In the 1990s, the band Semisonic had a hit with the song “Closing Time.” I always thought it was about closing time at a bar. Pretty much everyone did.
But according to singer-guitarist Dan Wilson, it’s about something far different. Enjoy this video as he breaks it down verse by verse.
Those who knew me growing up remember the family business, especially the blue-and-gold building on Route 1 in Saugus across from Kappy’s Liquors. The business is closed, but it leaves a lasting legacy.
Mood music:
I’ve been helping my father manage the realty trust that’s been part of the family business, with the objective of selling the building. His eyesight is bad, so I frequently read documents aloud to him. Yesterday was one of those days, and my younger son was there, listening as I read a document that essentially described the history of the business.
On the way home, he said something that floored me: “It seems like such a waste, getting rid of an entire family business.”
I thought about it for a few minutes. Then I told him that some businesses go on for generations, while others have more limited lifespans. But like people, they leave something behind, no matter how many years they were around.
Our family business wasn’t going to go on for generations, as it turns out. None of us kids wanted to take it over. I forged a path in journalism and Internet security; my siblings took their own routes, as well. And with the advent of online shopping, our family business suffered the same fate as many other family operations, as people stopped going to mom-and-pop stores and started spending their money online.
But it wasn’t a waste. It provided the family with a living when it was needed and helped us shape the futures we wanted.
For me personally, the business produced the resources my parents needed to get me the medical care I needed as a child. Later, it provided me with the resources to go to college. I met Erin at college and studied journalism there. Erin and I got married and had kids, and my career is still going strong, 20 years later.
Without the resources of the family business, chances are that none of that would have happened.
The business gave a lot of long-time employees a living to raise their own families with, too.
The stuff my father and stepmom sold — headwear and footwear for weddings and proms, party supplies, wedding invitations, favors, and so on — gave countless customers what they needed to build precious memories.
A waste? Hardly.
This being the day we celebrate the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., I thought it appropriate to share 10 favorite quotes from the man. He didn’t just lead the way on Civil Rights. He led the way on addressing that hole in the soul that caused people to be full of racism and rage to begin with.
It’s that same hole that turns many of us into addicts and bullies. May his words cut through your soul and attack whatever demons that hold you back.
Mood music:
“Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think.”
“The hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who remain neutral in times of great moral conflict.”
“That old law about ‘an eye for an eye’ leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing.”
“We who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive.”
“Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.”
“It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.”
“Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness.”
“An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.”
“Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.”
“We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.”
Over the holidays, there was much outrage over the news that someone stole the Baby Jesus figure from a Nativity scene at Sacred Hearts Parish in Haverhill, leaving a severed pig’s head in its place.
I was among those offended and troubled. It happened on Christmas morning and had all the hallmarks of a hateful act. A lot of people speculated that it was a hate crime. My guess at the time was that it was the work of one or more young punks who needed to be taught a hard lesson.
Yesterday, we learned more about what may have happened.
Mood music:
According to The Eagle-Tribune, police have charged 54-year-old Amarellis Ceremeno — a homeless woman — with the Sacred Hearts vandalism, as well as with the desecration of Iglesia Biblica Bautista (Bible Baptist Church), where she allegedly wrote “666” on the church multiple times.
The anger I felt has been replaced by feelings of pity. The woman reportedly suffers from serious mental illness, and police said she has an obsession with religion.
Early speculation was that someone had butchered a pig specifically so they could leave its head in the Nativity scene. But police told the newspaper that the pig’s head was probably discarded by someone who had cooked a pig for Christmas Eve. Police were reportedly informed that it’s customary for some in the Latino community to roast pigs on Christmas Eve and that Ceremeno may have found the pig’s head in the trash early Christmas Day.
This is a sad story from start to finish.
Fortunately, it looks like police and political leaders are doing their best to withhold judgement. I think we should do the same.
Mayor James Fiorentini told WCVB Channel 5 that the incident illustrates the need for better mental health assistance for homeless residents.
“I know this lady personally, as I’ve indicated to the press before. She’s a frequenter of the mayor’s office, and we hope she gets the help that she needs,” he said.
Mental illness drives people to dark places. I’m proof of that. Fortunately, I’ve been blessed with plenty of help along the way.
May it be the same for Ceremeno.
Amarellis Ceremeno, 54, of Haverhill, whom police list as homeless, at her appearance in Haverhill District Court last month. Photo by Paul Bilodeau/The Eagle-Tribune
“One day at a time? You wouldn’t believe the crap that swirls around my head one day at a time.”–Anonymous
Recovering addicts have a saying burned into their brains: “one day at a time.” It’s important wisdom to live by. But when the recovering addict has OCD, there’s a big problem.
Mood music:
In the world of 12-step recovery programs, the idea of “one day at a time” is not to be overwhelmed. Instead of trying to get your arms around everything necessary for recovery inside of a week or a month or a year, we subscribe to the idea of just focusing on what we have to do today. Doing this a day at a time makes the clean-up tasks seem a lot less overwhelming.
