The Life Fix

Kids today have a generationally-expectant "LOLspeak" phrase, "FML" or "f" my life. And while I am nowhere near the point where that sentiment would be even remotely accurate, with the constant and ever-ramping up of contention in today's society, the child-like bickering of our national leaders, and the general unsettling in virtually every facet of life, I really am getting tired of it all.

Now fear not, there is no garden-hose-in-the-gas-tank in my future. There is however a big change a commin', because I have always been a huge believer that, while we are expected to struggle and overcome during our time here on earth, the God of my/your/our choice surely meant this to also be a time and place of great joy and excitement and of wanting anticipation about the coming day; and quite frankly, I haven't felt that in quite some time.

And I don't think I'm alone.

Therefore, as today is Hump Day, the day we here at The Lounge find something and "fix" it, today we are going to describe exactly how to fix...life.

Step 1: HAVE A REASON TO GET UP
I find having both a long term and a short term purpose most effective; the long term provides me a structure on which to base my beliefs and priorities, the short term helping to provide motivation and those priorities, to optimize productivity.

For me, the long term is my faith. If you do not subscribe to a particular spiritual belief, it could be planning a trip to the next Summer Olympics or retiring comfortably before you turn 60. (And yeah, if you're looking for a good spiritual path, I'd be happy to share mine, because it rocks).

The short-term could include anything from making your monthly nut or putting your kids through college, to things as basic (yet still important) as making a difference in your community or keeping a perpetual smile of the face of your Significant Other. Whatever it is that will motivate you each and every day and help you to buzz through that ever-changing list of tasks that will get you there.

Step 2: BUY A TANDEM BICYCLE
Life was not meant to be lived alone. To the contrary, I believe that a life suffered alone is not lived at all, but merely experienced, and even then, not fully. This does not suggest that if you find a partner with whom you share a mortgage, a bed, and turns taking out the trash that you are sharing your life. That means you have a roomate.

Find someone who means more to you than anything or anyone on the planet, and to whom you mean just as much. That is not to say that this person will override your love and priority for your children or your own individual interests (or you theirs), but rather that it will be important for them (and you) to be a part of the others. And no, this will not require your S.O. to be a part of everything you do, or visa versa; that would insure disaster and this is not a lecture for Co-Dependents Anonymous. What it means is that you want them to be a part of most of the elements of your life and for those activities that are yours alone, you're excited to tell your loved one about it...because you know they'll be interested.

Often in today's society, I think people get married for the wrong reasons; not wanting to be alone or needing to feel loved among the most common, and the most likely to end in heartache. There is nothing wrong with wanting to not be alone or wanting to feel loved. But make sure that you and your prospective paramour share common interests. Know that laughter you share now isn't forced, and that the "little things" you presume you'll get over or aren't a big deal won't end up as dealbreakers. Does this person criticize everything you do, or are they always making corrections about even the smallest thing? Are you always being told you need to pay attention because you never remember a conversation correctly? These attributes don't make this person a bad human being, not at all. But if you find yourself biting your tongue a lot, or needing to rationalize things this person does , it most likely means the two of you would be much better off being good, close, respectful friends and not looking to run off into eternity together.

3. REDUCE THE GUEST LIST
Neighbors. Family. Church Members. Co-Workers. Little League Parents. Spinning Classmates at the Gym. Now that you have set the priorities and goals in your life and you have someone with whom to share the journey, you need to free up some time and space so that you can not only reach your goals, but enjoy the ride. The old axiom says: "if you try to do two things at once, you will either do both poorly or neither well", and I couldn't agree more.

I am not suggesting you lead a "tunnel vision" life, focusing on one singular interest. If however, you find you need to have a bi-weekly meeting to coordinate schedules and rearrange your personal activities, chances are you have too much on your plate and nothing that you do accomplish will be anywhere near it's optimum level.

Do you have a dozen "best friends" in your church, or is it more like two couples that you really enjoy spending time with and ten others who are the "cool folk" that you just want to hang with? Do you have time (or even really want) to coach the youth soccer team this season, or are you merely afraid you'll look like an uninvolved parent if you beg off for a year? Do you head to the gym three days a week because you want to get yourself (and keep yourself) healthy and in shape or because of the really groovy people you've met there?

You have a have person at the top of your totem pole, and of course you each have your own friends to whom the other has no or little interest or involvement. But the two of you have a few close friends you like being with and maybe a couple of rug rats and all that comes along with them, and sure, you have to make an appearance at the company picnic, the Pee-Wee Football Fund Raiser and your annual high school reunion.

