Life isn’t fair he said upon rising.
He takes his shower and only then
the commode does beckon.
He wishes it were earlier than then,
the reverse would be heaven —
the bathroom on emerging,
and shower after purging,
but he has appointments to keep
and miles to go before he does sleep.
So he pulls up his drawers
and heads out the doors,
sometimes, with the barn door
still flying.

He had just finished reading a novella
about a woman who, at fifty, left her
husband and he knew that if his late
wife who died at forty-nine had lived,
she would have left him at fifty, also.
They were such babies when they met
and married eight years later in their
early twenties. They grew and were
good at that growing, but they didn’t
grow together; he wished she had lived
so that, at fifty, she could do what
she had planned on doing which was to
leave him; it would break his heart
in a different way from which it was
broken, but at least this time, she
would be alive.

Most have big money belts tied tightly
around ever-expanding waist-
lines.

Some just wear ropes around their waists
and robes with no pockets for
possessions.

One said “I poured a ton of money into
this place, and I deserve a private
beach.”

Many agreed and hired a lawyer to press
their capitalistic cause with confusing
legalese.

One hired a lawyer to defend his cause against
those who would restrict his property
rights.

Loins girded, heels dug in, faces like flint,
but only two lawyers carried away the
booty.

The few with ropes and no pockets had time
to look around, smell flowers and watch
birds.

Those are two options said the capitalist
finding it harder to stand under the belt’s
weight.

A few only heard the roar of the ocean
waves as they watched the brilliant sun
set.

Nursing a sore knee and recuperating from non-stop visits from relatives each of the two previous weekends, he rested on the couch reading a novella by Jim Harrison about a woman who runs away from her husband and recalls events in her life, many very painful.

Always easily influenced by what he is reading at any given moment, he, too, began to recall events in his life allowing incidents to randomly enter and leave his thoughts. True to form, some of the thoughts were painful.

One recollection was of a Christmas party during his second year of seminary. Four couple friends had gathered at the apartment of one of the couples. He had just read a touching, short story about Christmas and thought perhaps he could read it at the party.

It was back in the day and all the seminary students were young men straight out of college. By the second year the other men at the party had sufficiently impressed the faculty so that they were known as the “Brain-trust Trinity” of the class. He wasn’t included in that designation, but he tried to hold his own. After snacks and eggnog, he asked if he might read the story that had impressed him so much.

Everyone thought that would be a good idea. And so he read and read and read. He became aware that the story, which just flew by when he read it to himself, was significantly longer in narration. When he finished, the host said smugly and sarcastically, “My, that was a fine story, touching, even if it took up the bulk of the time we have together this fine evening. Merry Christmas, everyone, or did the story keep us here till New Years?” Everyone laughed and he forced a smile.

The Trinity stayed for the third year and graduation because the faculty decided they didn’t need an internship and they all had graduate school plans. The faculty decided he needed a year’s internship to mature and perhaps learn how to write a coherent paper for church history, the professor of church history lightly quipped one day when handing back papers.

The professor always handed back papers in the order of best grade first and so on down. The Trinity always got the first three, changing places between first, second and third regularly. His was usually the last paper to be handed out.

The professor, who always addressed the students as simply Mr. said, “Well, Mr., Then there is yours. Once again you have the worst paper in the class. You know when I first met you I thought you were going to be an outstanding student. Indeed, you are verbally gifted. Turns out you are a con. Too bad your verbal skills don’t translate to the written word. Indeed, you will have a whole year away to practice. And, indeed, I hope you do.”
He didn’t dare look at any of the other students but could feel his face flush once again.

The professor liked the word “indeed.”

He looked back at the novella hoping that the runaway wife had some good memories. He
really needed some himself.

Actually, just then a good one did appear. When he returned to seminary for his last year he actually did quite well academically impressing the faculty, especially the church history professor — indeed, that one. He didn’t think he had changed all that much, but what he did know was that the Brain-trust Trinity had graduated, thank God, and the competition might not have been quite so stiff.

