Our Days

Each morning that I'm home, I walk outside, my hair a mess (what's left of it after forty-six years), coffee cup in hand and stare absently at the lake below our house. I listen as the birds come to life, completely unaware that today could be their last day. Frogs begin to quiet, aware their time is not now, but in the depths of darkness when other predators struggle to see their camouflaged bodies.


I breath deeply the fresh air, and sip gingerly from my coffee cup, the java still steaming from its recent course through my the machine that helps wake me every day. Every day the sun comes up, I'm reminded of God's blessings, the ability to see another spectacle that has been laid out for me, and those who matter most to me.


We all complain about our lives, but have you stopped to question what it is that's really bothering you?  Your job (be thankful you have one)?  Your house/apartment (be happy you have a roof over your head)?  Your significant other (be grateful you aren't lonely)?  Your situation in life (did you eat last night, or have a place to sleep)? 


On several occasions I've explained to people that I've seen destitution...I've seen people on the precipice of despair with only an insignificant thread on which to hang.  I've watched children beg for loose change to take to their parents so those parents can purchase a morsel of rice for their families.  I've watched pre-teens dancing and singing for money when they should have been in school learning to read and write.


My fellow North Americans and Europeans: while you scream for change and hope, or hope and change, there are others who cry out for just your petty change.  There are those who would love to be in your situation, have YOUR problems rather than theirs, and gladly change places with you even if for a day.


To cry and wail for change when our problems are so globally insignificant is perplexing to me.  Please save your pennies (even if they are pennies) and go see the world.  See what else is out there then you will have a much broader appreciation for what we have here.


With that, I will stare out at the lake that lies casually behind my house and listen to the birds as they wake to another day...those same birds without a care, or a cause, or a knowing.

Peace and love to you all.

Happy days!

I tend to be an optimist, even when I think the world is about to collapse.  Things can always get better because we control our own destinies, thoughts, actions, and reactions.  External sources will create obstacles for us, but we are enabled with the God-given ability to take a gross negative and turn it into a net positive.


"How is that possible," you might wonder?  Take everything as a gift--the good, the bad, and the ugly.  Piss poor people will be piss poor people; let them wallow in their petulance.  Don't let someone else live rent free in your mind, and shrug off events for which you have no control.


Most days I walk outside and stare at this little piece of earth the good Lord has blessed us with...and smile. The blue sky, the herons flying low over the lake behind our house, the sound of cicadas singing their strange song, our home, our children, our (mine and Cathy's) relationship...we have more than we deserve.


How could I possibly walk around like the weight of the world is pushing me through its crust?  Have there been challenges in my life of late?  Sure!  Will I allow those challenges to keep me down and have me blaming someone else for my ills?  No way. 


The Debbie Downers so many of us know are miserable people, and  I've elected to evict those Downers around me from my life--after all, I am my own landlord!  Hey man, seriously...why should I have to listen to or read someone's ten minute soliloquy about how everyone else is keeping them down or causing angst in their life?  Get a grip and take control, bro!


Do you ever stop and consider the many blessings that have been bestowed upon you, or do you have nothing but jealousy in your heart for those who are successful?  If that's you then you need to press your life re-set button.


Look, I'm not saying there aren't those who struggle, but even when I was struggling I wasn't miserable.  Planning and  plotting to make things better was always at the forefront of my mind.  I suggest you do the same and don't let those who think they are better than you, smarter than you, richer than you, or more spiritual than you have a say in how you feel.  Those people aren't worth your time. 

Be well and live happy! 

Coming Down the Pike

Life can be grandly spectacular (cantankerous). Curve balls and sliders will be thrown at you, and how you swing will determine the trajectory of your life. To say this year has been filled with surprises and let downs would be an understatement, but I'm not going to allow a setback to keep me from accomplishing those things in my life about which I am passionate.


With that, I've completed my most recent manuscript for what I hope will become my second novel. This particular endeavor was another work of determination, research, and a ton of time spent behind a keyboard. Better working on my book than dinking around on social media--although I must admit a certain affinity for doing so, but I digress.