Do yourself a favor. Get a 3x5 card and write down a dozen or so plausible excuses why you can't make it to all 27 Christmas parties, serve on the next committee, or head over to your brother's house every weekend when he breaks out the bar-b-que. You have a life, and you have already determined who you want to share the bigger portion of that life with. Try to be a friend to and accommodate everyone, you're either going to be a poor friend to all of them, or not a very good friend to any of them.

STEP 4. GET OUT OF THE RACE
Plasma. iPod. Prius. Telluride. The E Series. There is nothing wrong with wanting nice things, until it gets to the point where you are so busy and angst-ridden trying to pay for it all, you don't have time to enjoy any of it. So, quit trying to keep up with the Joneses (except this one, because I'm easy!) and start being a much happier you.

Here are a few tips:
* You can get a nice 32" flat-screen plasma for around $400. If you need bigger, you're just compensating for something else that is smaller and hey, we love ya anyway.
* Let the bottle-bleach blonde with the new chest and inflatable lips down the block do the 8mpg SUV thing. If you need to cart your starting five to practice every day, save yourself 20k and hook up with a Dodge Grand Caravan; 22 mpg, roomy as all get-out @ half the price with tons of fun extras. Or just stick with the beat up Chevy step-side. The kids'll think it's cool to ride around town in the back anyway.
* The Touch Screen-iPod-Fantasy-Turbo-Mobile....IT'S A PHONE!!!! Please tell me when it because necessary for everyone to be accessible, 24/7, to every information and communication medium known to man? I swear, I am this close to proposing an amendment to the Constitution to make it illegal for a mobile phone to BE anythng but a mobile phone. TWO Motorola Moto340 phones - from Verizon - FREE. 1700 anytime minutes, no roaming charge, picture mail, unltd photo and txt mssging - $89.99/mo.
* You don't ski, catch cold easy, and suffer for vertigo. So why did you pay 12% over market for your "winter place" outside of Aspen? There are some very nice vacation spots...uh...anywhere in the world, with no leaky roofs or out of season vandalism to worry about. And if this summer comes quicker than you expected and you don't think you'll be able to afford the trip you've been promising, just put it on the Underhill's American Express card. Want the number?

Step 5. Burn The Mortgage
I don't mean to your home, although if you can make that one extra payment a year (which you should be able to easily now that you've gotten rid of all the CRAP in your life), you'll be able to torch that puppy in half the time and save yourself about 100k.

This step in about burning the mortgage to your life, because now YOU OWN IT! I'm dead serious Lounge Lizards, most of what I've proposed takes nothing more than a couple of hours of clear, uninterrupted thought and the unfortunate realization that far too many of us believe we exist on this big ball of dirt only because a few decades ago, our parents had too much tequilia.

Now I certainly do not claim to have all the answers. In fact, while I have a few of these things already figured out, more of them need, if not a do-over, then a serious remodel. But after literally months of deep-seeded soul searching, long nights that have lasted well into that coming day of prayer, and acceptance of the hard to accept, what I do know is this...

Give me a true and loving and righteous God with a fail-safe plan, a good, honest, vibrant, positive woman who will allow me to love and respect her and who can love and respect me right back, a vocation with which I can make a positive difference in the world, a couple of ankle biters to love and raise and worry about, a safe home in which we can all live, a few very good friends to enjoy every once in a while, a healthy dose of humility, the first three Jackson Browne lp's, and a DVD of Nicklaus winning the '86 Masters, and I'm a happy camper.

Because gratefully, I have learned, that when I am gone from this Earth and standing in line at the Pearly Gates, waiting to be judged...

all the rest of it will not have made a darn bit of difference.

Monday Recap

MANY OUTSTANDING MOMENTS during Granpda Weekend. Aiden hangin' with Huck; like Rick and Louis at the end of Casablanca, the beginning of a beautiful friendship. The heart-melting smile the first time the little cowboy turned the light switch off by himself (it doesn't take much to entertain a 10 month old). The classic Bubblebath/Rubber Ducky Hour to bring a quiet end to each day. But for this extended four-day weekend, nothing topped the precursor to yesterday's mid-morning nap. 10:30 hits and like clockwork, a rabid case of the "crankies" set in...imagine Chucky having a really bad day. But a diaper change and a chilled bottle of 2010 Infamil Private Reserve...which usually sends him right into Sandmanland and...Mr. Cranky Pants still wants more. So, I fix him another bottle and when I return, he's not the least bit interested; instead, perfectly content to lay in my arms and have me rock him to sleep with a couple of less-than-stellar James Taylor covers, Long Ago and Far Away and Sweet Baby James. Fortunately, the lad has no musical ear yet, so my ick-apella lullabys were enough to put him to sleep...and I got to walk around the rest of the day with a case of the uber-warm fuzzies...

