The Importance of Thumbnails

I'm typing this painfully slow. It took a good minute just to get the title right, not in terms of meaning, but how the words were spelled. The cause of the difficulty is not too much sun and wind on the beach, nor is there too much glare on the screen. The problem is I cut my thumbsnails too short. In the modern evolutionary battle of the bloggers having the correct length of thumbnail is crutial, something I was not aware of or informed of until it was too late. I'm crippled in the same way that a person who normally types two finger style on a regulation keyboard would be if they had their index fingers wrapped in a ball of gauze. They could still type with another pair of fingers, but you can imagine the learning curve and the lack of production.

I am having to carefully place and press each letter on this Blackberry's keyboard avoiding if at all possible getting the fat bulge of thumbmeat onto any of the surrounding keys. Tain't easy, I'm telling you and I just wish someone out there had warned me.

One the one hand this has been a good experience because I have had to really think about where a sentence is going (corrections take forever), on the other hand (thumb) I fear I may have stumbled on to the kind of error in judgement which leads to species' end.

I heard something die last night.

At first, lying in bed, I thought the downstairs neighbor had gotten a cat and that cat was making an odd pleading mew,mew,mew,but a mission in the cold to the kitchen about 2AM revealed that the pleading was coming from my old cellphone. Four years old, ancient in terms of cellphone life, it had been unplugged from it's charger for three days.Stripped of all it's files and photos,poems from the subway and the park,it was lying alone on the coffee table, it's little red LED semaphoring it's distress. It made a last strangled wherp as I took a slug from the water jug in the kitchen.

It was such a familiar object to me. My thumbs knew just where to on it's keys. Now I have a whole new territory to explore on this newer sleeker thing. (The new thing is always sleeker)

More later from the funeral.

Sunrises, Part Two, Still Missing the Point.

Who said facts are stubborn things? Lenin? Marx? John Lennon? Groucho Marx? Well, the four of them were right but they missed something even more stubborn - habits. My routine for years now has been to get up, wash face, weigh-in, make breakfast, chart weight loss/gain, check email, check Able to Know, check Facebook, read the NYTimes on line (just the facts and headlines) and get-out-of-the-apartment.

Twenty five minutes flat, bang-zoom.

Three days ago I decided I would try adding in Watch the Sunrise. So, you ask, how's that going?
Um. Not so good.
I got up today (yesterday it rained so no sun in the sunrise so I skipped. More on that later.) weighed in, made coffee, got some fruit, made toast, charted weight loss (up for the week), made extra foam for coffee, took picture and headed up to the roof.

I was late.
No kidding.
That was my first thought as I came out onto the roof deck. I'm late.
Um. Let's think about this for just a moment.
Isn't watching the sun rise supposed to be a kind of meditative moment, a time to breathe out, take in the light and, for lack of a better word, be? As in 'let it be'.
Yes.
So, zo, what's with the I'm late?

There's going to have to be some serious pruning of habits and routines around here before the rising of the day gets to where I hope it will get me. First, no more breakfast dragged up to the roof. It takes two many hands, there are things to spill and forget and well, it's a distraction.

I still want to take the camera, but it's either going to be very low key or it's out too.

I just want two minutes, one minute, of watchfulness. Watch Fullness. Watch the Fullness.

It doesn't really matter if it's raining, so raining dawns are dawns and ought not to be skipped.

And, here's something, the dawn arrives everywhere. So I can head down to the Park or the River or the top of the hill in Fort Tryon.

I'll only feel late if I am trying to press more into the moment than it needs to be the moment.

We go on.

Sunrises, Sunsets and Who Watches Them

Fifty-Ninth and Columbus Circle, New York City


MTA Station Exit for the Downtown A Train

5:20AM

It's murky most mornings on the way across the street to Central Park. The huge golden statue is dulled by the darkness to the color of butter with about as much shine. Runners and bikers in knots of three and fours tie shoes, snug up helmets and otherwise occupy themselves as they wait for whoever is late. Someone is always late, someone is always waiting. I run alone so I can just push the Start button on my watch and head down the path into the gloom. It's just a short trot to the Central Park roadway. I can go left and run the 6 mile loop counterclockwise which has more, but smaller, hills or go right and run clockwise with steeper, but fewer, hills. I always go the opposite direction of whoever is running the roadway when I get to it. It's too early to make the decision myself. No matter how early I get to the Park, there is always somebody else there ahead of me.

