Category: reflections

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Essays inspiration life Making Changes motivation musings reflections

Droplets of Joy


What if you didn’t have to complain?

What would you choose to do if you were free to do anything you wanted to?

What if the word “boundary” was not in your vocabulary?

What if you dared to dream?

What if your dreams came true?

What if you listened to the symphony of your soul rather than the chatter of your mind?

What is peace?

What is love?

What is contentment?

What is harmony?

What if reality was sweet rather than harsh?

What if droplets of joy rained down every day and you learned how to collect them in the bucket of your heart?

What if happiness became your constant companion instead of a distant relative?

What would happen if you took the time to get to know your deepest, truest self?

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Essays memories musings profiles reflections Uncategorized

Impressions of Sedona


Majestic and Magical Sedona

I turn left on the two-lane road leading to the town of Sedona.  The world outside transforms into something much different than the one I am accustomed to. 

Towering red-rock Mountains appear unexpectedly.  The striped hills are radically different from the ordinary-looking mesas overlooking the surrounding terrain.  For the first time, the advertisements promoting this area ring true.  I get the distinct impression there is something special here.  There is suddenly hope the three thousand mile plane ride and the hotel suite awaiting my wife and I will prove to be a wise investment after all.

Sedona is a spiritual spa for die-hard vacationers as well as world-weary travelers searching for a way to resurrect their lives from an assortment of disappointments and failures.  I am not here to seek advice from healers, psychic or life counselors.  I am here to discover the heart and soul of this city out of time without the help of a tour guide.

Sedona is amazingly clean.  There are no signs of litter in the streets or sidewalks, no unsightly garbage dumps to mar the town’s bright aura.  The buildings, homes and streets all look brand new.  Most of the architecture is a sort of southwest modern with earth tone colors alternating with pastels.  It seems as though a beautiful, uniquely designed church abides on every street corner.  No two homes look alike, yet no building seems out of place.  There is an underlying unity of design but not at the expense of individuality. 

The single-story adobe-style homes at street level and the larger mansions in the mountains have no bars on their yawning windows.  They all look expensive, probably worth hundreds of thousand dollars each upwards into the millions.  Incredibly, you don’t see gates in front of the winding driveways.  There are no traffic lights clogging the two-lane road running throughout the town.  Instead, they have what the locals call “round-a-bouts.”  Here, the visitor finds an honor system where vehicles yield to the one reaching the four-way intersection first.  Anyone who doesn’t obey the code is sure to be a tourist.

I spend most of my time here in art galleries and walking around slack jawed, agape at the rock formations, multi-colored mountains, and fiery sunsets.  I feel “buzzed” every waking moment.  Even shopping, which I normally hate, feels like an acid trip.  The town itself, I think, is one huge energy vortex.

Young people flock here as if drawn to the area by the magnetic power of the town’s famous energy vortexes.  Many of the transplants have fled small towns where they grew up throughout the west to taste big city life.  After living in places like Houston, Phoenix, and Santa Fe, they search for something else.  They find it in Sedona, where small city values couple with new vistas of financial and cultural opportunity. 

Everyone you meet here seems to be from somewhere else.  Heaven is likely to be quite similar, come to think of it.

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Essays humor inspiration life Making Changes memories motivation reflections Uncategorized

The Not-So-Hidden-Truth About Starbucks


I am trying to write my second novel.  It is not easy, to say the least.  I am confident, however, that this is a universal truth among authors attempting to write their first or seventy-first long piece of fiction or non-fiction.  The reasons for this difficulty may vary from author to author.  My main roadblock seems to be the increasing disenchantment of sitting in a room all by myself for long periods of time.  Again, I suspect I am not alone in this predicament.  The problem apparently extends far beyond the relatively small segment of the population on planet earth attempting to write novels.  I know this because I have recently taken my laptop to a local Starbucks to resolve my isolation problem.

The Starbucks I now regularly inhabit is not your everyday Starbucks. Management recently retrofitted the place with long tables, benches actually, with stools and a strip of electrical outlets underneath to plug in battery cables.  Droves of people come here, not just to chat and caffeinate, but to do WORK! This includes college-students doing real, actual homework, not wasting time on Facebook.  Freelance, self- employed, and independent contractor types also hang out here.  These people, like myself, are hard at work, despite the distractions of noisy conversation and often-times idiotic, piped-in music.  I find this phenomenal and wonder,”Why do we come here?”  Many, if not all of us, are surely not homeless.

