A Common Sense of Humor

Things I Should Do More Often

-Run far
-Make tons of money and spend it/give it away each day
-Get up ten minutes earlier and pack a damned lunch
-Partake in "drawing contests" when my 8 year old begs it
-Go to soil service and find out what kills my grass every summer
-Listen to my own advice and leave my moody 13 year-old alone
-Watch the Daily Show with Jon Stewart

I've been preaching centrism and moderation for most of my adult life, and, thusly, have never really felt much of an allegiance to either political party. About a year ago, I wrote:

"Conservatives spit at Liberals...Liberals spit at Conservatives. Whatever doesn't hit one side in the face falls into the middle, and I make it my politics by sifting through the mud in the middle to find some rational understanding of the human heart and brain. Most of the time, I find solace in the middle. I can rationalize and empathize with the greatest rationalizers and empathizers in history...Most notably musicians, poets, comedians and huggers (not trees, but huggy people)."

That was in light of the big hubbub over schools not airing Obama's speech to school children. I could be wrong, but I think more and more people are joining me in the mud. The proverbial Pelosis and Palins keep on spitting across the political Mason Dixon line. Increasingly, the mud somehow seems the cleanest place to stand.

Nudging the muddied troops in the ribs with a big shit-eating grin is Jon Stewart.

Stewart plans his D.C. "Rally To Restore Sanity" as a not-so tongue in cheek tip of the cap to Glen Beck and is laying the common sense ground rules with sign suggestions that make me grin, really big.

-"Take it down a notch for America"
- "I'm not afraid of Muslims, Tea Partiers, Socialists, Immigrants, Gun Owners or Gays ... but I am scared of spiders."
-"Got Competence?"
-"I disagree with you, but I'm pretty sure you're not Hitler"
-"9/11 was an outside job."

Doesn't it make sense to step back and filter from time to time? In the same vein that 20% of the world has 80% of the money, 20% of the county has 80% of the venom, hatred and time to be a "winger". Those same people rile people up and give their respective Party a bad name with muddy centrists; creating rifts that lose elections by cutting off their nose to spite their face. I'm not going to even type the name  Christine O'Donnell.

I think a good sense would save our country. Sense of duty, sense of responsibility to self and others, sense of humor, and the ever fading and not-so-common common sense.

George Bush did not plan the 9/11 attacks to win an oil war. Obama is not a Muslim terrorist.

Depeche  Mode said it well back when I had hair, (a sweet soccer top swoop-mullet with badass bangs in case you're wondering):
~"People are people so why should it be, that you and I should get along so awfully?"

The answer, of course, is pride and ego and cowardice and envy and greed and sloth and every other reason that people argue, fight and divide. So no, I will not sit here and type Lenny Kravitz said it best in his lyrics to the song "Let Love Rule a bunch of lovey-dovey crap about turning the other cheek and loving thy neighbor...err..wait? When did that become uncool?

Anywho...I like Jon Stewart. He's smart. He gets the story straight, or tries to. He picks on everybody and demands sense where there is none. To top it off, he's damn funny (or his writers are) and that's why I need to make it a daily habit to watch the Daily Show. Maybe the country could save itself with a little common sense of humor.

Sticker Shock

A recent survey conducted by the Midwest Institute of Fabricated Surveys has revealed the top 5 experiences people most want to avoid, but cannot according to rules of society.

Number 5: The Awkward Office Hallway Head-Nod.
You know, the one you share with everyone in your office you either don't care for, or that you've never met, or that you've already said the Office Hallway Hello-To on that particular day. And heaven forbid you get the Head-Nod from someone you've already said Hello-To and you forget and say Hello-To for a second time in the same day. There are only so many shades of red.

Number 4: Renewing your tags
You know, the longest line ever, regardless of how many people are in it. I've been the second person in line before at the DMV to renew tags and still waited 4 hours to be helped because 1. everyone except the person helping the old lady in front of me took the day off, and 2. because the old lady in front of me was required to ask every conceivable question about tag renewal know to man in the slowest, loudest possible voice. Now I would never punch an old lady...again.

