still do. Happy Birthday Della! 

In Confusion There is ...Profit

Lots of confusion in the world these days: Syria, Afghanistan, Washington, and just about everywhere else. Elements seem unsettled and incomplete. Things just don't seem to be happening in the same order as they once did. Supply is not following demand; the rich are not helping to take care of the poor. Religion is not preaching love -- only solipsism, holding onto one issue in lieu of all issues. Politics has made a mess of justice, and of fairness. Racism rules our political thinking.

And yet the world wags on. We are depleting the atmosphere and poisoning our own air. We are neglecting our lovers, friends and family and honoring our celebrities. We have lost the ability to think. We only react. When we can.  When we will let us react. We are impotent. 

Perhaps there is no confusion -- only blank stupidity. No profit in that. 

Happy Labor Day

Labor Day Weekend gives all teachers, even those of us at STC, an extra day off.  That means that more "work at home" can be done (and I have a lot of it). More cleaning, yardwork and other kinds of "catch up" work can be attempted --- and it must be, and soon. 

Labor Day also signals the beginning of the end of the "hot" season in Savannah. Too bad.  I will miss the "summer dresses" I always enjoy seeing; I will miss the parade of bare legs; I will most miss the bodies bared to the heat. 

But the Fall in Savannah is glorious: warm, sunny, mostly calm, and always easy-going. Hopefully no stray hurricanes will come our way and we will all do well in our calm and yet focused lifestyle.

Happy Labor Day to all to us who labor --- for too-little money, for too long, for too-little respect and leisure. Happy Labor Day!

Cancer

The husband of a close collegial friend at STC recently underwent an operation for colon cancer. Cancer does not strike the same chord of fear in people that it once did, but it should. Doctors and the medical community are trying to convince all of us that survival rates are up, the view of cancer should change to "living with cancer," and that cancer is a survivable event. Since all that medical talk is "change of tone" rather than
"change of substantial fact" I prefer to accept cancer for what it is -- a life-threatening disease that cannot, at this point, be cured by medical science. 

Cancers can be arrested for a time; they can be slowed to the level of no discernible growth -- but they cannot be cured. Inevitably they grow again -- or they are metastasized to some other area of the body. Cancer is not the devil -- but it is not a benign sickness. 

There are so many different kinds of cancer that it is unthinkable to imagine that somehow you need not worry about it. Cancer, in many ways subtle and general, changes the order of things in everyone who is touched by the disease. 

Fame's Not the Game

At Lafayette College, we used to have a joke about the idea "I Know Famous People." Anyone who did a lot of name-dropping was guilty of this kind of "crime" and should be forever damned by having to wear a "hole-y" tee shirt with that phrase: "I Know Famous People" emblazoned across the front.

I don't know a lot of famous people -- I must admit. Many of my students have easily eclipsed my fame in just about everything I do/did. And that was all expected. I am an observer/teacher/learner by trade and take great delight in that process. Fame is a kind of useless concept anyway. What does "fame" mean? When that movie/television show came out, many people compared it to the Interlochen experience --- talented people who are carefully auditioned, trained well, connected with the right kind of mentoring, and then who succeed marvelously, Just like on "Fame." Interlochen did create fame for many -- but more importantly, gave them a chance to share their talents.  It's all about talent; not about fame. 

Thinking of Bertina (Tina)

I try not to think of Tina too much -- though it seems to happen every day. I feel a tremendous sense of loss when I do. This Gemini woman is so incredible when she is positive, and open, and real, and unafraid. And then she slides back into her fears and becomes just hateful, and "impossible."

I am a pretty typical male -- who has had a charmed and lucky life personally: good parents, and nice education, some obstacles/but nothing too bad; just a positive and focused life. Like many others I have had and will always have doubts: about myself, my beliefs, my future. That is just being human.

Bertina seems to allow no doubts; she trusts in nothing that is not absolute. I have faith that there is an absolute -- a "greater than myself," God -- but I am not sure of His/Her relationship to me as a person, or to mankind in particular. Bertina has been "saved" from many things in her life: an impossibly tough childhood, a unique family, her own escape into addiction, and other things to precious and intimate to mention. Being "saved" marks her as a one who doesn't have too much tolerance for those of us who don't understand that concept. I don't think I need to be "saved." The Biblical story of the "great fall" in the Garden of Eden makes little sense to me in the light of what I believe about human beings: we have free will, we will make mistakes, we are not perfect. None of those things make humans inherently bad -- and I refuse to believe we are such. We were created to be good; we are good.