I can only speak for myself.  I come here to overcome loneliness—to make some sort of connection.  And I’m happy to report that my new strategy is paying off.  I’m writing my novel on a regular basis, slowly but surely.

Now that we may have some insight into the reason for the overwhelming success of the Starbucks chain, I would like to come to the point of this piece.  Many years ago, I began listening to Prem Rawat speak about an inner experience of peace and contentment.  At the time, I did not have to go to Starbucks to be around people.  I had a full time, good-paying job, a girlfriend, my parents and cousins to surround me.  Yet, something was missing.

Mr. Rawat’s message of peace captivated me in a way nothing had previously.  I followed up on his promise to reveal a source of peace and contentment within myself.  I practiced the techniques of what he calls Knowledge, and, to make a long story short, I have not been in the least bit disappointed.  Well, perhaps that statement is not entirely true.  I had the idea shortly after receiving the techniques of Knowledge that I would not need anything else, including people.  To make another long story short, that idea turned out to be foolish and a bit funny, now that I look back on it.

But there is a point here, somewhere.  Oh yes, here it is:  I need outer connections—with colleagues in my chosen profession, with friends and family, even Facebook connections. Thanks to the experience of Knowledge, I’ve learned that I need something else.  I need a connection with myself for my life to be complete.  I’m not going to put a name to what I’ll call “myself,” because I’ve learned that names are insufficient to describe it.  I will just say this:  I was looking for a missing piece of the puzzle of my life.  Prem Rawat helped me to find it.  Now, I feel my life is complete.  It is full, not stuffed with things on the outside, but from within.  And my connections on the outside are more fulfilling, because I am a more full and complete person, with more to offer to others.

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inspiration life Making Changes motivation musings philosophy reflections Uncategorized

The Road Ahead


I have always wanted floodlights to illuminate the road ahead.

What I get, if I am lucky, is a little candle.  I must take care  to protect  the candle’s flame from the roaring winds that surround me.

To know what I am doing in life, I must first know myself.

To cultivate wisdom, I must read the book of life in my heart.

By cultivating harmony within, harmony will permeate every aspect of my life.

If I sincerely seek joy, peace, and love, these qualities will take root in my soul as surely as the sun rises every day.

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Essays fiction humor life memories profiles reflections

Zeda and the Jumping Fish


We sat on a flat rock overlooking the pond with the lines of our fishing poles dangling in the fresh water.  Actually, the poles we used were not real fishing poles.  They were made from tree branches strung with nylon lines and hooks my Zeda bought from a nearby bait and tackle shop.  My Zeda could not afford to buy real fishing poles, so he made them instead.  I didn’t mind.  He said they would work just fine.

The early morning sun glinted off the pond and the side view mirror of my grandfather’s 1953 Plymouth sedan.  The reflected light was so bright I had to squint to see.  My stomach rumbled.  I thought of the roll beef my mother had packed for lunch.  The roll beef and Kaiser roll sandwiches wrapped in wax paper sat in a brown paper bag next to my grandfather.  We had found one of the only shady places to sit in this tiny corner of the Essex County Reservation.  We had the pond all to ourselves.

“You said we would have a better chance of catching fish if we got here early.  I think you were right, Pop-Pop.”  I always called my grandfather Pop-Pop when I wasn’t calling him Zeda.

“The water is cool near the surface in the early morning,” Pop-Pop said.  “Fish like cool water.  They go deeper in the pond as the sun rises and the water near the surface gets warmer.”

“I hope we catch a lot of fish,” I said.

“A good fisherman is always patient, tateleh.  It is important to remain patient in any situation and twice as important when you are waiting for a fish to bite.”

I wasn’t used to sitting still for very long.  It was almost magical, however, how calm I could be when spending time with my Zeda.  I found everything that came out of his mouth interesting.  I loved the way he played the role of different characters in the stories he told.  He could do anything he put his mind to.  Right at the moment, he was fishing with one hand, reading from a small book in the other, and talking to me.

Something big crashed into the mirror of the pond’s surface.