Number 3: Jury Duty
You know, the human gene pool meeting at City Hall. You're the only normal one there, and you get to sit in between people who are employing the Stanislavski Method for mental illness/incompetency to try for a pre-coffee excusal.

Number 2: Public Speaking
You know, everyone finding out you're a fraud and an idiot, and that you say "bowlth" instead of "both". People who die from this fear, and there are thousands of them per year, usually soil themselves front and back before kicking the bucket.

Number 1: Buying a Car (in a freaking landslide that makes the Stevie Nicks version look like a, uh, I don't know, a really small landslide.)
You know, the experience where you have your IQ reduced by 75 points the minute your feet hit the sales lot, and everyone wearing a name tag inherits those lost points. You know, the day you go home and scrub your hands harder than a brain surgeon with OCD to get the filth of being swindled from under your nails.

Well, sometimes fear is nothing more than a big old nasty lookin' self-fulfilling prophecy, that doesn't quite swallow you whole for one reason or another. I just went though meat grinder number 1 from above, and while I make it a point not to be overly gracious to anyone who hasn't endorsed or sponsored my blog, I did want to say a public thanks to Mike Williams and Molle Volkswagen in KC.

Two days of talking, test driving, education, haggling and getting to know him have changed my mind about the fear of buying cars. Don't get me wrong, I did lots of homework and tried to be as educated as possible, but there isn't a trick in the book that could have swerved him off the path of simply being an honest guy selling people a car. You can tell he loves what he does and that probably makes all the difference. If you're shopping for a Punch Dub in the KC Metro, go see Mike.

I think you'll leave with a car and without feeling lighter in the wallet. Who knows, perhaps you'll get the strength to leave the diapers at home the next time you have to give a presentation at work...

In the Mail: Honk if you're horny vs. Have a good day

I don't have many readers per se, but some of you are vocal enough to warrant reprint of your comments to me, both personal and public, regarding past blogs. In a sense, I'm ripping this idea from Bill Simmons, who ripped it from Dave Barry, who stole it from me during my days as a Branding Iron columnist in Laramie, Wyoming when I wrote a fake advice column under the pseudo-pseudonym "Dear Fred". In other words, these requests, discussion points and criticisms are mostly made up, but lend themselves to more funny fodder for me to expound upon.

Mary R. in Chicago emailed...

"A blog entry every three weeks? That's a little skinny, no? Maybe you could spend less time on Mario Bros. Wii and more time with a pen. You're the one calling yourself an aspiring writer."

Mary, thanks for the inspiring words. Also, thanks for somehow installing a web cam in my house and watching what I do when I'm not writing. How many fingers am I holding up?
To your point...I'm trying to be more energetic with words. I want to be profound and topical. Unfortunately, I have to go to work every day and make donuts. I'm tryin. You'll see.

Dave from Denver Co. emailed...

"I like your blog. It's insightful, creative and inspiring. It gives me something to talk to my friends and family with every day. You are a true wordsmith. Keep up the great work, Cory."

Hey Dave! Thanks for the note. However, I think you meant to send this to Cory Feldman. The full text you sent also refers to "Dream a Little Dream" and being "sorry for my loss...it's tough to say goodbye to your best friend" and things that make me think you meant to send it to Feldman. In fact, Feldman forwarded the one you intended to send me, and it read:

"Your blog is weird. I'm afraid I don't get it. Get linear."

Thanks for that Dave. If by linear you mean making reference to Eddie Vedder's beard gristle in the same sentence whereupon I'm trying to relay my disdain for Fyodor Dostoyevsky...I hear what your saying. It's a slippery slope.

Lisa from KC messaged me....

"Um, I kind of liked the blog about hackneyed phrases in the English language. I'm definitely not saying I like your blog. I don't. At least, not yet. It's not linear and it doesn't have enough, you know, content. But you could expand on that list of horrible phrases that need to go away and it might make me like it a little more. Maybe."

