The JackB

"When you're in jail, a good friend will be trying to bail you out. A best friend will be in the cell next to you saying, 'Damn, that was fun'." Groucho Marx

Just Write

Walking Where Men Fear To Tread

Contradictions- The ocean is both beauty and beast.
Contradictions- The ocean is both beauty and beast.

Midnight approaches and I am accompanied by the dog and Ray Charles singing “Come Back Baby.”

Tomorrow morning I will check back in with family and friends who are being pounded by Sandy and hope they remain safe and dry.

It is surreal to be here in LA where the temperatures are in pushing towards ranges most often associated with Summer while elsewhere people are bundled up in winter clothing.

Women Rule Social Media

One of the guys I play ball with just found out I am a blogger. He thinks it is funny to ask if I am a mommy blogger and wonders if I know that women rule social media.

I smile and tell him that I am not the guy who got a vasectomy. His grin disappears and he walks away.

It is common knowledge that his wife forced him to get clipped and I am tired of his antics. I don’t need to engage in pissing contests and have little to no interest in the silly verbal sparring he wants to engage in.

Not to mention I am well aware of my cranky state and know trouble is coming. Most of the time I am a happy curmudgeon, but not tonight.

My knees and back hurt and I am concerned that the miles of wear and tear are catching up with me.

I Am Not Old

The comment about mileage isn’t a euphemism for a hard life of drugs and drinking. It is an acknowledgement of how I played sports.

I have spent decades playing hard. Haven’t had the talent to keep up with some of the guys but I made up for it in will and desire. I did the dirty work and spent time doing stuff that many didn’t want to do.

That is why some of the guys let me play with them. They were far more talented and normally wouldn’t pick me, but I made them want to because I played hard.

I keep repeating that because it is how I cope with not being able to play as I once did. It is not easy to accept and that is why I bring it up often, but sooner or later I’ll let go of the part that fights and adjust.

Rolling With The Changes

I am still rolling with the changes because it is how things go and there are no other options.

The blog is having issues. I noticed last night that when I tried to create a new post I couldn’t add pictures and the HTML editor was gone. It appears Jetpack is having issues. When I deactivate it the problems seem to disappear.

That irks me. It is one of my favorite plugins. Have to do more checking.

Ray Charles and Dad Bloggers

Ray has moved on to “You Don’t Know Me”, “It Should Have Been Me” and a dozen other songs I never tire of listening to.

Been a fan of Ray’s for more than 25 years but some of my most prominent memories come from my first apartment, a turntable and a bottle of Scotch.

I’d come home from work, turn on Ray and grab a drink. It was me, Ray and Johnny Walker standing on the balcony watching the sunset. Most nights I wouldn’t have more than that one drink, but every now and then there were…more.

Occasionally I’d wake up in the big stuffed chair I inherited from my grandparents and wonder why hangovers hurt so damn much.

Somewhere in the midst of all this came a girl who listened to Ray with me and would lie in bed listening to me talk about dreams for the future.

I remember listening to her talk about the future she wanted felt like this very wise, very old man.

Now I look back and laugh at the very young, very naive man I was.

Who I Was, Who I Am, Who I Will Become

Ray was there back in the days I refer to as who I was and he is here now in the time I call who I am. It is safe to say he’ll still be hanging out with me when I who I will become show up.

I feel like I have lived a thousand lives. Don’t know if everyone feels this way or if it is the province of writers, just that I feel this way.

Maybe it is because people have told me that if we had met at a different time or different place we might have done things together. Maybe it is because I see stories in my head and hear their whispers in my mind.

There is much joy in this journey and confidence that I am on my way to where I am going. Can’t ask for more than that and a request for health and wealth for my family and friends.

And that my friends is Just Write.

Bloggers Are Insecure

My Thoughts Are Over The Hills and Far away.
My Thoughts Are Over The Hills and Far away.

Most of you aren’t aware that I maintain about five different blogs, truth is there might be one or two more that I am not thinking about.

There are only a few that I talk about here. Random Thoughts and Words Left Unwritten get some play and occasionally I’ll point out the second Random Thoughts too.

