Bower of Bliss

Why are all reality shows about straight people filled with drunken sluts? Not that there is anything wrong with being a drunken slut. I'm a reality TV junkie, but the fascination with people who are more fascinating than celebrites is starting to wane. The only reality shows I won't watch are the dating scenario shows, where the sole purpose of the show is to fabricate situations and throw a bunch of horned up guys and catty women together to duke it out till someone climbs to the top of the pile and the rest go home bloody. But even some of my favorite shows are turning into slutapalooza. I can barely watch The Real World anymore. I used to find the roomates at least mildly interesting, and there was always something about yourself that you could see in the lives of these people as they tried to negotiate the difficulty of being put into very un-real situations. But lately the shows are really only about how fast everyone can fuck everyone else, and the aftermath that follows from all the fucking around. Myabe I'm just getting older and that whole attitude is seeming tired to me. Watching other people about to fuck is really not all that interesting, especially when you don't get to see them actually fucking. You can't watch any reality shows anymore where there aren't at least one straight couple hooking up and breaking up all within the course of a few carefully edited weeks. Is this what most of America finds interesting? Or is it self-fulfilling? Because that is what is being broadcast, that is what becomes interesting? I know I can turn off the television, but I love my television too much to do that. And there are more interesting things on, I know, but I'm having a hard time breaking the reality TV addiction.

It's bad. I even watch American Idol. I refused to watch the first season because I honestly couldn't care less who the next corporate ass sucker is, and I still don't care, but SweetieKins and I started watching the second season, in the beginning when they have all the really bad singers on, and the next thing we knew we were sucked into the whole drama of the thing. And now we are just as sucked into this season's. I honestly don't care who wins this time either, but I did call and vote 5 times for my girl Jennifer Hudson last night because for some reason Simon's got it in for her and she is by far the most talented and most interesting of the bunch. I don't want to see her go home before the rest of the crap-hounds that are competing.

Be the Change You Want to See in the World
Politics used to anger me. All the lies being thrown around from side to side, all the people who I thought were stupid for not wanting to vite for the candidate that I new was the right choice, all the tv commercials that were just wastes of money. But I'm not going to get angry anymore. I'm going to get involved.

I've always voted. I've voted in every presidential election since I have been legally able to. I vote because I want to voice my opinion, but I also vote because of the principle of it, because I can---and I understand that that is a freedom taken too lightly in this world, the ability to choose our own leaders. I even voted for Nader one year. I knew he wouldn't win, but I wanted to voice my opinion that this country desperately needs to break out of the two-party system that dominates politics. I vote because it's important. I vote because it's a fundamental right of being an American, and, as far as rights go, I've always believed you should use it or lose it (except for guns, I don't mind losing the right to own a gun).

Getting involved doesn't just mean voting in the presidential election though. Getting involved means voting for my town's budget, and voting for all the little elections that most people think don't matter. I know there are people who don't vote in the small elections. I was one of them. I didn't vote because I didn't know who was running or what their platforms were. But ignorance is not an excuse. Getting involved means finding out. These people are determining things about my life, albeit in small ways maybe, but I am beholding them with the power to make decisions on my behalf, about issues in the town I live in, and for that I will start paying attention and voting.

Getting involved means knowing the issues and making a stand for what you believe in. This year I am attending the RNC protests in NYC because I don't believe the GOP has any business gathering in a city known for diversity and progress (and if you don't know what any of those abbreviations stand for, you seriously need to get involved!). This year I am attending the gay rights rallies in my home state and in the states that are a reasonable driving distance. Because it's important. Because I have the freedom to peacefully gather and protest. Because my government is trying to legislate me into second class citizenship, and that is not okay with me.

And I'm not saying that politics will never make me angry again, because every time I see our president's face I'm angry that he stole the election and smiles about it. But at least now I am directing my anger into change.

