How Come I Never Get Invited To The Cool Funerals?

Yes, I've been to an Irish wake or two in my time, and it is usually true that the difference between an Irish wedding and an Irish wake is one less drunk, but on the whole I've got to say that my years of attending wakes/funerals have been kind of a drag (yes, I know, somebody has died and these occasions aren't supposed to be jovial, rip-snorting, ass-kicking events, but still). Not that I spend my days and nights pouting about such things, but a recent news story really drove home the point that I have got to start seeking out better wakes/funerals. It seems that out in California (this can't be a made up story because California is too trite; anyone with such an imagination would have set this bogus story somewhere, anywhere else) at a funeral service for a person who indulged (while still alive) in medical marijuana-laced brownies, somebody passed around a tray of brownies. Yes, the brownies were pot brownies, in a kind of tribute to the recently deceased. The interesting part is that no one told the three senior citizens--who ate the brownies and wound up in the hospital--that the brownies were "special." All's fine with the old folks, so not to worry.

Unfortunately, my list of "best of" funerals/wakes pales heavily in comparison. About the best I can muster is the wake I attended for a guy who was always on the phone. As a tribute, his family put his beloved phone in the open casket next to his corpse (this was a few years ago, before voice mail; it was a battery operated cordless phone complete with an attached answering machine). Maybe it was the grief that distracted the well-meaning loved ones, but nobody thought to turn the thing off. So there, right in the middle of the wake, as several of us were mingling and saying nice things, the phone rings/bleats. Before anyone could figure out what was going on and how to stop it, the caller's voice boomed out of the answering machine: Newt Gingrich, Robo-calling, urging the dead man to vote for a certain Republican Congressman in the upcoming election. Needless to say, those of us liberals in attendance walked out in a huff.

Then there was the funeral of a friend of a friend I got roped into attending after losing a bet. Maudlin beyond belief. The presiding minister kept mispronouncing the deceased's name, some four-year-old in attendance was screaming for his Elmo throughout most of the service, and at the end when it came time to play the deceased's favorite song--Bob Dylan's "Knockin' On Heaven's Door" (I love Bob, but really, talk about trite)--the person manning the boombox got mixed up and wouldn't you know it, out blared Bob's "Rainy Day Women # 12 & 35"--the one that goes, "Everybody must get stoned ..." (which, come to think of it, would have been appropriate for that California funeral).

I won't go into the details of the funeral I attended for an avid roller skater. Or the one for the woman who died of a lip balm overdose. Suffice it to say, if you hear of a probably-cool funeral taking place, give me a buzz. I'll bring the Kleenex and the Doritos.

You Don't Expect To Be Bright And Bon Vivant ...

I don't know. I've been sick all week, and just today when I started feeling better it's rainy and gray and the wind's blowing like it knows for the first time that winter's on the way. On the radio are competing news stories of folks lining up at 4 a.m. to buy a new phone and further reports from Occupy Wall Street. And more than a year away, I'm already weary of the coming political circus we know as a Presidential election. It seems fitting,somehow, that yesterday, a day after Columbus Day, Paul Simon turned seventy (did you know his middle name is Frederic?). Turns out he wrote the quintessential song for today more than thirty-five years ago, more than half his life ago. Appropriately, I guess, you have to put up with a little (going a long way) Dick Cavett to enjoy this American Tune.



The folks at Buzzfeed.com have some great photos of the whole Occupy thing. This one is Pulitzer-winning scary (look at that left hand, that right finger).

This one is pure haiku.

Make Me Nervous: Happy Birthday, Dad

My father would have been 85 today. Beyond the initial smile his memory conjures for me, my next thought--obviously, selfishly-- is, man, I'm getting old. One thing he liked to say (well, probably not liked, more like, couldn't help but) was, "Stop that! You're making me nervous," usually when I was doing something mindlessly repetitive like shaking my leg under a table. Not nervous like, oh no, I can't possibly speak in front of five hundred people, but nervous like You're Getting On My Nerves Here. I guess I'm sorry for provoking this outburst enough that I remember it so keenly, but how was a young kid to know, in his naturally solipsistic way, that one's inane actions could so irk someone else? In a way, though, I'm grateful. Operating under the assumption that nothing exists without the words that name it, without the memory of my father's momentarily fraying nerves I might have gone through life unaware of all the myriad things that can truly bug the hell out of me. Such ignorance would have made for a decidedly less colorful, more apathetic life. Naturally, armed with this genetic memory, I soon found myself echoing my father. But I always honored him whenever some student of mine was doing something stupid like constantly tapping an empty water bottle on her desk: "Hey Sara(h), as my father used to say, 'You're making me nervous. Cut it out.'" Ah, the tree-hugging fallen apple.

