In Venezuela Dad had a glamor grill built. Italian craftsmen made it of thick aluminum sheet and put a manufacturer’s plate on it: Piaggio, purveyors of fine scooters. That was their Old World humor at work. Dad agreed with Coco Chanel’s maxim. A grill should be two things: classy and fabulous. Actually, I made that…
The eternal question of forgiveness
March 10, 2014
I expect to write about the question of forgiveness for the rest of my life. It’s all right. I don’t mind. The subject interests me. A well-meaning friend sent me the following quote from a Holocaust survivor. Forgiveness is more than “letting go.” It is proactive rather than passive. We become victims involuntarily, when a…
Grampa can say anything
March 5, 2014
I have far too many bizarre physical problems to list. Here are the major ones. Three kidneys, three cowlicks, a baby tooth with no permanent tooth under it, no gastrocnemius on my right calf, the longest ear canals in medical history, and Meniere’s disease. The weirdest issue is that when I shave, the skin on…
A terrible death awaits you
March 4, 2014
I just wasted an hour trying to download the new Apple operating system for my computer. Apple is in a death spiral. They don’t send you disks anymore; you download everything fro the App Store. The problem is that the App Store will often not recognize your Apple ID and/or password. It waits until you’ve…
The pain of cashews and broccoli
February 23, 2014
About two weeks before Mom had her cancer surgery on April 4, 2013, she began to starve herself. I’ve written before why she did it. The law of unintended consequences bit us all in the ass: Mom, her parents, the nuns, Tim, me—everybody. Collectively, we were screwed. There’s no recourse. It happened, and it can’t…
No context for male beauty
February 23, 2014
Our popular culture is very cruel. I know, because I spent ten years in the factory that creates it. This cruelty bleeds over into the rest of our culture, which is deeply unhealthy. We hear on a daily basis about the stresses women are under to be beautiful. Although I have a certain amount of…
Watch for patterns
February 20, 2014
In Ghosts and Ballyhoo, one of the Lessons Learned is “Watch for Patterns,” pages 273-274. Watch for the patterns. They might help you perceive your destiny, make the right decisions, dodge a lot of grief, and endure that which you thought you couldn’t. A month ago, my cardiologist told me that I’d lost all the…
Memories no longer hurt
February 16, 2014
For most of my life, memories were torture. They were like pitiless satires of my aspirations, mocking everything I’d ever attempted. All I had to do was try to sleep, and I’d be flooded with memories of disaster, horror, pain, humiliation, and failure. Around 2007 it started to change, as I realized that each catastrophe…
The urn does not care
February 9, 2014
I’ve been told that my posts about my father cause anger. Though I’m under no obligation to explain anything, I will. My intention is to chronicle a life gone awry. I do this to banish lingering pain. Some of that pain is the result of things my father did to me, and some is the…