And what did I do during this week off?

I tried not to the think about it. I did big, bad-ass guy things, like mowing lawn and thatching and lifting big, heavy things out of my house and onto the curb. I did fluffy, girly things like going into the city and sitting in a hair salon for two hours while my friend and hairdresser of over a decade sculpted my sad, shapeless hair into a slick, new, shiny Manhattan ‘do.  I got a manicure, hung out with people I adore, pounded city pavement, even visited the New York Public Library, which I had never done…shame on me.

And I tried to undo all the damage the Cubicle Farm has created with my very first visit with an acupunturist. Says she – and the assorted chiropracters, physical therapists and masseuses in various cities and spas – that my back and shoulders are something of a marvel. Stress-turned-concrete. A bumpy, rocky landscape of muscles in fists. And my qi, the life force that is supposed to be freely flowing through me and connecting me to my surroundings, is stuck. I envision this mysterious qi as water, lovely in its natural, flowing state; swampy and murky and attracting mosquitos as it collects around all of those angry little fists, all of which I’ve clenched so unconsciously, so thoroughly, that we need every ancient Eastern trick in the book to break them down.

And make no mistake. I am breaking those mutha-f*&^%a’s down.

I’m only a few days and one treatment into this particular approach, but more treatments are definitely in my near future. In the interim, I will envision Tibetan mountains, smiling children, caribbean beaches, puppies, Gypsy flamenco dancers, whatever the hell it takes, to help free my qi.

Free my qi…Free my qi…Free my qi….

Next time I write, I’ll be past Monday morning. There’s something to look forward to.

Happy Sunday night, kids. A world of peace to you.

I am, beloved TCL, on vacation this week. I am not contemplating life from a sand-and-turquoise shoreline or a misty mountain top. Not redefining my boundaries in some distant, foreign cobble-stoned street. I am on my couch, seeking the simplest of pleasures: the OFF button for the voices in my head. You know the ones. They say things like:

Oh no, it’s already (insert day of the week).
Lord, Jesus, I have to go back in (insert number) more wake-ups.
Holy mother of all-things holy, I just can’t do it anymore.
Where in God’s gracious name did this day go?

On and on it’s been going since my first day off – which was last Friday - and so I’ve been trying simple things, like pleasant little trips here and there. Trips where I can meander and breathe deeply – and not spend money. But it hasn’t really worked. The knots along my back and shoulders, which should be softening up now that I’m not at my cubicle, swallowing my every instinct to run, are not going away. Instead, the blasted little bastards – each with a name and a birthday - are tightening. Building strength. Starting a bloody riot.

Today promised to be more of the same, even though the temperature and the sun were so perfect, one would think I’d be a little more gracious. It didn’t just happen, my state of grace, so I decided to force it by remaining outdoors. Where do I go, I thought, where I’m not shopping or trying not to shop? I am surrounded by strip malls, but a local family farm and nursery sounded like it might do the trick. There is something about the endless rows of color, call it mums in the autumn or azaleas in the spring, that quiets me down. So I went.

And there, among the rows of budding roses, an old commuting buddy. Ron. 

“Hey!”
“Hi!” 

Ron is one of those rare cats you meet maybe a handful of times in your life, a man so unshakably cool and pleasant, his ”roll” so infectious, it’s impossible not to be in a good mood in his presence. It’s not something he’s trying to push on you, mind you. Nor is it overcooked. It’s just Ron, the guy who, at 6:00 a.m., no matter what the weather or time of year,  would walk into our bus, give the driver his best baritone greeting, and move up the aisle to an empty seat as if he were on an effing red carpet at an L.A. movie premier – starring him.

“Hey, man, how you doin’ today?”
“Hi, baby, what’s goin’ on?”

Of course, when he’s not working or commuting, he plays sax. What the hell else would he play, you know?

I don’t see him often anymore. He has retired and is free from his bus groupies. And it is lovely to run into him. Twice in the span of only a couple of weeks, after dropping of our radar for months. Since today is a workday, he asks whether I’ve taken a day off.

“I took the whole week off,” I say.
“Oh, very nice! Good that you took a break!”
“I needed it bad. But I gotta tell ya, man, it’s already Tuesday, you know what I mean?”
“Ah…aaaahhhh….don’t do it to y’self,” he said, shaking his head, his smile completely replaced by blessed empathy, and a dash of gentle admonition.
“But I cannot seem to stop counting it down. I’m walking around with this awful feeling of dread. That’s how bad it is, man. That’s how bad it is. I’m a stinkin’ mess.”