So, as a paean to dad and the wonderful phenomenon of genetic transmission, I offer this bit of poetic whimsy. May it also serve as fair warning if you should ever enter my sphere of existence.

You're Making Me Nervous Here, You With...

Your faintest threats of bagpipes,
Your stubborn cotton wads blocking my path to much-needed aspirin,
Your ravenous clawing through your crypt-like purse looking for three pennies with which to make exact change; I've got plenty of change right here in the register but hardly enough serenity for this transaction,
Your scraggly, starter's-kit moustache,
Your jukebox punching up of Journey,
Your insistence, anywhere but on the first tee, whenever your ball is playable, if not desirably so, on pulling one more out of your pocket and declaring, so dismissively of rules and etiquette, "I'm gonna hit another one,"
Your mildly tapping of my shoulder for emphasis when we've known each other for all of two minutes,
Your failure to flush,
Your neglect of your turn signal,
Your private cellphone conversations conducted so publicly loud,
Your cats,
Your own over-active nerves.

MOE's, OOers, and the Po: The Percentages Of Occupation

This morning I'm occupying my porch. Why? Because it's a beautiful morning, one where autumn seems to be yielding the floor a bit to old man summer's dotage. It's truly a "99%" porch--an open-air slab of concrete with a couple of mismatched second-hand chairs and a beat up yellow plastic table. Even the constantly scampering chipmunks find it a bit cramped. But all in all it's a nice relaxer. I'm also occupying what passes for pajamas in my world--in this case wholly opposing plaid patterns on top and bottom. And, once Mr. Coffee stops gurgling, I'll be hard at work de-occupying a cup or two of java. Later I have to go in and occupy my occupation for 16 out of 24 1/2 hours so I can continue to occupy the place where I'm an occupant. Otherwise, I'm occupied writing this. 

Since my doctor has sworn me off pie charts, and I lack the necessary poetic chops to write a 2011 update of Walt Whitman's great opus, "I Hear America Singing," it's a precarious thin line I'm attempting to tread here--between mathematical bells and whistles and poetic artistry--all in the service of trying to make sense of this whole "Occupy Wall Street," "Occupy Cleveland" (it's about time somebody does), and "Occupy Whatever." Now I'm all for exercising one's Constitutional rights, and railing against Greed, though a bit nebulous, seems like a pretty healthy, right-minded thing to do. My problem with it all is this 99% thing. The protesters are saying they are the other 99% of the population, in opposition to the 1% who are Greedheads and control everything? I'm not buying it. Outside of loving ice cream and kinda had it up to here with Nancy Grace, there is nothing that can claim the support of 99% of the population. We're talking 297 million, I-contain-multitudes Americans, give or take a few million.

Give or take, that's one of the big questions (I guess, quite literally, Give or Take is what this is all about, isn't it?). In every so-called scientific poll/survey/study, there's always that ambiguous give or take thing--margin of error (and isn't it always +/- 2.5%-5%? How come scientists--supposedly anal, precise folks--are allowed to get away with this Margin of Error thing, but no one else is? Why not gamblers? Try pulling this one at a Blackjack table: "Well you see, Mr. Dealer, 22 is within the realm of the margin of error, so I didn't actually lose. Gimme my chips back, please." Or, "I took the Browns and the seven-and-a-half points, Mr. Bookie. They lost 23-14 [yes, the Browns are capable of scoring 14 points {give or take 2.5-5} in one game], which is within the margin of error. Can I have my money back in crisp tens, sir?"). So right away we've got to knock that 99% down a tad to account for the Margin of Error (MOE). And trust me, there are a few MOE's walking around out there--the truly marginalized. The guy walking down the street with earbuds singing along, way out of key and pitch, to some song, usually exhorting someone to "get your booty on the dance floor." The woman obsessed with finding the nearby Holiday Inn where, in the Elmhurst Room, the American Idol paper doll figures convention is taking place. Anyone presently in line at Graceland who won't be buying the premium tour ticket. These people and so many more are the MOE's of American Life who certainly can't be accounted for in some simplistic 99% vs. 1% demographic matrix.

