Wow. I love sex. Can you imagine being the first guy (or gal) to ever have sex? Turns out it may have been a fish 350 million years ago (He had a hook to hold her in place – Wow!) God bless that little fish. Incisoscutum Ritchiei.
Click here for an article about the amazing discovery:
350 Million years ago a small fish discovers sex
Posted in Fun, Photo, Science, sex | Tagged discover, fish, Science, sex | Leave a Comment »
Life is cosmic.
I greet most people with a smile, and am nice to a great percentage of the people who pass through my life. I truly believe that we each live within our own universe and that our individual universe is what we make of it. My universe is a happy place. In my universe it is easy to see joy and humor. it is easy to respect yourself and others in my universe. In my universe there is a strong sense of justice and an abundance of forgiveness. Even in the lowest moments there is an appreciation for life and all the feelings and experiences that come with it. That is my universe. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not always perfect, there are times when a smile is hard to come by, perspective gets lost in emotion, or I’m a jerk to someone – hey, everybody is an asshole to somebody, I don’t spend my time trying to please everybody (that’s hopeless, worthless, and no fun!), but I do try to be aware of the consequences of my actions and words.
My wife’s universe has some of the same qualities as mine, but not any of the stuff about being happy or seeing joy and humor in the challenge and experience of life. Definitely yes to the strong sense of justice and forgiveness, and a genuine attempt to be a person who lives with awareness, who is a good force in the world. I think my wife would agree that there is a large portion of her universe that is filled with dark matter, unknown territory, a region of mystery and dread. It’s not her fault really, she had some trauma in her childhood that affected her universe forever and she has both compensated and reacted to that in many ways throughout her life, and still to this day is equally at odds and at peace, angry, judgemental, flippant, sad, stubborn and sarcastic about these distant experiences. They are her dark matter, “That’s why I have seizures,” she’ll toss out when the subject (rarely) comes up. And for this reason her universe is a darker place than mine. She will tell me that she has never truly known happiness, simply because she cannot, because that was taken from her, and the healing from that theft is too long for one life to handle.
I once told my wife that I was seriously depressed for a large portion of my college experience, she scoffed, “You have no idea what depression is. You’re a happy person.” She is a proud member of the I have been more depressed than you club. Which probably explains why she is a psychotherapist (No, not a psycho therapist, a psychotherapist).
“What happens when two members of the I have been more depressed than you club get together,” you ask?
Good Question, and I have the answer!
I have friends who are severe sports fans. Friends who send text messages like, “THE ___________ (insert sports team name here) ARE SO FUCKING AWESOOOOME!!!!!! THEY JUST KICKED SOME ______________ (insert any other sports team name from the same league here) AAAAASSSSSS!!! YEAH!!! FUCK THE __________ (insert losing team name here)!!!!!*!*!*!* You know, those friends. It’s not all yelling and screaming either. Sometimes I get an email that just says “6-0″ which at first looks like one of those text smiley faces, and then I realize it’s the win-loss record of friend’s team. To put so much emotion and energy into something that has absolutely no bearing whatsoever on anything at all, it’s totally and utterly meaningless. What a wonderfully beautiful human thing to do.
But these guys, these sports fans who think they are so witty, dedicated and at times subtly sarcastic, who would go to a stadium filled with tens of thousands of people and yell at some small patch of grass or ice or wood, who would drink and whoop and holler until some timer ran its course, and then cuss and argue and gesticulate and analyze to no end what they just witnessed, these guys have no idea what it means to be with my wife and my very close friend, both members of the I have been more depressed than you club, these guys have no idea how to one-up in the “real” world.
Once they found out they were both members of the club this is the conversation that ensued between myself my wife and my friend, the three of us sitting in our front yard:
“Holy shit, like five years ago I was so anxious all the time I just stood in the shower all day and smoked cigarettes…”
“What would you do when the hot water ran out?” I asked my friend.
“I dried off! Heh heh heh, and then I would sit on the couch naked and read and read about all these diseases, you should see all the books I have about diseases. Every disease you can imagine. I probably know more about diseases than my doctor, I was so whacked out on anxiety I thought I was gonna die so I just stood in the shower all day and smoked cigarettes and read books about diseases. Holy shit.” And then they both let out a peel of laughter, and my wife kicks in,
“When my mom put in me in the mental institute because she thought I was going to kill myself I met this girl and she was so freaked out by everything she could barely talk, and I just stared at her and thought is that me or is that her, am I the one who’s so freaked out and can’t talk or is that someone else, and they made me take – (insert some medication here – called “meds” by those in the club – you have to say the word so many times, if you said “medication” you’d spend half your time saying that one word) – and it actually helped because then I would look in the mirror and I knew that was me but that girl still freaked me out I think she killed herself.”