Bertina has extraordinary promise as a human being; she undercuts this promise with her own spite, her own anger, her own longing for disappointment and failure. The love in her is nonetheless beautiful and deep -- but hopefully not wasted.  I wish her all the happiness and fulfillment she can handle. 

On the Brink

So many elements in the world are "on the brink!" We are on the brink of entering the war in Syria by adding US/UN airpower to the fight; we are on the brink of shutting down the government because a few maniacal right wing Republicans don't like Obamacare (or are racist, or both); we are on the brink of closing down the government and curtailing all services because of fiscal bullying on the anti-debt-ceiling caucus; we are on the brink of hurting the education of a number of STC students because we are convinced that we can force students to "learn faster" by giving them two Math or two English courses at the same time, by the same teacher, in the same classroom. 

We are on the brink of moral turpitude as we pretend that our polarization is morally based -- as opposed to selfishly based. We are on the brink of climate disaster as the deniers rally their stupidity and pretend there are no climate changes going on in the world -- until their hats float gently off their heads.

Life isn't always on the brink -- but it seems as if it is. And then change puts us firmly on another brink.

An Affinity for Brains

Attracted to talent; attracted to brains; attracted to energy; attracted to compassion! I have always been blown away by people who actually accomplish things and do so without compromising themselves. 

These successful people do not "blame others" when they sometimes fail; when their efforts don't succeed. They do not "curse the wind" for bringing them ill will or bad luck. They make their own luck and eventually succeed because they are steadfast in their abilities, their hard work, and their focus. 

My wonderful surrogate daughter Tosha is now engaged in a "great and scary project," testing whether that woman (or any woman), so educated and so talented, can long resist. She has met -- on a battlefield of that project -- an older, more cynical and savvy man -- who is inclined to use her for his own purposes. Can she get past these very human obstacles and still succeed in producing and directing (and perhaps even acting) according to her own principles. Or will she be used, for good or ill, to glorify and substantiate the "legacy" of another -- the older, the wiser, the more cynical, the more desperate. May the gods of theatre keep her talent intact, her reasoning sure, and her heart (as always) in the right place. 

Confusion, Confusion, Confusion

This registration and set-up period for classes has been the most confused, last-minute, and under-prepared-for semester in all my time at STC. I am not sure why -- new administrators, changing practices, new courses, many more students? Whatever the reason I have become more and more aware of the students' inabilities to cope with the bureaucracy attempting to do the impossible -- to reform itself 

First Nervous Day of School

It always feels a bit nerve-wracking, starting school again.  Whether it is high school, college, first grade, or what-have-you -- it is a nervous time.  The stomach is a bit unsettled -- the plan of the class is lost in the shuffling of thoughts and worries back and forth in the brain. The body and mind are both awash in worry and excitement.

Turning that excitement into positive excitement is the trick.  Keeping cool under pressure and focusing on what must be done -- is essential.  A teacher is a magician of emotion and feeling -- coping with worry and creating confidence and hope. 

And then it is all over -- for good or bad. 

Tides

Classes start tomorrow. Our new Dean leaves on the 30th of August. The tide rolls in; the tide rolls out. Life goes on in spite of constant change -- the new faces reflect the passing of the old faces. That is how it has always been-- and how it will always be. 

I am sorry to see this Dean go -- she was making progress on a number of fronts and actually could have turned General Studies into a real Division given more time. But the "hope" that one has when one starts to be enveloped by bureaucracy often flies like the morning mists. The rays of the sun dissipate it; the winds shift it from own way to another.

All of any one person's efforts cannot remake the world. The world remakes itself and includes the workings of many who try, and many who don't, and many more who don't care. 