The first Random Thoughts is where this all began. It is special to me because it is my first cyber home and I haven’t let go of it because it has sentimental value and because sometimes I go back there because it offers a place to do different sorts of writing than here.

Words Left Unwritten is where I focus on my fiction and I love that place too because it is where I have worked on turning possibility into opportunity. Many of the stories I write there have received quite a bit of attention and it is where I work on pushing myself to reach that next rung on the ladder.

The second Random Thoughts was my second serious attempt to move from Blogger to WordPress. It wasn’t self hosted, but it was where I began to figure out how WP works and where I mulled over whether it made sense to make the move.

“I believe we have two lives: the one we learn with, and the one we live with after that.” Iris Gaines From The Natural

The headline should be changed to sometimes Bloggers Are Insecure because that is more accurate. It reflects the truth or maybe it reflects my truth.

Sometimes when I don’t receive many shares or comments I suffer from Blog Envy and Tweet Esteem issues. Most of the time I don’t care because I love what I am doing too much not to do it.

This place you are visiting, it is my refuge and my salvation. There is so much joy in the journey I can’t properly express what it means to me.

I can tell you about how I became a writer, stopped and then started again. I can tell you about how blogging has helped put me back on track to what I am supposed to do with my life.

I am a writer.

This is what I am supposed to do. These words you read are magic and are taking me too places I only imagined.

Thirty years ago I wanted nothing more than to be an outfielder for the Dodgers. I was good. I led the league in home runs. No one had a better arm than I did. I threw out a boy at home plate.

I still remember scooping up the ball in center field and firing it home. It was perfect. He slid right into the tag.

Eighteen years ago I stood under a moonlit sky in the middle of Jerusalem and made my decision to leave the states and move. I walked with a group of twenty somethings like myself and talked about what life would be.

I flirted with girls from South Africa, England and Scotland. Israeli girls teased me about my accent and I laughed.

My dreams of playing centerfield were long since gone and I had other thoughts on my mind. I knew that I was on the verge of something big, something amazing and I wanted it.

Life happened and I went a different direction. Sometimes I have wondered whether the choices I made were right, smart and or proper.

I have wondered if I could do anything would I step back in time and try the road not taken. Most of the time I don’t think about that anymore. I don’t ask if things happen for a reason because it doesn’t really matter.

Life Is Challenging, But Good

It doesn’t matter because what is done is done and I have that fierce grizzly bear love that parents have for children. My children are simply awesome and I am grateful to have them in my life.

There is no doubt that life has presented its share of challenges and that there have been many moments where I have wondered what would happen next.

Frustration and uncertainty have reared their heads and I have asked if I am the source of challenges, but this is where blogging steps back in.

Blogging has provided a simple venue in which I have been able to ask and answer these questions. It is where I have wandered down aisles and pathways that have made it clear to me that this is special.

I don’t have all of the answers I have been looking for, but I have found more than a few. I feel a bit like Indiana Jones and though I am sitting at a keyboard it doesn’t mean I don’t wear the hell out of a fedora or am any less capable of using this bull whip.

Can’t tell you what chapter I am on, but I know there is a lot left in this story and I hope you continue to share it with me.

Barry Manilow Could Be A Blogger

English: Barry Manilow live at the Xcel Energy...
English: Barry Manilow live at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, MN on January 11, 2008. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Somewhere out there in the ether is a woman I used to date whose jaw has dropped because she know hell has frozen over, except she doesn’t know why.

If she read the blog it would be obvious to her, I mentioned Barry Manilow in a positive context. I didn’t make fun of him or suggest it would be less painful to have  root canal without anesthesia.

So why did I say that Barry could be a blogger?

It is not because he writes the songs that make the whole world sing, its because the man is a storyteller and that I have the utmost respect for. The best bloggers are storytellers who know how to make the words on a page dance for them.

There is a reason why I wrote two posts about that. It is because master storytellers know how to weave a tale that does more than hold a reader/listener’s attention. It makes them sit up straight, take notice and respond to a call to action.

That is My Goal

I want to be that guy. I want to tell a story that you can’t stop reading/listening to. I want you to respond to my tales the way the crowd responds to Springsteen in this video.

