Living Man Walking

Dude I know from the gym. Chet The Mean Ass Old Dude. His primary care physician told him he needs to get his affairs’ in order. Yet he keeps hobbling around, showing up at the gym, staring down fate. I see him coming from the shower, I always say something like, “Hey Chet! You look like shit. How ya doing, man?” He always responds with something like, “I’m still upright, Asshole. I just refilled my oxygen tank so I can kick your wimpy ass with ease.”

My gym’s full of old farts so you gotta treat them with respect.

Anyway, this time around I ask him how he’s doing and he looks at me strange. After a pause, he sez, “Let me ask you, Punk. What’s the difference between you and a condemned man on death row in Texas?”

“A Dead Man Walking?”

“Pre…cisely.”

“That’s a good one, Chet. Let me see, ah, how about I’m not behind bars?“

“Strictly speaking that’s true. But behavior is a form of confinement.”

I forgot to tell you Chet used to be an Insurance Adjustor. Then he made a bundle in the Options Market. Then he ran a Cloud company. Something to do with reverse mortgages for terminal patients. Then, I don’t know what he did. He’s old as dinosaur dung….

“Okay, Chet. You got me. What’s the difference between me and a death row prisoner in Texas?”

“Condemned Men in Texas get a date.”

“Wow…does that mean I’m a living man walking?”

“That’s right, Punk. And I plan to be walking a hell of a lot Longer than you.”

Here’s a living man…rowing!!!

My pal Dave, the 85 year old Anchor Out.

Used to be Rowing Champ Of The U.S.A.!!!

Here’s his boat, a real nice Cat Boat. You see it way out there?

Dave rows a half mile in and a half mile back every god damned day. Keeps him in shape. What’s he do on shore? He rides the buses all over hell. From here to The City and back. Up North to San Rafael and Novato. Through the posh woods of Kentfield to San Anselmo. I catch him now and then sitting at this bus bench.

I ask him what the hell? Where you gotta go you need to ride the bus every damned day? He looks at me like I’m a dumb shit which I am. “I like to get out and see stuff!” he shouts. “Listen! I pay 20 bucks a month for a senior’s bus pass lets me ride all day every day unlimited usage. How much you spend in gas every month?”

“Way, way more than 20 bucks.”

“Well?”

“Shit…I guess you get around.”

“And I dont gotta drive!”

I’m thinking I might purchase myself a 20 dollar unlimited use senior’s bus pass.

Behavior Is A Form Of Confinement

I wouldn’t get much use from a senior bus pass.

Me, I like to sit at Starbucks and write blog posts. I guess my world’s a lot smaller than Dave’s. Course, I do have the freedom of Google. I mean, the world is at my finger tips, so to speak.

With the internet I enjoy the freedom of a library.

I remember when I was a kid I’d go to the library and wander down the aisles of books, grab a few off the shelves, find a squat, and spend hours reading random shit like I was some kind of scholar. None of this activity was disciplined. Quite the contrary. I was wandering free through pages and pictures just like Rower Dave rides the buses all damned day looking at stuff, enjoying the scenery.

Sadly, my current activity is not quite so undisciplined.

Nowadays I sit here and scroll the internet. But with a purpose. I’m pursuing specific topics. You might say I’m confined by my behavior.

Death and Politics

One or more of my readers have commented on my themes. I got a reader don’t wanna hear about death all the time. HOW COME YER ALWAYS TALKING ABOUT DEATH, GLOOMY? Shit. It’s like you got a obsession with Death.

Maybe you’re right. I should talk more about life. About the beauty of life. How there’s life all around me. Stop thinking about Death. But I’m seventy two years old. And I’ll be Dead before too long. You could say I’m working my self up to death. Thinking about it kind of as a way of getting used to it. Like a guy on death row sticks his finger in the light socket as a way of getting used to the Electric Chair.

Politics, on the other hand, has become a “grave” matter

The other thing people don’t want to hear me talk about is Politics.

“You’re too Political, Gloomy. I mean, before you were just Gloomy, which sucked. But now on top of being morbid you’re Political. All you do is talk Politics. What’s with you? Cant you write about life, about everyday life? Why you gotta mix Politics into everything?”

“Life is not all about Politics!”

It isn’t?

Well, I gotta tell you. Just like Death is right around the corner…and maybe the nearness of death is why I like to talk about it…on the same token THE END OF OUR DEMOCRACY is also right around the corner.

Trust me, shits getting bad. Real bad. I know I’m beating a dead horse. But the fact remains, shit is getting real bad…Politics here in the U.S.A. has become an assault on a thinking man’s sensibility. Anybody who thinks with his head instead of his ass is naturally transfixed and horrified…and must, in moments of clarity, recoil with derision at how such a huge swath of our country has been conned and exploited for nefarious purposes. That, or else 80 million people in this country are truly bad! I would prefer to believe the former.

And the shit keeps coming. Every day a new Assault. A fresh depravity.

Now it seems all the good people conned into this MAGA cult have produced a Martyr.

FURTHER, The MAGA cultist are in the process, as we speak, of turning this Martyr into a Saint. Just as the Nazi’s made Horst Wessel a saint.

You wanna learn more about Horst Wessel?

Check out this link

Here’s another link

There’s Martyrs and there’s Saints, and often the two are one.

And that’s nice.

I mean it ties everything into a nice package.

But sometimes an alleged martyr is just a tool of the BIG LIE.

Like Horst Wessel.

Like Charlie Kirk.

I’ll let Christopher Titus tell it like it is…

Well, I guess I’ll keep talking about Death and Politics…

What the hell.

I’m just an old dude imprisoned by my behavior.

Maybe things will improve.

Maybe we’ll awaken from this nightmare.

Go back to when people were …well…for want of a better word…nice to each other.

I’m keeping my fingers crossed…