FEEBLE-MINDED? IMBECELIC?
...really? Could that be me? A crash-course in self-analysis...
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I've been thinking about my life a lot lately as I am slowly winding down this decade of my existence. I think of dreams I had that are gone and desire that was wasted. From the beginning, I always wanted to work in a radio station; I had the dreams and desire, but I wasn't very good at it. I didn't have the personality or the voice for it. I had a first-class broadcasting license, I had a lot of interest in the media, I loved working in radio, but it didn't love me back. I'm a high-strung person with not a very thick skin, which didn't help out at all when irascible bosses treated me unfairly, or made me feel really bad at what I did, because my personality never allowed me to be relaxed when I was on the air. I tried and tried to get better; I did everything I could think of in order to advance my craft, but it just never happened. How something I loved could hurt so badly, and in the end, I was always made to feel inferior in the business. It just didn't work out for me. I have a few friends on the internet that work at radio stations, including one who works at the station I used to work at, and I'm insanely jealous of them. It was a business that I loved. Oh well, huh? I just didn't have what it takes. And you don't need a broadcast license for that. In a last stab at trying to make it at that radio station (which was in my hometown), I tried doing all of the work no one else wanted to do, foolishly thinking that I was at last Relied On. Hah. My hours got cut due to station politics. It wasn't to be. 
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I remember 9th Grade Algebra Class. I fell behind the first day, and fell behind further and further each day. The teacher would throw all of those formulas up on the blackboard, and they just confused me. I just didn't get it, no matter how much I voluntarily stated after school while the Algebra teacher unsuccessfully tried to make me understand it. The same thing happened with 10th grade Geometry; I barely passed, and I just couldn't learn it. I couldn't, and not for lack of trying. I remember back in 3rd grade, in math class, and we had begun to learn "borrowing" in subtraction problems. And that left me thoroughly confused. I Just Couldn't "see" it. I'd stay after class, and though my teacher tried to hammer the concept of 'borrowing' in my head (where does that number come from in which I borrow from the sum...where is it?) I just didn't get it. Finally I did get it, when all of a sudden, it "popped" in my head, but not after undergoing a lot of anguish that none of my classmates went through.
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Whenever I've participated in card games (such as "Hearts"), I could understand it to a point, after which I couldn't advance my game. I just never understood the strategy. I took violin for three years in grade school, and for the first couple of years I did okay, but the third year was just awful. I never could figure out what key I was in...the amount of "sharps" in the sheet music is supposed to tell you that, but I could never commit that to memory. Again, I could advance 'to a point', then advance no more. And, ironically, "Orchestra" class was held twice a week, in the mornings. So, in order for me to take a Violin Course I was fast losing the ability to cope with, I had to miss Math Class twice a week, which made me fall even further behind. I used to work in a grocery store, and I loved every minute of it. Until, that is, when I turned 18, and would have to operate a checkstand. All of a sudden, the job I'd had for the previous three years turned into something of a terror-filled existence I didn't want to work at anymore. The customers, I felt, were watching me to make sure I didn't screw them out of any money. Hell, I don't know what people are thinking...
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I play guitar, and love doing that. But...I can't play a disciplined 'scale' to save my life. Anything lower than the "G" string, and it's total guesswork for me. Luckily, there's a non-technical way to play, through the use of chords, otherwise I'd smash my instrument into the wall and never pick it up again. I've found the ability to play another way, but will always feel like I am incomplete on the instrument until I can learn those scales. And when I do manage to play a scale, I get lost in all of the strings, putting my fingers on the wrong string, which means I end up picking on the wrong string and no sound comes out. This is frustrating! People are supposed to love what they're doing, at least in their hobbies, but my guitar-playing hobby always tells me that I will never be able to play exactly the way I want to. I've played for close to FORTY YEARS, f'cryin' out loud (!) and I STILL don't get it. It seems that in everything I do, I can progress "to a point" and then my progress stops no matter how much I beat my head against the wall.
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Rosemary Kennedy