Alan Poindexter: Rest in Peace; Charlotte Misses You; and Others Will Too

While I was teaching and directing at UNCC back in the 80's, I was fortunate to work briefly with a number of excellent students: Catherine Smith, Caridad Svich, Gina Stewart, Nancy Nixon, and many others.  Among those others was a talented, precocious, but somewhat shy freshman named Alan. Alan Poindexter was just beginning his work in college theatre at that point -- and he came to take a huge part in my production of Cloud 9. I did not stay at UNCC very long after that production due to the politics of the department -- more gender related than artistic I would now say. 

But this is about Alan. His sense of invention and hard work showed in that production -- and made him stand out as a potential professional theatrician just because of that.  This summer (2013) Alan passed away in Charlotte, NC after giving up his position as Artistic Director of the Children's Theatre of Charlotte earlier in the year. Alan made many breakthrough's in the Charlotte theatre scene: in artistic freedom in Angels in America, in numerous upgraded children's theatre productions; and always contributed to respecting and honoring other Charlotteans working in their crafts. 

Gina Stewart is right--Charlotte doesn't do a great job of respecting the extraordinary theatre work of Charlotte performers.  Even Charlotteans at a distance understand that Alan was one of those extraordinary theatre people who earned that respect -- on a local, regional, and even national level. 

The Incredible Lightness of Being...Alive

In spite of everything: overwork, jobs left undone, people I respect deserting their posts, sadness for no reason, stress brought on by everything, and the outlandish sense that nothing ever gets any better -- I still enjoy being.

Most people I know are fighting against the tide -- struggling against obstacles that occur and then quickly reoccur. It's a fight...to the death...literally.

Desiring You; Loving You

Love and desire -- both hold special places in my soul.  They are allied, but they are not the same. Love deals with the totality of another person. It not only wants to physically join but to also psychically join with the other. In philosophical terms -- it honors and respects the other and wants to be the other.

Desire wants the other as well. But usually only some part of the other -- like the beautiful body, or a part of the body, or the smile, or the soft voice, or the gentle heart. Both desire and love signal a movement towards the other -- but neither has any guarantee of successful acceptance by the other. In either case the other can resist, can turn away, can refuse, can ignore, and even can pretend such movement does not exist.

 

Passing ON, Without Stress

Some people learn, eventually, the things that will make them happy.  As I listen to my Dear Surrogate daughter (hereafter DSd) -- I think "go ahead, make a decision -- fight for the happiness you deserve." T has to learn to try for perfection, but sometimes settle for less -- and grow towards that perfection. There are no assurances. There is only the imperfect male out there -- who perhaps loves you, but cannot, as yet admit it. 

This very day a very new Administrator at STC bid "Adieu!"
She needed to destress.  She needed to learn the way to being happy -- and she is doing so. She is going back to her old job at SCAD -- and I wish her well. We will miss her leadership at STC. 

Friday before Classes Start

There has been a flurry of activity around here -- registration, classes added (or not), preparation begun.  It is all very unsettling -- it doesn't seem orderly somehow. 

Rotary today as well -- I have to arrive early since I have all the "gear." necessary to do the meeting. Hope it all comes off well. 

The weekend promises rain -- and I desperately need to do yard work.  We shall see. 
All things remain the same. 

Beauty in the Eye of...

There is such beauty in the world.  Some people are gifted with extraordinary physical beauty, especially when they are young. Others get progressively more beautiful as they progress through their lives, their roles as parents, their relationships, their marriage(s).  

Today I had the wonderful opportunity to interact with several beautiful people -- a youngish female scholar, an enduring administrative assistant, a new teacher drawn to the life of teaching our specific students at our Technical College. All of these people were women -- but they were beautiful not just because they were attractive -- but because they displayed depth, and kindness, and compassion -- well beyond their own particular physical beauty. Such complete beauty is the kind that makes my heart beat faster. 

It is one of the reasons that I think living, teaching, being a friend, conversing, etc. are all "art forms" fully supplying an aesthetic level of existence to my thinking and my doing and my being.     

Prelude to a Class

Getting ready for classes requires redoing the syllabus, setting a schedule for the term, mentally preparing oneself for the interactions that comprise teaching, and overcoming the reticence on all sides to the idea of being there -- together -- to learn.