“Pop-Pop.  I think a meteorite just fell.  We learned about them in school yesterday.  The big meteor comes into the atmosphere and breaks up.  Then smaller pieces fall out of the sky.”

“It’s not a meteorite, bubaleh.  The fish are happy.  They freulich in the water and jump out when the spirit moves them.”

“Wow,” I said.

There was a second splash about a hundred yards away.  “There goes another one.  I’ll bet they all start jumping now.”

“They aren’t going to make it that easy for us to catch them,” Pop-Pop said.  “Fish have more brains in their Kuphs than the average person gives them credit for.”

“If fish were stupid, it wouldn’t be fun to try and catch them, right Zeda?”

“Correct,” my boy.

“Could we go fishing every day before school and on the weekends too?”

“Well, we could go on any day during the week, but not on Saturday.  Saturday is for the mitzvah of observing Shabbas—something your parents seem to have forgotten, ankeleh.”

And so it went, back and forth between us the rest of the morning, until it was time to eat our delicious roll beef sandwiches.  We didn’t catch any fish that day.   I can’t say I was disappointed.

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fiction inspiration life musings reflections short stories

Something More Than Telewars


Grayson found it hard to breathe.  Sweat poured from his forehead, down his crimsoned cheeks, onto the stiff collar of his white shirt.

The cubicles surrounding Grayson in the sprawling call center buzzed with activity.

“This is Grayson Sellers speaking.  May I have your contract number please?”

“Habla Espanol?”

“I only speak English,” Grayson replied.

“Where are you from, Amigo?”

“We’re not supposed to disclose personal information.  Please describe your problem so that I can help you.”

“Don’t get excited, hombre.  I ‘m just being friendly.

“I appreciate that.  The problem is we have to complete a certain number of calls in an hour.  If we fall short, we have to have a good explanation.  Now, how can I help you?”

“Do you like your work?”

Grayson made no reply.  They hadn’t given him a script for a situation like this.

He peered over his cubicle walls in all directions for signs of his supervisor.  She was cruising three rows to the south in a bright pink dress and one-inch heels.  Despite the low heels, the sturdy woman easily topped six feet.  Her keen eyes scanned the room for the slightest hint of operator error.

“To be perfectly honest, I’m not crazy about working here, but the pay is great.”

“I’m a landscape architect—love my customers and they love me.  Business is booming like you wouldn’t believe.

“I’m happy for you.”  Can we please get to your insurance issue?”

He imagined the explanation for losing control of his temper and the call.  The customer was excessively friendly.

“Working indoors is not my gig,” the caller elaborated.

“I get panic attacks.”  The words tumbled out of Grayson’s mouth by themselves.

“I feel for you, Hermano.”

He heard heavy footsteps approaching.  The supervisor pulled up like an army tank reversing on its treads.  “You’re sweating, Sellers.  Do you have a fever?”

Grayson dabbed his forehead with a handkerchief.  “Just a little summer cold, Mrs. Wilson”

“Be sure to cover your mouth when you sneeze.”

A few rows away, an operator raised her voice.  Mrs. Wilson’s head turned like a turret.  She clanked away.

Another casualty of the telewars, Grayson thought.

“I could use another good man.  Why don’t you call me after your shift?”

“You don’t even know me.”

We’ll talk.  Then I’ll know you better.”

It was against the rules to use customer records for anything except work for the company.  There was a rule attached to almost everything he did inside these walls.

Against his better judgment, Grayson jotted down the name and phone number on his computer screen.

The call proceeded smoothly to completion.

That night, Grayson dreamed of a plant nursery in South Miami he had visited as a boy.  He played tag with his younger sister among acres of Royal Palm trees.  He wandered between rows of potted orchids blooming in beautiful pastel colors.  He inhaled the rich floral perfume.   The warm sun and a cool winter breeze kissed his cheeks.

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humor life musings reflections

Chicken Necks


Why would anyone want to be in the same room as a chicken neck, much less eat one? Consider the shape of a chicken neck, for starters. Does it remind you of a piece of cow intestine, or a giant snail without the shell — or maybe a biceps muscle severed from the bone? Now imagine one of these succulent items simmering in a saucepan flanked by mushrooms, carrots and celery. Add pepper if you like. Hold the salt—it comes with.