Lisa, you frighten children. But, I'm a sucker for even the most backhanded compliment...anything to make you happy.

And now for more non-linear and thinly sliced looks at anachronistic sayings we need to purge from our popular speech!

There have been moments when I caught myself saying or repeating something that made me wish I'd included it in the 2010 Banned List of Words and Phrases. There are simply hundreds of things we say to each other that are lazy and trivial and need to be sharpened and thought about or discarded. It's basically like having a clutter purge and grarage sale of the overused expressions we overuse without expression.

"A watched pot never boils."

Something someone says to you when you are anxious.
Imagine being 12 years old and waiting by the front door for your best friend to come and pick you up to go camping. Imagine your crusty old man walks into the room and glares at you and your backpack...glancing at his bare wrist to imply that he sees you have twenty minutes left to wait for the scheduled pickup time...

"A watched pot never boils," the watch-less old crankshaft says to you.
(How many fingers is he holding up when I turn my back on him, Mary in Chicago?)

What a stupid thing to say. A watched pot never...Yes it does. A watched or unwatched pot boils at 212 degrees farenheit. It takes a while to get there. You don't just snap your flipping fingers and have a cup of coffee. If you turn the heat up and stand there it'll boil pretty quickly. Hell, electric stoves these days can boil water in thirty three seconds. If you dunk a live hand grenade in a pot of water, it will boil.

What you mean to say is, "Stop being so anxious...it's pissing me off as a relaxed person who doesn't share your enthusiasm to watch you wait anxiously. My blood pressure is rising to match yours and I need to chill out and make you do the same.  I, too, wish your friend would arrive and whisk you away for the weekend so I can watch football in my underwear for the next 48 hours."

"Never say never and and never say always."

So dumb. I can tell you a million reasons why this is completely false.
1. I never want to press a thumbtack into my eyeball.
2. I always close my eyes when I sneeze.
3. I never shared a doobie with Chris Farley or John Belushi.
4. You always smile when you think about Chris Farley singing Fat Guy in a Little Coat."

Do I need to keep going? I always win this argument, and conversely I will never lose it.

"You staying out of trouble?"

People say this to you after you say hello to them. People say this to you when they don't know anything about you or what you do in your spare time. People just batter the snot out of this phrase one and it's not always pretty...

Father McDonaghy: "Hello there."

Person: "Hey Padre. How you been? You stayin out of trouble?"

Father McDonaghy: "Why? What have you heard?"

And while I can't remember using this phrase, it ranks right up there with the

I don't know or don't remember your name salutations we revert to in a crisis.

They include referring to someone as:

"Hey... Chief*"

* The list is massive, but accordingly shrunken to these examples

"Bud!"

"Man!"

"Dude!"

"Kiddo!"

"Fella!"

"You!"

"Holmes!"

"Stranger!"

And so on. We all do it. It's a shame these conversations can't be more honest.

Person approaching me: "Hey Chris...how've you been?"

Me: "I have been fine, person I think I should know! What is your name? This is weird. You called me by my name but I've temporarily forgotten yours."

Person standing in front of me shaking my hand with a blank stare on his face: "It's me, Casey."

Me: "Oh right! Casey! Man, great to see you old friend! You look terrific, Casey!"

Casey: "Keefe. Your brother. Casey Keefe."

Me: "Uh, well take it easy there, Chief."

In the world of customer service, there are some really annoying ones we need to toss out.

"Have a good day."

Even at your angriest, have you ever uttered the opposite to someone?

You: "Well, your service here is awful."
Waiter: "Sorry dude, we're understaffed."
You: "Have a shitty day."

Wanting someone to have a good day is pretty much implied. Unless you're talking about opposing soldiers in the battlefield, two people in the same vicinity of one another generally want the other one to have a good day. Even after the Super Bowl, 350 lb. lineman from different teams slap each other on the ass and say, "Good game. Have a good rest of your day."

We gotta come up with an alternate "walk away" phrase, or better yet, about twenty of them to put into rotation that actually express some meaning. I don't know, like...

