Journey

WAYNE’S WORDS
Volume 3 Number 23
Journey

NO, I am not about to whip out the lyrics to Faithfully, Open Arms or even Separate Ways. That would be nice to see, but you can go look them up yourself. Hell, pull out an old cassette tape, if you want.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (and, of course, Aerosmith) told us “Life is a Journey, Not a Destination…” I think we can all pretty much agree that this is a true statement. But this journey sometimes seems to take a lot out of us. And for the majority of us, this journey we call life is not always a Sunday ride through the country.

There are bumps, potholes, detours, washed-out bridges, seedy motels, unscrupulous characters, overpriced gas stations and bad parts of town on this journey. It is actually amazing that everyone just doesn’t take the next exit and leave. Sadly, some do. Some stay forever in that seedy motel, because the weather got bad. Some just drive into a bridge abutment and end their journey all together.

It is those of us who aren’t afraid of all of the aforementioned travel pitfalls that ultimately realize how great the journey is and was regardless of the snags along the way. Some of the problems we encounter are our own fault. We often don’t keep our vehicle (our mind) properly maintained. Many of us disregard the warning signs, orange barrels and even the dude at the side of the road flapping a flag at us.

Sure there are hard times during our travels, but what about all of the scenic by-ways, friendly passers-by, green lights, sunsets and rainbows that we are able to experience. What about the laughter of children, the acts of kindness and roadside farmers’ markets we come across. These things all make the journey worthwhile.

With all of that being said, I would like to disagree with old Ralphy Boy. Well, less disagree and more expand upon what he said. I do believe in the journey versus destination idea on a general level. I think that life is more accurately described as a series of legs on the journey and multiple destinations.

We all hated the “car vacations” when Dad just wanted to drive straight through. “Let’s just get there,” he said. Well, Dad had one destination in mind while we were sitting in the back seat watching all the other cool destinations whiz by our very eyes. Amusement parks, restaurants with giant cowboys on top, zoos and other cool stuff became pinpoints of missed opportunity to our young, wanting eyes.

Very few people embark upon life’s journey and ride straight through to death. On our life journey we will stop many times at many different destinations. That doesn’t mean, however that we stop growing. If you stop at a destination of marriage and family you (hopefully) end up taking those people with you on the next leg of your overall journey. Friends, co-workers, clients, shrinks, clerks at a store one frequents, and other people we meet also become voyagers with us on our grand journey, in full or in part.

[quick side note] How do we travel on this proverbial journey? I would have to say we are all on motorcycles. We are each in charge of our own journey, but as people join and leave us for any given leg they don’t jump on with you – the ride along side. Maybe we are actually all in tractor-trailers. How else would we carry all of our crap? Ah, let’s stick with the motorcycle version… it’s cooler.

Today 6,787,381,261 people are either on a leg of their journey or at one of their destinations. Many of them are on an extraordinarily tough leg of their journey with only the faintest clues of what their next destination might be. They are leaving their last destination that may have seemed a wonderful place at one point in time, but has recently turned into one of those bad parts of town out of which they absolutely had to pull themselves.

When leaving any of your destinations (whether people come with you or stay behind) you have to figure out what you learned while you were there – good AND bad. As you don your leathers and straddle your iron horse, you have things to think about and ponder. The time at your last destination may have taught you “what your priorities are in life, what you do and don’t want out of life and what your strengths and weaknesses are.”

That is what is known as baggage. We all have it and, even though the connotation is bad, there is baggage that is good. From both adversity and fortune grows strength. You just have to learn from the situations in which you found yourself at your last destination. Even if you have no clear idea of your next destination, you have to be able to point your handlebars down the correct road, the road of love, honesty, loyalty, sincerity and personal responsibility. If you stay on that road you will also find reverence, hope, thrift, charity, moderation, hard work, courage, gratitude and – of course – friendship.

