Eyeballs

My eyeballs are letting me down.

The fact is, they've never been much to write home about. They've never been functioning at maximum capacity. For me, it's a way of life.

When I was a little kid, I tried to take piano lessons. I was SO excited about learning the piano. But the teacher told my parents I just didn't have musical talent. (This was said with certainty about an individual who grew up to sing, play drums, guitar, some keys and a little banjo to boot, not to mention playing in several bands and writing hundreds of songs.)

Turns out, the real issue was my eyeballs. They couldn't see like they should if the music was too far from my face, which it was, and no one knew about it until after I was expelled from the world of the Piano-Forte. What did I know? I thought that's what the world looked like. And my physical limitation had me branded as a "no talent."

I have lived with this eye thing my whole life and I am not really sore about it. At this point, it would be like being sore because you have brown hair or green eyes. It's just the way it is.

And now my eyeballs have started a new journey of instability and insufficiency. They call it "Vitreous Detachment." The inside of my eyes are sort of falling apart. People don't seem to realize, in general, how gooey and gross the inside of an eye is. But when it starts coming apart in there and blocking your vision, well, it's hard to ignore. It's like looking through a veil of snot floating in salt water. And it's stubborn. It won't move out of the way

I'm told I will probably not go blind. Probably. And I have to admit that I like seeing things. But I will still have to adjust to the pseudosnot inside my eyes, clouding the sunniest of days. I also have to watch diligently for other signs of trouble.

Your body, it seems to me, is supposed to be your friend. It carries around your taste buds, which makes eating enjoyable. I'm thankful for that. It carries around your brain, which is certainly helpful. But as time goes by, this good friend starts letting you down a little bit at a time. You start losing your trust in this old buddy ol'pal. But what can you do?

In this case, it's the only friend you've got.




Peace to you.

© LW Publishing 2015

Unbalanced

There it is. A painting of Isaac Newton. He looks like he could have been a member of Kiss. He would have been chased out of the Bible Belt in the sixties, right?

According to Mr. Newton, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

What this has to do with figs, I have no idea.

But I find that this truth is remarkably untrue when it comes to emotional energy and the realities of everyday life. In particular, it doesn't apply to the arts. Using religious ideas to express it, it seems to me that Karma is not only not true, it is practically a joke. No offense intended to those who embrace the idea, but almost every aspect of life among humans demonstrates that there is no balance to the force. Everything is about as out of balance as you can get, and there aren't enough Darth Vaders in the universe to bring it into balance, no matter what anyone thinks about it.

And then there's God. The real One. Who doesn't seem all that interested in our sense of what is balanced and what isn't. He's got his own scale and we aren't allowed to touch it. So sad, too bad. But, the truth is, we'd only mess it up anyway because we simply don't know the true value of things.

Anyway.

How have you been?

I've been enveloped in the process of change. I'm changing in subtle but distinct ways, and it's making me a little nervous because I'm not really sure where it's all headed. I wonder if I'm going to end up being someone I don't care too much for, or will I be someone I could hope to be? I'm starting to feel the inevitable pull of "aging." And I'm not really what you could call old yet. Or at least I hope you don't.

Thing is, you'd think that if you put in a lot of effort, you could count on the results to some degree.  You'd think you'd end up with some control over what comes next. But, alas, that's just not the way it goes. At least not always. Then again, who knows?

Certainly not me.

And by the way...

I've been writing a lot of new songs after quite a long dry spell.

Why?

I have no idea.

I like it but it can be a bit unnerving how things come and go. And they do. Come and go, that is.

Turns out that some beasts require a lot of fodder to produce a few little morsels of meaningful something or other. And feeding those beasts can get very tiring.

If you don't believe me, just ask all of those artists with unfinished works.


Peace to you.




© LW Publishing 2014

My Father Before Me

My Dad is 83 years old. It’s weird to think of him as an old man, but that’s what he has become. Still, he has a youthful way about him, even though he has a disease called “Lewy Body Disorder” which is slowly stealing his mind and body away. But, overall, he’s doing pretty good. In his prayers he recently began thanking God for letting him live a good long life. I’m with him on that one. I hope for the same.

I wrote a song for my dad a while back. I thought, since it’s Father’s Day tomorrow, I’d share the words here. In honor of my Dad, Luther Virgil McWhorter, who everyone calls “Bert” for some reason...