"Don't get hit by a bus!"
"Exit through the door there and go back to your car. Drive home and enjoy surfing the internet for pictures of J-Wow."
"Don't forget to brush your teeth later."
"Honk if you're horny."
"I hope you find a ten dollar bill in an old jacket tonight."
"That was a weird conversation we had about the weather just now...let's promise each other to never do that again."
"I hope you win a radio call in contest this month!"
"You have a goofy face, but you were fun to chat with."


That's all for now. Have a good day.

Are you it?

Remember playing "tag" when you were a kid. Do you ever watch kids play tag now that you're grown? I chuckle watching the kid who unwittingly becomes "it". He take the responsibility so seriously. When you get tagged, you need to get rid if "it" and pass it on to someone else, chop chop. Being "it" kind of sucks, but hey...you're the one who got tagged. Do something about it....you can't just stand there. 

So I was talking to my Mom yesterday when this idea hit me. An exemplary citizen, my Mom, and quite possibly the most conscientious person walking the planet. As such, I draw a lot of my strength and inspiration from her. Let's face it, resiliency is never easy, especially when it comes to growing older, learning from mistakes and trying to become a better person. Stiffness is much easier. Rigidity comes naturally. Doing nothing is much easier than bending over backwards.

To my point, my Mom has the joyful task of grandmothering my 4 month old niece lots of weekends this summer. She and Quincy Rose have spent some really good time together (I'm jealous) and you can literally hear it in her voice. It gives her deep and sweet peace to be in the same room with her newest grandchild. My brother and his wife went through a lot to get to this point in their lives. They have been so patient and determined, and they are excellent parents in complete love with their daughter. They are lucky to have a grandmother nearby to free them up...and I know they appreciate that fact. But it takes a lot to commit your time every weekend. It takes a lot and she doesn't feel even slightly obligated. She'd have it no other way than to pack a suitcase and drive an hour there and back through 1-25 traffic. Sounds like a standard grandparent, but not everyone is like that.

You have to have giving in your blood. You have to work at it for a long time for it to seep into your veins. It gets easier over time. You get good at giving it all away and not feeling drained. You get back far more (silently) than you give. You don't get giving in your blood without resiliency and practice. You gotta do a lotta back bends.

As my Mom is telling me about her summer of repeated two and three day stays in Denver to watch QR, I'm wondering how impactful that intentional and quiet donation of your time could be if we re-directed it around our neighborhoods, workplaces and to strangers.

Here comes the liberal in me...tearing out from under my moderate summer skin.

You and I do not, as a rule, give enough of ourselves to others. You and I are selfish.

I know there have been countless national efforts to stir people to donate time or money to a charitable cause. I'm not talking about the (wonderful) Salvation Army or (fantastic) Habitat for Humanity. I'm not talking about organized volunteerism, not referring to any activity that yields you a T-shirt or a certificate of completion. I'm not even talking about Random Acts of Kindness. Those are terrific, but people could be overflowing with R.A.K if they were raised up right and taught to open doors for people and say "Bless you" to a sneezing stranger in the grocery store. Teach your kids to do that, please.

I'm talking about intentionally and specifically giving of yourself, your time and your effort all day every day on a conscious and subconscious level to people around you who are capable of doing the same once they see you mean it and it makes you feel good. I guess I'm talking about collectivism. And no, I'm not suggesting socialism.

I think we can live in this country and have progressive and capitalistic blood in our veins and still give it all away every single day...knowing that others would be giving it back in our direction. It would be hard work. It would require serious effort. It would be risky. (See Our Founding Fathers, Pioneers). And don't think I mean give away your fortune each night after a hard day of work. I don't think you should deposit your paycheck into a stranger's checking account. Moreover, I'm not advocating making the same deposit into a panhandling cup. But you owe somebody thirty minutes a day. After that, you can do what you want. If you still feel good giving after an hour, keep going.