“Wow,” says my friend, “What meds are you on right now?”
My wife’s face suddenly gets very rigid as she lists the three or four meds she is currently on. Meanwhile I’m sitting watching this, thinking “I can do this. I’ve never been in an institution or anything, but I can do this. I’v never had meds but I see where these two are coming from. I can do this.”
My wife suddenly starts with, “Do you ever just want to eat glass?”
“Oh my god! You have that too?” My friend says suddenly exhaling a puff of smoke, “There’s something about the texture…”
(I can totally do this)
“The smell…”
“It’s like I know it will rip my mouth apart but I just want to bite it and bite it and bite it…”
(I know exactly what I’m going to say)
“I can almost taste it…”
“Every time I see a piece of broken glass I just want to stick it in my mouth and eat it…”
(Holy shit, I’m going to blow them away with what I’ve got!)
“That’s so weird, I thought I was the only one.”
“Oh my god, I love glass.”
Then without a pause I say, “For years, when I picked up a knife or a scissors or anything sharp I would see myself stabbing my eyes out and every time I would have to pause for just a split second and remind myself ‘that’s not cool, don’t do it.’”
There’s a long pause. My wife looks at my friend, my friend takes a couple drags on his cigarette and as he snubs the butt out on a rock by his foot he says, and these are his exact words, “Dude. Everybody has that.”
I was totally denied membership. I tried several more times but my confidence was already shattered, I had no chance,
“Once I was sitting on the ledge at the top of a six-story parking garage. I was just sitting there at night and and I saw a cop pull into the entrance, you know, six stories below me, and like 3 minutes later he’s pulling up right behind me and he says, ‘you need to step down from there sir. Towards me.’
“He said ‘towards me’ so I wouldn’t step off the ledge and fall six stories. (I paused here for dramatic impact, but from the look on their faces it’s not working) So I did and he checked my ID and I asked him what was wrong and he says ‘You can’t sit there. You might jump. You need to leave now.’ and he got in his car and drove away.”
“You never would have jumped,” says my friend.
“What were you doing up there?” my wife asks.
And I’m forced to say, “I was writing in my journal. I just needed a quiet spot,” which was true, but completely unimpressive to the club. As I sat there wondering what I needed to say to these two to prove to them that I know what it’s like to be depressed my wife continued on,
“When I didn’t leave my house for 11 months I was so scared I could barely look out the window, my mom would walk with me half way down the block and back and it was the most terrifying thing I have ever done…” by the time she finishes I convince myself the club is for “screwballs” like my friend and my wife who fail to be happy in this world, it’s for people who can’t fully let go of the past, it’s for people who haven’t overcome their greatest fears, people who can commiserate over the misery of their lives, and I realize, That’s not me.
The realization makes me more comfortable with my wife. I realize she needs the competitive atmosphere of the club, where I would rather enjoy the happiness that I have now and appreciate the now-ness of it. It is not a judgement in any way, only a realization of who needs what. My wife is still processing her childhood and I am processing my now. My childhood and family were loving and wonderful, hers a nightmare.
Are you wondering what the “brief incident” is? I haven’t told you yet. First I had to show you the multiverse.
A BRIEF INCIDENT
I came home from work early, at about noon and I was hungry for lunch. I opened the fridge and saw there was a piece and a half of my wife’s home-made pizza (we have pizza night once a week with pizza she makes from scratch). I grab it, heat it and am about to eat it, when I wonder, “Is she going to be pissed that I ate the last piece?” Pause. ”Oh well.”
In that little pause I thought, “I’m hungry and this is all there is to eat. If I split it there’s barely enough for either of us, but if I eat the whole thing at least I can hang on for a couple more hours.”
Yum! My wife makes amazing pizza.
A bread dough my wife made. Not pizza dough, but similar.
Well, you can guess what happened when my wife came home 30 minutes later.
“Did you eat all the pizza?”
“Yup.”
“How could you eat it all? I was saving that for myself.”
“How was I supposed to know that? There was barely enough for one person. It was like a little snack.”
“I can’t believe you ate it,” she dropped her bag on the floor and just stared at me.
“It’s all there was. I was hungry, so I ate it. I don’t get why you’re so upset.”
