I have a confession to make that, no surprise, puts me far outside the mainstream of current thought.

I hate memes.

I hate memes for the same reason I hate clichés: they are lazy. Well, I don't know if they are lazy so much as the person using them is. 

But...now that I've admitted that, I'll also admit to having been inspired by one. This one:

 

I saw that on the facebook page of one of my friends, whose page seems to generally consist of nothing but memes, and I read it, paused, and went on to something else. Then, about 3 days later, I woke up at precisely 6:10am (unusually early for me), and I had this thought coming out of whatever dream I'd just had:

If you are perplexed by what decision to make with some pressing issue in your life, the answer should always be:  

Choose Love. 

And if that answer doesn't fit, then neither the question, nor the answer, are really all that important.

A Valen-timely message for my girl

I realized the other day, as I heard someone pontificating at great length, that the longer someone talks, the less I hear them.

And later, as I was reveling in my proud observation, I pondered it further to realize that it's also true of food - the longer I eat something that I really love, the less I appreciate it.

I went on to realize it applies to a great many things - when I bought my first house, I remember sitting in my car in the driveway and looking up at it in wonder; when I first buy a car, I love admiring it and discovering new things I love about it; when I stare at beautiful scenery, same thing; but eventually in each case the beauty and my wonder and my admiration begins to fade.

But...I then went on to realize that the longer I live, the more I like it and the less I take it for granted...and the more I want of it.

And the longer I'm a dad, the more I recognize after 21 years of it, that it's my favorite thing ever.

And most importantly, the longer I am married to Cheryl McVickar, the more I appreciate and admire her, the more I discover more reasons I love her, the less I take her for granted and the more I realize that she is my favorite person ever.

I love you, Cheryl McVickar. Happy Valentine's Day!

Thus the Title

With Election Day getting closer and closer, and the anticipation and excitement building and building, I found myself thinking about how, as much as I am enjoying the build-up - the latest news impacting my side as either a pro or a con, and the daily reports of the latest polling, and tracking it closely every single day on spreadsheets and in conversations with like-minded friends, I mostly just wish so much that Election Day would hurry the heck up and get here.

But then I thought about the feeling I get afterwards and the loss of that excitement and anticipation and how quickly I revert back to my day-to-day routine, with only an afterglow and the memory of what a really, really good time it was, the leadup and the actual climax of seeing the voting results in the races where my team was successful in its conquest and accomplishing their goal.

And it struck me how similar politics, sports and sex are.

Don't plan to be again in my 70's though

I heard a weather report the other day that called for tomorrow's temperatures to be high in the 70's, and I thought, well, how about that. So was I on occasion.

I mean other than sex?

Is there anything that fascinates humans as much as other humans?

life again imitating art

My Dad used to tell us that the biggest challenge in watercoloring was convincing yourself to stop.

It struck me recently that the exact opposite is true of getting to the gym.

Ain't life grand?

We can use colors to clash horribly or merge beautifully.

We can use words to express opinions that make people turn ugly and defensive or we can use them to make beautiful poetry or literature.

We can watch a human being walk into a school and rip 17 kids to shreds with bullets and hate and in a matter of minutes, lifetimes will be impacted forever, sometimes in immediate death, sometimes in emotional scars that last a lifetime.

We can look outside and see delicate snowflakes gently floating down to earth juxtaposed against a background of the pink buds of a tree in mid-April bloom.

Thus is the beauty, ugliness and confusion that surrounds us and challenges us everyday.