I see it as three tiered, this notion of collectivism. On level one you've got Random Acts of Kindness. RAK's are quick, on the spot, and they feel good. Good to give and get. Few and far between sometimes, but evident in our culture and recognized when you give one or get one as going out of your way. On level three, you have full time selfless souls like Mother Theresa and a relatively short list of people who exclusively give without ever needing to receive. Most on this list refuse to receive anything in return for their full donation of self. So like any pyramid, there are very few people at the top, tons of people struggling to get up to and stay in the middle, and too many people piling up at the bottom doing little or nothing. TAG's are the way to get out of the cluttered basement. TAG's are your ticket to level two. Eat it, Abraham Mazlow.

I challenge you to commit a Targeted Act of Giving. It probably takes less than thirty minutes out of your life. TAG a person and keep giving to them unrelentingly and never ever question if they pass the TAG along. Intend to do all this silently and without them noticing. Trust that they will; like that insurance commercial where people see a guy hold the elevator open for a lady and then the lady from the elevator subconsciously passes on the random act of kindness and the world becomes more responsible...Except you do it on purpose. With all your heart and without expecting anything in return.

I can't tell you what your TAG is going to be. It would kill the spirit to try to list some ideas of what I think you might do, and I won't bore you with what I intend to do (or keep doing). But if you're having a hard time imagining what I'm suggesting, walk outside and look around you. Do you have a neighbor that could use some help with cleaning their gutters? Do you have a ladder and a free hour?

Go to work and look at your office mates. Does someone need an ear because they are having a really rough time with a spouse? Do you have an ear and ten minutes? Someone need $50 to get them through to payday? Don't expect it back, and put it in an unmarked envelope discreetly in their desk when they aren't looking.

Imagine your family tree as a giant mural...I can almost guarantee you that a phone call for no reason to someone on that tree would do some good.

Keep it going. Forge and don't expect thank you cards. Move on to giving to people who may not need anything. Be a pioneer about it. Give to those close to you...your friends, spouse or kids. Give them your time and energy. TAG them and see how they change. And be prepared to receive. Be prepared for people to return the giving in your direction. Accept it wholeheartedly and without guilt. You're "it" again, brothers and sisters.

Being "it" sucks, right? Not really. It is hard work and it means you have to go after people and leave your comfort zone. It means you feel alone, too. But if you smile, being "it" keeps the game going, and people keep playing.

Enough blabber. I got stuff to do.

I'm "it".

   

Fear and Self Loathing in Cleveland

This is my knee jerk, off the cuff, forgive me for the typo version of a blog I can't not write.

What the hell just happened?

I just spent really valuable time in my life caring about LeBron James, a guy who used to be a kid I liked. An athlete I used to admire for his talent. Another selfish idiot.

Who in the world deserves that type of adoration? NOBODY. I watched the entire "show".

I am the problem. I am the reason advertisers signed on and paid him to tell us he was selling out. I'm the fringe NBA fan that spent reserve time away from family to put up with that shit.

I cannot absorb the depth of selfishness I just witnessed.

Sorry Cleveland. As a KC resident I can sort of feel your pain. You guys loved that kid. You adored him. You invested 101% of your sports 401k in that kid (and maybe some of you put a couple bucks in Brady Quinn stock). You bought his jersey, watched his shoott arounds and listened to his talk show. You kicked Drew Carey to the curb for this kid and he just peed on your lawn.

I'm so pissed.

He had a chance to do something really cool with that TV show. Show some highlights. Talk about his choices. Wax poetic about life in Ohio. Introduce his newest teammate, Chris Paul and start down the road to Cleveland fame and lore. Even make sense of the setting. Instead, he uses this purchased time with ESPN to pimp out twenty kids from the Boys an Girls club ("Sorry kids...it's not the Knicks!") and ressurects Jim Grey to say nothing, do nothing, and make me feel like a complete idiot for caring about the NBA.

The NBA is the most selfish league in the world. I am an idiot for not realizing it until now.

This is all my fault.

Thank you Ubaldo Jimenez, Soccer, quiet signings like Paul "The most loyal guy in the world" Pierce, Paul Goydos for shooting a 59, women's beach volleyball and anything except the NBA for being around today.