And what about the OOers? The Otherwise Occupied? In a more orderly world they might passionately side with either the 99% or the 1%, but as of right now, they're otherwise occupied. I mean it's obvious I'm not an Einstein with numbers, but out of 300 million Americans, there has got to be several thousand people currently suffering a raging toothache. You ever had a raging toothache? Let me tell you, it occupies you 100%, no MOE. What about brides-to-be? In the months--let alone weeks and days--leading up to her wedding, you think a bride-to-be can possibly be occupied with anything other than wedding plans? What about all the Jehovah's Witnesses faithfully going door-to-door as we speak, and all the homeowners politely opening their doors to them? You're going to say these people aren't otherwise occupied? The hungover? The folks waiting in line at a discount drug mart? Parents trying to placate an unhappy kid at Chuck E. Cheese? Pundits excoriating the 99% protesters? OOers, all of them.

And of course there's the Po, who are always with us, kind of. The Pre-occupied. The woman I run into now and then who's obsessed with "Shirley and Laverne," to the point where I can't even get a word in to inform her it's Laverne and Shirley. The folks busy making bladder control issue TV commercials. The folks in need of bladder control products. Any and all adolescent boys (aged 12-40, +/- 2-5years). Owners/renters/renting-to-own-ers of metal detectors. Zombies. Curling enthusiasts. Lana Del Rey fans. Bloggers. Civil War re-enactors. You can't count people in on the new Occupy X movement if they're already preoccupied, can you? Multi-task, fine, but it goes against the laws of physics, I believe, to multi-occupy.

And so, doing the math, rather quickly and with that comfortable margin of error crutch propped nicely in my right armpit, the sum of the MOE's, OOers, and Po comes out to roughly 150 million Americans (proper-birth-certificate possessing ones only, naturally). Which makes for one half-assed America. Which, if you have any sense of history, is about par for the course, status quo--which, for the 99% of those who are non-golfers and non-Latin scholars, is same as it ever was.

Back to the porch. 

Flatteredific

One woman's accusation is another man's flattery. Yes, I stood accused yesterday. And make no mistake about it, the disdainful tone of voice, the arms akimbo, the fists clenched squarely on the hips, even the eyebrow action all spelled nothing but a-c-c-u-s-a-t-i-o-n when she said, "You've read the dictionary, haven't you?" "Well," I mumbled in true humility (the humility of one not caught in nefariousness--that would be humiliation--but one who feels flattered but knows he's not perfect, that he could feel flattereder), "I skipped around a bit."

This all stemmed from being disappointed that a so-called baseball dictionary didn't include the wonderful word "donnybrook" (a free-for-all or brawl). There was doubt written all over her from the get go about the currency/legitimacy/existence of the word, so when I resorted to hauling out a "standard" dictionary to prove my point, I was greeted with "hunh"--not the genuinely intrigued, well-now-I-just-learned-something-I-hadn't-hitherto-known-before hunhs, but a more exasperated, fine-I'll-let-you-have-this-one-but-that-doesn't-mean-you're-still-not-quite-the-pill-in-my-book hunh. Which all led to me erupting a few minutes later with, "You want a really good word? A word most people have never heard of, let alone use?" (Of course these questions were rhetorical, as if anyone would answer them in the negative, so I didn't wait for her to reply). "'Hoyden'--a high-spirited, boisterous, or saucy woman." "What the--" was her rather, well, hoydenish (and only then did I realize the appropriateness of gifting this, yes, rather boisterous woman with such a splendid word) retort. The look she gave me screamed you're a huckster (which, incidentally is right across the page from hoyden in my dictionary), but her look changed soon enough when I whipped out the dictionary again and showed her "hoyden" in all its obscure but legitimate glory. That's when the downright accusation/flattery took place. Guilty/accepted.

