10 Observations About Growing Older

Note that my next birthday is a while off, but for whatever reason the thought just occurred to me that things really do change as you grow old.  Not being one to brush-off inspiration in any form, here goes:

1. Weight - When I was a kid I could devour McDonalds until my blood was the equivalent of french fry grease; now just smelling McD's makes me gain weight.
2. Music, Part A - It seems that 95% of the newer music I hear today sounds exactly the same (exceptions go out to Nickleback and a select few others).  Kind of what people my age back in the 60's must have said about The Beatles I guess.  Seriously though, when my kids force me to listen to Sirius Hits 1, all of the songs seem to have that electronic vocal enhancement nonsense that makes them all sound the same. 
3. Music, Part B - Since almost all of the newer music I hear sounds horrible, I've gone back and "discovered" bands like Pink Floyd.  That shows you just how very nerdy I was back when I was a teenager.
4. Body Talk - When your body gets older it seems to talk to you much more.  "Shouldn't have eaten that last night moron!" is a frequent refrain I hear from mine.  "You do know that I am going to make your legs feel like steel beams in about an hour" is another.
5. Talk Radio - You actually listen to talk radio.  Now in my defense, I have always been a fan of Howard Stern, but I'm not sure that counts as being pure "talk radio".  Anyway, there was a time when the thought of listening to people talk about news and politics on the radio would have caused me to puncture my eardrums with chopsticks.  Now I actually listen to it.
6. Work Around the House - I actually look forward to doing things around the house.  When I was younger I could barely muster the interest to pick up my dirty laundry.
7. The Younger Look Much Younger - It's getting to the point where the average high school student is starting to look somewhat fetus-esque to me.
8. The Older, Well They Don't Look So Bad - Case in point.
9. You Think About the Past - Granted that when you are younger you don't have much of a past, but when I was 16 I didn't spend much time thinking about when I was 10; as I've gotten older though, I do think about when I was younger (and how much of a moron I was back then). 
10. Glory Days - You actually can listen to the Springsteen song Glory Days and truly understand what it is about.  In fact, you can hear the song and immediately a vision of some mondo-jock from high school comes to mind; you know, someone who now probably sells used cars...that or the prom-queen who is now contemplating plastic surgery.
    

Control

"I don't wanna rule the world

Just wanna run my life"

(Janet Jackson, 'Control')

Control is an important element in my life.  If you know me at all personally, you'd probably think "there is a pretty in-control person", and to some extent you would be correct.  If fact, the phrases "wrapped too tight" and "rigid" have been used in the past to describe an extreme view of how this plays out in dealing with me.  However lest anyone thing that the control I'm talking about is over others, then you'd be absolutely. positively wrong.  I actually I want control over no one.

Scratch that last sentence; I just want control over one person actually:  myself.

In a lot of ways, the biggest struggles I have had in life to date have been those over personal control, where events, situations and things seem to have this ability to exercise a level of control over my behavior that I find appalling to the point of causing depression. No where is this more apparent than in two areas:  alcohol and eating.

D.I.T. (drunk in training)
As a normal course of business, I don't normally drink alcohol (well more on that later).  In fact, I basically stopped drinking for all intensive purposes around about 1988 or so.  I have had a relapse or two over the years, but by and large I can look back and see only three days or so over the past twenty years where I've let alcohol get the best of me.  Why?  Why is this such a big deal, after all people go out all the time and have a drink or two over dinner and are fine (this happens all the time when I am traveling by the way)?  For me, it's pretty simple:  I learned in the late 80's that when it comes to booze I effectively have two switches:  None and Drunk.  Simply put, it's very difficult for me to be able to drink in moderation.  As a concept, moderating never came into the picture when I was "learning" to drink.  This is in part, I think, because I was and (to a lessor extent) still am an extreme introvert.  Think about it:  Booze became the "magic potion" that made all my introverted inhibitions simply go away.  Who wouldn't want that?  It was a real "Jeckel and Hyde" kind of thing.  Couple that with an alcoholic father and you get someone who is never more than a few cases of beer away from dysfunction.

So what happened?

First, I somehow realized that it really, really stunk when I would wake up feeling like I had to vomit into a garbage can at 6:30 in the morning (after not having slept all night).  Simply put, the consequences were horrible.  Clearly, my body was telling me that this stuff was poison and that it needed to be removed at any cost and through any available passageway.

Second, I realized that the "magic potion" that tamed my introversion was in fact turning me into something I was not.  The alcohol molecules had this ability to direct my words and actions.  It took control.  Pondering this, you realize just how frightening that thought really is:  this is MY body and MY mind, yet I am turning it over to this THING that will MAKE ME DO things?

The is an epilogue to this part of the story:  I haven't been what I consider to be drunk in a long time.  I have, however, re-learned (I think, hope, pray) to be able to have a glass of wine with a meal or in the evening every once in a while and, surprisingly, leave it at that.  It has gotten to the point where I control the alcohol, instead of the alcohol controlling me.