THE OSCARS FOR this family is as follows: didn't watch it, weren't all that interested in who won. I remember back in the days when Oscar Night was a "big" deal; in fact maybe the first actual "Must See TV". Mostly I remember the hosts. I recall Bob Hope when I was younger, then the Carson Years of the late 70's/early 80's, followed by the Billy Crystal/Whoopi Goldberg 90's, probably the longest stretch of great Oscar nights, highlighted of course by Crystal's opening sequences that were always funnier and more creative than any of the movies nominated. If the Academy was smart, they'd pay Crystal whatever he wanted, give him 100% control and sign him to a lifetime contract. As for last night, my thanks to gal pal Patty Santin for her live updates via FB chat while I was sitting at the keyboard catching up on work I put off to spend the last four days with Mr. Smiley Face...

AL GORE DEPT: Here in IF, two years ago we had our last substantial snowfall on June 11. Last year, May 21. Yesterday, March 7, was our third consecutive day with temps over 35 and the second in a row over 40, and in every yard on our street, it was hard to find more than a melting snowman's worth of the white stuff. Being a NoCal boy, I'm as happy as Tiger Woods in a hotel room full of b-cup bleach blondes, but I am wondering how the anti-GW crowd will explain this one. Maybe passing it off as a reasonable result from all the extra driving we've been doing since our community-minded friends at the oil companies lowered pump prices to less than $3 a gal? Uh....yeah! I am sure the eco-folks are glad the guys at ExMob are finally starting to see the light...

NEXT UP, MARCH MADNESS: Today, my 13 year old heads back to school, while the 11, 15, and 17 year olds have the day off. Reason: The elementary and high schools on this side of the Snake are on Trimesters, while the Junior High, located directly next to and across the street, respectively, from each, is on a Semester schedule. Public Education at its finest...Always a day late and several million dollars short, our local, county, and state governments, along with a couple of dozen large corps are hosting a mini economic summit and jobs faire at the Civic Aud. here in IF today. Among the scheduled speakers will be Idaho Governor Butch Otter and IF Mayor Jared Fuhriman. Coming on the heels of last week's Labor Dept. announcement that new job losses were 7.2% less than expected last month, do ya think if they'd had job faires like this all over the US two years ago, we might have avoided this whole economic slump all together? Personally, I think if the gov required the banks to either lend every last cent of bailout money to businesses for expansion or give it back, with interest, we'd have all been back in black months ago...Final madness of the month: my good friend Stacy Beintema, late of arch rival Foothill High in Pleasanton and the Grupe Co. of Stockton, CA, where in 1984 she lured me into the maelstrom of property management when I began my slow departure from the peace and quiet of the rock and roll biz, turns...a year older...on the 15th. Once again, the Ides have it, and I'd say she's doing ok. A retired SJCO cop for a hub (and a fabo guy in his own right), two awesome kids (one war hero and one recent Fresno St. grad who is taking the "girls always fall in love with men just like their daddy" WAY too seriously), and a fulfilling career helping people stay alive at the American Cancer Society. Not bad for a salty (not) old gal who still doesn't look a day over 35. Happy Birthday, B...

THIS WEEKEND WAS also my brother Bob's 48th birthday. He, his lovely wife Susan, and their daughter Alex celebrated a week early in Maui, where they took a much needed vaca. Not surpisingly, I received notice on their 3rd day in paradise that they had been "Bartmaned" again. It seems everytime these two leave the continental US, disaster ensues. Nine years ago, nary a month after their wedding, they hopped a honeymoon flight to Ireland (the lengths my lil' bro will go to play a new golf course!). In the middle of their trip...9-11. Last Saturday, it was the Chilean earthquake and the very real, albeit temporary, threat of tsunami waves overrunning the islands. In the end it was an oddly enjoyable afternon for them and the thousands of other tourists bunking beachside to pack up, cart their rental cars up to high ground and watch the tide come in and out until the all-clear was given. The NTSB has politely requested the next time they are looking for a get away spot, they should try Kansas. Happy Brithday, Bubba...

AND SO ANOTHER week begins. Senioritis has already started setting in on school teachers (along with some students), geese are starting to head back to Canada, ticked they missed the Olympics, and I'm sticking pins in voodoo dolls of my friends back in Cali who are enjoying their home golf courses while, because of the snow that remains, I'm lucky to scare up a good game of Wii Golf. But we live, we love and we pray for the best, all the while remembering how blessed we are just to be able to experience the madness.