Top Benders of My Life

My last post concerned a trip I took to New Orleans way back when and a desperate search for authentic Cajun barbecue.  My good friend, Suzy, posted a comment alluding to another evening spent in the Big Easy and it got me to thinking about the top benders of my life.  It is hard to rank these things — in part, because they are so hard to remember at all.  But I recall three benders distinctly enough to write about them here.

First up is the time in college when I was having girl troubles.  I stormed off to a party to drink away my sorrows and found myself throwing back a lovely potion that I had never tried before — a Long Island Iced Tea.  I had another.  And another.  And still more.  My roommates had to carry me home, but getting back to the dorm was the least of my worries.  At the time, I was a contact lens wearer and this was long before they made lenses that you could comfortably wear overnight.  I made a few desperate — and to hear my roomies tell it, quite comical — attempts to remove the lenses from my eyes, but to no avail.  I woke up the next morning with my clothes still on and my eyes sealed shut.  For a few moments, I learned what it’s like to be blind.  It sucks.  Eventually, I dribbled enough water into the slits of my eyes and cried enough real tears for the lenses to start to come loose.  Not a good morning.

Next up is the time that I went to a strip club with my dear friend, Peter, who is now the godfather to both of my children.  Peter and I were living together in New York City after college.  Pete always had a thing for strip clubs and the clubs in the Big Apple were second to none.  We used to go to Scores, right under the 59th Street Bridge.  We went one night to solve the problems of the world and I ended up getting ridiculously drunk.  So drunk, in fact, that I broke the cardinal rule of strip clubs — I fell for one of the dancers.  Ah, this is painful for me to recall even to this day.  Any rank amateur knows that the strippers don’t give a shit about you.  They are businesswomen.  And they are in the business of taking as much money as possible from hapless shlubs like me.  At a certain point in the evening, Peter gave me a little salute and headed home.  Let me tell you, when you outlast Peter in a strip club, you know that you are HAMMERED.   By that time, I had burned through all of my cash — $20 per lap dance and about the same for a beer will do that to you.  So I handed over my credit card and got some “Scores Dollars” — basically, Monopoly money, but instead of buying Park Place you buy Fake Boobs.  I was barely coherent at this point.  My Scores Dollars vanished in about five minutes, as did the stripper who had charmed me.  Time to go.  I hailed a cab and, about halfway home, I realized that I had no money.  Not Scores Dollars.  Not U.S. Dollars.  Nothing.  I asked the cabbie to stop at an ATM.  It was freezing cold out and I was so trashed that I couldn’t punch in my access code correctly.  After about five tries, I headed back to the cab, but he was already driving away.  I couldn’t blame him, really.  I walked the rest of the way home.  There is cold, my friends, and then there is New York City cold.  Hammered.  Broke.  Frostbitten.  Nice!