This recent novel, the second in the Bill Evers series, is entitled Occam's Razor, and will once again take the reader to regions of the world they may not have ever seen, introduce them to a considerable amount of conspiracy theory, indulge their senses with a lot of action and adventure then finally overwhelm them with the spiritual and paranormal.


Once I completed the first draft of Occam's Razor my mind was already racing with plots for the third Evers book. As fortune would have it, ideas began forming and I began writing some notes and will soon begin performing research for the third installment. In the interim, however, I must admit a bit of self-indulgence while wallowing in self-pity.


Without going into detail about what was weighing heavily upon me a few weeks ago, I was reading a social media post thrown up on a friend's wall about the demons inhabiting his mind due to some of the nastiness he has seen while on the job. After swearing to himself that he would not work in that particular field again (never say 'never'), he was forced to step back into that arena in order to continue putting food on his family's table. 


Wow! His story put things into perspective for me and got me back to work on my book, because you see, I had put it down and mostly walked away from it for quite some time. Yeah, I would peck away on it here and there, but there was no real intent and vision for the last third of the novel. Then my friend posted his story for the world to read...and I was inspired!


No more pity parties, no more walking around like there was a black cloud hanging over my head. I put my nose to it and banged out the last portion of the book in two weeks. I felt energized and happy for the first time in quite a while, and have now decided on another book project that sways from my current genre, but it promises to fill a certain need I have for story telling and inspiration.  Just you wait and see what is coming your way over the next several months.  :)


Be well and be happy, y'all.  We're all we have you know.

Writing and the Strange People Who Write

From a purely physical perspective, writing is a wholly unhealthy endeavor.  You sit in front of a computer or keyboard pecking away, or conducting research to make your story, plot, or theme richer and more enjoyable for your targeted reader.  Your waistline tends to grow, your eyesight suffers, and you largely ignore those you love (and everything outside the scope of the story and computer) in order to convey the strange ideas and concepts that swirl in your head like Dorothy's house as it was scooped up by that F-5 tornado on the Kansas plains.

I've had the good fortune to meet a large number of authors in my lifetime, and each is rife with quirkiness and peculiar personality traits that most would find, well, quirky.  Personally, I find those traits interesting and telling about the individual's cognitive abilities, but hey, I guess I suffer from a form of  mild quirkiness too.

That said, I believe writers work at "the craft" for many different reasons: it's a form of therapy for many; there's a burning desire to tell a story that has been floating around in their brain for some time; in some, there is the OCD-ishness that will not rest until their thoughts have been properly communicated; and still, there are those who relish in the glow of others telling them how wonderful their work is (this narcissistic personality trait is rarely successful, but I wanted to point out that it does exist in the stratosphere of writing personalities).

For me, there's a combination of some of the things listed above that drives me to write--the therapeutic nature of expression and the sharing of what creativity God has given me with others, or my OCD nature that seeks out miniscule mistakes, usually post-mortem, endured by those tolerant souls who most often give me a pass for my inconsistencies and misgivings, and the burning need to see where the story will lead.  I often write without an end in mind--I've found that it changes several times as the story develops, so I prefer to begin with a notion, build on that, and hopefully watch it blossom into something recognizably cohesive.

Finally, there is the finished product...that tangible something you are happy to share with others, all the while hoping they enjoy those crazy thoughts that swam through your mind as you drafted the first of many manuscripts that would eventually morph into what they now hold in their hands.

And for me, there's this--smiling along with a few young men and women who were happy to buy this book of mine, although I doubt they were nearly as excited as I was to meet them.  These photos had little to do with my need to create a story, but I promise you, they are motivation for the second.

Be well and at peace.