Lebron, you could win 15 championships and you would still be the biggest sell-out, whore, misguided bandwagon guy I ever saw on TV. Of course, I lined your pockets tonight and watched the show, and I wrote this backlash blog...so you got what you wanted, what the "Stars" of the NBA all want...the spotlight.

Well, it's one bulb dimmer after that garbage.

In Memoriam

I spring from a weird generation. They call us Gen X. We don't quite fit a mold, and yet, as times inexorably moves along, we are now being primed to take over for our predecessors. We are about to be handed the keys to the car...and our folks are more than a little nervous.

What about Gen X'ers defines us? Where do we largely fall politically? How does our education, socioeconomic stratification and collective "world view" make us ready to get our learner's permit to test drive the planet?

When Roger Daltrey song "My Generation", he was talking about the color-bursting, edge-pressing side of his generation...The Me Generation. The Baby Boomers. The Hippies that turned Yuppies that turned Reagan Republicans that turned into what they are now...very possibly the last recipients for Social Security. They are my parents, and a generation that had it tougher than I did, but not nearly as tough as the one that preceded them. That is, of course, the way it always works. But the Boomers had really big shoes to fill. Impossible, you might say, and perhaps that's why they never felt comfortable in their own skin. For all the growth and wealth and achievement the Boomer's felt, something was always missing.

I was born in the twilight of the Vietnam conflict. My Father served in the military. My uncle served in Vietnam. My maternal and paternal Grandfathers fought in World War II. I pay my deepest thanks and respect to those men and women who have given me the freedom to own a piece of the Internet where I can write nearly anything I choose without fear.

Gen X'ers always have had war, or conflict. So, in a way, did the Boomers. They were largely conceived in the shadows of Armistice Day, but were ushered into their teens in the backdrop of Korea, and bore the brunt of the horrors Vietnam produced. But when I say that my generation has always had conflict, I don't mean we had more wars or skirmishes in our youth to deal with than our parents and grandparents did...I mean that we saw it each and every day with our own eyes. And got kind of sadly used to it.

It strikes me that the two generations of Americans that fought hardest to preserve our freedoms and maintain peace for their own children were the same bright minds that invented all the channels by which war and starvation, slavery and brutality are now shown to us via television, movies and the Internet all 24 hours of any given day. Perhaps it was meant to be, that for future kids to understand the freedoms they take for granted, the spoken or written word was never enough. Filmmakers had to generate hours of footage, re-create those images into the scores of movies, documentaries television mini-series, books and video games that remind the viewer of what happened.

Now, with the Internet, you can watch war any time you like. You can see murder and brutality any time you like. You can witness oppression whenever the mood strikes you. I'm numb. We're numb. My Father had to be told what it was like by his own Father and their friends.

We have Afghanistan. Iraq parts I and II. Homeland terrorism, and hot spots around the globe that flare up all the time. There are certain to be places we are fighting that you and I aren't even supposed to know about. We have the threat of Kim Jong Il. We have the insanity spewing from Ahmadinejad. We have little Hitlers challenging us to an arm wrestling match every morning for breakfast. We're numb. We don't get it.

We don't know how scary it must have felt to get on a ship, and have no idea where in the world we were headed. To never have heard the words Guadalcanal or Okinawa or Hiroshima. The world was massive back when my Grandfathers were handed the keys. It was HUGE.

Now, my kids can watch a border skirmish in Dar fur on a web cam. They can see troops patrolling the dunes in Kabul with a mouse click. Totally numb.

The Boomers are handing us their own modified, souped up version of the keys to the world. It's a lot smaller now, and fits in your hand. It's easy to start, self-navigating and can parallel park itself. So you wouldn't think we'd be able to screw it up...but we might. If we don't hold on to some of the basics and remember from where we came, we might. Happy Memorial Day. Do yourself a favor and call or seek out a vet from WWII today and listen in for a while. I'm lucky enough to be able to call my Grandpa, and I plan to.