Finally, I will share with you the story that my friend, Suzy, referenced in her comment.  I met Suzy about eight or nine years ago at a conference in — where else? — New Orleans.  It was a conference of communications professionals — not the craziest people you’ll ever meet, but not exactly wallflowers, either.  At the hotel where the conference was being held, a few attendees gathered at the hospitality suite for an after-dinner drink.  At this point, I was barely even buzzed and was about five minutes away from retiring to my room for the night.  Someone suggested that we head to the French Quarter for a nightcap.  For the purposes of this story, I will say that this was Suzy’s suggestion.  Yes, that seems about right.  Against my better judgment, I agreed to join a group that consisted of me, Suzy, and two guys, both named Andy.  We ended up at bar named the Funky Pirate, which is world famous for a drink called the Hand Grenade.  One or two of these suckers could drop a horse.  We had more than one or two.  One of the Andys fired up the jukebox.  It was probably about 2:00 a.m., so we were the only fools left in the joint.  I remember Jukebox Andy attempting to do one of those James Brown moves, where you sort of drop down to the floor with one of your legs sticking out and one tucked under your ass and then you try to pop yourself back upright.  He made it down to the floor just fine.  A heroic effort nonetheless.  I remember lying down in my bed back in my hotel room and looking at the clock.  4:00 a.m.  What made it even worse was the fact that Iwas scheduled to give a presentation at the conference the following morning — or, more accurately, the SAME morning.  I woke up a precious few hours later, still drunk, my head screaming.  To hurl or not to hurl.  That was the question.  I decided not to hurl.  I went to my conference, sucked it up, and did what I needed to do.  Suzy was there, too, looking none too worse for the wear.  Neither Andy was anywhere to be found.  Jukebox Andy surfaced later in the afternoon and we shared a cab to the airport with two unsuspecting conference attendees.  Andy looked hideous.  The woman sitting next to me kept whispering to me, “Is he OK?”  No, lady.  No, he is absolutely not OK, OK?  At the airport sitting at the gate, waiting for our plane, Andy magically produced an orange from his backpack.  He was hunched over, staring down at the floor.  He looked like he was going to pass out at any moment.  He began peeling the orange, slowly, so slowly, and eating it, bit by bit.  Something about that scene cracked me up to no end.  A few months later, Andy, Suzy, and I had a reunion in New Jersey.  Andy had a Hand Grenade glass with him.  You went that drunk and still managed to take the glass? 

Sensei, I admire your skills.

Wii Are Family

I spent Thanksgiving in Connecticut with my mom and dad, my sister and niece, my two children, and my girlfriend.  Here are our ages, from oldest to youngest: 80, 69, 44, 41, 41, 9, 6, and 3.  What could possibly bring us all together?  Well, it wasn’t turkey, since Mom opted, for no apparent reason, to make pot roast (which was delicious).  No, it was the Wii, the greatest videogame system of all time. 

I’ve had my Wii for about two years now and it continues to amaze and delight me.  I decided to bring it to Connecticut, thinking my kids might need a diversion.  Instead, the whole damn family got involved.   My niece and my daughter had a bowling match.  My dad and my son had a sword fight.  My son and I played some hoops.  At one point, my girlfriend challenged my Dad to a bowling match and then — God bless her — she challenged my MOM to a match.  Who do you root for in THAT one, sports fans?  The woman who birthed you or the woman you’ll be in bed with that night?  (Sorry, Mom, a boy’s gotta’ do what a boy’s gotta do.)

It was big fun and I strongly suggest that you ask Santa for a Wii this holiday season if you don’t have one already.  Assuming you’ve been good, that is.

Greatest Hard Rock Songs of All Time

You wouldn’t know it to look at me, but I love a good hard rock song as much as the next tat-covered metal-head.  I have always struggled to control my foul temper and there is something about the pure expression of raw anger in many hard rock songs that I love.  I’m pissed off – and so are they!

As you’ll see, many of the songs on this list are by “the usual suspects,” but I have tried to pick songs from these bands that are a little less obvious.  “Smells Like Teen Spirit” is a brilliant hard rock song, but you already knew that, so what’s the point of putting it on my list?  OK, then, dear reader, please turn your amplifier up to 11 and let’s kick it…