An Indulgement--Buddy Smith Style

For those of you who have read Of Blood and Stone, you know that Bill Evers's handler, Buddy Smith, enjoys a fine cigar. Perhaps its Buddy's way of thumbing his nose at the United States government, the same government that regularly lines his pockets with cash when strange missions are to be carried out and accomplished, but he has a burning passion (no pun intended) for Cuban Cohibas, the preferred smoke of Fidel Castro. 


The flavor of a Cohiba is uniquely mild with a very aromatic smoke cloud that floats from its burning end.  If you were to ask Buddy why he enjoys that particular cigar, he would most likely look at you like the fool he took you to be, scoff, and walk away--most probably planning your untimely demise for being an idiot.


There have been times, however, that the hardened former mercenary could not get his hands on a Cohiba and searched for a substitute.  What he found pleased him, so much so that he periodically ventures from his home in Virginia to Easton, Pennsylvania to purchase en masse those sweet tobacco blends that keep him from assassinating foreign dignitaries as they walked the streets of Washington D.C.


It's at Leaf Famous Smoke-Shop that he finds himself, sitting at a table with his back to the wall sipping a Kentucky bourbon and smoking a Romeo y Julieta from the House of Montague. He most likely orders his favorite dish, the Cordon Bleu sliced ham and Swiss on a pretzel bun because, well, he's a Southern boy. And it's at his table, his keen eyes scanning the room in search of an old adversary, or perhaps someone hired to do the adversary's dirty work, that he takes long pulls on the Romeo y Julieta.


"An old bastard like me can afford some of life's finer pleasures," he mumbles to himself, the secure feeling of the Colt 1911 sidearm tucked just beneath his left arm...just in case.


He closes his eyes and pulls on the cigar again, allowing the smoke to swirl in his mouth, but careful not to inhale. The mild flavor of the tobacco and sweet taste of the rolling paper mingle on his tongue long enough to give him pause, memories of days long past dancing in his mind.


As your author I will tell you that I've visited Leaf before.  It's truly a sight to behold and one of those places that a writer, burgeoning with ideas and sensing that he was in a place that could be called upon as a scene in a novel, finds himself taking in everything--the way people dress, the three piece band playing outside, greeting patrons as they enter, the huge walk-in humidor, the smell of cigar tobacco gliding through the air.


Then there's the bar and restaurant, a place with its own feel and vibe, separate from that area where men and a few women comb through shelves of cigars in search of their favorite smoke.  Preppies, yuppies, and a few blue collar types sit at tables with friends and family talking about the day's happenings, the possibility of escape from their own repetitious lives something they quietly savor.


These are the places I enjoy: where life meets fiction and fiction becomes a glimmer of reality.  If you get a chance to visit Leaf, I encourage you to do so. 


Live your own adventure!    

Life is Short-Only Now do I Know What it Means

Growing up we all heard it--"have fun, life is short."  When you're young that particular phrase has little meaning because you're still on the 'new' side of life.  Family, friends, career: we work so hard at these three things, these societal norms that the word 'life' takes on a new meaning.  Accomplishments, personal and professional, are those things of which life is made.


Yes, those things ARE life, and very, very important parts of it, but so is self-expression, laughter, breathing, seeing, and listening.  It's become much more clear to me, with each passing day, that we take so much beyond the point of seriousness, including ourselves.  Is there really so much self-worth that we believe our own lives are worth more than the person next to us, around the corner, or standing on the street?


I tell you friends, I find myself laughing at more and more and taking everything less seriously all the time.  Some people find this developing trait to be annoying, but me...I think it's endearing.  By taking myself less seriously I find I enjoy things, little things and big things, more than I would otherwise.


None of this means you should be less driven or ambitious, it simply means those focal points shouldn't define you as an individual.  It's okay to be passionate about something, but not at the expense of others, or just as importantly, yourself. 


For many years in corporate settings I've watched some walk over others in an attempt to elevate themselves.  I've figured out that they were only standing on the shoulders and backs of the ones that made it happen for them, and more often than not they were later exposed for their ethical shortcomings. 