In China, chicken necks are a delicacy. This, no doubt, is a direct result of the overabundance of Chinese people and a perennial shortage of food in the country to feed them. In addition to the Chinese, dogs and pigs enjoy chicken necks as a regular staple. Cats, on the other hand, are much too dignified to eat them.

Here’s a thought. It’s entirely possible chicken necks could become a popular dish in America. If the banks fail, we might all find ourselves homeless, grilling chicken necks on street corners surrounded by the few sticks of furniture left over from the foreclosure sale.

If you are wondering what chicken necks taste like, please ask someone else. If, however, we turned out to be the last two people on the planet due to a natural disaster, I might hazard a guess. In such a case, I would be in the unenviable position of the sole remaining authority on chicken necks. It would be my duty, out of human decency, to attempt some sort of an answer. After considerable thought, I’d say chicken necks probably taste like dark meat chicken—very stringy, dark meat chicken accented with a gristly texture. They might also taste a bit like stuffed derma, a Jewish folk dish I have only seen but never eaten. On second thought, stuffed derma probably tastes like ice cream cake compared to a fried or boiled chicken neck. I can’t really be sure of this because I never summoned the courage to ask what stuffed derma is made of. As far as the smell of chicken necks is concerned, let’s not even go there. We’ll just say that chicken necks don’t smell. They stink.

If you are the curious, adventurous, or self-loathing type, you may wake up one morning with an uncontrolable urge to experience the taste of a chicken neck. To these people I offer one final word of advice. Chicken necks may taste better in a strong chicken or meat broth. Remember, this is only an assumption. If you must try a chicken neck, you do so at your own risk. Please also note that a serving of chicken necks will provide you with a decent amount of vitamin A. The idea that they are a good source of vitamin C is, sadly, only a rumor.

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musings reflections

Light In The Tunnel Of Youth


I heard his footsteps enter the kitchen. I sat at the breakfast table, afraid to glimpse the advancing Bengal tiger, my father.

I didn’t have the stomach to gaze into his piercing green eyes. My mind saw those eyes jumping from the bushy, long hair straggling down the back of my neck, to the rumpled, black T-shirt I had pulled on shortly after stumbling out of bed. Those X-Ray lamps of his would finally come to rest on the doodles and paint droppings on the blue jeans I had worn for most of the past year in art school.

The footsteps halted. I imagined the Bengal tiger crouching on all fours, sizing up its prey. Minutes passed. The silence became unbearable. There was nowhere to run. The tiger had me cornered. I turned in my seat, almost like a revolving door. I held my breath as well as the awkward position.

My father leaned on the kitchen counter dressed in a navy, pinstripe suit accented by a red silk tie and powder blue business shirt. His eyes focused not on me, but on his perfectly manicured nails, like a high-priced trial attorney adopting a nonchalant pose before tearing into a hostile witness. He looked up at me suddenly.

His eyes always darted back and forth when he was angry. My father’s gaze was rock steady on this day. I did not perceive him to be calm, however. His slack posture spoke to me of something else, something entirely new, and horribly unexpected. My legs grew numb, perhaps from the ridiculous position I sat frozen in.

“Please say something,” I managed to blurt out.
His face held no expression now, as if a gremlin somewhere inside his body had flipped off an electrical switch.

“When you finish art school,” he said, “my responsibility for you will be finished. You’ll be on your own. If you end up ‘nowheresville’, it will be your unhappiness, not mine.”

My father continued to regard me with that terrible, neutral expression. His keen eyes bore into mine. I was certain he could hear my heart beating double-time inside my chest.

“I have to go to work now,” he said, and marched with a purposeful stride out of the room.

I turned and stared vacantly out the kitchen window into the back yard. I saw myself as a teenager, smashing plastic golf balls across the lawn for hours with the rusty seven-iron my father had given me from an old set. I blinked. The memory vanished.

It took a full five minutes to convince my legs to lift me up from the table.

In the next few days, I realized my father had done me a favor by bluntly pointing out what the consequences of my actions were apt to be, at least as far as my relationship with him was concerned.