There are lights. They make big pools of brightness that aren't connected so you run from deep darkness into an elongated glow, just about bright enough to allow you to read your watch, then back into the darkness again. On the West Side as you run up hills by the Theatre, the only light comes from the traffic signals, mushy green, cellophane yellow and then, a sullen red which is neither light nor darkness. I stare at the dim white line of the running lane. In the summertime, to my right, there are hundreds of people sitting or laying down in a line waiting for the box office to open. You can hear them quietly talking to each other. In the winter there is only the sound of your own breathing and the sh-sh-sh-sh of your shoes.

If things are going well I can make the loop in either direction in something less than an hour. When I was working, I would cut over to the East Side and take the 6 train downtown. It would still be dark in the winter, but in mid-Summer, the sun will be up and shining down 59th Street straight into my eyes which is not a good thing when you are trying to dodge early morning delivery trucks and taxicabs. It's more of a nuisance then anything else.

I got to thinking about this the other morning after reading a Ben Jeffries post about sitting and watching the sunrise from his balcony. "Wow," I thought, "Who watches the sunrise?" I tried to remember the last time I watched one. I'm up every morning on vacation in Florida way, way before anyone else. It's dark as I head up the beach and the sun is peeking over the condos by the time I get back, but I don't watch the sunrise. It's just there all of a sudden. It's time to trot over to the grocery store to get what's needed for lunches and breakfast.

Sunsets in Florida are another matter. They verge on being the sacred, a time to gather on the sand or in chairs on the patio and ooh and aah at the changing colors in the sky and water. The ones we are with talk about yesterdays and tomorrows and there is wine. There is joy and solemnity. I often wonder what it must have been like for humans eons ago to watch the sun setting behind a mountain or sinking into the sea, the darkness settling in, the sounds of the night beginning to rise.

It takes a lot of being ready for the rest of the day for a person in this modern age to take the time on a workday to watch a sunrise. I think it's something we've lost, or at least I have. When I think about this as I run I remember that sunrises were probably much more important to the ancients than those ominous sunsets. Sunrises were proof that life would still go on, that fields could be planted or harvested, that travel could begin, buildings built and all things were possible.

The folks at Stonehenge weren't looking at sunsets, they, in huge crowds we know now, were marking the rising of the sun at the ends of it's yearly back and forth travel on the horizon. The sunrise marked for them the true circle of life.

In Japan, the Land of the Rising Sun after-all, there are hundreds of sunrise watching sites. This one is the Husband and Wife Rocks.





Or head to a morning in Tibet in time to see this:

And we cannot leave out the event which is the true center of the Christian Year: The Easter Vigil. People gather every Spring in places as diverse as hay fields to parking lots to mark the coming of the light.



So, have I been missing something by churning up and around the park instead of stopping by the Reservoir for a few minutes to take in the beginning of the new day? Probably. So, I've been thinking, there must be a way I can watch a few sunrises a week. Maybe make it the time that I read my affirmations out loud, have a cup of coffee and  try to envision what the next twelve hours of daylight will bring. Or maybe even that is too active, too busy, too full of purpose. Maybe I should just watch the light change into the morning.

Then see what changes it brings in me.

Ten Pages of "Who am I?"

According to "What Color is your Parachute?", one of the books I am using to guide my transition, job search, life change, the first challenge is find out who you are. So, it says to take ten sheets of paper and write Who am I? at the top of each one followed by one answer on each page. Here are mine in the order I thought of them : Teacher, Explainer, Writer, Runner, Reader, Salesman, Father, Brother, Uncle, Scrabble Nut, Chess Player, Board President, Listener, Problem Solver, Comedian, Cook, Handyman, Art Lover. Music Lover, Theatre Lover, Organizer, Director, Manager.

It shows you where my head was that day, very shortly becoming not a Manager. Interesting, no?
I'm sure you've noticed that the list contains more than ten answers, so let's cull that list and move a few things around:

Runner Teacher, Explainer, Listener, Problem Solver,, Salesman, Customer Service Maven, Writer, Reader, Father, Brother, Uncle, Family Member, Scrabble Nut, Chess Player, Game Player, , Comedian, Cook, Handyman, Art Lover. Music Lover, Theatre Lover  Lover of the Arts, Organizer, Director,Board President Manager.