END
Posted in Calm, Communication, depression, Emotions, Sarcastic | Tagged anxiety, childhood, Communication, depressed, depression, eating, fridge, friend, glass, husband, Man, mutiverse, pizza, suicide, the club, universe, wife, Woman | 2 Comments »
My Bubby (grandmom) died Thursday. I find myself feeling strangely emotionless about her death. I love my Bubby and was close to her, she was a woman who dedicated her life to helping and giving to others. Even in her final days she was concerned about the nurses who tended to her, offering them the food and drink that sat uneaten by her bedside. She lay for nearly four weeks in her bed struggling with death, and finally on Thursday she died with her son (my dad), her daughter, and my mom by her side. My Dad called me minutes later eeked out,
“Hi sweety…” and burst into tears.
He cried close to a minute and then handed the phone to my mom who was able to tell me what I already knew. Every time I feel pain or sorrow it turns out to be for my dad, who is in deep mourning for his mom. I find little emotion inside me that comes directly from my Bubby’s death. Why is that?
I know I am not cold hearted. I am confident in that assertion. I feel for my father. So why do I not feel pain or sadness or grief at the loss of my Grandmother. Many answers come to me:
1. I am protecting myself. I know that pain, sadness, grief, guilt are all emotions I could be feeling now and none of them are particularly pleasant.
2. I am repressing my emotions. Same as #1
3. I am saving my energy to support my father. I like this one, and it is what I kept telling myself (and my mom) when I was out with my kids to see my Bubby before she died. I paid close attention to my sleep schedule and made sure I ate plenty and had lots of energy should my Bubby die and my dad be in deep grief. She didn’t die then, but I was ready.
4. I don’t care. As cold as it sounds this is still a possibility. Maybe I have driven my emotions away with logic – something like this: We all will die, grief is caused by loss (not death), if I do not attach myself to anything in this material world then I will not feel loss when things are no longer there (this could apply to a car or a grandma, a dog or a job, a wife or a favorite pair of pants). I don’t know about this one. On some level I do try not to be attached to the material world, but on another level I enjoy all that life offers. I cry and laugh, I feel many emotions throughout any given day, and I love my kids, wife, dogs, computer ipod, cameras, etc.
5. I’m a guy. Guys don’t cry. Yeah, yeah, could be, but I’ve had loved ones die before and I cried, I missed them, and I was sad.
6. I didn’t know my Bubby as well as I thought I did. I realize only now that I never really got to know my grandmom in that grown-up kind of way. When my Zady (grandpa) died I felt like I had grown up and gotten to know him in a whole new light. I felt like I started to see him for the person he was and not just “my Zady.” He was his own person with his own life outside of my universe. I don’t think I ever experienced that with my Bubby, she has always been to me what she was when I was a kid, “My Bubby.”
7. She’s been old for a long time. It’s not a nice thing to say, but she has been. It’s been a long time since my parents have been able to focus fully on their lives. My mom and dad have dedicated much of their time, energy, emotions and money to care for my Bubby over the last 5-10 years. It wasn’t until she entered Hospice nearly a month ago that I began to think, “Wow, my parents will really be free to do what they want, now.” I felt a bit guilty about that thought, but I live in reality and I don’t like hiding from thoughts just because they are not necessarily appropriate. Of course I never said that out loud, but I thought it, and that’s ok. In some ways I feel relief that she has died. The last month and a half have been torture both for her and my father. Bubby and Cooking have always gone hand in hand. Wether it be a small lunch for two, or a grand dinner for the entire family, Bubby was the one who cooked and fed us all. Ask me or any of my brothers or cousins and the first thing that comes into our heads when we think of Bubby is food. She stopped cooking over ten years ago. That was when “My Bubby” died, when she stopped cooking. Ever since then I have struggled to create a new connection with her from 1500 miles away and it hasn’t happened.
As a side note on #7 I must say that I am extremely proud and inspired by the dedication my parents showed to my Bubby. Along with, “I want to be able to support my family,” one of my top motivations for working hard everyday, running my businesses and doing all the work I do is that I want to be able to care for and support my parents in their old age. They have shown me that “Family” extends on both ends of the generational boundaries, so my kids will need my support, but my parents will too. I pray that I am capable of caring for my parents as well and better than they have for their parents.