Teaching for me has always been performance -- preparing the brain to move forward into the process without faltering, feeling too many obstacles, or rejecting the process outright. Then the schedule changes themselves need to be assimilated and made easy.
Then comes the execution of the process -- hopefully seamlessly -- and the teacher then focuses on something beyond the simple information. 

Savannah 1

The time between dusk and dawn; when trees drip moisture and the bugs sing in the trees! Trees are hung with vines and Spanish moss. Shadows are deep and dappled under a summer skylight.  Quiet rules.

Savannah is one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Its people are kind, a little kinky, and compassionate. At night the rustling of leaves mimics the rustling of cool sheets in dreamy bedrooms.  Not a party town per se, like New Orleans. But a town of partiers, more like Amsterdam or Stockholm. The town rests in fits and starts, and sleeps on the margins. Each room is a caress in itself.  Each house gives a different feeling of complicity. You are not sleeping alone in this town -- even when you are alone. 

Savannah is  ....... mystery, and story, and a kind of poetic fog. It is words that are not often used: "tontine,""murmuring,""liaison,""erotique,""slow ride." Savannah gives hope to the disjointed and alone -- and caresses the souls of the deep thinkers who also feel almost as deeply. 

North Carolina Shakespeare Festival: Do Not Go Gently...

The NCSF Board voted several days ago (August 1st) to "cease operations immediately" due to a lack of funds, just before engaging in its scheduled audition and rehearsal for "The Scottish Play" in September. The Board, which is huge, gave no details of its situation -- and seemed to suggest (along with the staff) by its silence -- that "oh well, we have to close....la, dee, da." That Board should be eliminated -- with a new Board chosen who can and will actually support the theatre.

Managing Director Pedro Silva is a professional who has directed, acted and produced on the High Point stage for a long, long time. To undercut the theatre is this fashion is an absolute tragedy and elevates "bean counting" to its highest possible idiocy. The Peter Principle is in operation here. People of Greensboro, High Point and Winston Salem -- support the NCSF before you lose it all, on account of the stupidity of a very few. 

 

Death Out There

Every person's death around me or near me, serves to remind me of the reality of mortality. Will the world miss a beat when I am gone? No, obviously not. Will even those closest to me pause and reflect about me -- perhaps for a second, if I am even worth that. I am mortal; I am transient; I am constantly moving towards and beyond my own death. 

This is not philosophy -- this is fact. There is no religious element to it -- death is simply "death of the body"  -- at some last moment of tangible choice. There is no death without this choice, I believe. We have free will -- this I believe. And I also believe we will not be "punished" by a higher being for having that free choice, and even for exercising it -- albeit badly.

What lies beyond death? I do not know. I speculate that it will be as I imagine it to be -- or so I spoke to Sheila at her untimely death. "Heaven will be...what you want it to be!" That is the only answer that logic can bring to the question -- that thinking may or may not be correct, but it is our consolation in the saddest times we live through. 

Ray Woods, Rest in Peace

Ray Woods was one of my real friends at Rotary East.  Since I became a full-time member I often sat at Ray's table, in the back center (closest to the food, farthest from the podium).  We often talked about my job(s) -- which he found interesting; the things we had in common (my birthplace, Milwaukee: a city he worked in and appreciated); companies I knew (Cutler-Hammer, where my Dad worked: a place where Ray consulted in Milwaukee way back when).  Ray and his wife Ardis(sp?) who played a Victorian tour guide for many years in Savannah, were fixtures in Savannah and its incredible lifestyle. 

Ray was a gentle yet strong man -- always interested in the other person, even when their name(s) would sometimes elude him.  Ray finally got my name right -- after many weeks; even handling the intricate foreignness of my last name--Mrochinski.
I really appreciated the kindness and integrity that Ray possessed -- a real Rotarian, a kind and giving human being, an incredible example for others. Ray Woods passed away on April 10, 2013. Rest in Peace, my friend.   

Under Summer Dresses

Summer is that time of the year in the South -- where flirtation reigns, and all things happen that can happen, even though they probably shouldn't.

