Tag Archives: holiday

I didn’t miss it…

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A few minutes ago I realized it was Monday. I also realized I hadn’t written a word since Thursday. Even if it’s not something I’m going to share, a four day break is awfully unusual. It’s even more unusual if you take into account I didn’t make any notes, didn’t proof anything, and didn’t so much think about anything that might be confused with writing. I didn’t miss it. And that’s what really surprised me.

It seems that the long weekend threw me utterly off the routine. I have no idea that getting back to work tomorrow will bring it all careening back into place, but at the moment it all feels like a big pile of “meh.” Maybe that’s to be expected as an appropriate end to a lengthy weekend. Besides if I ever found myself perfectly content with anything I’d be worried that it’s a sure sign of a stroke. As it is, I’ll just take it as a sign that it’s been another weekend governed largely by apathy.

By their blood…

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For generations unbroken stretching back to before the Revolution, America’s bravest sons and daughters have shouldered the burden so many of the rest of us studiously avoided. They shouldered the nation’s hopes and dreams, answered the call, and stood on point to defend our collective ideals and advance the proposition that democracy and liberty are worth defending.

They died in the hundreds and thousands in places with names like Niagara, Ticonderoga, Vera Cruz, Chancellorsville, Manila, Ypres, Guadalcanal, Tunisia, Anzio, Normandy, Inchon, Khe Sanh, Granada, Mogadishu, Kandahar, and Fallujah.

The world and popular culture may want to forget – to pretend that peace and love are enough to sustain us. The men and women who served, though, know differently. They know that we’re sustained only because so many of our sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, friends and neighbors were willing to pay out that “last full measure of devotion.”

The modern world was built on their backs and paid for by their blood. Let us never diminish their sacrifice by pretending otherwise.

What Jeff Likes this Week

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For the final offering of this six-post series, you might think I would have planned to end on a high note. Given that the week just past featured all manner of goodness and joy in the spirit of the Christmas season, the list of likely targets is extraordinarily large. However, since this is me we’re talking about and not some nancy-boy, cry at the drop of a hat, sensitive, new age man, all I can tell you is this: What I like this week is mostly the fact that I’m back at the rental house, two dogs are happily snoring in their beds, and that I am fully in control of the television, thermostat, and meal preperation.

Be it every so humble, temporary, ill designed, and poorly insulated, there’s no place like wherever it is you happen to hang your hat. It may not be “home” but it’s at least filled will all your own stuff and sometimes that’s just as good.

Note: This is the 6th and final entry in a six-part series appearing on jeffreytharp.com by request.

What Jeff Likes this Week

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As I’ve discovered after two weeks of planning for What Jeff Likes this Week, there’s the easy answer and the one that’s a little more involved. The easy answer is a no brainer: I like long holiday weekends. Four days feels just about like the right balance between relaxation and boredom. With that said we’re going to go ahead and dive a little deeper this week to see what I really like.

The answer, for anyone sticking with the story this far, is dogs. I like dogs. Maggie and Winston are perfectly happy jumping out of bed in the dark hours of the morning and getting their day started. They’re ready to go and do whatever it is I’m ready to go and do. A jangle of the keys is enough to motivate them towards the door and a long car ride. They’re not angry when plans change and don’t expect to be consulted before major decisions are made. In short, aside from from regular feeding, the pursuit of undivided attention, and the finest of modern veterinary care, they are remarkably undemanding creatures – satisfied in being part of whatever is going on around them.

In my experience, dogs don’t have ulterior motives. They’re actions are’t distorted by the race to get ahead. They’re not going to betray your trust or break your heart. They’re going to be the most unquestionably loyal creature in your life… unless they think they can get away with stealing food and then all bets are off. I think most of us can agree that’s perfectly understandable anyway.

It’s no secret that I like dogs and animals in general more than most people. For anyone who has spent any time dealing with people, I’m surprised that’s not the case universally – or maybe it is and the rest of the world is just too polite to say it out loud.