His words shed a cold, clear light on my attempted escape from the pain of growing from a boy into a man. This recollection may have made my father seem cruel, but he was never an unkind man. Perhaps he could have “gilded the lily” more in his advice to me while growing up, but not on this occasion. He did not speak to me with malice or hurtful intent. He spoke honestly and with deep concern, and his words altered my future indelibly for the better.

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reflections

Miss Crisson


The name Miss Crisson fit her. Words come to mind, like “crisp,” “sharp,” “cross,” and “criticism.” I remember a six-foot tall, middle-aged woman with regular, Germanic features and wide, hazel eyes peering from behind big-rimmed glasses supported by a clunky plastic frame.

She wore an expression of perennial disappointment punctuated by frequent, angry outbursts. I thought then her mood was the direct result of our consistently delinquent behavior — the student body of Miss Crisson’s fifth grade class. Now I think there may have been other factors involved.

Miss Crisson did not carry her statuesque figure gracefully. Instead, she stood in an ungainly posture in front of the class, arms crossed, daring anyone to misbehave. She never seemed to feel comfortable inside her own skin, or perhaps the small print, cotton dresses she wore like uniforms were all a half size too small.

Looking back, I imagine men might have considered her sexy if she had dressed in a more colorful, modern style. Regular trips to the beauty parlor would have helped too. But she had no use for fashionable clothes or fixing herself up. Her thinning hair drooped in unenthusiastic curls. The humidity in the spring and early summer made the hair from the buns she wore march in a column down her neck like AWOL soldiers.

I recall her first name with great difficulty: It was, or is Doris. Is she still alive as we speak? She took great pains to keep us at a distance, in our place. Miss Crisson the teacher, the person in charge, we the students, there to obey.

It was not so much the things she did that I remember. It was rather the things she didn’t do. She never, for instance, sat on a chair in front of the class with her legs crossed, or in a more casual moment, on the side of her desk. She always stood, implacably, a permanent fixture in front of the class. She sat at her desk only during study periods, often holding her head while reading from her lesson plan or papers that looked to be terribly important. We spent six hours a day, Monday through Friday, with Miss Crisson, surely enough time to get to know someone well, at least enough time for her guard to fall occasionally. Yet, I can’t recall any informal moments with Miss Crisson, never the spontaneous joke or appreciative laugh from the student audience.

She never spoke of children or relatives. I never learned a thing about her personal life after spending a year in her classroom. Did she spend her childhood years in a middle class tract home at the mercy of bible-toting, God-fearing parents? Did her classmates taunt her for being too tall? As a teenager, did she have many boyfriends? Did she ever have a boyfriend? Did she eat dinner at home alone every night in a terry cloth bathrobe and slippers, her hair liberated from the customary bun, hanging in loopy strands? Did she sometimes wake up to an alarm buzzing from the bedroom, slumped on a sofa in front of the television?

She came to class every day, in the full bloom of womanhood, apparently without suitors or romantic prospects of any kind, already resigned to premature spinsterhood. Perhaps Miss Crisson was a lesbian, stuck in the unenlightened nineteen fifties, a prisoner of her strict upbringing, afraid to explore her sexuality, without compassion for herself or anyone else. Her sharp rebukes for the slightest infringement of class decorum were, I realize now, a sign of frustration, the invisible weights Miss Crisson carried on her broad shoulders. We didn’t see those weights because children see only with their hearts. They respond to kindness, humor, patience and love. They don’t understand why an adult would possibly want to act any other way.
 

 

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inspiration musings philosophy poems reflections

The Beloved


I see a woman shopping in a shoe department
She is long and lean, quite beautiful
and unmindful of my lustful stare
She is like so many women
I desperately want to make love to

I am a fool, of course
because what I want can never be satisfied by any woman
Even the most beautiful woman in the world
cannot quench the flame that burns within me

I often forget
what I truly want
You, my beloved

Beyond the fantasies and small desires
conjured by the deceitful magician
Mind brandishes multi-colored shrouds
in a deft attempt to lure me away
from where You reside

Your palace is more luxurious, more enchanting
than any abode the world has to offer
Beyond words
Beyond imagination
Beyond the boundaries I call myself

Sometimes I catch a glimpse of You
a flawless diamond
perfection itself
too beautiful for these outer eyes to see
more precious thana hundred Spanish treasure ships
waiting to be discovered