I've been reading Doris Kearns Goodwins'  "The Fitzgeralds and The Kennedys", an intriguing and well-written history of two important families in American Life who combined to form one of the most noteworthy chapters in our country's Political Life. Joe and Rose Kennedy's daughter, Rosemary (sister of John, Robert and Edward Kennedy) was "slow" as a child. The family decided, at least at first, to hide Rosemary's disability by including her in all family activities, and describing her to the press as being sweet, shy and quiet. Later on, Old Joe Kennedy tried to "fix" Rosemary's brain by making her undergo a frontal Lobotomy, which only made her worse. Up until that time, mother Rose Kennedy tried her best to make sure "Rosie" could get every advantage there was, which didn't work. She lived the remainder of her life in a Wisconsin Clinic, apart from any family contact. 
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Back in the day, writes Kearns, "defective" children were branded as "idiots", "imbeciles" and "feeble-minded". It turns out that the American Association for the Study of The Feeble-minded "elected to call them 'Morons' (from the Greek Word for 'fool')", and that's the class Rosemary fell into. The text continues, "To the untrained eye, (morons) could talk like anybody else as long as the conversation didn't get too complicated, and they even could jog along after a fashion for several grades in school, learning to read and write and to do simple sums." That's exactly how I feel these days, straining to be a part of society, trying to fit in. Sometimes holding a conversation with someone takes all of my energy, and I get mentally Worn Out. I am definitely hoping that I'm "feeble-minded" rather than being a Imbecelic Idiot, but sometimes I don't have any control over that. And maybe there's a fine line between the two states of mind. There's hope though. I can still eat an ice cream cone without getting any on my forehead...
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I've written about a lot of things in this blog, but I've rarely crawled inside my brain to try and analyze what's going on inside. Sometimes when I read things, I'll get hit hard by what I've read, and that's the case here. So am I a moron? Feeble-minded? Perhaps...all I know is, while I seem to find a way to exist...it gets lonely in here sometimes.

I DIDN'T KNOW I HAD A GREEN THUMB...
...vegetation and I have never gotten along all that well...

One of the chores I had to attend to, especially because Dad was on the road so much when I was a kid, was to help out with the lawn and gardens which surrounded our house. Mom planted gardens everywhere she could, and many a hot summer afternoon found her planting, weeding, sculpting small irrigation canals around the plants, trimming them and generally keeping everything looking really good. I've never found it all that rewarding doing lawn and garden stuff. But every week I was out there, mowing 2 and a half lots; our back and front yards held a total of 26 pine trees, and then afterwards, watering all of the plants around the house. In spite of the fact that I had some killer hayfever, there I was, toiling away. The sooner I got done, the sooner I could go swimming. So I had incentive. Fast-forward to today: I see people working in their gardens all the time. And I guess it's quite an industry; around this time of year, stores stock plants, fertilizer, bark, mulch, seedlings, seeds, herbicides, and gardening tools up the ying-yang. But, I don't give a Royal Rip about gardening. I find it dull, boring and monotonous. You couldn't pay me to pick up a shovel. But those who battle the onslaughts of weeds do undergo mighty struggles to make things look great. One such example is my next door neighbor is plugging up mole-holes in his lawn, using all types of incendiary devices. As long as he doesn't blow up my house, I'll be happy. Now, I always root for the Underdog: The Small Independent Businesses struggling against Corporate Giants. The legions of blue-collar folks who don't get all of the breaks that the Fat Cats get. Charlie Brown's little scraggly Christmas Tree. The everyday property owner fighting off nature. And even little plants that manage to gain a foothold in This Cruel World. The small against the mighty...you get the idea.
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Well, earlier this year, I stepped outside to get in the car, and in the small space between the driveway and the side of my house, I saw the first wisps of a little bush trying to take hold and survive. And I don't think it's a weed. And I've been watching it with a sort of detached bemusement, because it's surviving; it's growing, and doggone it, I've even weeded it a couple of times. (Me Weed?) Luckily for me there's enough moisture down here on the Oregon Coast (and especially lucky for the bush) for it to survive, no matter what I do (or don't do) to it. I told the kid who mows the lawn to steer around it; I want to see how big this thing gets. Heck, I've even thought about watering it. With my luck, it'll grow up to be some sort of poisonous plant, but maybe not. And as long as it wants to grow here, it's got a home. Nature's life force. Growing in spite of me. If anyone knows what kind of bush (or weed) this is, please let me know.
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So, I'm taking my meager "hands off" approach to gardening to the next level. I was at a friend's house when I noticed a big spiky weird-looking bush-tree sort of plant growing on his property and I commented about it, and he told me that all that needs to be done is rip off a few spikes and stick 'em in the ground, and they'll grow, just like that. Really! Really, I guess. It is some kind of Flax plant, to the best of my knowledge, and I have a plan: I'll plant a couple of Flax shoots smack in the middle of my back yard, theoretically resulting in big spiky bushes which should drive the neighbor kid who mows the lawn crazy. One of my neighbors who lives in a butt-ugly three-story house south of me, for some reason chopped down a bunch of trees, which means I get more sunlight, which is great for the lawn and any attendant plants (dandelions and all). Just the Flax, ma'am. Just the Flax.
Best of all, I could put the same amount of effort into the Flax plant as I did the little bush (none), and I'd have a sort of centerpiece on my lawn and I could marvel at it, if I ever spent time on my lawn (which I don't). And I'm thinking, what a great way to 'prank' a neighbor who goes on vacation with his family. I could stealthily sneak onto their property, plant a few Flax shoots, and when they come back, "pop pop pop pop", they'd find flax bushes growing everywhere. I can just hear it now: "WHERE THE F$%&!!!! DID ALL THESE $#%&#ING BUSHES COME FROM?" Snicker snicker...maybe I'll prank the neighbor who has the Ugly Pink House. That's all he needs, weird-looking spiky plants adorning his Pink House. It really is ugly. Anyone who has a pink house SHOULD be pranked. Short of that, I could canvass the neighborhood and try to take up a collection, and when 'that' neighbor takes his family on vacation, I could perhaps hire a painting outfit to paint the house another color. "What color?", they'd ask, and I'd say, "I don't care. Just cover up the Pink."
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As you can tell, I'm never home; I don't even know my neighbors' names. And I've got good fences. Though, the neighbor in the Pink House knocked a section of it out with his tree-falling travesties. I'm gonna have to talk to him about that. If I don't prank him first.