• Nirvana, “Lithium” – These guys changed it all, didn’t they?  The hilarious thing is that “Nevermind” knocked off Michael Jackson’s “Dangerous” to become the #1 album in America.  With all due respect to the King of Pop, Kurt Cobain was dangerous.  “Lithium” is classic Nirvana…Slow, then crunchingly fast, then slow, then fast.  Toward the end, Cobain screams, “I like it, I’m not gonna crack/I miss you, I’m not gonna crack/I love you, I’m not gonna crack/I kill you, I’m not gonna crack.”  Is it any wonder he eventually cracked?   
• Cracker, “Low” – Whatever happened to these guys?  Who cares, they left us with this amazing single, which includes this lyric: “I’ll be with you, girl/Like being low/Hey, hey, hey/It’s like being stoned.”  I’ve never been stoned, but I’ve been low, baby. 
• Smashing Pumpkins, “Bullet with Butterfly Wings” – Is there a better voice in rock than Billy Corrigan’s?  Not when he sings this lyric: “Despite all my rage/I am still just a rat in a cage.”  Yes, Billy.  Me, too.
• Rage Against the Machine, “Guerilla Radio“ – Yes, yes, I know.  I AM the machine. But I can bite the hand that feeds me, can’t I?  Actually, this song takes the hand, rips it from the arm, chews it up, and spits it into a gutter.  The menacingly whispered, “It has to start somewhere/It has to start sometime/What better place than here/What better time than now,” leads to the repeatedly screamed, “All hell can’t stop us now.”  Oh, baby, turn that shit up.
• Metallica, “Enter Sandman” – This is the quintessential hard rock song, so I was tempted to pick another Metallica tune until I had the opportunity to attend Game Six of the World Series a few weeks ago.  They play this song when Yankee closer Mariano Rivera jogs out from the bullpen to the mound and it was EPIC.  52,000 people banging their heads.  Say your prayers, Phillies, you won’t be with us much longer. 
• Silverchair, “Tomorrow” – I can’t name another Silverchair song, but this one kicks ass, Fatboy.  Here’s a lyric that always makes me think of my ex-wife: “You say that money isn’t everything/But I’d like to see you live without it/You think you can keep on going, living like a king,/Ooh babe, but I strongly doubt it.”  She actually HAS kept on living like a king, but, oh, well.  Maybe tomorrow…
• Foo Fighters, “Monkeywrench” – How do you go from being the drummer of Nirvana to the front man of another kick-ass hard rock band?  I don’t know, ask Dave Grohl.  This song is about being gay (I think), but it really hits on all of the classic hard rock themes – not fitting in, persecution, and just being absolutely ripshit about the whole thing.  Take a deep breath and sing along with this lyric: “One last thing before I quit I never wanted any more than I could fit into my head I still remember every single word you said and all the shit that somehow came along with it still there’s one thing that comforts me since I was always caged and now I’m free.”  Remember, you need to save up enough air so that you can scream the word “free” for about 20 minutes.

I realize that I am missing several worthy artists: Guns-n-Roses, Pearl Jam, Van Halen, Hole, and Def Leppard, to name just a few. But I am out of time, and so are you.  Please add your ear-bleeding suggestions to the list.

Happy Meal Me

Is there any product on the face of the planet more perfectly named than the McDonald’s “Happy Meal”?  It’s rather arrogant if you think about it.  THIS meal — not some other meal, cooked by you, perhaps, or purchased elsewhere — is so certain to produce happiness in the consumer that it is NAMED after happiness.  

For once, the wizards at McDonald’s decided to pull back on the whole “Mc” thing and not call it a “Happy McMeal” or a “McHappy Meal.”  No, there is no need to bastardize the meaning of it all. 

It is a meal. 

And it makes you happy.

At least it does if you’re under the age of ten, as both my children are.  (Nine and three, to be exact.)  They get happy at the mere NOTION that we might be heading to McDonald’s to get some grub.  And who can blame them?  It’s perfect, really.  You get your protein in the form of some Chicken McNuggets.  You get your fruits/veggies in the form of french fries or apple dippers.  (What’s the ratio there, do you think?  Seventy five orders of fries for every one order of apple dippers?)  You get a drink, which can be milk or juice.  And, best of all, you get a toy.  A toy made in China by a child half the age of your children, but, hey, it’s a global economy and toys are important.  We like toys in this country.  We NEED toys.

Today, the toy for boys was an Astro Boy action figure and for girls it was a My Little Pony.  (There is not even a hint of gender sensitivity in the toy selections.  At McDonald’s, boys like to blow things up; girls like to play with dolls.  As a father of a boy and a girl, that’s pretty much right, but do they have to be so OVERT about it?)  