In my history there are plenty of moments of exploration and enlightenment about one or the other member of another gender that have gone on in the guise of summer romance. It's not the heat, or the slight tang of musk in the air, nor is it the humidity which collects and flows along every body that moves. It is more than physical elements -- it is also mental and emotional ones: longing, loneliness, too much time to recall and remember, and the desire to be ... happy again.

Human beings all flow towards happiness -- that desire to be fulfilled and smiling, giving and taking freely from someone who wants me and does the same. Under Summer Dresses lies the body -- the body is always there, clothed or not, warm or hot, cool or chilling quietly in a welcome breeze. Ovid knows the truth. Emily knows the truth but will not name it. Heat happens.

More Summer Dresses

She looked back now-- I saw it. Her eyes were thankful, as usual. 

Another she pressed her lips too long and too warmly -- I felt it.I would have missed my cue onstage -- that would not have been "Good!"   She wanted a connection then but I deferred for silly reasons of righteousness.

Another she came to my house on my birthday -- and took me out for ice cream. And I responded with a quick "good bye" even knowing she wanted something else.

A long-remembered she visited my house on the last day of her trip to Savannah; she stared at my house until I came out to greet her; then she ran away to her husband.

Another she leaped up and put her legs around my waist -- but it was intermission, and there was no time -- and there was also "too much time" between us.
So many "she's" but only one I called directly by that name -- She was mine.

In Time

Many names; many faces; many dreams -- lost or won; many angry moments; a few quiet loving moments; some excitement; lots of sameness; finding the spirit or energy of a moment is impossible without insight, introspection, and careful observation.

There is no "beating the clock." Eventually we will all wither, however slowly, and die. For some of us it will be today; for others an unexpected tomorrow. For a very few of us -- there will be a conscious choice -- life of death, heaven or hell, good or bad.  Choose wisely and well -- because once time runs out, there is no reprieve. 

Summer Dresses

Getting older probably increases the amount of vivid remembering that goes on during one's current days. So here I am -- getting older -- and remembering lots more clearly about a lot of things. I remember the temptations; I remember the sins! But most of all -- I remember all of the details, all of the details of all the decisions, all of the details of all of the big decisions, all of the details of all of the decisions that became big decisions -- that have affected my life to this day. 

There was a time when I asked a serious question -- that became a marriage proposal.  There was a time where I put my hand high on a smooth bare upper back, so that the hand didn't go too far South, and a very fervent embrace didn't become an immediate liaison. There was a time I resisted an insouciant doll face carelessly aimed sidelong with eyes still tracing mine -- so that I didn't fall into those grappling pools. There was a time I kept from instinctively touching those cute blue cotton running shorts -- forever pulling down the shield that only barely kept two humans apart. There was a time when dipping into the icy fall waters of the closer of the Interlochen lakes could not have cooled someone so young. There was a time that staring into the partially clothed  middle of a woman  desired would have been a betrayal -- of this desire, and another as well. There was a time when a teenager rushed into my arms and became my instant unrequited dream in a second. There were many such times -- real and partially imagined, realistic and yet unimaginable in their importance to me.

Often  I did not respond well to an unannounced kiss -- pleading moistly for another,  when I was so tunnelled into something else that I couldn't think. I regret those unfulfilled moments as well. The youngish sister, the playwright, the wouldbe lover.
So many moments; so many decisions; so many wins and losses.       

Sheila Lives

Sitting in my office and looking at Sheila's iconic "dancing" picture posted next to my clock -- always makes me skip a breath, silently think her name, wonder what might have been -- if she had lived. It is more than unlucky to get a terminal disease when you are young -- and especially if you have lived the kind of measured careful thoughtful life that should have earned you extra decades, instead of lost ones.

I loved Sheila then -- and still do now. I can't really explain why. The magic that we had was trust, and giving, and trying to understand. I don't know that we were perfect together -- mostly because we were such amateurs at what love really is. Too many times selfishness on both our parts, or reticence, or unsureness, or even fear --interfered with our surface communications. But inside -- we loved. In our hearts -- we loved. In our souls -- we understood what love means. We loved each other. 

The End of a Long Hard Day, Monday August 5, 2013

Today there was a good-bye luncheon for a beloved math teacher and leader at STC, Heather. Grades were also due today so (as an administriviator)I am dealing with the three people who do not have their grades in on time. There will be "hell to pay" if they don't catch up and get their responsibilities in order. 