Case in point (or maybe just a self-serving diversion to make this long post even longer): The other day I felt the urge to look up the word "torpor." Yes I already knew the word means "a state of inactivity or insensibility; lethargy, apathy," but the stickler in me (a close acquaintance who goes by the name of Leonard) wanted to be sure (okay, I'm borderline nuts, as if anyone could pronounce it any other way) of the word's correct pronunciation (let me make this clear right now, although those r's made me a tad skittish and I wanted to be sure, I am NOT one of those pronunciation commandos who go around pedantically correcting people's mispronunciations of words ["the word is pronounced zo-ology, not zoo-ology, unless, of course, you live in a zoo!" he said rather nabobily], although I still get a kick, years later, out of the for-all-intents-and-purposes-quite-learned person who in public once pronounced the exquisite word "gibberish" as gib-ber-ish rather than jib-ber-ish [though maybe that was the person's point--gibberish to the nth degree is not just jib-ber-ish but downright gib-ber-ish]; and oh, why not, we're already quagmired in parentheses, how about the fuss over the pronunciation of the word "forte" [something in which one excels]: for years everybody went with for-tay, but lately more people are going--a bit peevishly, in my view--with the one syllable fort; technically the word comes from the French and should be pronounced fort, but the Italian musical term forte [for-tay] meaning "in a loud, forceful manner" [Pierre corrected forte my mispronunciation of the word forte], has kind of been mixed up in it all and most people seem to say for-tay, as in "correct pronunciation of obscure words is one of my many fortes"; most arbiters of these kinds of things [we all have crosses to bear] accept this Italian usurpation of the French [commendable choosing of sides there!] and acknowledge the legitimacy of for-tay along with fort [which all makes sense to these ears; somehow one's strong points sound much cooler when they're for-tays rather than mere forts, which if we had a day or two might be kind of ironic; although wouldn't for-tay sound cooler, if maybe not as manly, for the word that--unimaginative military types--means "a fortified place"? "Whatcha building with all those couch cushions there, Billy?" "It's my super neato for-tay, sir!"; although in strict military terms, I guess the word might be a bit effete [rhymes with defeat, so there]: "No one will be able to penetrate our well-fortified for-tay, will they Maurice [pick either Morris or Mor-eece, whichever makes the joke funny/ier]?"). (And of course, I think it's clear that my mere picking up the dictionary and making the effort to look up "torpor" simply to confirm its correct pronunciation [let alone all the divergent thoughts such action provoked and the subsequent ramifications of the act, of which this post is the {hopefully} ultimate], prove that at the time I most definitely was not in any way in a state of torpor.)

But back to my original point about the joys of dictionary reading. In the few seconds it took me to find torpor in the dictionary, I chuckled thinking about what a great word torporific would be: "Geez that meeting was torporific." "Imagine that! I looked up the word operatic in my thesaurus and the only word there was torporific." "'Ostentatiously torporific' said the critic about my dance interpretation of Mein Kampf." But the joke was on me, because right there in the holy dictionary, after the pronunciation and definition was this: torporific adj. Great minds think alike notwithstanding, this discovery made me curious about ific. At first glance, and one usually doesn't get beyond that, I assumed it was a very positive suffix thing. As in terrific or splendific. I can't be the only one who kind of in some way equates ific with chocolate, right? But then I thought about horrific. If there's such a word as horrific, why not torporific? And then, deeper--wouldn't terrific, ironically, come from terror? Kind of like awful coming from full of awe? Such lexical miscegenation of good and bad--are the Tea Partiers aware of such evil?! I had to get to the bottom of this ific thing (of course if my years of Latin class had been more studious I would have, um, already been at the bottom). No Luddite I, for convenience's sake I took to the World Wide Web (and what happens if, as any devoted Coast To Coast A.M. With George Noory follower knows is imminent, full disclosure of extra terrestrial life becomes reality and we learn that aliens from other worlds/galaxies/universes/dimensions are tapped into life on this Earth and even tapped into our Internet? Might there indeed be a Steve Jobsless future of a Universe Wide Web? Would we have to change all our url's from the ubiquitous, don't-even-mention-it-anymore WWW to UWW?). At (http://www.)dictionary.com/ I learned that that nifty ific tag comes from the Latin fic, "a combining form meaning 'making,' 'producing,' 'causing.'" Fics sense to me. Something that's torporific causes torpor, horrific causes horror. Duh. But the best part, no really, was that in the list of examples, included with honorific, pacific (never thought of that one, did you?) and prolific, was this word--frigorific. Oh, the mind reels and careens. Frigorific (definitely frig-or-if-ic, not fridge-or-if-ic). "That friggin' frigorific meeting was so torporific I feel like hurling myself in the friggin' Pacific." Alas, such action just might be a tad frigorific, because that word (heretofore unknown to and unheard of by me, but ecstatically welcomed like a little lost lamb) means "causing or producing cold." Come wallop me, winter. I'm fortified (or fortayified) like never before: "It's not the snow, it's that frigorific wind." Fortified for the coming political storm, too: "Look, I met the guy. I could never vote for someone with such a frigorific handshake." Fortified for anything, now that I've got this word in my arsenal. "It'll be a frigorific day in Hell when I disown my dictionary." Unfortunately, the word is supposedly now "obsolete." Well, I say, come on 99%, unoccupy frigorific Wall Street and let us all occupy the word frigorific and make it unobsolete.