My kids figured out a few visits ago that the bottom of the Happy Meal box tells you which toys are up next.  (The DaVinci McCode.)  This is a great way to keep abreast of pop culture, but also indicative of our tiny lil’ attention spans.  A whole lot of people probably worked for five years on Astro Boy — a perfectly fine film, by the way.  Doesn’t it merit more than a week or two in the Happy Meal line-up?  Apparently, it does not.

In Astro Boy (as in so many other movies for children these days), we have completely befouled the Earth and now use it largely as a giant dumping ground for worn-out robots, discarded from the floating city above where all the cool people live.  Someday, a thousand years from now, an archaeologist will stumble across my garbage from this afternoon.  She’ll carefully dust off Astro Boy and Iris, the My Little Pony, with a delicate brush.

“My God,” she’ll say, her voice barely above a whisper. ”They had rockets coming out of their feet.  And really gay looking horses.”

This Post Could Save Your Life

About five or six years ago, I was down in St. Thomas with my then-wife and daughter.  We were staying at the Marriott Frenchman’s Reef, an absolutely lovely resort, and we were enjoying a lazy day at the beach.  One moment I was sitting on my towel, catching some rays and nursing a pina colada, and then, suddenly, I found myself in the surf, desperately trying to pull a drowning woman to shore. 

To this day, I have no recollection of how I made the transition from Jimmy Buffett to David Hasselhoff.  I don’t remember anyone yelling for help, I don’t even remember running into the ocean.  And yet there I was, along with another guy about my age, fighting the waves and tugging this poor old lady up onto the beach. 

What I do remember is how HEAVY she was and how her husband just stood there watching us, a look of profound sadness and confusion on his weathered, old face.  I realized later that the woman was so heavy because she was full of water.   

We dragged her up onto the beach and it was pretty clear to me that she was dead.  Every time we moved her, water came spilling out of her mouth.  She wasn’t the right color.   

In an incredible stroke of luck, an emergency room nurse happened to be vacationing at our resort and was sitting nearby.  She began CPR.  I ran the length of the beach, hollering for a doctor.  One brave young man told me that he was in training to be an EMT.  “Let’s go, brother,” I said and we ran back to the old lady.

She was alive!  The ER nurse had brought her back from the dead – quite literally.  An ambulance arrived and they took the old lady away.  I later learned from the hotel manager that she and her husband were visiting our beach from a cruise ship.  They kept her in the hospital for a day or so and she was able to continue on with her vacation.

I tell you this story not to portray myself as a hero, but only because it stands in ridiculously stark contrast to how poorly I have performed under similar life-or-death situations involving people that I actually know and love.

A few years ago, for example, we gave my daughter (about three years old at the time) her first-ever Lifesaver and she promptly proceeded to choke on it.  I was with her at the time, along with my then-wife and then-mother-in-law.  Three seemingly capable adults vs. one fucking Lifesaver.

We all stood around for a few seconds in a total panic.  Madeleine is choking!  Holy shit, somebody do something!  Somebody!  Anybody!  Hello? 

I eventually stepped up to apply the Heimlich Maneuver.  Bear in mind that I am 6’3” and 200 pounds, while my daughter, at the time, was probably about three feet tall and 30 pounds.  I gave it a go and nothing happened.  I tried again.  Nothing.  My daughter had survived open heart surgery when she was 13 months old.  Now, we were going to lose her to a piece of hard candy.

“Call 911,” I said to my wife and about 10 seconds later, my daughter managed to swallow the Lifesaver, which, thankfully, had melted down a bit (though not as much as me).  The firemen arrived a minute later, God bless them, but it was all over by then and everything was fine.

Something remarkably similar happened a few years later when I was out to dinner in Hoboken with my good friends Andy and Suzy.  Suzy loves to talk, so I knew something was wrong when a silence descended over the table.  Sure enough, she was choking – not on a Lifesaver, but on a piece of skirt steak.  I looked at Andy and he looked at me.  Neither of us moved a muscle.  Suzy looked at the both of us, desperately fighting to breathe.  Her eyes said it all – “Would one of you fucking clowns get off your ass and help a sister out here?!” 

