Wednesday
Not too bad for midweek. Another fast day.

Finished the last two Philip K. Dick short stories today. I moved on to Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. I saw the movie last year, but didn’t read any of the books. I’m rather enjoying it.

m3lody came to the REC to have dinner with Darren ( – his posts are transcripts of what Goosie, a fellow IRCer, says. We refer to them as “The Gospel according to the Prophet Goosie”); she was talking to Jess when I came outside. She invited us to go to the Dead Goat Saloon with her and a few friends (Beth, Sarah, Jeremy and Robert) to hear local musicians, the Zach Phillips Parrish Band. So we went. It was pretty good. For the longest time, I couldn’t determine of whom it was that Zach Phillips reminded me. Then it came to me: He favored baseball player Rollie Fingers, due to his moustache. But another thought came to mind… The way that he contorted his face when he played and sang, an amendment to the original reference came to mind: He was like the mutant amalgamation of Rollie Fingers and Jim Carrey.

NPR/PRI Programming
The topic of the first hour of Talk of the Nation was Father Loss. The guest for the hour was Neil Chethik, author of FatherLoss: How Sons of All Ages Come to Terms with the Deaths of Their Dads (Hyperion Press, 2001). It mainly dealt with the way that men deal with grief, especially concerning the loss of their father or primary father figure. They also discussed the some of the ways that men and women express their grief differently. One of the things that prompted Mr. Chethik to write the book was the occasion of his grandfather’s funeral. He and his father had gone to his grandfather’s house to clean/clear it out. While they were working, the senior Chethik told his son that his father had never told him that he was proud of him or what he had accomplished; he said that he never wanted his son to have to feel the sense of loss that accompanies that. At that moment, he told his son that he was proud of him.

This segment reminded me of two things and made me aware of something else:

  1. Reminder: Even though my parents divorced when I was young, I have never been at a loss for contact with my father nor for positive father figures. Of course, that’s not something that a child’s mind usually considers. These are the thoughts that come, most often, to a person with the perspective (and, hopefully, the maturity) of adulthood.
  2. Reminder: I miss my grandfather. My father’s father, that is; unfortunately, I never got to meet my mother’s parents. I remember spending some vacations and a few weeks in the summers at my grandparents’ house in West Virginia. I remember watching my grandfather get ready for work (he was a coal miner) in the afternoons and then hearing him come home after midnight. (Yes, I was still awake after midnight. What can I say? I have an indulgent grandmother!) I remember ‘hanging out’ with my grandfather:
    • Trips to the Dairy Queen.
    • The day he bought me a BB gun… much to Grandma’s chagrin.
    • Just sitting around watching TV.
    • Whatever….

    He was a good man. I am glad that I got to know him.

  3. New, or at least ‘more conscious,’ awareness: I am afraid of my parents’ mortality. That’s not an easy thing to admit. Almost no one likes to think of their parents as being less than immortal. Emotionally, we expect them to always be there to help, to guide, to just… be there. Logically, we know that can’t happen, but we put it out of our minds. Such is the paradigm and paradox with which we live.

That’s all for now.

Peace.