Decades later he heard that the fellow who had made the sarcastic crack at the Christmas party had been widowed and had become a recluse hiding away all alone in retirement having alienated his own children.

Having been widowed himself, he never would have wished that on his worst enemy let alone a one-time, marginal friend and his heart did go out to the man, but he took devilish pride in not having become a hermit and is glad his kids still call and occasionally visit from distant places, thus contributing to the exhaustion he was experiencing in that very moment.

Shirley gave them more grapefruit than they
could eat before the trip home, so they just
bagged it and put it in the cooler. Nancy
told him not to eat the grapefruit in the morn-
ing when he took his blood-pressure medicine
because it would interfere with the medicine.
He told her he knew that but thanked her for
the concern. The grapefruit survived the four-
day trip so they had some when they arrived
and several days thereafter. The last, two re-
maining grapefruit were awfully soft, so his
wife squeezed them into juice which tasted
just fine. He drank it on the deck and spit the
seeds over the railing. He sent an e-mail to
Shirley thanking her again for the grapefruit
and telling her how long they lasted. She e-
mailed back saying she missed them already
and was really glad the grapefruit lasted that
long and that she was sure it would because
the grapefruit is really hearty this time of
year. She thanked them again for lunch at
the Giant Dragon, something they do every
winter, and that she just loves the pork
noodle bowl (which she always gets), half of
which she takes back to her condo for dinner
but only because it is cooked and that, even
though she is not religious, she wouldn’t
carry raw pork into her place or put it in
the refrigerator because it would contaminate
the other food. She noted that Nancy wanted
her to remind him to be sure not to eat the
grapefruit in the morning and that she really
missed them, too and how glad they both were
that he and his wife finally had gotten to meet
their sons, daughters-in-law, who were Gentile
but that was alright, and the beautiful babies.
He thought he would wait awhile before he
responded.

He came to a stop at the intersection,
looked east and saw several cars coming.
He looked to the west and saw the setting
sun; he stared as the descending light came
up over the horizon in the bright blue sky;
he breathed deeply — inhaled and exhaled.
He looked east; the cars were passing;
he pulled out, turned west; the Buddha
in the front seat and Lao Tzu and Confucius
in the back all clapped and smiled, especial-
ly in light of the fact that they almost
got into a really bad accident the day be-
fore when a driver not practicing mindful-
ness pulled out in front of them and the
attentive, mindful driver (him) swerved,
avoided the car and the telephone pole and
regained the road. The three passengers
breathed a sigh of relief and said, “Nice
going, bro.” He thought about the hot tub
at home and the blower which makes thousands
of bubbles. They read his mind and said in
unison, “Yes.” How many times in a lifetime
does a person get such affirmation especial-
ly from such dignitaries, he thought as he
pulled the car in the garage.

What a silly boy. He has to learn
to pick his fights. His righteous
indignation got the better of him
once when he was driving down a
Chicago street and a cop car came
flying by no lights spinning, no
sirens screaming. He said to himself,
that cop has sworn to uphold the law
not abuse it behind a badge. And so,
silly boy followed crazy cop right up
to the precinct station. The cop slam-
med it into park, got out and sauntered
across the street. Silly boy slammed
it into park jumped out and shouted at
crazy cop, “Hey you, you were driving
way over the speed limit and you, of
all people, should know better. You
could have killed somebody. What makes
you think you’re better than the law?”
Crazy cop stopped, turned and headed
for silly boy. “I’m not even going to
ask you to repeat that, you expletive,
expletive, expletive loud mouth. I’m
going to tell you just once,” he snarled
hand resting on his gun holster, “Get
back in the car and drive away slowly —
NOW!!!” Silly boy said sheepishly,
“Yes, Officer,” backed into the car,
put it in gear, looked to his right and
saw his soon to be ex-girlfriend shak-
ing her head in disbelief. What a
silly boy.