I looked at Andy again and he at me.  Our eyes said it all, too – “Dude, I don’t want to do it.  YOU do it!!”

Suzy was standing up now and really struggling.  Andy and I remained seated, engaged in our game of Cowards Chicken.  Who would blink first?  Not me, man.  I couldn’t get a Lifesaver out of my daughter.  Now, I’m supposed to get a skirt steak out of Suzy? 

Like Madeleine, Suzy eventually took matters into her own hands and down went the skirt steak (or maybe it came out, I don’t remember).  What I do remember is my deep sense of shame and embarrassment afterwards.  A dear friend of mine had been in deep shit and I did nothing.  I didn’t try and fail.  I didn’t even try.  Suzy, I apologize.  Andy, you suck.

One more quick story… Last weekend, I was with my kids, my girlfriend, and her kids in Warwick, NY, visiting friends who have horses.  We were feeding apples to the horses and there is a bit of technique to it where you hold the apple in the palm of your hand and provide a little resistance when the horse leans in to take a bite.  The horses were slobbering like fiends (“Sour apples,” our friend explained), but we were having a good time. 

My three-year-old son wanted to give it a try, so I picked him up and gave him a small piece of apple to hold.  “Really hold your hand steady,” I said to him as the horse approached.  About three milliseconds later, the horse was eating his hand.  My son started yelling and, for a crucial split second, I did what I always do when the pressure is on: absolutely nothing. 

The best part of this story is that my son still has all ten of his fingers and suffered only the smallest of scrapes on one knuckle.  The second best part of the story is that my girlfriend managed to take a picture of the precise moment when my son realized that a 2,000-pound animal had mistaken his hand for an apple.  I’m also in the picture.  I have a near-total lack of expression on my face.  My left arm dangles casually by my side, while I actually appear to be using my right arm to boost my son CLOSER to the horse’s mouth. 

We had some ice cream later to make it all better.  Nobody choked on a thing.

Songs That Were Banned at My Wedding

Yes, my marriage ended in a puddle of goo, but, gosh darn it all, we had a lovely wedding and the music was good.  We hired a band called the Rhythm Dogs and they, of course, wanted to know which songs we wanted them to play.

“Let’s save some time,” I said, always ruthlessly efficient.  “Here are the songs we DON’T want you to play.”

And here they are for you now:

• “Shout,” The Isley Brothers – My knees are for shit, so it’s always been a challenge for me to “get a little bit softer now.”  Besides, it’s just stupid.
• “Celebration,” Kool and the Gang – This song is way too prescriptive.  If you have to tell people that “we’re gonna’ have a good time tonight,” you’re trying WAY too hard and you’re probably not going to have a very good time at all.
• “Mony Mony,” Billy Idol – I curse like a sailor, so there is no real thrill for me in chanting “get laid, get fucked,” especially in front of my grandmother.  Didn’t we work these sort of impulses out of our systems in high school, people?
• “Paradise by the Dashboard Light,” Meatloaf – The first problem with this song is that it goes on for about 20 minutes. The second problem is that your drunk Uncle Irv is always going to grope a bridesmaid during the Phil Rizzuto part.  Really, there isn’t much else to do.
• “Old Time Rock and Roll,” Bob Seger – I have no problem with people busting out the air guitar on the dance floor.  However, there is no way on Earth to play the “air saxophone” without looking like an absolute ass.

The funny thing here is all the songs that AREN’T on this list.  The “Electric Slide” brings me great joy to this day, and I’m a big fan of the “Macarena.”  If I’m at a party and they play “Hot, Hot, Hot,” I will lead the conga line to the parking lot and back even if I’m sober, sober, sober. 