MY FATHER BEFORE ME
©1998 DJM MUSIC

As I make my way through another day
I say something or do something that reminds me
I am more my father’s son than I ever thought I would be

And as the years go by, when I look in the mirror
I see my father looking right back at me
I am more my father’s son that I ever thought I could be

But it’s more than a grin or the outline of a smile
It’s the shape my heart takes as I’m trying to find the answers
It’s the longing within me as I’m looking to the skies
It’s the Hand of Heaven shaping that makes me what I am

Like my father before me
Like my father before me

I may never know him like I think I should
There’s a distance there that makes it quite a mystery
How I am more my father’s son than I ever though I could be

I may never know him like I wish I could
But if I learn to know myself maybe I can see
How I am more my father’s son than I ever thought I would be

Cause it’s more than the sound of my voice when I am speaking
It’s the shape my heart takes when I look out on the water
It’s the longing within me as I’m looking to the skies
It’s the hope of Heaven waiting that makes me what I am

Like my father before me
Like my father before me




Peace to you.





© LW Publishing 2010

Weak

I have this new thing. It doesn’t happen every day, but it happens quite a bit. When I wake up in the morning, my mind wakes up, mostly, but my body doesn’t want to cooperate. My body just wants to lay there and think about it for a while. Well. As much as it can think without my mind. This can go on for quite a while. A few times, I’ve forced myself to get out of bed anyway, and stumbled around the room like a zombie. It’s not pretty. It’s like being drugged.

The medical journals call this “Sleep Paralysis.” Apparently I’m “hypnopompic.” Isn’t that quaint? It’s when your body tries to wake up while still under the influence of the chemical your brain produces to keep you from moving while you sleep. This is what keeps most of us from punching someone out when we’re dreaming about being Jackie Chan.

What? You don’t dream about being Jackie Chan?

But, anyway, this chemical isn’t being properly whatever whatever... My body chemistry is whacked. Big surprise.

For years I’ve heard elderly people talk as if their bodies were strangers. Older women talking about their hands, but not saying, “my hands,” anymore. Instead, they refer to them as "they." “They just don’t work like they used to.” “They hurt me a lot.” As if some delinquents in the neighborhood are coming into her house while she’s sleeping and doing these things to her. And old men talking about their feet as if they’re a bad neighbor who they can’t get to act right. “They just won’t leave me alone.” “They bother me night and day.”

This creeps me out because I’m starting to move into that neighborhood. Every year the list of what’s “wrong” with me gets longer. It’s not that I’m old. I’m not. Honest. Really. Seriously.

AND NOW, A WORD FROM OUR SPONSOR...



Anyhyoo. I’m not old. But I’m definitely not young anymore either. And things just don’t work like they used to. The plumbing, as they say, is starting to get a bit leaky. And it's made me think about one of the most famous kings in all of history who was also named David. It’s said that, “He died at a good old age, having enjoyed long life...” The key being “enjoyed.”

I was visiting people at a retirement home a few years back and there was this woman I spent some time talking to who wasn’t “enjoying” long life. Everyone she loved had died except for her son who never came to see her. She was mad at God for keeping her alive. To be honest, it was a bit intimidating, so I just listened. That’s something I can usually do without making too many mistakes.

If I get to live that long, which I often doubt, here’s how I envision my old age. I know this is a bunch of hoo hah. But let me dream for a minute...

I imagine being surrounded by grand-kids. My wife and I spoil them, enjoy playing with them, get them all wired up on sugar and caffeine and then send them home to terrorize our grown children. We will laugh gleefully when they pull out of the driveway. They’ll call us in an hour or two and say, “What did you do to our kids,” and we’ll just say, “Why? They were great when they were here!”

I imagine having more time to think about eternal things. Perhaps I’ll come up with a theory of everything, but then I’ll forget it before I remember to tell anyone about it. Perhaps I’ll resolve the perceived “conflict” between God’s sovereignty and the responsibility of man and then refuse to tell the theologians. Perhaps I’ll finally understand . . . things.

I imagine having some uninterrupted time to spend with my wife and friends. My kids will be my best friends. And their kids. And maybe theirs! (Let’s go for broke.) We’ll play, I don’t know, chess or checkers on the wii while listening to music that makes the grand-kids beg us to turn it off.

While we’re not playing wii checkers, my wife and I will just go out of town for no reason and eat at restaurants only old people like. I’ll actually get to sit with her in church. We’ll feed the poor and visit the sick without looking at our watches.

You never know.

All of this, of course, depends on my body not falling apart first. The spirit is willing, but...




Peace to you.


© LW Publishing 2010