Life and Other Passions
I was having an unruly mood, walking and talking to myself, kicking stones.
But then I spotted a cat watching me from a window.
Ah, look at the little kitty!
Cats are mood busters. I see it all the time. The hardest of hearts turn to mush when they spot a cat. Ah, look at the little kitty! Here kitty kitty. Oh aren’t you a pretty kitty…
All cats have a cuteness gene, I swear it!
I am forever grateful for the strangest, most magical of beasts, the common house cat.
I’ve been reading about the 46 year old man who plans to live forever.
He’s been subjecting himself to all the latest and greatest in medicines, diet and exercise, with a little voodoo in there by injecting himself with his sons blood – ewwww.
He looks great and no doubt he feels terrific. I can attest, my 40’s was by far the best decade of my life too – uh, without all the latest and greatest and millions to burn. I was fit and happy and…
Well, what can I say dear fellow.
I have some bad news for you.
You will get sick. And, you will eventually die.
So sorry. But that is how biology works.
No matter what kind of great shape you are in, entropy is gonna find you, because despite our best intentions, and sometimes because of them, our bodies and minds wear out.
It is called old age.
I did too much exercise (warning to all you extreme fitness freaks) and now I can’t do very much. I had only a few serious overuse injuries in my life but oh boy, do they come back to haunt you and severely limit you. Even without that, our bodies cannot and will not do what they could when they were young. You will find this out. I can assure you, it is a FACT!
I have discovered that there is little difference in life span between those who took care of themselves and those who were a little more lenient.
So just a heads up on this. You can overdo good intentions and shorten your life. Ah, life is a trickster! So don’t be too smug about your health. In an instant you can lose it.
Your life is never on hold. Just enjoy what you have today. Tomorrow never comes, and neither will biological immortality.
Do something that is so wonderful you leave a legacy of goodness in this world instead of concentrating so hard on your own self interests. If you have millions to spend on yourself, you’d do better to help someone who has nothing, or someone really struggling to survive. That is the best way to live forever, and the only way.
I should like to apologize to all the people I have knowingly shamed in my life, and there are many of you. I am so sorry.
I was shamed by others most of my life and you’d think I would know the horrible consequences of that enough to not inflict it on others.
But alas, I did not.
Isn’t that a sad testimony, considering how long I have lived?
All these years I have believed that everyone else was okay, and I had a lot of bad in me that was inexcusable. I caused others to feel this way too.
In the movie, The Mission, slave trader Mendoza attempts penance for his wrongdoings by dragging a big heavy bag of his metal armour and swords everywhere he goes. As if he, and he alone has done wrong in his life. He is eventually set free from this by the very people he once enslaved.
This is what shame and guilt is. That big bag.
But here is the reality of it. Everyone has done wrong. Realizing that was like that indigenous man cutting Mendoza loose from his bag of shame. That man knew the truth. No one should carry all the weight of shame. We have all done the inexcusable at some time in our lives. No one is exempt.
And I’ve learned that those who shame and guilt another the most, are often the ones who have a lot to be ashamed of themselves! The ones who subdued me the most, for what I now see as being petty crimes, were the ones with the blackest of hearts, who did much wrong in their lives.
I am definitely not saying forgive, or even forget. I don’t believe in that. You can’t forgive and forget pain. But you can see the truth about humans.
This is not an excuse. I knowingly shamed others. I am offering an apology and a way for you to be free from a burden that is not exclusively yours to carry.
I wanted to sleep in.
But I have a cat.
After numerous head butts, some bites, meows and loud purring Sam my cat sat at my face and glared at me.
“Sam, what is the point in getting up? No one cares if I get up or not.”
Those big golden eyes burned into mine. “I am not no one. I care.”
I got up.
I know a person who does non stop bitching. About everything.
She goes on an on and on about how terrible things are. It is utterly amazing and fascinating how everything she sees, hears, reads and experiences is all bad. It is impossible to divert her.
You could be walking along and point out some lovely flowers to her and she might momentarily agree, but then quickly point out that the weather is going to change and they will all freeze, or the planter they are in is ugly, or they are not getting enough sun and will die, or the colour scheme is off, or gardening is hard work for nothing, or people are going to steal them, or…..
To say such a person in emotionally draining is an understatement. She is an emotional vampire!
You can’t go anywhere with this person as she focuses on the bad or potentially bad of every single thing.
She wonders why I don’t want to go out for meals with her! Let me tell you, you could go to a five star restaurant and be treated like a princess and she would bitch non stop about the entire affair.
Why do rich people persecute the poor?
Why do they take away their benefits, pay them shit, work them to the bone and kick them to the dogs? They take away food, health, shelter and liberty.
Why do they treat seniors so deplorably? It is shocking how our elders are so disrespected and forgotten. They deny them health care or enough money for a decent life.
And women! We are losing all our rights! The handmaidens tale is not fiction.
All the things we fought so hard to wrench from these greedy bastards hands is being snatched back.
If they had their way, we would all be out on the streets, unable to buy a loaf of bread, with only the shirt on our backs.
And they just want more and more and more and more.
Look at what CEO’s make. Look at what their employees take home. Both values are obscene. Vile. Disgusting. Oh my. Look at what Mr. Weston got for being a good CEO to the shareholders lately for Loblaws. Since he successfully overinflates grocery prices so we can’t even afford a head of lettuce, saying companies should make a profit, he got a raise from 8 million to 11.4 million! Because he was, poor fellow, underpaid. Do you believe this crap?
What does it mean to be billionaire? It means you are above the law, above reproach, even above God. You don’t even pay taxes. I pay more taxes on my meager pension. And it means everyone is totally expendable. There are always replacements.
Yes, I am pissed.