Hindsight being 20/20, I suppose my wedding should have been banned at my wedding, but what can you do?  Like I said, the music was good.

10,009… And Rising

I checked my stats this evening and was thrilled to see that I have crossed the 10,000-visitor mark! 

I can remember when I hit 500 visitors, not that long ago. 

Who are you people? 

THANK YOU!

Five, Four, Three, Two…

Ah, there’s nothing like a good countdown to get the old blood pumping.   The ball dropping in Times Square on New Year’s Eve.  The calm voice of Mission Control before NASA launches another group of brave souls into space.  The chanting of fans at the end of a big football game upset.  The amount of hours, minutes, and seconds left before  ”iFight Shelby Marx” premieres on The Disney Channel.

Whoa, wait a minute, what was that last one again?

The countdown — once reserved for at least semi-special occasions — has become terribly overused and abused in our time-obsessed society.  Personally, I can’t stand it.  It adds to my already unhealthy obsession with time, or the lack thereof.  I often feel as though I am wasting time and/or that I am living on borrowed time.  (And yet he has time to blog?  Yes.  Yes, he does.)

The rise of the countdown also reflects our society’s desire to elevate everything to “event” status.  The finale of “American Idol” is an event.  The finale of “CSI: Des Moines” not so much, but it is billed that way anyway by marketers desperate to attract attention in our ADD world. 

(A brief aside… One of my pet peeves is how everyone these days declares themselves to be ADD.  If you have been diagnosed with ADD, fine.  If not, then shut the hell up.  Can you imagine people walking around saying, “Oh, my God, I am so cancer”?)

Nobody loves a good countdown more than the financial entertainment channel, CNBC.  During the depths of the financial crisis, they were running countdowns to things like Ben Bernanke’s testimony on Capitol Hill in hours, minutes, seconds, and hundreths of seconds.  Geez, I wonder why everyone got so fucking keyed up?

Please.  Save the counting down for things that actually matter.  Like when my humble blog will attract its 10,000th visitor.  I am currently at 9,933.  9,934.  9,935….

(Yes, I realize that it’s a count-up.  Deal with it.)

Greatest Divorce Songs of All Time

Our lives are set to music — songs that carry us through the good times, the bad times, and all the times in between.   My recent divorce was a blend of all these types of times and music was always there.  If you’re looking for sappy songs of heartbreak, you won’t find them here.  These songs are about picking yourself up, dusting yourself off, and moving on — occasionally with your middle finger extended.  Here we go…

“Ordinary World,” Duran Duran — I’ve always loved Duran Duran.  This was their comeback hit from a few years ago and I think it is one of their very best.  Here’s the chorus: “But I won’t cry for yesterday/There’s an ordinary world/Somehow I have to find/And as I try to make my way/To the ordinary world/I will learn to survive.”  This captures how I felt during the divorce process — not as though my world was coming to an end, but that I had actually been living in a false world and was clawing my back to the real one.

“Invincible,” Pat Benatar — Like Duran Duran, Benatar is another one of my guilty pleasures.  I was listening to her greatest hits album just this evening on my way home from work, in fact, and rocking out to this song.  Here’s the chorus: “We can’t afford to be innocent/Stand up and face the enemy/It’s a do or die situation/We will be invincible.”  I’ve written previously about the importance of being nice during your divorce, but there were times during my divorce when I had to “strap on the balls” (as a boss of mine used to put it) and say, “No more Mr. Nice Guy. Let’s get it on.”   

“Scarred But Smarter,” Drivin’ N’ Cryin’ — This hard rock trio from Atlanta knows a thing or two about being stepped on and getting pissed off.  In this kick-ass anthem, they sing, “Nobody said it would be fair/They warned you before you went out there/There’s always a chance to get re-started/To a new world, new life, scarred but smarter.”  I was reminded of this song just the other day when I read an article about scars in The New York Times that included this line, “Better to be a scarred and living dog than to be a dead lion.”