(Not at all) Sad

Forgive my overstating the importance of a stupid concert from last week, but I memorialize May 3rd, 2010 for my own bad memory, the memory of my kid down the line, and my own Dad who wants to know how it went...

The KC Pearl Jam Review Slash-Blog-Slash Best Concert of My Life Blog

I was really nervous, which is saying something because I never get uptight about anything (Insert M*A*S*H* canned laughter) let alone about how this experience would "go" for me and the boy.

Bear in mind that I'd just paid for his first stick of deodorant about 10 days before...at his request.
Bear in mind that I am an idiot compared to other people on this planet that know about cool things, music and fun.

So, I was nervous that I would embarrass the hell out of Sam and push a "great time" on him and force laughter and act way too cool and just blow the whole thing...well, because that's what you do as a Dad.

We both put on concert t-shirts (with long sleeve undershirt). It was instinct. Nobody mentioned it. You don't talk about things like that, you simply let it ride.

We drove to the Sprint Center with my I-Pod on full Pearl Jam mode...him driving (the song selection) and me allowing him to drive. He did a good job. He mixed it up, moving from "Daughter" to "Amongst the Waves" and collapsing with "Red Mosquito" at 20th and Grand.

We argued (philosophically) about the first song we thought they'd play as we sauntered about the spring/city/evening traffic. He voted for "Sad" which he knows is my favorite song they ever wrote, and it hit me then like a frickin Mack truck...This kid was listening to me at some point in his life. We have contentious times. He doesn't always like me, but...he gives a shit about my opinion. He cares about the old man a little bit. We...are...friends?

I played that song for him two years ago. Found it on an AOL sessions website that captured some great studio time on giant Persian rugs with all of the band playing surrounded by about 95 guitars and no audience. It's real and raw and right here if you want to watch it. It remains a favorite place of mine to visit in ye olde cyberspace if I'm searching out a place to feel right.

Anyway, I shared that video with Sam a while ago and he asked me later why it wasn't in my ITunes library.

I had no good answer. After all, it was my "favorite song".

He got an ITunes gift card for his birthday and dropped 99 cents of it on me one night. He burned the single song CD for me. He gives a shit what I say. We're buds.

We parked at the Cashew (you know, for the free parking) and jogged to make the opening act. I think I felt as alive and ready at that moment as I have in a long time when it came to being a Father... simply because I was back in control and not being guided by anything other than a desire to make that moment happen without pretense. It was like his birth. Ironic and contradictory though it sounds.

We fought the dopies and moshers in the halls with joy. Every person we saw was a freak and a brother. They all had the same love for the place they were in as we did. Sam took all of it in stride...the swearing, stammering, crowding, screaming, beer spilling and the grinning. I saw it in his eyes that he got it. He knew that this was an exception to the norm...that this was an adventure to soak in.
This was a pool to not fear swimming in.
These were people that would never laugh at his dance moves.

We tried to buy a $3 poster before the show got underway but missed out. It was ideal (price for me and longingly viewed by him as we passed it on display) for us all, but ultimately, I couldn't pay the drunkest guy on the concourse 10 bucks for the same cardboard tube the vendor sold out of- so we decided that souvenirs were not part of the plan.

Seats...great. View of the stage...great. Opening act (Band of Horses)...great. Anticipation...great. The feeling we shared when the lights dimmed and the bass start to hum was just marvelous.

They played for two and a half hours and honestly never let up from the minute they took the stage except to reload on water or wine or a smoke. They played everything in the arsenal. It was so great. I don't even want to ruin how terrific that show was by trying to over-talk it.

We left with our ears ringing and heads spinning from the dopey behind us with the one-hitter who couldn't stand up. Sam knew what all the chaos was, whether he understood the delivery method or the brazen smokey discord that surrounded him. We took it all in stride and and I kept watching his eyes. They were fixed on the stage. On the way out of the front door I proudly invested in a tour t-shirt for him.

As we got close to the car, he asked me why they didn't play "Sad".

I didn't have an answer for him, but I definitely wasn't sad they hadn't. It was the best concert I ever saw.