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General Rantings

According Ability

We all know Karl Marx’ words:  “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”  He (who, in the 19th century, only considered he/him folk worthy of discussion) was talking about the division of a particular society’s assets.  I (who, in the 21st century, only very recently figured this out) have discovered a whole nother meaning…

My first seven decades were squandered trying to cram the square pegs of what I thought should be normal into the round holes of what I actually came across in life.  When I couldn’t do this, I dropped it.  If a friend crossed the line into what I considered OCD granularity, I tuned it out.  If another friend suffered from an anxiety disorder she herself admitted to, I discounted her fears.  While I might well be polite and emotionally respectful/accommodating in both instances, because I sincerely care about my friends, I didn’t take what was being said all that seriously.

I did find that my “normal” yardstick didn’t, at times, leave me with a whole hell of a lot to work with…

Then the pandemic hit.  We all experienced a dizzying explosion of information, misinformation, contradictory information, and ever-changing information.  Respected sources firmly informed us that masks weren’t necessary or even advisable one minute, then that masks were essential the next.

Those of us at the highest risk…old, perhaps immunocompromised, with heart conditions, asthma, diabetes, et alia…were more than just scratching our heads.  For us whether or not COVID-19 could be caught from environmental surfaces, or if it was safe to eat inside a restaurant, was truly a matter of life and death.

You may be able to see what’s coming.

Remember my OCD friend?  Guess who pored over every shred of information available from any reasonably respectable source and stayed up all night laboriously connecting dots no one in their “right” mind could possibly have kept track of?

And my other friend suffering from anxiety attacks?  I perhaps don’t have to tell you who figured out the best ambulance service to call on or local hospital to request they take you to.

At long last I might have figured it out:  Fuck both the concept of “right” and “normal.”  “From each according to their ability…”

Flash Fiction

Mighty Mouse

“Damn mouse!” I didn’t dare respond, but my wife’s anger worried me.  She was cleaning the fresh mouse shit off the kitchen counter with enough homicidal rage to viciously slaughter someone a lot bigger than that poor mouse. “Whad’ya do this time, Husband Dearest?  Replace my old-fashioned, snap-their-little necks mouse…
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Reviews

Fabulous Foolishness

I highly recommend a 1949 film entitled My Foolish Heart, currently available for free on Amazon Prime.  Despite the title, you can stop rolling your eyes.  The only authorized film adaptation of anything written by J.D. Salinger, it may not be perfect, but his authenticity made the unique cultural and…
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General Rantings

Slippery Science

I’ll start by giving the other side of this argument its due: Like the bible, in which passages can be found to support both sides of remarkably opposite points of view, respectable scientific experiments and statistical analysis can be found to support both the politically polarized left and right in…
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Other Stuff

Edible Enchantment

The ecstasies of the east drew me to the west. Hypnotized, I headed for that vintage wooden schooner at the end of Pier 6 in Brooklyn Bridge Park. Her masts seduced me with their rhythmic sway: a slow side to side, then an impetuous backwards circle incestuously doubling back on…
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Other Stuff

Eastern Ecstasies

East River. Pier 6. Vintage wooden schooner that’s circumnavigated the globe twice. I lazed at a waterside table just south of Pier 5, gazing across the water separating my Brooklyn home of many decades from my birthplace in Manhattan. Toying with a trick from decades ago, I squinted: The sunlight…
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