“Gold Digger,” Kayne West and Jamie Foxx — OK, sorry, this song is not only hysterical, but painfully accurate as I sit in my two-bedroom apartment across the street from a train station in blue-collar Fanwood, NJ, and my ex-wife settles into the jacuzzi tub in the spacious, marble-covered master bathroom of the 3,500-square-foot McMansion in fancy-schmancy Westfield, NJ, that I used to call home.  Check out these lyrics: “18 years, 18 years/She got one of yo’ kids, got you for 18 years/I know somebody payin’ child support for one of his kids/His baby momma’s car crib is bigger than his/You will see him on TV, any given Sunday/Win the Superbowl and drive off in a Hyundai.”  My youngest is three years old.  Let’s see, eighteen minus three equals — ah, fuck, get the Hyundai.

“Since You’ve Been Gone,” Kelly Clarkson — I almost pissed my pants during “The 40-Year-Old Virgin” when Steve Carell screeched “KELLY CLARKSON!” while getting his chest hair waxed.  But you have to give the girl credit: this song kicks ass.  Here’s the chorus: “But since you’ve been gone/I can breathe for the first time/I’m so movin on/Yeah yeah/Thanks to you/Now I get/What I want/Since you’ve been gone.”   ‘Nuff said.  Time to have sex with my hot new girlfriend.

“Fighter,” Christina Aguilera — Like “Since You’ve Been Gone” (and the grandmommy of them all, “I Will Survive”), this song is really for the ladies, but, shit, man, I love it, too.  Who can resist this chorus when you’re settling in for your fifth straight hour of mediation, battling for the right to see your own children: “Cause it makes me that much stronger/Makes me work a little bit harder/It makes me that much wiser /So thanks for making me a fighter/Made me learn a little bit faster/Made my skin a little bit thicker /Makes me that much smarter/So thanks for making me a fighter.”

Well, there you have it.  Which ones did I miss, sports fans?

Oh, Sure, NOW Spock Is Cool

I have pointy ears.  There, I said it.

Your ears are rounded on the top.  Mine come to a point.

My mother says that when I was born, the doctor said that my pointy ears could be “fixed” through some combination of baby oil and bandages.  Mom took a pass.  Thanks, Mom!

I was teased mercilessly about my ears throughout childhood.  “Hey, Spock ears!” was a pretty popular taunt.  “Look, it’s Mr. Spock!” was another.  You get the idea.

I did my best to hide my deformity.  Whenever I wore a baseball cap, I tucked the points of my ears under the rim.  On the rare occasion when my hair grew a bit long, I would try desperately to pull a piece of my hair over the points of my ears.

When I was in college, I worked as a lifeguard at the swimming pool in the condominium where I grew up.  I thought I was pretty cool and had attracted a following of young kids who hovered around me all day, waiting and hoping that I would go into the pool and horse around with them for a while.

Jonathan was one of my favorite kids.  He was maybe seven or eight and just a very sweet, smart boy.  One day he was sitting next to me on a pool chair.  He sat up with a bit of a start.

“Do you know that your ears are pointy?” he asked me.

It was very much like that scene in “The Sixth Sense” when Haley Joel Osmet reduces his teacher to mush by screaming “Stuttering Stanley!” over and over again until the poor man has, indeed, regressed back to his childhood and can barely spit out the words, “Shut up!”

“Yes, Jonathan, I know my ears are pointy,” I said as calmly as I could. 

There would be no horsing around in the pool that day.

Today, many, many years later, I love my pointy ears.  I know now that they add character to my ugly mug and, besides, what the hell am I going to do about it anyway?  I wear my hair short and when I wear a baseball cap, the points go on the OUTSIDE, baby. 

All this has come back to me recently with the opening of the new “Star Trek” movie, where Mr. Spock – and everybody else in the film for that matter – seems to reek of a cool that I never could have imagined way back when.

My son, Christian, has one ear that’s a bit pointy.  Son, you are the coolest kid in the galaxy.