Staying on that road, you will find that the ride is smoother, the weather is nicer, the gas is cheaper and true friendship is more abundant. As I have already said, in all actuality, we never really know where our next destination is. We have a feeling of where we would like to go, but regardless of our intentions, weather conditions change, bridges wash out and sometimes you even hit a toll road. Sometimes that bad stuff happens within us; sometimes it is external. It is our job to figure out how to deal with it and how to (hopefully) learn from it. That is the journey.

An old Chinese Proverb says: “To get through the hardest journey we need take only one step at a time, but we must keep on stepping.”

So, as you embark on the next leg of your journey: ride safe, be true and may the sun and the wind always be at your back.

Until Next Time,

Wayne

PS Here a couple of quotes I love, but didn’t use:

“All of life is a journey – which paths we take, what we look back on, and what we look forward to is up to us. We determine our destination, what kind of road we will take to get there, and how happy we are when we get there.” – Anonymous

“Plenty of people miss their share of happiness, not because they never found it, but because they didn't stop to enjoy it.” William Feather

For you.

Rainbow’s End

WAYNE’S WORDS
Volume 3 Number 22
Rainbow’s End

I had a crappy day last week. It started out crappy. Got crappier and crappier and finally left me feeling completely worthless. I felt beat up. I was at one of my lowest points in quite awhile. The people, places and reasons do not matter for this conversation. Suffice to say, I had been drawn into a vortex of despair that was quickly sucking me back into the deep, gray, recesses of depression. Again.

I went and cried to my shrink.

I focused on work and visited with a client.

I got a call from a dear old friend. (Thank You!)

Nothing could help extract me from the twister of torment in which I was helplessly stuck. I went back to the office and my co-workers couldn’t even cheer me up with our normal, bawdy, raunchy repartee. I was spinning faster and faster in a cyclone of sorrow. Finally it was time to go home.

I didn’t want to deal with the tempest of idiotic, quitting-time drivers on the surface streets, so I got on I-10 East at the Avenida de Mesilla On-Ramp to circumnavigate the city to the Lohman Exit.

There were storm clouds all around as I entered the freeway. It wasn’t raining as I accelerated to highway speed, but I could plainly see the squall line and it was right at the I-10/I-25 Interchange where I would be looping around to travel north to the Lohman Exit. Of course, after the crappiest day I am driving right into the heart of the storm.

As I neared the black wall of weather into which I would soon be driving, I noticed the rainbow. The sun evidently was able to peek through a break in the storm clouds behind me. The band of colors seemed to be falling right on the very same Interchange which I would soon be using. I let out a sarcastic cackle at the thought of seeing what was at the end of the rainbow.

As I got closer to the Exit, I started to enter the rain. There were just a few large drops at first, but soon I would enter the torrents that were drenching the desert on the far side of the fast approaching rainbow. And then…

I kid you not.

No B.S.

No smoke and mirrors.

I entered the rainbow! And it ended on the hood of my car! I could NOT believe it. I must have been tired and emotionally beat up – hallucinating. I could actually see the ROY G. BIV touching my car! The colors of the rainbow engulfed me like a scene from a 60’s drug movie!

I wiped my eyes. Still there!

I turned on my wipers. Still there!!

I slapped myself in the face. Still there!!!

Hell, I even clicked my heels three times and said “There’s no place like home.” Still there!!!!

I drove for more than a mile engulfed by the rainbow’s end. My hand to God – not only was I AT the end of the rainbow, but I as also IN the end of the rainbow!

So often times in life, I have longed for the gold at the end of the rainbow. On that crappiest of days last week, I was lucky. I was shown the wealth that the rainbow had to offer.

The treasure at the rainbow’s end is me.

And I always thought the only thing I would ever find there would be an irritating leprechaun guarding a bunch of worthless marshmallows shaped like pink hearts, yellow moons, orange stars and green clovers.