Do you feel the power that comes through it all. Some of it is because Bruce has natural charisma and some of it is because his songs tell a story. They capture and captivate. They make you feel joy and they make you feel pain.

When you can do that you have lightning in a bottle.

There Is a Method To the Madness

Someone asked me to explain my theory on blogging and social media. They wanted to know why I operate the way I do and if it is successful.

My response is that it is successful. I could suggest you read You Don’t Need A Niche To Be A Successful Blogger or that you take advantage of the content in Twenty-Five Links That Will Make You A Better Writer/Blogger because that information is gold.

And I could tell you that bloggers who want to be successful have to walk the fine line of self promotion and that I am trying to do it now, but that would be putting the cart before the horse.

Why?

If we are talking about what makes a blog successful we have to start by identifying and setting goals for a blog/blogger. If you don’t have goals you can’t develop a plan of action to take you from point A to point Z. Without that information you are like a driver who is wandering the freeway with a general idea of how to get to the store but no real sense of what exit to take.

Figure out why you are doing this and you can pick up a road map that will help you find your way.

That is part of why I cover so many different topics. It is part of why I mix fiction in with business. The only way to become a better writer is to practice writing and part of my process is to not lock myself into one topic or genre.

Read about Georgie, check out the Beginning of The End, Plenty of Time or Building a Future and you will see many of the same commenters. That is because a community has been formed there and community is what drives social media.

People are tribal. People are communal creatures. My goal is to build connections and build community.

Can you see dad in center field.

I don’t know how many people will really read this post. It is chock full of layers and that is how I like to write, but we live in a time of instant gratification and short attention spans.

People love lists like 5 Reasons Why I Hate Your “Epic” Content and I kind of enjoy writing them. I kind of enjoy ranting and raving but there are lots of times where all I want to do is write letters to my children and talk about kicking drunk clowns out of birthday parties.

Most of all I like to Just Write because that is how I work on my craft and practice becoming a better storyteller. And maybe if I put some time in and god smiles upon me this post will be picked up by more than the people in my Triberr tribes and we’ll find out just how much magic is left in the night.

How Did You Become Who You Are?

Dead Sea sign

Ojai, Texas, Israel and Los Angeles are on my mind because these are the places of burning importance to me.

These are the places that helped me become who I was, who I am and I am going to become.

My friend Sandi put something up on Facebook about being a 5/5 on the feistiness scale and I responded by saying I am an 8 or a 9. Don’t  know if that is good or bad, but I am who I am.

iTunes is set to shuffle and Sting’s song A Thousand Years has just come on. Is this a message or just coincidence. Beats me and I am too tired to try to figure it out.

Still staring at the picture of the sign from the Dead Sea.  There are so many stories I could tell you about the lives I have lived and the paths I have walked. Some of them are more interesting than others and some are probably just dull and devoid of meaning to most.

Twenty-Seven years ago I began making plans for a future that didn’t materialize. I was going to live ten thousand miles from home. I was going to become a soldier and raise my family in a different land from that I knew but one that always feels like home.

And then life happened. There was a shift and a change. I took a different path and became a different person. Can’t say better or worse, just different.

How Did You Become Who You Are?

Do you ever think about it. Do you ever wonder about what could have happened if you had made different choices. By now it should be obvious that I have done and still do this.

It is a part of me. I am filled with wanderlust and a desire to seek…things. It may not seem like it, but there are large periods of time in which I am settled and not interested in stoking the flames, but things happen and the shift comes.

Part of me doesn’t like the sound of it, makes me sound manic and or imbalanced. Don’t like that because I am…not.

Feisty. Sometimes impulsive and willing to dance in the flames, but I know what I am doing.

Tonight Facebook shared a face from my past. A woman I knew from my time in Ojai was shown to me. The AI on Facebook suggested that perhaps we knew each other and I laughed. We know each other, or at least we did.

There was a time when I thought perhaps we might get married. There was a time when we shared a brief scare and I wondered what it might mean to be a father at 19. It didn’t happen and I am grateful. Many years have passed and though I look back and smile I know she wasn’t for me.

In The Days of My Youth

iTunes is still speaking to me. Good Times, Bad Times by Led Zeppelin has just come on. Can’t help but smile listening to that and then I have to listen to Babe, I’m Gonna Leave You.