Note: This is the 2nd feature in a six-part series appearing on jeffreytharp.com by request.

The age of conquest…

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Columbus Day is one of those odd holidays that no one enjoys unless you’re Italian, work for a bank, or find yourself in the employ of the federal government. There are plenty of hand-wringers out there who tell us that it’s Indigenous People’s Day or that there should be no celebration at all commemorating the arrival of Europeans in the New World – I also choose not to quibble about things like who got here when or whether it should be Lief Erikson Day. The concept of discovery is more important than the individual act itself. And to those out there wanting to argue that you can’t “discover” a place where people already life, I mostly say “nuts.” Columbus and his crew discovered territory that, to them and to most of Europe at the time, was new and wholly unexpected. Call it a flapjack and it’s still a rose by any other name.

See, Columbus sailed during what use to be called the Age of Conquest. Some nations and civilizations did the conquering and others were vanquished. It’s happened since the dawn of recorded time and was happening long before we bothered writing the stories down. As often happens with the vanquished, we don’t hear much about their history. Now as a student of history myself, I’m all about understanding their story, but I’m not about rewriting the entire age of exploration into an overly simple victim narrative. Likewise, I’m under no illusion that Columbus or those that followed are some kind of demigods. History is a more complex animal than that.

All I’ll say is we’d do well to learn a bit more about the Age of Conquest. I suspect some of the lessons there are shockingly applicable to those of us schlepping around in the modern world.

Break’s over…

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So a few of you (probably those who haven’t been around very long) might think that after a four day hiatus from posting I’d be back and better than every. Sadly, only part of that is true. I’m back. It doesn’t feel like I’ve been gone. And the muse didn’t see fit to endow me with a week’s worth of brilliant posts for your amusement. Trust me when I tell you that I’m far more disappointed than you are about that particular turn of events. If you spend enough time writing (or trying to write), disappointment is just one of the emotions you learn to live with as a constant companion.

I’ve extended the long weekend one extra day so instead of throwing myself back to the wolves tomorrow I’ll ease into it on Wednesday. I’ll try not to rub in the fact that it’s only going to be a two day week for me, but I’m not going to lie and tell you that doesn’t make me awfully happy. Instead of brilliant posts of experiences on the road, I’ll be reaching into the old grab bag this week to see what notes I have left over from posts that never quite got fleshed out. It’s not the most original approach, but there are a few nuggets in there that are likely too good to waste. In the meantime, I’m sure that by mid-morning Wednesday the restive effect of these days off will have been worn away and I’ll find myself with plenty of new stuff that needs saying.

It’s Monday again and even though it’s not a “school night” for me, it definitely feels like the break’s over.

What Annoys Jeff this Week?

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1. The long slog to summer. Now that we’ve tipped the hat to the father of our country, we start the long, hard march to Memorial Day. For those of you not keeping track, that’s 13 straight weeks without a federally approved long holiday weekend in the mix. It feels like a very, very long time between breaks. Of course I’ll probably throw a few days of my own leave at this problem to keep from having a complete break from reality. That’ll stave off the worst effects, but it clearly no substitute for legitimate long weekends. Others will disagree, but for me, this slog from mid-February to late May is the worst part of the year.

2. CBO Reports. The Congressional Budget Office is the non-partisan doer of research on behalf of the feckless officials we elect to Congress. Their reports are spun by both sides equally, but on balance the reports themselves are as close to fair and balanced as we’re likely to see from any large bureaucratic organization. I forced a laugh when I saw their latest report on the impact of the proposed minimum wage hike. It’s the classic Washington good news, bad news story. The good news is raising minimum wage could lift as many as a million people above the poverty line. The bad news is it could also simultaneously throw as many as half a million people out of work. A report like that gives both sides plenty of ammunition and seems to increase the likelihood that we’ll stay true to form and opt to do nothing at all. Based on the CBO’s report, it seems that a radical increase in the minimum wage is a devil’s bargain at best… great if you keep your job and get your raise, but a spectacularly craptastic deal if you’re one of the 500,000 extraneous employees who are thanked for playing and invited to go on back to the house.