They sit in silence; even her stomach
stops grumbling. She looks out the

large windows at the desert mountain.
She breathes deeply and slowly. She

looks down at her hands resting on her
knees, at the age spots. She stops look-

ing, closes her eyes; images swirl and
disappear. People bring joys and sorrows,

unresolved personal issues, concerns
for others, compassion. Not all will be

resolved. It’s not therapy. After awhile,
one or two speak from the heart — their

hearts, not the hearts of others sitting
in the circle. Not her issues, but she feels

a warmth anyway. She hasn’t thought of
that joy or that sorrow, but they flow

like a spirit into her nose, eyes, ears down
to her heart. Meeting ends; tea is served.

It is spring and relatives descend from
really busy, congested places looking
for relief, peace and quiet. Some come
from far away, really, hot, dry, brown
places for the lush, green, late spring
world along the Big Lake and even
though the water is too cold for swim-
ming or even wading, they can walk
the shore and imagine the water’s
waves rolling over them or they can
sit at a restaurant’s lakeside, out-
door patio munching on homemade
kettle chips and sipping martinis,
squinting into the sun while watching
sailboats just out of storage and on
this season’s maiden voyage dock by
the restaurant. The talk goes on till
the wee small hours because the visitors
live three time zone’s away and they
are not tired, but after they leave, the
man realizes he is not just tire; he is ex-
hausted. It was a very nice visit and
they stayed three days, because by their
age they all understand along with Ben
Franklin that “Guests, like fish, begin
to smell after three days.” The house
was fresh as they walked out the door
and the man barely made it the beckon-
ing couch for a much-needed nap.

You will learn to think critically —
weigh the choices, make rational
decisions, ask who, what, when,
where, why; you will learn to love
the written and well-spoken word;
you will learn to love music and
art and science and history and
philosophy and sports and physical
fitness and yes, even foreign lang-
uages; you will learn of physics
and meta-physics; you will learn
of logic and morals and ethics and
you will learn of the great religions
of the world and you will be free
to choose one or more or none of
those great religions; you will have
passion for what you do and com-
passion for others and you will
continue to learn and ask questions
and value them more than answers;
you will love the out-of-doors
and hiking, biking, swimming, camp-
ing, jogging, backpacking; you will be
a good steward of creation; you will
hold a flower instead of a gun; you
will lay down your life instead of
taking another’s; you will love a
good joke, one that isn’t at the ex-
pense of anyone, except perhaps your-
self and you will laugh often; you
will know how to break up words cor-
rectly at the end of lines, but you won’t
care (see above incorrect “correctly”)
because you will be writing poetry
and if you are lucky, you will under-
stand the subtle difference between
what you are and what a chair is and
you will know that rocks move very,
very slowly and that you are mostly
water, bacteria, fungi and viruses;
you will be in awe of life; you will
be “innocent as a dove and wise as a
serpent”; you will know what “turning
the other cheek” really means; you will
know that “Jesus loves the little child-
ren, all the children of the world —
red and yellow, black and white, they
are precious in his sight”; you will
internalized the sermon on the mount;
you will embrace the four loves – storge,
filia, eros, agape and you will know
that God is love; you will forgive and
accept forgiveness; you will know
how important it is to know how
to cut a board straight, tie a few
knots, change a tire and maybe, just
maybe, if you are really lucky, how
to plant a garden — either flower
or vegetable or both, and if you can’t
have or simply don’t want a garden,
at least you can appreciate a garden
and the work that goes into it, and
nod and have the smarts to tell the
tiller of the soil, thank you or
“That’s lovely”; appreciation is a
sign of a well educated person;
courtesy is too; gratitude is a sign
of a spiritual person; it’s nice
to combine them; they go well
together; and then there is the whole
thing about cooking as a spiritual act-
ivity, not to mention a discussion
on the joy of fly fishing, but that’s
for another time.