It’s a good way to be in all aspects of life. Plan for the future, but stay focused in the present.
The problem with an OCD case is that the disorder forces you to do nothing but stew over the future. You look at the next week or the next month and relentlessly play out the potential outcomes.
The first time someone told me to take it a day at a time, my instinct was to punch him in the face. I had a business trip three weeks away to worry about. I had a medical test scheduled for the following month and had all kinds of potentially grim outcomes to worry about.
That’s how guys like me roll.
Still, I decided to give “one day at a time” a chance. I even took a class of mindfulness-based stress reduction to that end.
I learned that it absolutely is the best way to go about life. When I’m able to focus on the present, I’m happy and successful.
But I’ve also learned that it’s hard as hell to pull off. My OCD often reasserts itself and I dive back into long-term worries, which lead to present-day failures.
The whole concept fell to ashes this past autumn as I slipped into one of the deeper depressions I’ve had in a long time. The depression has lifted significantly, but I remain scattered.
This past weekend I was so all over the place that my lapse from mindfulness became too big to overlook, and I find myself looking for ways to get it back. I feel like Bill the Cat from the “Bloom County” comic strip: flopping about and yelling “Ack!”
I played guitar both weekend days, which helped. More daily walks would help, too. It might also do me a world of good to go to confession sometime this month. Emptying the trash that builds up in the soul is a good way to move on.
In a perfect world, I would probably do well to take a refresher course in mindfulness. But this isn’t a perfect world, and there’s no time or money for such an endeavor.
Somewhere in my house is the packet of papers I collected during the mindfulness course. I plan to tear the place apart until I find it.
Stay tuned.
Thirty-one years ago this week, my older brother Michael died at age 17. I felt the need to write something to mark the anniversary. But to be honest, I didn’t know what to say.
Part of that is because I wrote the whole “how his death affected me” post three years ago in “Death of a Sibling.” I also delved into the lighter memories — the outrageous and hilarious shit he used to pull — in “Celebrating a Lost Sibling.”
Then yesterday, during my 45-minute drive to the office, I was chuckling over a crack my oldest son made at my expense a few days ago.
“You know, Dad,” he said, staring at the Superman S on the T-shirt I was wearing, “you look like Superman, 20 years after saving the Earth, with more gray hair and more than a few extra pounds.”
I have the same, serrated brand of snark. I’ll scold him to teach him manners and respect, but I’m usually laughing inside. More often than not, I laugh aloud, which admittedly defeats the purpose of scolding him in the first place.
Truth is, I also enjoy it because it reminds me of my brother.
It’s funny how life works. Sean is named for a best friend and surrogate brother who died some years ago. But he’s sounding and looking more like my real brother all the time.
Like Michael, Sean has a unibrow and the start of some whiskers above his upper lip. He’s tall and lanky, the way Michael was before he started weight lifting in his early teens. His hair grows wild, the way Michael’s did, though the latter tried to control it with frequent hair cuts. Sean prefers a shaggy head.
There are some distinct differences between Sean and the uncle he never met, however. Michael was studying to be a plumber at the time of his death. He enjoyed the art of putting pipes together in just the right formation, allowing water to flow. Sean prefers putting LEGOs and robotic machinery together.
Sean is a Boy Scout, a choice his uncle — and dad, for that matter — would never have made. Sean is also more cautious and refined than Michael was. Sean hates his braces but hasn’t pulled them off with a pair of pliers like his uncle did the same day his mouth metal was installed. Years later, my brother’s act of rebellion is the stuff of treasured family lore. But Sean knows better than to try such a thing.
Differences aside, the similarities are hard to miss.
That makes me happy.
I’ve been releasing posts as part of a project where I put my feelings to images created by artist and infosec pro Eddie Mize, more popularly known as EddieTheYeti.
The project will continue indefinitely, but here’s a compilation of what’s been done so far. Think of it as chapter 1.
Mood music:
I sucked at a lot of things as a kid, but I could draw. It was the one thing that always got me compliments from people who otherwise ridiculed me. Those drawings were an exercise in emotion. A good example of that is the Paul Revere Owl of Rage I wrote about a while back. Writing eventually replaced drawing, though I’ve maintained a life-long appreciation for art that captures emotion. Which brings me to Eddie Mize, also known as EddieTheYeti.
Every year, I have trouble finding my Christmas spirit. I’ve written a lot about why that is, and 2014 was no different. But I feel like God is throwing me more clues than usual. One such clue came as I was reviewing some works from Eddie Mize.
Here’s the thing about remorse: You can’t change what’s in the past. You can let the memories rip you apart, or you can learn from the experiences and invest it in being a better person.
Instead of fighting some mental disorders, such as OCD or ADHD, picture yourself accepting and even embracing them. Then learn to use your disorder to your advantage.
For those who don’t experience or understand depression, it can be hard to understand the duration of someone’s melancholy and why, after a while, they can’t just snap out of it.