Wanna know who your neighbors, friends and family are donating money to? Find out here: http://www.fundrace.org/neighbors.php

Whitney Houston
Oh Whitney, child, it's finally caught up with you. Of course the whole world already knew what you didn't have the guts to admit. But I guess that is the double-edged sword of addiction. Everyone sees it but you. Yes, we saw it in that towel you carried around with you everywhere, wiping yourself down because even though you were standing perfectly still your heart was racing double time from all the uppers pumping through you. We saw it in all the crazy things you were doing, and crazy can't hide from the public. We saw it in your unfledging support of your man Bobby. The irony in having a voice that could move millions but not being able to give voice to your own needs. To be such a strong personality and such a strong stage presence but be weak when it comes to the mens, to let yourself get dragged down with your husband, a serial criminal and drug abuser himself. I wonder if you were like Tina Turner and Sid Vicious. Was it that stronger personality that first got you to snort that first line, that told you it was okay, that it would make you feel better? That the world would love you even more? Is Bobby your Nancy Spungeon? And why won't your publicist tell us what drug you are rehabbing from? We've known all along Whitney; if you're going to go clean then come clean and at least tell us what horse you were riding.

It's snowing today. It's really snowing. We just noticed that the daffodils and tulips that we planted in the fall were starting to poke through the still-frozen ground. I hope they don't freeze to death now. I was excited to see them because our yard is overrun with moles and I was pretty convinced that the moles ate all of the bulbs that we planted in the fall. So now the frost will get what the moles haven't.

I'm pretty much done with winter. I've had my fill. I'm ready for spring and some warmer weather. I'll never be able to fix that mailbox.

I get a LOT of porn e-mail spam at work. It's because my e-mail address is on the Web and spammers can send out spiders to crawl the Web and read e-mail addresses off of Web sites. The company I work for recently tried to filter out porn spam, which resulted in all of our e-mails getting lost, the good with the bad with the porny. They were subsequently able to furnish us all with the e-mail addresses and subject lines of the lost messages, so we could contact the senders to let them know that we didn't recieve that important e-mail they sent.

99% of mine were porn spam.

Because whatever they did didn't work the way it was supposed to, we went back to our old system of letting it all through. I'm quite sure that they are filtering a good portion of the spam already, and I would be getting a lot more if it weren't for the existing system, but it cannot be difficult to set the filters to reject messages with certain words. I am quite sure no one I conduct business with will ever be sending me an e-mail with the word fisting in the subject line. At least not in my present line of work.

So the porn continues to flow in. These are a few of my favorite subject lines from the past weekend:

• OMG, I was tricked by a tranny
  
• Black Booty Banging
  
• Real Homeade Squirting Bloopers
  
• Turn your spud into a stud
  
• Cartoon Hentai Skanks are always sick in bed
  

Driving to work this morning I saw a dog running alongside the road. He was wearing a collar. I could hear it jingling through the closed windows. I wondered where his owners were, and if they knew he was gone, and if so, were they missing him? I wondered if he was running away, or trying to run home.

Dogs are not the smartest animals when it comes to cars and roads. Last summer I hit a dog while driving to work early one Saturday morning. It popped out of nowhere, like a deer leaping from the woods it came out of a band of trees on the side of this back road and darted out into the street. For about 2 seconds it ran alongside my car, but I knew what was coming. I stepped on the brakes but I couldn’t come to a complete stop before the dog darted in front of my car. I wasn’t going very fast, but it was fast enough to launch the dog up into the air and send it rolling head over tail into someone’s front lawn, maybe even the house where it lived. My car finally stopped, but the dog never stopped moving. It eventually spun back up onto its legs and bolted into a field of weeds behind one of the house. I got out of the car but the dog was gone. I don’t think it was limping, but it happened so fast.

I called SweetieKins freaking out. I had hit a dog. I don’t even kill bugs. I pick spiders up and let them out into the backyard. And here I had not only hit the dog but I couldn’t even help it. I was mad at the family for letting their dog run wild. I was mad at the dog for not letting me help it. I was mad at myself for not moving fast enough.