Tomorrow Sarah (English Chair) heads off on her cruise to Northern Europe; wish and hope that she stays safe during a time of al-queda sabre rattling in the Middle East and Africa. Sarah seems to be handling her new administrative job about the same as I am --reluctantly and better than expected. She is too young and lively to be an administrator -- especially for no extra pay.

Besides all that I finished my SLOGS for this term and will send all that information to my Dean as soon as humanly possible.  "Humanly possible" -- somehow that phrase gets overlooked and made into a trite rejoinder in the midst of bureaucratic kerfuffle.      

On a Day Too Quickly Forgotten

Some days have more import than others. Some days cling in one's memory -- a day of lust perhaps, or a day of mourning, will haunt and sometimes totally reactivate your thinking. Other days are like this one -- no sense of deja vu here. No clinging memories or bright moments of incandescent strength here. Just ordinary -- heaps and heaps of ordinary. 

Don't know why that is. Don't understand the mechanics of changelessness -- the real shape of ordinary. But there it is. No romances will ever blossom on such a day. No spectacular decisions will be hammered home into a prescient outlook. Just the same. Today is just the same. The same as what, you ask?  The same as same -- ordinary.  

In Deference to Women

"Fascinated" is the word I would choose; yes, I have always been "fascinated" with women. Mainly because they are so different -- physically, emotionally, psychologically.  When I was very young I thought there were few differences between women and men, boys and girls.  I was still fascinated, but more scared of or scared away by the obvious differences.

Now as an adult I am no longer scared -- but still fascinated.  I admit freely that I don't really understand how most women think, and even though a few of them have tried to tell me how I think, I am convinced that they don't really think like I do either. It's a grim kind of discovery -- when you finally fix on the fact that gender differences create life differences, create goal differences, create "purpose" differences.

I am willing to go with the fact of the differences -- and just try to float and go with the eddies and floes that are all around me. Swirling this way and that -- my views are as confused and partial as ever. One of the "dreams" I used to have consistently was of me drowning -- being pushed and shoved under water, and struggling like a madman to maintain equilibrium, to fight my way to the surface. Once a relationship with a woman hits that level of distress for me -- I am forced to flee, to get to the air, to breathe, to live. For some women who might someday read this -- I'm sure that explains a lot.        

Fired for Blogging

A female redheaded news reporter somewhere down South got fired yesterday, for posting "true" confessions on her personal blog.  It's a shame because she really didn't admit to much in her confessions: not wearing a bra on the air one day, being afraid to do stories about "old people" because she was secretly frightened of them, and making some comments about her salary on her YouTube channel. There is no "freedom to speak" and there is no "freedom of the press" -- and there also is no privacy. As we are monitored so are we judged, juried, fined and/or fired. People are blaming the younger generation -- sharing stuff "out there" which "should be kept secret."

My blog will never be about work -- or its related elements. Not that those areas are controversial -- but they are not the principal parts of my life. But I am not afraid to post the truth -- that's all I know; that's all that I can say.     

What is of Value?

People are of value. They have the most value in our lives: those we love -- our relatives, lovers, friends, co-workers; those we are acquainted with -- our bosses, fellow-workers, neighbors, associates; those who are important to us -- everyone else we think about.  

So blogs talk about people -- all those people mentioned above. And hopefully blogs tell the truth (as the blogger sees and understands it) about all those people.  And hopefully those mentioned in blogs understand why they are mentioned, and don't take instant offense when they are mentioned, even somewhat, disparagingly.

Many people have come and gone in my life. Some I have loved and lost. Others I have loved and hold onto in my mind, or in my heart. But no matter the status of any of them -- it is them I need to talk about. Because they are the people who have shaped me, such as I am, and helped me to survive this long. And they are the people I value. 

On Love, Friendship, and Age

I believe in friendship -- and companionship, and acquaintanceship, and many other kinds of closeness between human beings. Big of me, right? No, I'm just making the point that there are lots of degrees of friendship that I participate in -- and would participate in, if it were possible.