As a side note to this whole post: My wife is very saddened by Bubby’s death. I think it’s that emotional muscle again. She is always ready to feel some emotion for someone or something. Her emotional muscle is firm and ready for action at a moments notice. Here she is full of expression for all the emotions you would expect someone to feel for their Bubby’s death, for their husband’s grief, for their father in law’s anguish and grief, for their 9 year old daughter’s not-wanting-to-talk-about-death confusion and such, for all the help that our friends are offering us in this time, etc. She is a well greased emotional machine. Jeesh, I should not have said my wife is “Well Greased” now my mind has totally gone elsewhere…
In Conclusion:
Different people react to death in different ways. I have drawn a diagram of the affect my Bubby’s death has on people and how that affect ripples out into society through each of us that are close to her, spreading out to people we barely know until the whole of society absorbs it. I think I’ll call it the “Emotional Ripple”.
The "Emotional Ripple" My Bubby's death is felt most strongly by those closest to her - Two sons and daughter. Then comes her friends, myself and my cousins, then cousins wives, kids, and close friends, and the ripple slowly works its way out into the broader society, which eventually absorbs it.
Posted in Death, Emotions | Tagged Bubby, care, Death, emotion, emotionless, Emotions, parents | 17 Comments »
Before I write this post I want to point that it is very odd that I am even writing this post. Why would I post something for the whole world to see if I am “extremely embarrassed” by it? I don’t know, but I am. I think it’s hilarious, and if I can’t laugh at myself…
I looked at my wordpress.com stats a couple weeks ago and noticed a stat called “Top Searches” which tells me what people searched for in a web search that led them to my post. Here is what is extremely embarrassing. Can you see in the screen-grab below what the top search is for leading people to my site? (Here’s a tip if you can’t see it hit CTRL and the “+” keys and it should enlarge the text and the picture in most browsers) AGH! That’s gross – I can’t believe my site came up for that search. I do not even want to think about why someone searched for that in the first place. Well now the whole world knows. I love the digital age!
My "Top Searches" result is Extremely Embarrassing!
Posted in Fun, Photo, Retrospective | Tagged blog, embarrassing, post, stats, top searches, Weird | 4 Comments »
In case your not up on the latest SMS “InFo IjhEmo in2Ex” means:
“I’m not freaking out, I just have emotions I need to express.”
This is my wife’s final statement in this brief argument we had the other night. It began like this:
I say, “I don’t think we need to rush this. Let’s have fun! Making a baby is fun, and it’s okay if we take our time. I know the last two times it happened real quick, but we don’t have to freak out because nothing has happened in one month. I mean, it’s fun making a baby, don’t you think?”
“You just don’t understand what it’s like for me.”
Pause… ”Okay. Tell me.”
“I’m not getting any younger. I can’t have a baby forever…”
“I’m not saying let’s take forever, all I’m saying is let’s take our time…”
“You just don’t get it, it’s almost the end of the year and then I’ll be 38…”
“In August…” I add.
Glare. ”I’ll be 38…”
“We still have time, I mean I’m not saying we should take years, but we can relax about it. I don’t think we should freak out about a couple extra months…”
“If we don’t have the baby now, if I don’t get pregnant, I’ll only get older. I’m not getting any younger, next year I’ll be 38, and then I’ll be 39, and then I’ll be 40! I can’t have a baby when I’m 40. So do you understand that I am not freaking out? I just have emotions I need to express.”
This is one of those moments where I can say what I’m thinking, or I can say what she really wants me to say. If I say what I’m thinking the evening is ruined, there will be a lot of grumbling, and it won’t really get us anywhere in the scheme of things. My wife does not appreciate my logic in a conversation like this. Because my logic leads me to the obvious conclusion that, “Ok, so what you’re saying is not only are you freaking out, but you are in complete denial about it?”
Considering we are literally in bed naked and ready to “cuddle” (i.e. engaging in the hard work involved in making a baby), I am severely inclined to say, “Yeah, I do understand, that makes a lot of sense.”
Which I do. (Say, not understand. The only thing I understand is that she is totally freaking out.)
“Really? You’re not just saying that?”
“Yeah, I totally understand,” (that you are freaking out). ”It makes a lot of sense,” (that you are in complete denial).
“Ok.”
Kiss, kiss, happy, sex, sleep. Whew.
Posted in Communication, Emotions, Fun, Pregnancy, sex | Tagged Baby, bed, Communication, freak out, husband, im, Man, Pregnancy, Pregnant, sex, sms, texting, wife, Woman, women | 7 Comments »
“Thank you so much for the chocolate!” says my wife.
(So we’re having sex now?)
“That was very thoughtful of you.”
(Sweeeeet. We’re having sex now?)
“You really make me feel safe.”
(Now we’re having sex!)