And Ron does Ron. He lowers his head to a conspiratorial level, and shows me yet another one of his a magic tricks. 

“Listen here. You know what I do, on almost a daily basis? I go outside, I set up my speakers…”
“Ha!”
“I am serious! I get myself a glass and a straw and I do it all up,  the way they say in the islands, ‘just so,’ and I am out. I’m gone. I’m on another…”
“Chapter?”
“Chapter. Planet. I’m just out. And it’s just for me. My wife thinks I’m nuts, and that’s alright, cuz it’s just for me.”
“I understand.”
“And you know what,” he adds, eyes wide open with wonder, ”That mess works every single time!”

And we laugh. Because all good tricks, performed just so, work every single time. And I laugh a little longer than he does,  because when he said “just so,” he put a little Montego Bay in it, and it tickled.

So.

Now that I know the trick…

I came home and stepped into my own little corner of the world.With an air and attitude of ritual,  I lit a candle. With the flame from the candle, I lit a stick of amber incense. Then, I stepped out of the room to pour some ease-my-mind into a glass. In just a few more moments, when I turn off this computer, I’m going to listen to something that will silence the already distant voices with sound of soft, tropical rainfalls and wind chimes, and it will all be just so, as it should be.

We’ll talk again soon, kids.

well, you could have been anything that you wanted to,
and I can tell….

the way you do the things you do

that’s the answer to the last trivia question, kids. hey, i think that we should begin a movement, if only for the sake of getting away from our desks for a little while: the TCL Movement for Movement. we take all the video footage on “the temptations” and other rythmically gifted groups, learn the moves to each song, and go downstairs to the lobby around lunch time and do it. lipsync and dance. a different song every day. step away from our desks for 20-30 minutes, give our performance (TCL Presents…) and get on with the rest of the day. oh, the benefits would be ENDLESS. and when we’re done with the “temptations” roster, we could take on more complicated stuff like michael jackson’s “thriller” and “bad.” HA! can you imagine?? (you’re butt is miiiiine…) i LOVE it. a woman can dream…

before the workday gets away from me without a group hug (completely unacceptable) let’s keep it on the temptations’ top ten. reminder:

10. get ready
9. the way you do the things you do
8. cloud nine
7. i know i’m losing you
6. ….oh how i love this one…here’s the opening:

each day through my window i watch her as she passes by
i say to myself, you’re such a luck guy

name the song, have a little coffee, and before you know it, it’ll be time to go home. i promise.

but on to the hope of better things:

answer to last week’s question? in bold…and here’s the whole opening for “ain’t too proud to beg,” by the temptations, because, seriously, has pleading every been this cool?

i KNOW you want to leave me
but i reFUSE to let you go
if i have to BEG, PLEAD, for your sympathy
i don’t MIND cuz you mean that much to me…

and let’s stick with the temptations because they put me in a fabulous mood. i googled their top 10:

10. “get ready” (never met a girl who makes me feel the way that you do..(you’re alright!))
9. you tell me…some words to help:

the way you swept me off my feet,
you know you could have been a broom
the way you smelled so sweet,
you know you could have been some perfume

well, you could have been anything that you wanted to,
and I can tell….

(the next line is the name of the song.)

now go. have some coffee, and let’s maharishi an error-free rest of the week for your friend and fellow tcl member, me.

Another movie moment that popped across my screen this week belonged to “The Big Chill.” I remember watching that when it first came out with my then-18-year-old college friends and wondering about our own parallels to those characters…and I also remember LOVING THAT SOUNDTRACK, man! A million years later, I see this movie – and the parallels are frighteningly real – and the soundtrack still makes me stop and listen and watch. The moment I watched: The end of a dinner scene, when Glenn Close, Tom Berenger, Meg Tilly, Jeff Goldblum, Kevin Kline, William Hurt..all of them…all reunited college buddies…are floating in and out of the dining room and kitchen area, cleaning and yammering and doing what a group of soul mates do. Kevin Kline’s character goes for the wall unit, pulls out an album, places it on the turntable, and when the song begins (with a great pa-prrrrrrrrrrrra-pa BAM!), his whole body plays a spastic air-drum, and with that, everyone starts to dance through the clean-up ritual…

The song?
Here’s the first line:

I knoooow you want to leave me

1. give me the next line
2. do NOT come into work tomorrow; it’s FRIDAY
3. don’t forget to adjust every clock and watch this weekend…

massive hug, and have a little coffee i’m about to brew. it’s late, but what the h-e-double-hockey-sticks.

if you sing it, it will come. also, that’s the answer to yesterday’s question.

