A very dear friend of mine is passing. Ralph's got a malignant tumor, he's 85. He'll probably be gone by spring. He's not at all unhappy about it. He's led as great a life as anyone he's ever known. He's been in the highest realms of American politcal society and consulted to princes and world leader for over 30 years. One of his neatest feats was teaching a course in Supply Side Econ at Moscow University every year for decades. When the Soviet Union fell, it was his students who helped to bring Russia out of the ashes.
I went to his last lecture today. He's failing. His hair is falling out. He's starting to have trouble breathing, but he says he's the happiest man alive. His lecture was great and uplifting. He's very optimistic about what is coming for the U.S. and our allies. More on that later in this thread. It was recorded. I may be able to get y'all a link to it.
What I want to talk to y'all about was a vibe I felt after this lecture. I've been partying with this guy since 1982. We've shared girlfriends. I have to say that I was well past maudlin when I got in the truck to drive up to the lecture, and my random playlist on Pandora reflected it. Every song was something about loss, dying, etc. I even got a cover of "The Parting Glass" . When you're a shaman you find things like Pandora tend to bend to your mood. Today, it could not have been more evident.
Coming out of the lecture, I saw my friends with whom I've been drinking with Ralph. Ralph got carted home. I invited the other two to come out with me to the watering hole. I'd buy the first round. I got in the truck and immediately got hit with "Big Chief" by Professor Longhair. If you don't know it, look it up. It's the kind of thing the band in New Orleans plays on the way back from the funeral. It was one upbeat tune after another all the way to the bar. It got me to thinking about this vibe I was having. The problem is it doesn't have a name. I'm trying to put my finger on it, and I just can't. It's a vibe that has dominated my life--at least the best parts.
Jackie Gleason had that vibe. When you used to see him on his variety show. The girl would come out and bring him his scotch and he'd smoke a cigarette and do his monologue-- yeah, that vibe.
My dad used to have that vibe. He knew Gleason. He knew him in Miami Beach-- used to drink with him. A lot of my Dad's friends had that vibe. It was a cool vibe to have around you, but until now I never really thought about.
Rodney Dangerfield had that vibe, at least when he wasn't talking about getting no respect. He had that vibe in a big way.
Dean Martin had that vibe when he wasn't playing at being a drunk.
This isn't "Cool." Cool is something else. It's got a bit of finality to it, but it isn't fatalistic. It's pragmatic about life and death without being morbid. It's happy about Life, because it beats the alternatives.
But I can't put my finger on what it is. Maybe you know it. Maybe you don't. After a couple of drinks with my buddies and a fun conversation with the waitress, I headed home, and started this thread. I'm probably going to post a few more times as things come to me, but as Jackson Browne said, "It's a song I hear playing right in my ear, but I can't play it-- can't help listening anyway." All of a sudden, after 60-some years, trying to put my finger on this vibe and give it a name is important.
I'll leave you with one thing that might get you on the path to this vibe. It's been doing it to me for close to 40 years.
I'm waiting for someone to put a name on this vibe. I don't have it— the name. I'm not sure I even know what you're talking about. To be pleasantly occupied and free of anxieties might be about as good as it gets.
Originally Posted by 16penny
If you put Taco Bell sauce in your ramen noodles it tastes just like poverty
My friend shaman. No one gets out of this world alive.
OK, Now, hold that thought. Imagine you've just passed me the bottle, and we've both hoisted our beakers to toast it. You turn back and gaze into the campfire.
Now, what is that feeling?
I've been pondering it. I used to think when I was much younger that it was what Saul Bellow called "Grun tu Molani." If you haven't read Henderson the Rain King, I would strongly suggest it. A guy named Henderson goes to Africa to find himself. Along the way, he bumps into a tribe that takes a fancy to him. Somebody there tells Henderson he has a lot of Grun tu Molani. Translation is roughly "Man want to live." It was one of the few books I was forced to read in college that actually made some sense. I told my friends about Grun tu Molani. We even used it as a greeting for a while.
It's been over 40 years since I read the book, and I don't think Grun tu Molani is quite what I'm talking about, but it's on the path. I think it is a prerequisite for this state of mind. You want to have a fierce desire to live to feel this. You also have to recognize your own mortality and the impermanence everything around you.
I'm sure what brought this on was seeing Ralph. Whatever "this" is, Ralph has it. He walked through life with a king-sized dose of it. Seeing him up giving his lecture, I realized he was starting to lose it. His was always the fiercest. Now, it is starting to go. Soon it will be gone.
I spent some time this morning trying to lookup an appropriate word. German is usually a good source if English fails. Germans have a bunch of good words that have no English equivalent. They have Schadenfreude and Sitzpinkler.
BTW: I did find a really good word:
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Innerer Schweinehund
“Inner pig dog.”
Sometimes, we hope that our spirit animal could be an eagle; wild and free. But most times, we find that we have an inner pig dog instead. It’s the little voice in your head that keeps us lazy and tells us that it’s ok not to go to the gym. Silencing the innere Schweinehund is hard work – but it’s worth it.
I just liked it. It has nothing to do with the subject at hand. Nowadays, there are pages and pages of webpages that have words in foreign languages that have no English equivalent.