Until Next Time,

Wayne

The Plunge

WAYNE’S WORDS
Volume 3 Number 21
The Plunge

Well, I have gone and done it again. Already. Friends told me I would be happier if I did it. Life would be less confusing and more enjoyable. Everyone, including my boss, told me “go ahead, Wayne, don’t be afraid.” I really didn’t want to do it. I had done it a few years ago and it had started out blissful then turned to constant happiness and finally ended in total emptiness. Still, everyone kept telling me that it was great before and that it would be great again. People told me it would be good for me, good for my self-esteem, and good for me to feel apart of something again. I actually swore I would never do it again.

It’s funny how a short passage of time will create an atmosphere where you can be talked into something. So, as time ticked by, my resolve weakened. My constant barks of “Hell No” turned to occasional statements of “Maybe Later.” Indeed, more of the old tick-tock and my words changed to “Ok, soon.” I was close to the edge of doing it again. I was standing on the precipice over looking the abyss ready to make the leap. All my friends were in my head telling me it would be better than the last time. It would be different. I would like it and I would smile every day.

I don’t remember if I was pushed over the edge or if I fell or if I leaped off. Regardless, the end result was the same. I took the plunge.

I joined an online, social website.

Yes, I am finally on Facebook. I had done the MySpace thing (mostly because I had a radio show) and it had just turned stupid and worthless, like things often do. I was told that the newest online community craze was light years beyond MySpace. So, after all of that goading – and after a certain co-worker, who shall remain nameless (Charissa) – went ahead and made a page for me, I joined in on the “party.”

I am actually somewhat frightened by Facebook. It knows WAY too much about you. I think it actually already knew my shoe size before my last name was completely entered. Facebook knows you know people that you actually forgot you knew. “Facebook friend suggestion: Karl Wittick – You both went to Junior High at Rhein Main Air Base in Germany in 1979 and were the only two people to wear cowboy hats to school because you wanted to look different and you used to invite all the pretty girls over for Friday night dances in the basement then play nothing but slow songs so you could press against them and you both played the Baritone in band and caught candy in your instruments when you were playing Octoberfest music on a float in a parade and you used to eat Gummi Bears from the “Trinkhalles” and washed them down with liter bottles of Coca-Cola and there was that one time you two made out with those two German Girls on the playground behind base housing and it didn’t matter if they couldn’t speak English and you two couldn’t speak German even if they were talking bad about you because at least they kept making out with you two. Facebook thinks you may know Karl Wittick. Would you like to add him as a friend?”

People are so afraid of “Big Brother” knowing what is going on in their personal lives, but they are generally proud to splay it out all over the Internet for just about every part of the collective consciousness to see. Remember, part of the assimilated people are parents, children, husbands, wives, grandparents, employers and prospective employers – and they all can look up pictures of you vomiting in a hotel lobby garbage can last Wednesday night (you know, that was the night before you called in sick on Thursday)! They can also read your postings about how you couldn’t remember who he (or she) was, but he (or she) left his (or her) underwear in your kitchen and you think you remember protecting yourself, but you are going to the doctor to take some tests just to be sure. Facebook knows all.

I actually have a theory that Facebook is a joint FBI-CIA venture that was brought into existence with the Homeland Security Act of 2002. The creation of said website was probably hidden deep within the darkest recesses of the bill. The government realized that it doesn’t really need to spy on us, because we will let it all hang out since it is on a site with several million of our closest friends. Where did the government funding come from? I am sure the start up money was the very last of the funds left in the Social Security account. I believe that account used to be just for paying out funds to Social Security beneficiaries, but since it was opened up to the general monetary fund to help pay for the Korean War way back when, they have gone hog wild with it - like a twelve-year-old boy with “unlimited” cash in a video game store.

But, I digress.

As I said, I am now on Facebook. I am a Facebookie. Is that what we call ourselves? That sounds too much like a community of gamblers. Or is it Facebookers? That one is too close to making us sound like we are turning online tricks. Facers? That doesn’t even look like a word. Facies? Too close to feces. I don’t know what term will be or has been coined for those of us on Facebook, but for the time being…

We can call ourselves friends.

Until Next Time,

Wayne

PS I like this site fine. Just don’t get me started on eHarmony!!!!!!