“Babe, baby, baby, I wanna leave you
I ain’t jokin’ woman – I’ve got to ramble
Oh, yeah, baby, baby, I will be there
I’ve really got to ramble
I can hear it callin’ me the way it used to do
I can hear it callin’ me back home”

My thoughts are back in Israel and I am remembering how it all started in Ojai.

We were evacuated from a forest fire. The entire lot of us leaving in the dead of night. Almost 30 years later I can still see the flames lighting up the sky and hear the howl of the siren.

Years later the rumble of the earth will wake me and as I listen to a hundred car alarms I’ll remember the sound of the siren and ash falling from the sky.

Time will pass and I’ll walk down a street in Jerusalem past the scene of a terrorist attack. It will have taken place days earlier, but I’ll stare at holes in the wall and remember the sounds of the siren and the rumble of the earth.

These Words I Write

You can blame Jim Murray for these words I write. He was one of the finest sportswriters ever and his writing made me fall in love with words.

There are others who I regard fondly and remember with joy, but Jim Murray is among the very few regrets of my life. I would have loved to have met him and to have talked about writing.

It would have been great to hear some of his stories. I am sorry it never happened. With some luck I may still yet have the chance to do so with Vin Scully.

How did you became who you are is a question I have asked many times. I still ask it and not just of myself.

I think if I did a better job of asking others to share their tale with me I would find myself in an entirely different place than I am now.

How did you become who you are?

An Easy Fast Doesn’t Provide Atonement

This happens to me…Every Year. In the days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur I become more restless and unsettled.

Every year I write posts about this and share thoughts about religion, casting away sins and self love.

There are levels of intolerance discussed within these pages. As a father I think about what sort of obligation I have towards my children and I ask myself if I am hitting the mark.

The Truck Driver

My son walks into my office today and tells me about how this truck driver intentionally blocked an aisle in the parking lot today and forced cars to drive the wrong way.

“Dad, he told mom and I to use common sense and go the other way.”

I asked him if the man was rude or polite. He says the guy was obnoxious.

“Dad, because he wouldn’t move mom and all these other cars had to drive the wrong way, we almost had an accident.”

His story sets me off and I ask for a description of the man. My son wants to know if he can go along for the ride and I say no. “Dad, I want to see what happens.”

I tell him not to worry and that I am going to take care of this. He looks at me and asks why I look so angry and I tell him that it the driver’s behavior is unacceptable and I am going to fix things.

As I walk out the door I hear multiple voices asking me to remain calm.I turn, smile and say don’t worry.

Five minutes later I reach the shopping center and the truck is still parked there. It is blocking an entire aisle so I am confident all I need to do is find the driver.

The Truck Driver

I see a man pushing a hand truck towards the juice store and I am certain he is the driver. I park my car, take pictures of the truck and head over to the store.

There is a juice store employee standing outside. I ask him if they normally receive deliveries at 4:15 and he says no. This one was supposed to be there at 7 Am.

“Why didn’t you tell him to move his truck to the far side of the lot so that he wouldn’t cause a traffic jam in the lot?” There is silence and then the employee shrugs his shoulders at me.

I explain why I am angry and mention that this store put my family at risk. It doesn’t matter who was driving. He is part of the problem. He says he is sorry and offers me a smoothie. I say no and then the driver reappears in front.”

“Did you tell a woman and a boy to use common sense?”

There is a hard edge in my voice and I feel my hands flexing. He tells me that he said use common sense but claims he was talking to himself.

“So you ignored your own advice, chose to block traffic and then almost created a six or seven car pile up.”

He takes a step backwards and apologizes, but I am not pacified.

“I am not a woman. I am not a 12 year-old boy. Tell me to use common sense. Ignore me. It is what you did before. Pretend your work is more important than the safety of others. Pretend that I am not the very angry father of the family you put at risk!”

I know I am on the verge of shouting. If he doesn’t apologize I am going to make the kind of scene he doesn’t want. But he does apologize again. He tells me the other driver was sick and that he is sorry.