Seeking and giving forgiveness is essential if you want to become a better person. But it’s hard and often seen as a green light for more abuse.
I had a vicious temper when I was younger. To call it a byproduct of OCD, depression and addiction would be pushing it, because I think the temper would have been there even without the mental illness.
“Relief Valve” by EddieTheYeti
The band Five Finger Death Punch has a new video for the song “Wrong Side of Heaven,” which focuses on the plight of homeless veterans. It struck a chord with me.
Mood music:
I’m not a veteran, but I have scores of friends and colleagues who are. They are respected and thriving. But there are many who aren’t so lucky.
The plight of homeless veterans is an old story, and it highlights American hypocrisy. We have holidays honoring our vets, and when we see veterans we thank them for their service — especially those who served in the second World War.
But when we see homeless people — many of whom fought in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan — we treat them like vermin.
We let so many of them live on the streets, without proper shelter or medication for the mental illnesses they caught from watching comrades get ripped apart on the battlefield.
We look down at these vets every day as lazy, crazy, smelly vermin who prowl the streets scaring our children. We have no idea of what they’ve been through to get so scarred, and a lot of us don’t really care, even if we say we do.
This video nails that reality.
We can do better.
I used to exercise a lot. In my teens, I’d spend an hour a day on a beat-up rowing machine. In my 20s, I’d hit the gym seven days a week to use the elliptical cross-trainer machines. And in my early 30s, I’d walk 3.5 miles a day, no matter the weather.
At some point I stopped.
Mood music:
I don’t have a good reason why I stopped exercising. I told myself that I was becoming obsessive about exercise, but I’m pretty sure I was bullshitting myself.
I did manage to keep my weight down through diet alone for a few years, using the standard Overeaters Anonymous food plan of no flour and no sugar and weighing out all my food.
I still try to live by that food plan, but along the way I’ve grown inconsistent. I’ve slowly determined that the full OA experience isn’t for me. I particularly soured on the idea of having sponsors who dictate my every culinary move. Giving other people that much control over me hasn’t worked in the long run.
I used those feelings as an excuse to get sloppy and have only hurt myself as a result.
I slipped on old addictive impulses last year, and I have the weight gain to prove it. Prednisone didn’t help, but I used that as an excuse for months after I stopped taking it.
In any event, I currently feel like a disgusting mess. I don’t care about being thin. I do care about getting winded every time I climb stairs.
I didn’t wait for the New Year to start fighting back. I refocused on careful eating in November. And a couple weeks ago, after determining that diet was no longer enough, I started working out again on a cheap elliptical machine I bought last year.
I want to tell you I’m enjoying it, that I can’t go a day without a workout. I especially want to do so because I have so many friends who passionately post about their marathon running, weight lifting and Brazilian jiujitsu sessions. But the truth is I don’t enjoy it, and I never have. It bores me, frankly.
But it’s necessary, so onward I go.
My mission is to be consistent: to use the machine for 40 or so minutes as least five days a week and to supplement it with walking.
As I relearn the discipline of exercise, I thank God for music. When I put on some Black Label Society, Pantera or Thin Lizzy, I’m able to go on autopilot and plow ahead.
I have the added motivation of knowing that I’m very similar to my father. Like him, I’m a life-long overeater. He’s now bedridden and in failing health. If I don’t change my ways, I’ll meet a similar fate.
I respect my more athletic friends more than ever. The joy you get from your chosen method of training is something I aspire to. I don’t know if I’ll ever get there, but I will get healthier. And I’ll have you to thank for leading the way.
We all have dysfunctional friends and family. In some respects, they add color and fun to our lives. But sometimes you find yourself up against that special someone who constantly complains about others and puts you down. We want to accept the latter as much as we accept the former. But there’s a problem.
Mood music:
The latter group — we’ll call them the toxic people — rub off on you. Their toxic tirades seep into your pores until you either (a) get sick with worry because of all the rumors you’ve been fed or (b) end up as a toxic complainer yourself. When you get this way, you will surely bring other people down.
As a Catholic, I’ve been taught that we have to love and accept everyone, regardless of their flaws. Unless, of course, they are a pro-choice Democrat.
Political jokes aside, the line about acceptance makes perfect sense. Love is supposed to win out against hate. I badly want to believe it. But I’ve also learned from experience that it simply can’t always work that way. If someone insists on vomiting verbal toxins every time you have a chance to converse, you have to cut them lose before they poison your soul.
That’s the inconvenient truth about toxic people. You want to love them because you know that, deep down, there’s a good heart beating away. But if you stand too close, you’ll adopt the very qualities in them that you despise.
Don’t let it happen.
If you have a toxic person in your life, cut them lose. Not because you’re selfish and you can’t handle the pressure, but because you have to stay strong for yourself and many others.
Life is too hard and too short to be dealing with negative souls. Pray for them because you want them to be happy and more pleasant to be around. But do so from a distance.
