Life at 3 miles an Hour

The metro is blocking my view this morning. At least it’s blocking some of it. I can’t see the beach, the waves or the gulls. I can’t see the skyline or the mountains for that matter. Lot’s of windows here filled by a hulking, hideous, green and yellow, diesel , double length, people mover idling at the curb. It blocks one view, however it does enhance another. I have to focus on the foreground this morning. I have to look at what is right in front of me for a change. I’m usually not very good at that. It’s ironic because one of my motivations for starting this Monday morning Starbucks routine was so that I would stop for awhile and focus on what is right in front of me. When the background is removed from my view I’m forced to look at the foreground. I have no doubt that I was created more for the foreground than the background. I just prefer the other. Out there I can dream. I can imagine. I can plot and I can scheme. I can envision what is out there and how I can ge...

I’m a meddler. That’s my confession of the day. I’m a meddler. Simply defined, I just can’t bring myself to leave things alone. I am always, relentlessly plotting and scheming a “new way” of doing something. I have an inner built in belief that everything can be improved upon. I’m not bragging, it can actually be quite annoying. It has served me well, this tendency to meddle, in some areas. Engineering and design come to mind. An aptitude to meddle is a valuable commodity there. It pays well and can be highly valued. Not so much by the meddle-e as it is the meddler. It works well where things are seemingly broken. It is just plain annoying where things are already fixed. I’m watching with great interest the meddling that is now reportedly taking place here at Starbucks. Howard is back and charged with the task of meddling them back to the basics of what made them great. That was of course before someone meddled them out of greatness. See that’s what I mean about when ...

I can really get drawn in anytime some media outlet presents one of their “Where are they now?” deals where they go in search of formerly famous celebrities, athletes, and iconic figures of the past. Hearing the tales of what went wrong for them and even sometimes what went right to boost them out of the limelight or maybe their own personal 15 minutes of fame is often very enlightening. I haven’t seen one of these stories in awhile, but I started thinking about them again recently when I stumbled upon an old yearbook. Yearbooks were a brilliant invention. Whoever decided it was a good idea to record, for history sake, the photos of everyone who shared those formative years of ones life should be given due honor. I don’t know their history or how far back they go. Sometimes I imagine unearthing one from prehistoric times, carved entirely on stone, Flintstone –like. I wonder if Davinci provided the yearbook for his graduating class, done entirely in oils. Is there an ancient sc...

So I broke a tooth the other day. That can only mean one thing. I’m officially old now. Now I don’t mean to imply that old age is the only thing that reduces teeth to shrapnel in your mouth. I know of people who have experienced cool and exciting adventures which led, ultimately, to having a tooth broken. Many pirates, not that I know any personally, have at least one broken tooth from a drunken brawl in some exotic Caribbean port. Sports figures, particularly hockey players, are likely to have broken a tooth if they’ve had a distinguished career bashing heads and eating pucks. Mine was from a wheat thin. That’s right, back up and read it again to be sure. I broke a tooth on a “WHEAT T-H-I-N”. You need to understand that just before I ate said wheat thin I dropped a handful on the counter accidently and most of them broke of their own accord. They were apparently already resigned to their assumed destiny. One of them had other plans I’m guessing. He was taking prisoners o...

Ok, so I’m not a writer. At least by writer’s standards that have been thrust upon me. It wasn’t even a valiant effort. I did get to attend a new writers group this past week. That should count for something. And the teaching for my community o’ faith was much more of a literary work than the usual offering. They were just coincidences though, merely anomalies within an otherwise lame effort. I could blame it on practically anything. This has been an unusually draining few weeks with one more to go. However, my feeling is that if a challenge can be conquered against intimidating odds, then it can be conquered anytime. I’m not sure of the wisdom here, but I’ll not whine “It’s not my fault”. It is what it is. Time to regroup and reevaluate, I don’t have time for blame. Life is too short. Get over it and move on. Try again. Take another angle. Those are all preferable to me over “It’s not my fault”. Why is it always about fault anyway? I can’t tell you how many I encoun...