Wow, that's a lot of crossing out, changing things around and re-naming, but that's how the exercise should go. Now to expand on each a little and say what turns me on about each one. (Each one of me?) And, after that put them into an order of importance. Who will be number one?

My first day off, my first off day

I was brought into the office last Thursday, mid-afternoon. Why does that sound like a line from a police drama? The store was being reduced to less than half of it's former space. Wow. Big surprise and no big surprise. They had played around dates and plans for the past month.

We were going to be open for years to come.

We were going to shut down next week.

We were going to be in business until the end of the year.

We were going to liquidate everything within the month.

We are moving the paint department,

We are not moving the paint department,

We are moving the paint department.

The store will still be the old name.

The sign is coming down November first.

The sign is staying up

but

It will be covered by a new sign.

So, I am in the office. My boss said he had to be the bad guy. I was not going to be a part of the new compressed version. There was going to be a new corporation running the store. It wasn't really his decision.

It all made good business sense. I was probably the biggest expense employee-wise. It, nonetheless, was a bad decision in the opinion of the man who was now going to the former owner because my presence in the store brought in a lot of customers. Here was my pay until the end of the month and here was a check for my vacation time. Big whoop. Fifteen years. Two checks. Ah.

I pretty much knew it was coming. We all knew there would be a lot of changes. The place had been losing money ever since the Home Depot opened down the street. I had let them know that I would be willing to hang in as long as it took to make the new place a success, but the guy who will now own the store hadn't made eye contact with me for three days. Never a good sign, even if he had a lot on his mind.

He came in as my now former boss and I were speaking.

"You never even asked me if I would be willing to negotiate lower wages or fewer hours." I said.

He mumbled something I missed.

I went upstairs and got my stuff; clothes, books, my coffee cup, my shaving kit, my tools all went into two big bags. Luckily, I had been cutting back on leaving changes of clothes there and had been leaving more stuff at the gym.

I met with my former co-manager, showed him my list of pre-paid special orders, all very organized, of course. Shook hands with whoever was nearby, some hugs. Went up to the new owner and said

"Well, I can't say I'm not disappointed because I am."

He turned toward me.

"I hope for your success." I continued, "but I don't think you can do it without me."

"Oh, so now you threaten me?"

{No kidding. That's what he said.}

"Um. That's not what I said."

Sigh. That pretty much encapsulates the fifteen year relationship we had. He's the kind of guy who gripes and moans to a customer for ten minutes over a ten dollar refund before giving them the refund. Ah.

I walked out then remembered I still had my keys to the place. I walked back in and handed them to him.

"Good luck" I said.

Remembering Squanto or Not Remembering Squat-o.

I'm blaming the wine. I saying that because I'm hoping it's nothing else. You know, like the early onset of dotage. It's going to difficult enough to find a job in this economy without having to use a damaged brain. It's was probably nothing.

There we were the four of us, having just had a really nice dinner up on the roof and somehow the subject got around to genealogy, one of my favorites. I was related how, even after ten years of research, neither I nor my cousin has been able to find the "crossing ancestor". That would be the first member of a family to set foot in the New World. I said we knew we were from Virginia and that we were here before the Pilgrims packed their bags. I went on to say that even though things were bad in Virginia, all the books contain a chapter entitled "The Starving Time", things were worse for the Pilgrims "until one of the weirdest coincidences of history happened."

The other leaned forward to hear the tale. I related how the Pilgrims had met an Indian smack in the middle of their little outpost territory who could, amongst other things, speak English. Seems the guy had been taken prisoner by English explorers around ten years before the Pilgrims landed. He had been taken to Spain, sold into slavery, then oddly was bought back by an Englishman, taken to England for several years and THEN brought back to New England via Nova Scotia just in time to act as interpreter and guide for the men and women in the black suits and dresses. I said they all must remember the part about him showing the Pilgrims how to put a fish in with the corn seed to make it grow. (Ah, Thanksgiving pageants!) Well, I said, that wasn't an Indian technique, the man had learned it from the farmers up in Nova Scotia.