I love the ific idea. Causing, producing, making. Seems to me there's a motivational fortune to be made with the "From Iffy to Ific: Transform Your Life Now!" slogan.

But anyway, enough's enough. Or is it? Yes I have read and continue to read the dictionary. Got a problem with that? In fact, I'll go so far as to say I vociferously advocate the dictionary as your next Book Club book. The choice is yours. You can either spend ten hours of your life wading through the latest "middle-aged hoyden has donnybrook with frigorific husband, quits her day job to follow her bliss and exploit her forte of crafting natural, environmental-friendly donuts, flirts too terrifically with the decidedly unfrigorific truck driver (OMG!) who delivers her dough, sinks into the abyss of torpor, and is eventually re-awakened to the joys of her unmanque life via Pilates and Rhoda reruns" tome and then spend another two hours discussing all the empathetic epiphanies the book inspired with a dozen of your closest buddies, or you can spend a mere three hours rummaging through and across and up and down and back and forth some ratty under-utilized dictionary, experience epiphanies out the wazoo, truly turn your life from iffy to ific, and have a riotous two hours sharing your discoveries with those same friends. I dare you.

And btw: another great word, drivel (kind of rhymes with civil).  

Truckin'

The calendar says it's October 4th, 10-4, which means only one thing here at spitoutyourgum: our (kinda) annual salute to the world's truck drivers. They supply us with what we need and like, haul away what we're through with, amaze us with their maneuverability skills, and daze us with fantasies of life on the road. Or whatever. But getting to know a few drivers over the years, I've come to respect them and appreciate the fact that they're great characters. So, in celebration of these men and women, I humbly offer a poem I wrote nearly twenty years ago (don't think the red light factoid is still fact), before I really knew any drivers. A bit of splenetic piece of poesy this, an imaginary kiss-off, an all-purpose empathetic paean to the you-broke-my-heart blues--a message so hefty I felt only a qualified, and quality, truck driver could be trusted to deliver it. Thank you, drivers.


Driving You Away



I need a big
18-wheeled truck
To haul away
The memory of you.

The truck driver
(I see him as a cussing type,
Impressively fat with a mustache
That'll cut your nose
When you kiss him),
I'd give this guy,
Who I'm gonna call Hector,
I'd give Hector enough quarters
To get through all the tolls
To get to where I'm sending him.
You see, I'm willing to pay the price.

I'll start him heading south on 71
Out of this panic-quick Cleveland town
'Til the sign for 70 west Indianapolis
--which humdrum he's gonna bypass--
But he's going right through East St. Louis
West to St. Louis where he's gonna drive around some.
I like a big rig on city streets,
Makes you jittery
Making wide right turns,
Cutting commuters off
With that Arch in sight always
--whatever goes up, baby
comes metallic down the other side--
Then a run red light
And it's dirty river south
Down 55 through Memphis and Jackson and deeper.
And he will be instructed
Not to acknowledge any scenery
--not that Hector is wont to do such a thing--
But he will not stray from his mission:
He's driving you away,
And after this ride,
You will not come back.

Down into Louisiana he's gonna
Catch that desperately long Pontchartrain bridge
And when he gets to that halfway point
Where he can't see land ahead of him
Or behind him,
He's gonna stop that rig, shut it down,
Irregardless of traffic
And courtesy
And he's gonna shout from his cab perch,
“Not yet, baby! You ain't being abandoned
In this nowhere, yet. We got traveling to do.”
Then he starts up again.

And when he hits land he heads fast right
West on 10 way west
Past the sun through wide Texas
Where he can smell wasted Juarez, west.
And he will not jacknife.
And when some newly jerked kid
Pulls his arm down
From a mother-driven Aerostar
Just outside of Phoenix
Hector's gonna oblige and blow his horn loud
And that mother's gonna jump in her seatbelt
And slap that kid well to remind him
And Hector's gonna roll on west
1,947 miles times 18 wheels from New Orleans to L.A.
But he's not gonna push you off
The continent, baby, no.
He's heading 5 north now,
Largely for symbolic reasons:
It gets cold up north.
But in the desert of Sacramento
He's gonna start to circle 'round
--heading east on 80.

No,
Don't even think about it.
We're just toying with you, Hector and me.
'Cause somewhere out on 80,
Out in the dead west,
There's one red light
--the only red light left on 80, baby.
And that's
where the memory
of you
gets out.

Appropriately.

Happy Birthday Groucho Marx