Food, Glorious Food
The second biggest control problem I've faced in life surrounds food. To give you some perspective, looking at my life as an adult (from age 18 onward), my 6 foot 3.5 inch frame has weighted anywhere from 178 to 262 pounds.  Growing up I had the metabolism of an elephant shrew, eating (mainly the wrong things) constantly, but always remaining a very thin guy.  When I graduated from high school I was a rail.  As I got into my twenties, my metabolism began to slow down but my eating didn't.  In fact, I probably ate worse the older I got, if that's conceivably possible.  At my worst, my weight was so bad that I was having blood pressure problems and I was faced with the choice of either losing weight or going on B.P. medication for the rest of my life.  I wisely choose to loose the weight, and eventually dropped down to about 211 pounds.

The story doesn't end there though.

I remember when, after loosing weight for the better part of a year, I "jumped the shark" and started to gain it back.  I was on vacation in South Carolina, it was a night, and I was depressed at the thought of paying all this money for a vacation but yet being miserable.  I was all alone, wandering around the boardwalk and decided to go into this greasy restaurant.  I ended up ordering a hamburger, fries, a diet soda and this enormous ice-cream & chocolate cake thing for desert.  It tasted good, but it also marked the back slide on all the work I had done to drop over 50lbs.  Eventually my weight went back to about 255lbs.  So what happened?

Surprisingly, control had a lot to do with it.

When I was losing the weight, there was a personal event happening in my life that left me feeling completely out of control.  Because this thing involved someone else, there was only so much I could do to impact the situation, which left me anxious, depressed and longing for at least something I could control in my life.  That something became food.  Dieting...and in retrospect that's what I was doing...became this substitute thing in my life that I could control and it became very comforting.  While I told everyone at the time I was losing weight to lower my blood pressure, and on one level that was true, it wasn't the whole story.  No, the more important underlying reason was I desperately needed to be able do to something positive to control some aspect of my life, as so many others were outside of my control.

Things do come full circle though.

Events this year have once again brought me back to the point where I realize that it's important to me, as a person, to be able to control what happens to my body.  I feel this way not out of depression, anxiety or some notion of vanity, but rather because I've found that gives me peace of mind to know that I, and only I, decide what I put into my mouth.  I listen to my body and how it feels, and I make better choices about what I eat, which my body in term reinforces as a good choice by helping me to feel better.  Right now I'm back to losing weight, but I highly doubt that I will ever get back to 211 pounds.  No, this time I'm focusing on changing my eating habits, eating at a clip to lose weight when I can, and always asking myself how I feel before I decide to put anything into my mouth.  I'm not perfect at this, I will not rapidly lose any weight, and I sure as hell have no illusions about having the ability to maintain this level of control constantly.  I do know this though:  I now realize that I control what happens when it comes to eating, and that makes me feel much better.  


Postscript
I don't really understand what brought me to this point...I really don't.  Much like the weather, there are probably a thousand individual cause-n-effect elements at play here, with the sum total being far too difficult to model, predict or explain.  I do know and understand this though:  I enjoy being in control of me, and that includes continued sobriety and making food decisions that make my body feel better.  There isn't enough enjoyment in this world, so this is a very good thing.

Road Apples, #49

Jack-hammers - I had the joy of experiencing intermittent jack-hammering last night, as the gas company was working a few feet from the front of my house on some sort of problem.  I realize that this was no doubt a necessary repair, but my God, every moment I was about to fall asleep they would fire up the jack-hammer.  Without fail.  I am tired.

Shooting at Ft Hood - First, what happened at Ft. Hood was a truly tragic event; condolences to the families of the victims of this senseless event.  Second, look for the Glenn Beck's of this world to somehow manage to blame the tragic shooting at Ft. Hood on President Obama.  The likes of Michael Savage will no doubt make some "Hasan?  That sounds an awful lot like Hussein to me..." comments.  These are folks who never miss the opportunity to turn a tragedy into a political event, not unlike the extreme lefties that they mock.

Love Shack - Former NYC Commissioner and failed Homeland Security nominee Bernie Kerik plead guilty to 8 federal counts yesterday, and will serve between 18 and 33 months in jail.  Amazing, utterly amazing.  This guy was a walking abuse of power.  While I generally like Rudy Giuliani, this guy does make you question at least some aspects of his judgment.  Sometimes good leaders are horrible judges of character.

The Election is Over - and I just realized that I've not really mentioned anything about it on a local level.  All told, I think the results in my neck of the woods were fairly positive...or at least have the potential to be positive.  Judge Nealon won retention, which is a very good thing.  Also a good thing is the election to judge of Attorney Moyle.  Regarding Scranton City Council, Mayor Doherty will now be facing a veto-proof majority, led by Janet Evans. That's not necessarily a bad thing, provided that the principals involved, namely Ms Evans and Mr Doherty, realize that they are being paid to work together to solve problems.  For Mr Doherty, this means consulting with council every once in a while.  For Ms Evans, this means actually doing something other than simply complaining about "the man".