3. Dreaming while you sleep. It’s very rare for me to remember dreams I have once I wake up. Sometimes they’ll stick as a vague recollection, but usually they’re gone by the time my eyes are fully open. Except the one I had last night that featured a former boss of mine. Somehow he showed up in my current office with glowing red eyes, tore up a couple of cubicles and then hurled a potted plant at my head. The odd thing might not be that I remembered this little episode once I woke up, but that it didn’t actually feel very surprising. Make of that what you will.

What Annoys Jeff this Week?

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Sure it might be a touch unseemly to throw together a post about the week’s annoyances the day after Christmas, but it’s Thursday and that’s just how I roll. Since I value consistency above almost all other things, not posting today would be pretty damned hypocritical of me. Of all the things you can call me, I’d like to at least avoid that one. With that said, here’s the final installment of WAJTW for 2013:

1. Reaching halfway. Realizing that you’ve reached the halfway point of your vacation sucks. Knowing that from here on out every new day brings you one sunrise closer to the drudgery of the workweek hangs as an unfortunate reminder over the time you have left to do what you will. Sure, it’s not a march to the gallows, but it’s still uniquely unpleasant in its own way.

2. Expectations. Since I know a little something about logistics, reading articles about how major delivery services like UPS and FedEx “screwed up” the holidays is always vaguely amusing. I’m pretty sure what people mean is that they didn’t order some key critical piece of Christmas swag until late in the day on December 23rd and then expect the shipping company to temporarily rescind the laws of physics in order to deliver this precious package “on time.” I know the sheer level of effort and mountain of technology that goes into moving a cardboard box from one side of the continent to another, but I’m not saying the transportation outfits are blameless. Still, I have to think if Mr. and Mrs. Christmas Shopper bothered to order even a day or two earlier, they could have saved themselves some angst. Then again, expecting a touch of personal responsibility at this festive time of year is probably a bridge too far.

3. Sitting around. I’m not a social butterfly by any stretch of the imagination. Still, somehow I manage to keep myself busy from morning until night most of the time. At the moment, I’m beginning to feel like I’ve radically under-planned this Christmas vacation. Once you’ve gotten accustomed from long years of practice to running your own show, calling your own shots, and dealing with life’s daily ephemera, there’s something vaguely unsettling about sitting around with nothing planned, nothing that needs immediate attention, and nothing that’s even close to routine.

Happy Christmas

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This would probably be a longer Christmas post if the internet connection here at the Jeffrey Tharp Historic Childhood Home, Library, and Giftshop weren’t so problematic this morning. Since it’s come down to needing to post using nothing but thumbs and a 5-inch screen I’ll simply say happy Christmas. Enjoy the day and all that comes with it.

Home again…

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Having made the drive and settled in with 2/3 of my critters leads to the inevitable question – What now? I’m not exactly known for my comfort level with “just being.” There’s always one more thing to do. One more post to make. Laundry to do. Etcetera and so on. You see, as much as this was home for 19 years, it’s still a place other than my own. It’s a feeling somewhere between being 17 again and being a random out of town relative stopping in for a visit. Maybe “unsettled” is the best descriptor even though I’ve done my level best to temporarily reposition all the essentials here with me.

So it’s safe to say we’re now well into the period of sitting around wondering what it is I’m supposed to be doing. With nowhere to be, nothing here to tinker with, and even less on the “needs done now” list, I’ll do my best not to drive myself crazy with a day and a half days marked off with only a vague “to be determined.” I’m glad to be here and it’s always good to be right back where I started from, but it does a marvelous job of making mince out of my routine. And that always makes me just a little extra crazy for the holiday.