“You should be thankful I wasn’t hear to see you put lives at risk. You should be thankful I am not any more upset than I am, but we aren’t through. I will submit a complaint. That is not me wagging my tongue. That is a promise.  Next time show some consideration for others.

Atonement

Night falls and I think about what happened. I don’t feel badly about what I said or that I filed a complaint. Safety comes first and there is no excuse for his parking his truck that way. I am certain he tried to take advantage of being a man who was faced with some children and angry moms.

Yet I can’t help but think of my own mistakes. I am not perfect. There are lots of things you can rap my knuckles for.

It won’t be long before Yom Kippur officially starts and my fast begins. It won’t be long before I have ample time to focus my attention again inwards and ask all the hard questions.

I read Torah every Yom Kippur for a little more than 25 years, but I haven’t read the last two and I miss it. Can’t decide why I miss it, but I know that I do. Not sure that it is important.

My gut tells me that the past several years have lead to this point and that we are on the verge of something really big. Good things are coming, or so I think. And so I take a moment to listen to the words of the songs below and to think.

Some words continue to remain unread.

When Father Doesn’t Know Best

All luck run out
All luck run out (Photo credit: nyoin)

I am beginning to hate Words With Friends. It is because two of my friends have kicked my writer ass up, down and around the block.

It irks me not just because I am competitive but because I have a larger vocabulary than most people do. I never run out of words but apparently I run out of good combinations.

It sucks to be beaten constantly and it is only made worse because there have been multiple times where I lost right at the end of the game.

I HATE that.

Never Give Up, Never Surrender

Forgive me for using a slogan from a forgettable film, but it is apropos for this discussion. I have a grip that would make a gorilla jealous and a will to win that doesn’t let me just walk away from things. When it gets tough, I get going, but not in the opposite direction.

Yet, I keep losing and it makes me scream WTF because I haven’t figured out what I am doing wrong. It is clear that I am, but I am determined to figure it out.

There are bigger problems and more important issues than this, but sometimes it is the little ticky tack ones that make you crazy.

Self Hosted Blogs versus Free

Bill has a post running today that reminded me of the advantages of a self hosted blog and why I made the change.

Free blogs are great but if the powers that be decide you have violated their Terms of Service they can yank your blog and you will lose everything.

You might not know this, but I have a bunch of free blogs that I still use. They all need to be backed up.

  1. Random Thoughts- Do They Have Meaning?
  2. Fragments of Fiction- Version 178
  3. Words Left Unwritten

Each of those is important to me for different reasons and I would be irked if I lost them. So I have taken steps to back them up. Better to be proactive about it.

Children and Hard Questions

My son asked me about the Boy Scouts today and why they got into trouble. It is not easy telling a kid that some people are sick enough to hurt children. It is not easy to try and talk about these things in a way that impresses how serious it is but doesn’t scare them silly.

It might have been easier but last week was our conversation about 9-11. My little mister wants to know why people will fly planes into buildings and if I ever am nervous about flying.

He wants to know what I would do if someone threatened the family. I do my best to reassure him and remind him these things are quite rare, but he presses me on the issue.

I make a point to look him in the eyes and I tell him not to worry because I will do what is necessary. He doesn’t say much other than he feels better. I am still superman for a bit longer.

When Father Doesn’t Know Best

Last week my daughter had some sort of misunderstanding with several of her friends. They are eight years-old so I thought I would have some time before some of the drama hit but I was wrong.

The dark haired beauty shared a ten minute story with me about why she and her friends were upset. She told me about how some of them cried and how she wasn’t sure if they could be friends again.

I listened to her tale and asked if she thought it was a misunderstanding. She blew up and told me that I can’t understand because I am a boy.

So I hugged her and told her I loved her. She said thank you and then told me that I still didn’t understand.

Did I mention that my girl already has mastered the female look of death. One day some boy is going to wither and shrink under that glare, but not me. I may not understand but I am still dad.

Something tells m that this won’t be the last time I don’t understand, but I am ok with that. My daughter is smart, strong and has a good head on her shoulders.

But I would be remiss if I didn’t share that I have never seen anything like this with my son and his friends. Maybe it is because I understand boys. 😉

And that my friends is my entry for Just Write #53.

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