I hope the dog is okay. I hope its family noticed it limping and took it to the vet. I hope I didn’t hurt it, just scare it. I hope I scared the family into taking better care of their pet. Every time I drive down that road I think of that dog at the spot where I hit it.

By the time I got to a place in the road where I could pull over this morning, I saw in my rearview mirror that the dog had veered off the road and was heading into a field. Safe passage little pooch. There’s a biscuit waiting somewhere for you.

Slowing Down

Last night in yoga class I was reminded to appreciate the clarity of slow growth. A new student was lamenting to the teacher how he is becoming frustrated in the class, having been taking the class for several months and noticing how much more advanced some of the other students are. I understand the frustration -- I was there once myself, the inflexible guy in a room full of bodies of seeming rubber. I didn't hear the instructor's response, but as I was driving home I knew what she was saying to him.

Yoga is about the process, not the end result. And the yogic process is slow, glacially slow. I was this guy 10 years ago, when I first started practicing yoga, and I'm still 10 years away from a lot of the people in the class and at least 20 years away from the teacher in terms of ability. But I don't let that bother me. I could drive myself crazy trying to be the person across the room instead of recognizing that where I am is important for me to learn what I need to learn in this moment. Yoga is discovery, and like life, the deepest, most enduring lessons take time and carry both the price tag and reward of commitment. We can all benefit from accepting ourselves in the moment and welcoming the opportunity to change.

The century plant, an elderly couple walking hand-in-hand down the street, the Grand Canyon, homo sapiens, Mount Kilimanjaro, the Dead Sea, the sky.

Tonight I honor my teacher for showing me the grace in advancing slowly and learning to breathe through the challenges. I look forward to the future, and taking my time getting there.

My husband (who shall heretofore be referred to as simply SweetieKins) and I have officially crossed over into white trashdom. Last week our mailbox fell down -- cracked at the base of the wooden post from years of rotting and fell over into the front yard. The mailman drove up, looked at the beaten up mailbox lying on the ground, and drove away. I think it's some kind of law that they are not supposed to leave mail in a box unless it is off the ground. I'm sure somewhere in the annals of post-office bylaws there is a formal written statement to this affect, but the post office people told my husband that they just won't leave the mail unless the box is off the ground.

We went a few days without mail delivery. Normally this wouldn't be such a big deal -- the mail to me is like the phone, unless I'm expecting something I have no use for it when it beckons. But the mail this week was different. We are waiting for several checks, our tax refunds and also a check from the sale of some stocks. So this was a bad week to not have mail. The post office will hold the mail for you for a few weeks (after that I am not sure what happens to it, maybe it gets sent to a dead letter office or finds its way back to its senders) so it wasn't like our checks were just going to disappear or go home with a post office worker. But having to drive across town and wait in line at the post office to get our mail was a pain. And I didn't even do it; that was SweetieKins' task.

I'm getting to the white trash part.

I finally had some time during daylight hours this past weekend to assess the damage and get over to a home depot and fix us up real nice with a new mailbox post. But we live in New England, and despite the apparent softness of the ground from all the late winter rain we have been having, the ground was just to frozen to dig more than a few inches. I couldn't even get the remains of the old post out to dig a new hole to put a new post in.

Realizing the futility of the task, I ended up in the garage looking around for a bucket or something that I could prop the old post up into just to get it standing, something temporary until the ground thawed enough, maybe a few weeks, until i could fix it the right way. Well, we had no buckets, nor anything shaped like a bucket.

But we did have something better. A Christmas tree stand. Now our mailbox sits at the end of our lawn proudly waiting for its first mail delivery. We even had some heavy wind that first night and in the morning it was still standing. I'm so proud I could have my picture made next to it.

The mailman was driving up the road the day I put our "tree" out at the curb. I stopped him and asked him if this would suffice until the ground softened. He assured me that as long as he could reach it from the car, it was fine with him.