"Hey" said one of the guests,"What was this guy's name?"

One of the more famous tape erasures of all time is the eighteen minute gap in the Nixon tapes. The gap in my brain's ability to recall the NAME of the Indian who saved the Pilgrims of New England from starvation is not as famous yet, but it felt like it. I was stunned. My mind had failed in remembering, after remembering all of the other pertinent facts, the fellow's name.

"Uh...." I said, "Holy cow, I don't remember. I want to say Sequoia, but I know that that's wrong."

There was a pause and we, thankfully moved on to other subjects. Cheesecake. Florida vacations. Dentist visits. I kept waiting for this mush inside my head to cough up the answer, but no, nothing, Nada, zilch.

They all left. I cleaned the kitchen, packed my bag for the 18 mile run coming up early next morning and I went to bed.

I didn't think about the situation at all.

About 2:18 AM, I woke up. My eyes opened. It was raining hard and I thought about setting the clock to go off too late to go run the run in the rain.
"Squanto" My brain said." Now go back to sleep."

Transitional Species 9/26 - The Two Party System

The books on this subject could fill a section of Barnes and Noble and, in fact, do. The one book I have, besides the one in my head, says that to start off on your transition you should catch up on your sleep. True.
So, despite having a lovely time last night at party number one of the weekend with some of the nicest people on the planet, I went home early and crawled into bed.

The people I mention save cats. More about them tomorrow.

I got up this morning completely in a fog and then remembered that I have people coming over to visit me tonight, so there was some frantic wastebasket emptying and counter clearing. The people coming tonight do not save cats, but they do support cats like me. We shall have party number two and watch the quarter moon float over Washington Heights.

On Sunday, I run the 18 Mile Tune-up for the Marathon which will be just what I need after ravioli, salad and red wine.

Joe(not caught up yet)Nation

What the Hell is a Transitional Species?

I think it was 60 Minutes or 48 Hours, some network news magazine, which had interviews with people who were out of work, unemployed, had lost their jobs, been laid off or, as most of them put it, "in transition". It does sound better than "I was put out on my ass." In transition implies some kind of movement from one thing to another, from one place to another. It's a positive euphemism, but like so many euphemisms, it rings hollow after some time. Some of job seekers had been 'in transition' for three years or more. That's a lot of time without a lot of movement.

Darwinism and Evolution have become a couple of my favorite subjects lately, along with Physics, Cosmology* and the building of stone buildings in the Middle Ages. I just finished reading Born to Run, on ultra-marathons, the kind of race where the participants run a 100 miles or more, in it the author asks (and answers) the question: Why would we as a species trade moving around on four limbs for running on two? (See also this article in Men's Health.) Pretty fascinating stuff about opening your chest for better air flow, losing all our hair so that we sweat, rather than pant, to cool off and the development of a ligament or two in our necks to enable us to hold our heads steady while we run. Chimps don't have those ligaments, we do. Chimps can't run down their prey, we can. Evolution says we and the chimps had a common ancestor who probably did not have those ligaments either, but that there would have been some Transitional Species between us (Steady Heads) and that common ancestor, probably a whole series of generations of ape-like creatures, each getting less hairy and taller, each getting faster afoot and gaining in endurance.

There will always be a Transitional Species (or many several) between the ancient creature of old and the present form. That's who I am now. A creature in transition, that is to say, I am like everyone else.

The latest news on my present job is that there isn't any latest news. We should know more in a week or three days or by Monday or on Saturday or real soon, depending upon who you talk to up in the office and how many minutes it's been since you talked to them last.

Meanwhile, my survival training has kicked in again. I have begun to take stock of what I have. That will be the subject of tomorrow's post, but so far I have found two containers of chicken stock in the freezer.

Joe(They were behind the bags of blanched green beans.) Nation

 - *Did you know there is a black hole at the center of our Milky Way Galaxy? That there is a black hole at the center of just about every galaxy they've looked at? Think about that for a moment -

Darwin was right

So, nothing is set yet, but sometime in the next two to six months I will not have a job or at least not have the job I have now. What you will see here is what is going on in this small life over that period and beyond. I welcome your comments.

Joe(more and better things tomorrow)Nation