glory be to our various higher powers: it is THURSDAY.

in between dinner and dishes, i caught about 20 minutes of “cougar town” last night. it doesn’t do much for me so i don’t tune in regularly, but i have to say, it does have its moments.  and last night, it had many of them. andy (actor ian gomez, who i really like) the neighbor’s husband, is one of the funniest characters, and it was all about andy. the plot? andy wants to go dancing. he NEEDS to go dancing. but his wife doesn’t want to. and as his wife, she knows he’s capable of doing WHATEVER HE NEEDS TO DO to make people feel bad for him, so that SOMEONE will go dancing with him. she says he’s the devil. calls him “keyser soze.” and you’re thinking like courtney cox is thinking. really? andy? but he’s so soft. so sensitive. so…slightly clueless. naaaah. end of the episode: they’re all out at a club. andy got his way. and before he gets to the club, you see that every poor-me story he told to get everyone into a danceclub was concocted, completely made up, by using the immediate elements around him. he even faked a fall, a twisted ankle, a limp, which slowly corrected itself as he walked to the dancefloor. and let me tell you…the boy can DANCE.

so tell me, kids, what fabulous movie did “cougar town” lift last night? it was in a lot of your top 10′s. and if you’re really feeling ambitious, who played the role that andy was emulating?

go get some coffee a-la-sara.

and make the day a peaceful and productive one.

but enough of that. a little morning ha-ha.

a true story on karmic retribution: “the professor” approached me days ago in search of an empathetic ear. the painful subject? the number of stalls in the men’s room. there are two. for the entire 14th floor of men. i knew of this already because mc, our tcl compare, has also mentioned this to me. it is a travesty. an architectural brainfart. and i was starting to feel a little sorry for the boys when i thought, WAAAAIT a second…two stalls for about 100 men? which means the boys have to wait, what, 5 minutes to take care of business? BIG, HONKIN’ DEAL, dude!! or have you not noticed the lines at ladies rooms across the nation?

seriously. no empathy here. just a cock of the eyebrow and a “welcome to our world.”

so, sf made some dd a little while ago. not sure that there’s any left, but i’m headed to the pantry to have a pour. and since we’re in paradise, after all, i wondered, what are the top 10 songs on the subject of paradise? and here’s what i got:

10. “paradise” by sade in 1988
9. “paradise” by kace (??) in 2002 (that explains why i don’t know it)
8. here’s a snippet…it’s so popular that if i go one line above or below it, you won’t have to think at all…

I think I can make it now, the pain is gone
All of the bad feelings have disappeared
Here is the rainbow I’ve been prayin for

give me the name of the song, and have a terrific day!

coffee will be all brewed in 10 minutes. the weekend will be here in a few more hours. how good is life, you know?

while you wait, let’s think brady bunch karma. marciamarciamarcia is on the phone with a prospective date. in a starry-eyed haze, she opens the door to the back yard for a little fresh air and BAM! “OH MY NOSE!” which of the BB brothers threw the fateful football that made marcia look like deniro in raging bull?

have a WONDERFUL day and weekend, guys. and to anyone who upsets you in any way today, let us mahirishi, say…a mighty itch.

what a gorgeous day it’s turning out to be, huh? this morning’s story: MV’s 2-year-old son, mani, is having some trouble with a new “haircut” that his mom has given him. in all fairness, though, it was not a haircut, which might be the problem. she shaved it off. and while the breeze might be welcome as the summer months approach, baby boy is not pleased with his own reflection. he’s walking around with sheets on his head. and when she tries to feed him or talk to him, he’s giving her the the 2-year-old version of “talk to the hand, lady.” a vazquez tragedy. she feels rejected. he feels uncool. let’s maharishi a resolution, kids. and superhuman hair growth. ooommmmmm…

yesterday’s answer: davy jones (jockey/monkees lead singer) and desi arnaz, jr. (mini-babalu)

today’s BB question: ‘member that song? and the cheesy choreography? g’ahead. dust of the memory. here’s a lyric.

I think i’ll go for a walk outside now
The summer sun’s callin my name
(I hear ya now)

name the song.

and have some dd in 10 minutes.

let’s have a little coffee, shall we?. and in the meantime:

center square belonged to alice, the housekeeper (and yes, to paul lynde on hollywood squares, paolo)!

next question: marsha-marsha-marsha had TWO heartthrobs visit her on the show (which solidifies jan’s argument!)…but, be that as it may…we need to name these heartthrobs. hints:

1. one was a daydream believer
2. the other – a junior to his famous cuban father

wednesday. let the coutdown begin.