“When I was having that seizure and you weren’t here all I could think about was that I wished you were here.”
“Aw, that’s sweet.” (Sex, here I come!)
“I was on the floor like this (she indicates her hands up to her ears and curls her chin into her chest) and my brain was so wacked out I couldn’t think of anything, but I remember thinking that I wished you were here.”
(Yay sex!) “Wow.”
“Yeah,” Hug, Kiss, “I’m so tired and wiped out. Good night.”
Huh? (“I’m so tired and wiped out,” That’s code for, “Don’t even ask.” Oh well, maybe tomorrow.)
Posted in Calm, Communication, Emotions, Fun, sex | Tagged Communication, conversation, female, huband, male, safe, seizure, sex, wife | 3 Comments »
I think about death a lot. Not in that depressing “oh no, I’m going to die” kind of way, just in a way that after I’m done thinking about it I feel so wonderful to be alive and have all the opportunities that I have right now in the moment I am in. Death is such a normal thing – we all do it, and I don’t think it’s so much death that is feared, it’s loss. When someone dies they are “lost” gone forever from our life (e.g. “so sorry about the loss of your mother”) and when we ourselves die we “lose” everything that we have had all our lives. At the same time, we all know that death is something we will be doing some day, yet I very rarely hear people talk about their own death, as if that would be a downer, macabre, or depressing.
I put death in the same category as pooping. I mean when is the last time you talked to someone about your poop? Something we all do, something that is a natural part of being human, and indeed being alive, yet we feel odd about it. Maybe if I don’t talk about it, it will go away, or I can pretend it doesn’t exist. Yet, there is always something to remind us of these inevitable moments in our lives, like cemeteries and bathrooms, grandparents and toilet paper, cancer and farts. Yes, there is no denying we all shit and we all die.
In fact if right now I became very ill, it would be considered bad for me to think about death, as if thinking about it will bring me closer to it. It is considered “weak” to think that I may be dying. It is considered courageous to fight the battle of life to the last moment, never admitting defeat or accepting that death is only days or even minutes away. I have seen several people die, I have been with people at the moment of their death. I can tell you with my utmost sincerity that the most courageous act I have ever seen was my cousin, at the age of 24, accepting that it was his time to depart this life, to move on to whatever it is that lay beyond life, to leap into the great unknown with his eyes wide open – which he did. His family and friends were with him and we packed his mom’s living room where he lay on the sofa, his sister by his side. One moment he breathed and the next he did not, it was that quick.
It was the most beautiful, sad, deep, spectacular, intense, exhilarating, confusing moment of my life, to watch his death. It was a moment that is etched in my memory, that is revisited so often that it has truly become a part of me – a part of the way I think and live. I know that death can happen at any moment to myself and to those around me, so why walk on this earth and play games with people’s emotions, why speak from a place of insincerity, why waste time complaining about things I have the power to change? These are questions of life that death answers so easily. There is no place for not living truly and to my full potential, there is no place for a life without courage, or a day without appreciation and sincerity.
And do I live this way? Short answer: No. But I strive for it, and every day I come closer to this life I envision, and remind myself of the joy there must be in living a life full of appreciation, sincerity and courage.
I started this post several weeks ago and have saved a couple drafts. Three weeks ago my grandmother went into the hospital and 13 days ago she entered hospice care, which means the doctors do not expect her to live more than two weeks and she is only being treated for pain and kept as comfortable as possible. Short of a miracle she will not recover, medicines and surgery will no longer help her.
If she knows that she is on her death bed it is only by intuition, as no one has told her. Her two sons (one, my father) and daughter decided she’d be more relaxed and at peace if they did not tell her outright. I do not question this decision, it is theirs to make, and in fact after speaking with them about it I agree it is the right thing to do. They feel that for her, knowing death is near would make her very scared and nervous.
My Grandmother's hands - on her death bed.
When I found out she was going into hospice I immediately purchased a one-way flight to see her with my kids. My wife could not come and she was both grieved at not being with my grandmother and our family from all over the world, and also appreciating the time to herself to process her feelings. It was her first time she was away from our two year old son for more than a few hours (9 days!)
I feel that now is the right time to complete this post and share it. Please post your thoughts on death as comments, I would love to hear how you feel about it.
Posted in Calm, Death, Emotions, Photo, Retrospective | Tagged appreciation, bathroom, beautiful, cancer, cemetary, Death, denial, die, farts, grandmother, life, love, poop, shit, sincerity, taboo, truth | 6 Comments »
