Rubber Band Ball

In the kitchen junk drawer (does everyone have one of those?) sits a rubber band ball that has grown just larger than a baseball. I found a purple rubber band from the asparagus on the table and stretched it around the ball. As usual, I thought of The Mickey Mouse Make-It Book from which came the idea to make a rubber band ball. I was six then. We didn't have hundreds of rubber bands in the house. Not being able to make the ball immediately, I gave up.

Fifteen years ago I wrapped a couple rubber bands around some used aluminum foil. I added bands as I found them. The ball grew but lacked bounce because of the foil core shortcut. I tossed it in the bin as a thing begun badly, but the idea lingered.

When the kids outgrew them I packed my Mickey Mouse books in a tote but lingered over The Make-It Book. I saw the things I had made. Some worked, others not so much, and one, the rubber band ball, still called to me.

I wound two rubber bands together to form a tiny ball. I added the half dozen bands lying in the junk drawer. I added rubber bands as I found them, winding each tightly around the core. Sometimes I thought of the book, the aluminum foil failure, the idea of what I was making, but mostly I wound the band I happened to have around the ball in the drawer.

In my basement nook is the tote of comics and Mickey Mouse books. Without digging into it for the Make-It Book I remember most every page, especially the rubber band ball project. In the white space I should write that these things take time, patience, and the art of forgetting, letting go. My grandchildren would do well to learn that, but maybe such things can't come straight out of a book.

Fast Food

Seventeen years ago I stopped eating fast food. I had a quarter pounder with cheese, super-size fries and Coke for dinner with my mother-in-law. My wife was in the hospital with our four-day-old daughter. I was tired and in no mood to cook. McDonalds seemed the right choice. We ate at the restaurant that used to be on the university hill near the hospital, visited my wife and baby, and went home to sleep. By eight o'clock I knew something was wrong. By ten I was camped on the bathroom floor.

At about 1:30 on the morning of the 29th I told myself, "I will never eat fast food again." By three or four I was able to shower and sleep a few hours before returning to the hospital where they discharged my wife but kept our daughter one more day. Leaving our daughter was even worse than food poisoning. I was still recovering from that and remembering what I had told myself.

It's no surprise I would swear off fast food when I was on the bathroom floor unable to move six feet away from a toilet. The surprise is that I've never gone back to McDonald's, Burger King, Taco Bell, or Wendy's. Not even for a french fry or Shamrock Shake. I stopped cold and I don't miss it.

I'd like to tell you I'm super-healthy now but I try not to lie here. I'm still twenty pounds overweight, still likely to finish a bag of chips once I open them, still drinking more alcohol than I should, still eating too much sugar. I'm no paragon of virtue. I've just quit fast food for so long I can't imagine eating it again.

Years ago I bought Twinkies, not having had one in years and remembering how I had loved them. I bit into the first one and chewed a couple of times before it registered: this thing is terrible. I swallowed that bite with a question mark on my face and took another. I couldn't remember ever having not finished a Twinkie. My school lunch bag always held knock-off snacks. When I got hold of real Twinkies, I damn well ate them. But the second bite was disgusting too. It wasn't stale or moldy — I doubt Twinkies can grow mold. It simply didn't taste like food. I spit out that second bite and threw the second Twinkie away still wrapped in its package. I've no desire to try again.

After seventeen years, it's the same with fast food. I just don't want it any more.

I need to figure out what day I dropped Facebook. My guess is that seventeen years from now I'll have little taste left for social media. I hope that I'm healthier for it. I really thought I'd shed a few pounds without all those quarter pounders, super size fries, and super size Coca-Cola. Damn.

80th Birthday

It is my father's eightieth birthday though he's no longer here to celebrate. He died in 2015, so we won't have cake, the girls won't make cards, and we've bought no present. Yesterday Mom said, "tomorrow will be a hard day. It's the thirteenth." Dad's birthday, as if I could forget. Dates matter to me. There was no way I wouldn't remember his birthday. I've been thinking about it for weeks, but I've been looking forward to it.

The day will be difficult for Mom as are the anniversary of his death, their wedding anniversary, and even her birthday, the milestones of him being gone from her. I think of him on the anniversary of buying his business and at the start of Syracuse Women's Basketball season. For Mom these days are filled with sadness. They play out differently within me.

I'm grateful today. As the years pass Dad's memory takes up less and less space. This sad fact is inescapable: the dead pass away. All the calendar days still occupied by my memories of him, these are chances to come back to Dad, to have him come back to me. I'll spend much of today thinking of my kids and wife, the weather, my job, my brother and mother, and whatever is in the news, but I'll have Dad with me and smile because there's one thing about his death that comforts me.

Dad forever remains for me as he was. Aside from the heart attack that felled him, he was healthy and whole. His eyesight was being restored. He got around well and could drive. He was strong and able if not so much as he once had been. He took care of himself and others. All of which is to say that he never suffered a decline, something he would have hated. Dad was able and capable for all his life. Were he here now to reflect on things he would nod and call his a good ending.

Still, I miss him and wish he was here to celebrate, but my wish is mostly selfish. I want him to behold my daughters and hear the sweet voice of his beloved daughter in law. I want him to have a few more hours at the garage with my brother and their cars. I want him at home with Mom doing the simple, routine things of their lives, the ordinary magic of life together. And I want to take him to a basketball game, sit beside him, and not need to say a damn thing, just cheer and be together.

These are my greedy dreams. They fall apart when I consider having to again say goodbye to him. Instead, today, his birthday, I say hey, Dad. He doesn't need to say anything back. He never had to. Though often enough the words he said to me sounded exactly like, I love you, son and they still do.

A Little Easier

Sat last night with four guys sipping whiskey late into the night talking politics. We're mystified how anyone could vote for the awful orange liar, but mostly discussed how Democrats should support a simple proposition: It should be just a little easier for all Americans to realize economic security. We weren't talking about wealth. Every one of us has kids who are about to go to college. We just want to be able to make that happen without burdening them with crushing debt. None of us feel like we can make that happen. This is a huge part of what's wrong with our country.

One guy referred to an Aaron Sorkin West Wing episode in which a character suggests things should be a little easier:

I never imagined at $55,000 a year, I'd have trouble making ends meet. And my wife brings in another 25. My son's in public school. It's no good. I mean, there's 37 kids in the class, uh, no art and music, no advanced placement classes. Other kids, their mother has to make them practice the piano. You can't pull my son away from the piano. He needs teachers. I spend half the day thinking about what happens if I slip and fall down on my own front porch, you know? It should be hard. I like that it's hard. Putting your daughter through college, that's-that's a man's job. A man's accomplishment. But it should be a little easier. Just a little easier. 'Cause in that difference is... everything. I'm sorry. I'm, uh, I-I'm Matt Kelley.

Matt apologizes because it's unseemly to complain in America. If you're not succeeding, you haven't worked hard enough. That's the National Anthem of our economic country.

Hogwash.

The Democrats' message must be relentlessly positive and absolve Matt Kelley, my friends, and me of guilt. The message must be that if we work hard and save honestly, the game will be made more fair for us and, more importantly, for our children. Every human being in this country deserves a fair chance of reaching for the American dream, no apologies necessary.

Democrats don't need to oppose the tribe of liars across the aisle. They need only work toward restoring fairness, demanding equity, and helping us provide for our own. The United States has sheltered the wealthy for so many years, it is time to take care of those on whom the wealth has been built.

I'll keep thinking about this.