Love is another matter -- erotic love requires the physical ability to love, and the mental and psychological ability to be close to, to respond to, to fulfill, the needs of another human being.  More than a generation of time between two people in a love (erotic) relationship nearly makes that relationship implausible if not impossible.  The genetic attractions won't be there -- and if they are there, they are easily undone by the reality of -- too slow, too fat, too ugly, too...  I recognize my own limitations at this point -- even though attracted to the breathless face and smiling eyes of a twenty-something-year-old, I need to keep myself in check and not instead try to pretend I'm an Anthony Weiner type middle-aged (or old-aged) freak who can't see his own reflection in the mirror. 

Love is mysterious and also has many other levels -- even within the erotic realm.  Desire can be internalized into a dream-landscape, which is all the really old really have.  I can't pretend to be 20 again no matter how good of an actor I am, or how self-delusional as well. 

Looking for Comments

There are people directly connected to some of my postings -- but for them and for all, I welcome their comments on individual postings. Eventually I will open up this blog to Google Plus -- thus getting a wider range of readers and/or commentators. Right now only people who find themselves named in the postings are asked to respond -- and only if they wish to do so. 

What Do Women Want?

A provocative question -- without a provocative answer.  Women are human, too. So what they want is what all humans want -- a little happiness, less despair, no deception, honesty, compassion, some fun, some humor, some playtime on every level, a living of life that is complete and wonderful, some risk-taking, some loving that is honest, a heart that is true, a soul that is open, eyes that are real, and kisses that mean something more than they are. 

I still never knew what Bertina wanted; I am pretty sure Maureen never wanted anything, or else wouldn't ever express it if she did want something. And so for the man -- the object/subject of all this -- he would never know what was wanted and would just walk away and give up. 

So Much More to Say: On Bertina (Tina) and Maureen

My failure to reclaim dating skills I never quite possessed is the real story of my non-relationships with Bertina and Maureen.  For the latter person I became a disembodied pen pal -- a reliable "voice" somewhere off there, mostly unconnected to flesh and bone, totally bereft of emotion or pain. I should have been aware of that fact then -- and I should have tried to correct it. Sooner, earlier, more emphatically!

For the former "datee" I should be writing a book, rather than a poor remembrance in a blog.  There were so many high points corresponding to so many more low points. Suffice it to say at this point that some of these "true stories" will come out here and there over the life of this blog -- as they did in conversations with my friends and confidants at the time of their occurrence. I am certainly not always right about things I have undergone, mostly due to the "rosy-colored memory" effect. But what is true for me, is true for me and the way I try to live. And so it is; and so it must be. 

On Tina and Maureen

Actually, post-the-horrible-and-unfair-death of Sheila Mrochinski, I have tried twice to re-establish my dating life. First with the inimitable Bertina Carey (see previous emails) and then with someone I knew well  from my time at Ohio State University.
Ms. Maureen Flora is a poet and a high school teacher in Central Ohio.

I admired and liked her -- enough to even trek 1600 miles up North (to Ohio) to visit her --twice -- neither visit quite worked out as I expected, not that I was expecting fireworks -- but at least perhaps a slight sparkle would have been nice. I sensed fear in her (which she freely admitted)-- but then time and near-daily communication should have assuaged that fear. But it didn't. I offered to have her come and visit me in Savannah which she reneged on quite a number of times -- still fear? or no spark on her side? I could never be sure -- because like me she had her own history to contend with -- an unexpected divorce, etc. And that is life -- for all of us. 

I stopped my communication with Maureen, except through this venue -- not because I wasn't sincerely interested. But because life is finite -- energy is finite -- and love is linked to both those concepts. We must honor time -- and life -- and energy ---by never wasting them. 

Tangle of Time and Work

This week my new duties as Department Chair of Social and Behavioral Sciences have almost "done me in." So many new hires, interviews, desk copies of books, etc. have been gotten -- that I sometimes feel the whirlwind about me without sensing any direction at all. Of course, time draws us all forward -- but, time does not rescue us from perfidious overwork. 

There are too many things that I miss --- parties up in Easton for Bastille Day at the Kendrick's, trips to the beach or a restaurant to discuss "administrivia" with my fellow Chairperson, even a simple visit to the movies or an evening where I do not put myself to bed by 10:00 PM.  I feel caught up but not completed in sync with my tasks and duties. Displacement rules. All things float akimbo. 