YEAH, I KNOW IT'S BEEN A WHILE...
...in fact, this is the longest blogging hiatus I've ever taken...
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Maybe this happens to all bloggers everywhere. The Blog-drums. I just haven't felt all that resourceful or creative. But since it's been three weeks, after all, you'd think I could find something to write about. So here I go...
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THE I.R.S. TOLD ME NOT TO FILE: Somehow, I lost my 2011 tax information. April 15th went past, and still I hadn't sent anything in. So I mailed in my Form 1099, along with a message that said, "I've received no refunds in the last few years and as far as I know, that continues to be the case. A couple weeks after that, I got a notice that I should contact the Friendly I.R.S. folks sometime soon. So I accessed their 800 number, and told the lady at the other end about my circumstances. We went through a few questions/answers. I told her I hadn't filed, and she looked up my taxable income, and said I hadn't made enough to require any submission from me. I asked her, "are you telling me not to send anything in?", to which she replied, "we actually prefer that you don't because it means more paperwork; look up your figures in next year's tax instructions and don't send in anything if the tax tables tell you not to." So how about that. The I.R.S. told me to NOT to file. I bet you don't hear that every day. I know I don't.

WHAT'S UP, DOC?: I got bounced to another doctor when my original physician packed up his old kick bags and left with a smile. The new doctor is a little hard to get used to...he's originally from Nepal, and although he speaks English fairly well, his words come out all crammed together in a very blusterous manner. I don't hold anything at all against foreigners who come to this great nation of ours to seek their dreams; it's just that he's from somewhere else other than America, and I'm having to get used to the way he communicates. Maybe he knows he's difficult to understand, because he gives his patients a written summary of everything they've been told, which probably helps in this case. But then again, I think he knows what he's doing after all. I had to give 5 vials of blood during my visit to the Vampire corner of the medical center. He's checking all kinds of things including my thyroid. I have been feeling very tired lately. And I'm hoping he'll have me on a course of treatment that'll give me the Zip and Zest of a teenager. As if that's going to happen anytime soon.
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STRANGE BEDFELLOWS DEPARTMENT: How did 1940's crooner Jerry Vale and late '60s drug band Moby Grape end up on the same side of a record? Both artists are as different as Night and Day, after all. I think Jerry Vale might actually have sung "Night And Day", the old Cole Porter song, way back whenever...

Columbia Records has been around forever. It grew into a very, very large record company with hundreds of artists. Not only did they release 'regular-issue' records, they issued lots of special-issue records; for example, I have an LP featuring many different artists, on the 'Columbia Special Products label with such artists as Tony Bennett, The New Christy Minstrels, Eydie and other middle-of-the-road performers. The record came out in the early '60s.

By the late l960's, however, things weren't as squeaky clean. After all, it was the Age of the Hippie, all wearing flowers in their hair. Oh to have been there. Anyway...Columbia put out this special pressing, a 7" album, with 2 songs per side. "Great Contemporary Music" they called it, and was issued for Crest Toothpaste. On side two of the record, Moby Grape was indeed contemporary at the time, but Jerry Vale hadn't been contemporary since the late 1940's, sustaining himself thru the years by singing Muzak versions of other artists' hits. Don't get me wrong; I like Jerry Vale, but anyone 'in the know' in the late 1960's knew Mr. Vale was about as contemporary as typewriter ribbons are nowadays. Maybe Moby Grape planned it that way: "Hey, let's get the record company to put a Jerry Vale song in front of ours, that way we'll sound Really Shocking!" In my opinion, going from Jerry Vale headlong into Moby Grape is an example of Musical Whiplash.
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So I'll end things here, and maybe I can work up the urge to blog again in another three weeks (?). Basically, I wanted to tell both of my faithful readers that yes, I'm still alive.