After close to an hour of searching, the only word that even scratched the surface was:
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Yūgen
(Japanese) Means “a profound, mysterious sense of the beauty of the universe … and the sad beauty of human suffering”. This concept is very important in Japanese culture and the exact translation often depends on the context. In Chinese philosophy the term was taken from “yūgen” meaning “dim”, “deep” or “mysterious”.
However, it doesn't begin to take in the cheeriness of what I'm driving at. There's an optimism in the face of mortality. There is an ultimate grim joy. I also can't believe the Japanese have a clue what I'm talking about.
There's a story that went around the north side of Cincinnati that I heard from a stranger who was there. There's a bar in Brentwood that opened originally back in the late 50's. I knew it as the Pink Penguin. Nowadays it's called Sundy's. I've heard some of my graduating class from high school roost there. I've only been in there once over 30 years ago. It has (or had) a piano bar.
The story goes that my crazy Uncle Henry came into the bar shortly after it opened up and found it nearly empty and wholly lifeless and sullen. He took it upon himself to call up the piano player from The Vernon Manor-- one of the poshest spots in town, and then call up everyone he could think of. Soon there was this massive party going on and it lasted three days. I heard about this in the early 90's from a man who had been there when Henry walked in the door. After 40 years, he was still filled with whatever it was that Henry brought into the room.
It just so happened that on my way home last night, KYHillChick said she wanted curry from the Indian joint that's on the other side of that little strip mall. I ended up parking right in front the bar. I was reminded of that story, and it only fueled my interest in what it was that Henry brought into that place.
Perhaps the Irish have said it best.
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But since it falls unto my lot, That I should rise and you should not, I gently rise and softly call, Goodnight and joy be with you all.
"Life" Erroll Flynn had it. It's why he had an "In" (invatation) to any party. Because any party he attended was a guaranteed success. He was even known to come in swinging on a chandelier, or dressed as a pirate. It's the origin of the expression "In like Flynn". (Meaning a guaranteed success, or a preordained solution. )
Sorry to hear of your old friend, old friend.
An unemployed Jester, is nobody's Fool.
the only real difference between a good tracker and a bad tracker, is observation. all the same data is present for both. The rest, is understanding what you're seeing.
Shaman, not sure I know exactly what you are talking about. But I might be somewhere close.
Dad turned 89 last Sept 1. He went into a nursing home on July 2 2012.
I visited him at the home on Christmas day almost three weeks ago. And he was maybe 20% there, as to mental acuity.
Last Wed, he went into the hospital with 63% O2 sat, depressed BP, complete renal failure, and in a comatose state. Through the miracles of modern medicine, his physician got Dad's blood pressure up to where it should be, got full renal function, and with forced ventilation the O2 came to 95.
Actual diagnosis is trachial-bronchial malaise (collapsed trachea) inhibiting airflow, and low BP depressing kidney function.
We withdrew all sedatives on Friday. Extubated on Sat morning. BP is fair, O2 is still in mid 80s at this point.
But Dad is gone. He is still unresponsive, but for an occasional opening of his eyes to a loud sound.
I signed the hospice papers and DNR order. We withdrew all life support measures this morning and transported him back to the nursing home.
My brother and Step Mom wanted to know why I was letting them kill Dad. It was not a pleasant conversation. But with the assistance of a fine physician they eventually came to understand it was the only appropriate decision.
With no IV fluid support, nor medication to bring BP up, his body will be in full renal failure very soon, if oxygenation does not fail first. I do not expect his body to function through the end of this week.
So yes, there is a certain vibe in the air around here. It is not maudlin. I am not sure what to call it. Somber to be sure.
People who choose to brew up their own storms bitch loudest about the rain.
Sorry to hear, IS. I will be facing similar choices with my mother rather soon.
Anyway, Shaman, if German fails, French often has the answer in matters of the heart and life. Perhaps it's simply "joie de vivre". The pure joy of being alive, the conviction that "life is good".
"Life" Erroll Flynn had it. It's why he had an "In" (invatation) to any party. Because any party he attended was a guaranteed success. He was even known to come in swinging on a chandelier, or dressed as a pirate. It's the origin of the expression "In like Flynn". (Meaning a guaranteed success, or a preordained solution. )
Sorry to hear of your old friend, old friend.
I think "in like Flynn" really had more to do with sexual conquests.
"Life" Erroll Flynn had it. It's why he had an "In" (invatation) to any party. Because any party he attended was a guaranteed success. He was even known to come in swinging on a chandelier, or dressed as a pirate. It's the origin of the expression "In like Flynn". (Meaning a guaranteed success, or a preordained solution. )
Sorry to hear of your old friend, old friend.
I think "in like Flynn" really had more to do with sexual conquests.
Think what you like. Another fascinating actor was Lon Chaney (sp?) "The man with a thousand faces". He could be discharged from one film in the morning, and be hired on to another film in the afternoon, and they didn't know it was him until he signed the contract. They had rules in effect at the time to ration out the roles available, and he broke those rules every time he signed name to another role. He had his reasons to break the rules, and was good enough, he got away with it. Did his own make up.
An unemployed Jester, is nobody's Fool.
the only real difference between a good tracker and a bad tracker, is observation. all the same data is present for both. The rest, is understanding what you're seeing.