Lots More

There are many more stories to tell about Bertina -- little stories, happy stories, romantic stories, and sad stories too.  We lived a history together, even for such a short time -- both now and in the past. Her experiences made her the woman she had become -- as my experiences had shaped me. 

No one's part was particularly better -- or healthier -- or more successful. No comparison needs to be made. We are what we are. And we cannot change easily -- that is true of either one of us. 

I feel a failure in this relationship -- but most of that failure is not deliberate, active, or even conscious. I just know it is a failure. 

When in the future I write about Bertina -- it will be the same. The moments of beauty or joy that are etched will be there forever.  The moments of pain and embarrassment will be there as well.

Carey, Bertina

This is a woman I love -- but cannot live with.  I said "Goodbye, I love you" to her several years ago now -- and I still feel the same.

After Sheila's (my wife's)  death in December of 2006 a Christmas card from Bertina gave me hope of a continuing life, and steered me away from my intense desire to join
Sheila -- in whatever she was experiencing. Bertina had been a student of mine "a long long long time ago" at a mystical place called Interlochen. I knew her then -- but we were never lovers.  Even when she once came back to visit Interlochen years after she graduated -- we did not become lovers (I could not be unfaithful to the woman I knew then as my girlfriend)--her name was Peggy).

The Christmas card became a string of letters, and emails, and finally phone calls. I did not know initially that there was a "weekend live-in boyfriend" in her world -- as we pursued this whirlwind re-romance. The came a rendezvous -- in Wilson, NC of all places. Then more phone calls, lots of emails, cards, letters -- and a volatile relationship ensued. As we became more serious with each other -- the volatility increased because there was, after all, another man who was definitely there first and definitely was a more permanent fixture than I was likely to become.  They, he and Bertina, had lots in common -- same Church, similar background in addiction and AA, and just plain proximity.

Bertina broke it off with me tersely, in a text.  Even though I had visited her in DC several times -- she broke it off in favor of...let's call him Dave.
But the circumstances were such (she had had a bad test for a possible serious disease that same week) that I could not accept the break -- and instead foolishly and romantically drove North to DC immediately.  It took me two days to drive there  due to circumstances beyond my control (actually I left my wallet at home in Savannah) and I arrived duly concerned on Saturday morning of another "live-in weekend with Dave." As I rapped on the flimsy front door I found them in "Monica Lewinsky flagrante" and my heart exploded. I realized I had been lied to, in many more ways than one, by this woman whom I loved.

I left -- promising never to return or to respond. Things happened -- time passed -- suddenly I was in demand again, sought out by Bertina-- and I resisted with simple unadorned silence. Bertina came to specifically visit me at my home as part of a training "gig" with her company that landed her nearby -- I let her into my house -- and we were back on the front burner again.  I am not sure if I have the sequence right here but she finally did "break it off" with Dave (let's call him Mel II) and the heightened communication continued. But obviously something else was going on as well -- because suddenly our communication got "rocky."

Accusations, name-calling, fault-finding, anger, and other vulgarities ensued. Who could fight the hardest? Who would win this battle of the sexes? And then -- the fact that I didn't believe in Christianity as she did (huh?), the fact that I perhaps didn't trust her enough to ever be honest with me, the fact that she didn't ever believe I was giving my "all" to her sexually, that fact that we lived apart and appeared to like it that way -- and our relationship finally exploded in one final phone call -- and my own closing words:
"Good bye, I love you."

Now it is several years after that -- in that time she spent more than a year writing, emailing, and communicating with me trying to get us to "re-establish our friendship."
It could not happen -- I was done with arguing, pain, accusations, and depression. I would rather spend my life in more positive pursuits. Just last week I got a birthday care from Bertina -- claiming I was a "blessing and a joy" and she would always "celebrate us." It was not in the same language that attempted to belittle, hurt, and destroy me less than a year ago.  I love her -- but I cannot ever understand her. And I am not so foolish enough to think that we could ever get past whatever anger seethes underneath -- in each of us. And so it is...today. "Good bye -- I still love her."