I am pissed that we don’t fight back hard enough. We worship worthless, tone deaf, idiot billionaires and celebrities. We throw money at them for their substandard products and shows. We hang on their every opinion as if they are gods. We give them positions of power to rule over us and humiliate us.
We live in a slave economy. We all work and live to provide the rich with lavish lifestyles we will never ever experience, that they constantly shove in our faces.
They shamelessly flaunt their wealth. I am sick of seeing tours of some assholes ten million dollar homes on the beachfront. Reading about their Greek vacations, and five hundred million dollar yachts. The two dozen rare collectible cars they own. The Rembrandts hanging in their living rooms. This is not to show us what we can obtain, it is to keep us hungry, to keep us in our place, to keep us dirt poor and slaves to them.
When you are poor, money is everything.
Without money, you can do and have, nothing.
Long gone are the days of the best things in life are free, if that was ever true.
Enough money buys you freedom, well-being and health and can give you a future to look forward to.
People who have enough income will tell you money is not everything because they have enough money to take care of themselves and enjoy life. They don’t understand that without enough money, life is just survival. A great deal of what makes life enjoyable are the things you must pay for; vacations, experience, education, dining out, etc. Even the simplest things, like a walk, requires comfortable shoes; going out for a coffee with friends requires transportation and money to purchase a beverage. You can’t even go to a museum or a gallery without a fee. Or enjoy an ice cream cone.
Anybody who does not have enough money knows that thriving is a whole lot better than surviving. People who have money do not know what it is like to just survive.
Misery is nickel and diming your whole life because you have to and have zero money for anything beyond the bare necessities.
We live in a free country, despite all the screaming that we don’t.
I say to any of you who think our country is a dictatorship, that you need a hefty reality check. You need to ask an immigrant what dictatorship is.
Ask a person who has escaped North Korea. Ask an immigrant who made great sacrifices to live here. Ask those that lived in dictatorships under tyrannical rule what freedom really is. Ask them why so many want to live here.
Freedom is what we already have. In spades! We are so incredibly fortunate. You need to take a look around. You need to educate yourself. We are free in so many many ways. We elect our leaders. We have abundance of everything. We can choose from a huge selection of cars to drive, clothes to wear, food to eat, furniture, electronics, appliances and gadgets. We can get jobs, an education. We can live where we want. Buy a house. We decide who we will marry. We have health care, hospitals, ambulances. We have pensions for the disabled and seniors. We can travel by planes, trains and buses, anywhere at anytime. We can speak our minds. Write books, make art, music. Sure nothing is perfect, but compare our country to the rest of the world. Do you realize these things we take for granted are not available to a huge amount of people in our world? They have no options and they live in constant fear.
Years ago I met a man from South America who was so grateful to live here. The story he told me of his life was shocking, and it is amazing he is alive. He had been beaten and tortured and lost his family. He had to watch everything he said, did and thought. He couldn’t go anywhere without permission. He didn’t have choices. He didn’t have options.
You cry because our government wants to protect us? By making us wear masks and get vaccines while we are in the middle of a global pandemic killing hundreds of thousands of people? I ask you, how do we stop the spread of disease? We are all in this together. The virus is our enemy, not our government. You think wearing a mask and getting a vaccine is persecution?! You know nothing about persecution.
You don’t understand how democracy works. It means we do what is best for everyone, and that sometimes means it may not be the best for you personally. We make some sacrifices. But we have so many benefits. So many freedoms. We live so well!
There are 50 dictatorships in the world, and the number is growing. You want to add this country to that list?
You have absolutely no idea what freedom is.
Someone in the neighbourhood just got a new dog.
It barks nearly all night.
How can people do that? Get a dog, leave him outside barking himself hoarse, while they are either out somewhere or at home with the ear buds in, playing video games, oblivious to reality.
It happens also in the apartment building I live in.
A new puppy is purchased and then we get to listen to the poor little darling howl for hours while the owners are away. Or worse, some tenants put their dogs out on the balcony and forget about them. So the stressed and lonely dog barks for hours.
How can people be so cruel and thoughtless? Not only to the dog, but to all their neighbours?
We had this problem when I was a kid at home. The neighbours behind us had a dog that barked all night. Even when we spoke to them, they were like, so what. Problem? What problem?
I realize that puppies have to learn to be on their own, and that if you want your dog to stay outside there is a period where they may bark. All of which I find heartbreaking. Animals need a lot of attention and love, and to me, that is what the real problem is. Dogs need companionship. A little love and care can go a long way.
There is a disdain for self published authors that is not found anywhere else in creative pursuits.
They call it vanity press. It is vain to write and publish your own book. Why? It’s not vain to create art, to make a CD, to dance, to make a video, a movie or anything else. The big guns seek out the amateur for the next big thing. This does not happen to self published book writers.
I encountered this at my job at a bookstore many years ago. When we ordered books, we received a separate pamphlet for self published books that we could order from. Automatically it was as if managers were presented with a big plate of pooh. Faces changed, noses wrinkled. Disgust.
My first boss was not like this. She gave self published authors a chance. God bless her. I am sure she helped many to be a commercial success. But she was one in a million.
Why are amateur writers, who publish their own books so hated?
It is true, our work is unpolished, we are not professionals. But I will tell you, that the published authors aren’t professionals either. The only difference is they have the benefit of seasoned editors to take their raw gems and make them diamonds. Professional writers do not have a greater gift than the rest of us, except they lucked out and got a publisher with great editors and who promoted them. I guarantee you, before that, their writing was no better than a self published author, and in many cases, worse. And how many books that are professionally published are still crap? Many.
I suspect it is the book publishers who created this wide spread horror of the self published author. Their book sales take away from their profits.
I am very happy publishing my own books, even if they aren’t great. I love doing it. I am just wondering why that is such a bad thing.