What does "life is short" mean to me?  All that I've written above and a little more.  It means peace, love, laughter, music, learning, education....and just being good to one another. 

Except for the buttholes of the world. 

I jest.

Peace to you all!

Karate Class, Kids and Me

Over the years I've attempted to teach children martial arts, and each time I've tried my success has been limited.  The constant interruptions, the fidgeting, the crying, the giggling, the thumb sucking--it all drives me crazy.  To say I've lacked patience in this realm is an understatement!


So here I am, almost a month removed from beginning a new class.  I explained to the YMCA manager that I was interested in trying to teach children seven years old to twelve years of age in one class, and my second class beginning at age thirteen and up.  That's not an unreasonable request, wouldn't you agree?  The remarkable thing?  She agreed that this was the correct age groupings.


A few days prior to my first class I received a call from the local YMCA activities director asking if I could swing by her office when I got off work.  "Sure," I replied, assuming the worst.  I figured she was going to tell me that there wasn't enough interest generated in the classes and that the floor time would be better suited for another yoga or zumba class.  I'm pretty sure I even rolled my eyes at the mere thought of those classes taking my karate floor time, but hey, what can you do when there's no love to be found?


I walked into her office and sat down.  She began, "I've got some really great news!"
"I'm all ears," I replied, a smirk on my face (I have no idea why I was smirking.  Probably a carry-over look from my full time job--the usual look I have on my face when someone brings me news I don't want to hear).


"There are almost thirty children signed up for your classes," she relayed, her white teeth shining from constant bleaching. 


The information didn't quite sink in...all I could think was, I wish my teeth were that white.


"Did you hear me, Howard?  Isn't that wonderful?!  Almost thirty children.  The parents are soooo excited to have this class offered," she smiled, her white teeth mesmerizing. 


I wonder if she uses Crest Whitening Strips?


Finally, it dawned on me what she was saying.  "I have almost thirty children signed up?  No adults?"


"Well, that's what I wanted to speak with you about, Howard.  Several parents have children ages four and up.  Many want to put their four year olds in your class."


I've got to ask her who her dentist is.


I shook my head.  "Like we discussed, children that age, four, five and six, usually aren't ready for a karate class.  The teacher winds up being a baby sitter while the kids stand around and learn little."  I thought my reasoning was sound and the argument valid.


"Would you be willing to try teaching a four, five and six year old class?  The second class would be for those seven and above?"


I should stop drinking so much coffee.  I'm sure that's what's staining my teeth.  I bet she only drinks water and tea.


My head dropped in sullen defeat.  How could I say no to my new part-time employer?  Besides, her teeth are so incredibly white.


My first few classes were exactly what I expected.  Snotty noses, giggling, crying, thumb sucking, questions about my dragon belt (I still don't know what that means), a couple of loud farts, smelly feet, and pigtails.


Something was missing though, something I couldn't quite put my finger on until the fourth or fifth class.  My impatience was mostly AWOL.  I would be lying if I said it was completely gone; on the contrary, there were a couple of kids that I wanted to see put their shoes on, tell mom and dad that my class wasn't for them, and march right out of there. 


In the old days my trouble makers would be worked harder and be disciplined even more than their classmates, but age and a little bit of wisdom seems to have crept into my mindset.  One such little girl, the daughter of a military family, was a bit of a problem child.  I made up my mind after the first class that I didn't care for her or her lack of respect for adults (particularly her sensei, which is why I made her do a few extra pushups in a few different classes).


Yesterday, I took a little different approach with her and the couple of others who obviously suffer ADHD (attention deficit Howard disorder).  I corrected them when they were wrong, but made a big deal out of even the smallest of accomplishments.  Suddenly, several of them were trying a little harder, focusing just a bit more than they had a few minutes earlier.


After class I was gathering my things when my little trouble maker girl walked back into the dojo. 


"Sensei?"


"Yes, sweety?" I answered.


She ran over to me and jumped in my arms and gave me the biggest hug.


Yeah, I'm still smiling--stained teeth and all.