Sometimes Things Break - I had my washer repaired yesterday morning, to the tune of $164.83.  The pump was leaking, and given the age of the machine, it's not unreasonable for this kind of thing to be replaced.  As I tell my children when they bemoan broken things, "sometimes things just break".

Dowd takes on a better target, namely noted chickehnawk Rush Limbaugh

I personally think that Rush Limbaugh represents the pilonidal cyst of American politics (you Limbaugh fans out there will not doubt get the reference).  Anyway, Maureen Dowd does too, as noted in her great column today:

November 5th Maureen Dowd Column

Well worth reading.

Indicative Election

There will be a lot of talk about how this off-year election was somehow set-back from President Obama. Don't buy it. Off year elections are mostly about local issues, not national temperature checks. There were three elections that were being watched nationally though...

...in New Jersey, Governor Corzine seems to have lost his bid for re-election by about 5%. New Jersey is an incredibly expensive state to live in, so there are always big issues surrounding taxes that resonate with voters.

...in Virginia, an incumbent Democratic governor lost his bid for re-election by a wide margin.

...closer to home, voters elected a Democrat for a Congress in a traditionally Republican seat. Link Here This is the race I find the most interesting, as it speaks to the dual-nature of the Republican party. As I've mentioned many, many times, I'd be a Republican if it were not for the social conservatives who seem to believe that their vision of morality is the only vision that counts. In this particular race you had two Republicans who did split the vote...resulting in the loss...but the split seems to be along the lines of social vs. economic conservatives. Dangerous stuff for a party that already is in the minority. This election says more about the fractured nature of the Republicans than it does about effective campaigning by a Democrat.

No doubt that the Republican spin-machine, lead by the likes of Limbaugh and Hannity, will tell glowing tales today of grand GOP victories. That's their job. That's what they do. That isn't necessarily reality.

Americans are an independent lot. We like to work hard, be successful, and do what we want with our money. We also want people staying out of our business. That's a negative against Democrats who want to tax the crap out of everything and punish success. That's also a negative against Republicans who want to impose a code of morality that they themselves have trouble upholding (right Pastor Haggard?, right Newt?). I can hold my nose and vote for a drunken-sailor-spending Democrat because on some level they are trying to do what they view as being right, all be it misguided. I have a tougher time on the Republican side, because of the accusatory nature of holier-than-thou social conservatives who try to use their version of God as a vote-getter.

The late Lee Atwater got it right when he described a "big tent" Republican Party, where there was room for individuals with a variety of views. Unfortunately, the likes of Sarah Palin and other national, socially conservative Republicans s seem to have more of a "members only" tent in mind. That's sad, because it forces many of us hold our noses while voting. In my book, misguided intentions win out over finger-pointing & hypocrisy.

If You Are Interested In Religion...

...I found a terrific blog at

http://leavethebuildingblog.com/author/leavethebuilding/

...note that I'm not going all evangelical on anyone, but I find the blogger's writing to be a great mix of simple, direct and positive communication.

He's "...a news guy"

First, I want to state that I don't know Steve Corbett, I have never met Steve Corbett, and I don't (often) listen to Steve Corbett on WILK radio. As far as I am concerned, he's a stand-up guy who is just as entitled to his opinion as am I. Speaking of opinions, there is however a sticking point I want to reference that does bother me when I think about Steve Corbett.

On one hand, if you listen to WILK for any length of time, you will no doubt hear some of the station's promotional spots; one of those spots includes Steve Corbett saying (among other things) "...I'm a news guy!". I've also heard Steve Corbett on the 'Nancy and Kevin' show talk about how they "do hard news"; to his credit, his counterpart in the morning, Kevin Lynn, seems to shun the notion that they (WILK's opinion shows) are in the "hard news" business. Clearly though, Steve Corbett views himself as being a news reporter.

On the other hand, we have pieces like this [Link Here] which in my mind have nothing to do with "hard news" and everything to do with opinions. Launch the link and read the article. This is Steve Corbett telling people who to vote for, as evidenced by quotes such as:

"In Lackawanna County, two stale incumbent judges want to be retained.

Vote no."

The above doesn't read like "hard news" to me. Throughout the article, Steve Corbett mostly notes who he is going to vote for (with phrases such as "Gartley’s place is on the bench."), but other times he is far more directional. "Vote no" seems more like a demand than a request.

So what's the harm? Both Steve Corbett and Steve Albert are both entitled to opinions, right? Hell, I hand out opinions in this space all the time. Yet I do not, however, claim to be a "news guy". I do not claim to report "hard news". No, I'm just a pension guy with lots of opinions and fairly good typing skills. Steve Corbett, however, does claim to be a "news guy". Along with that statement come more than a few tough questions, such as:

1. When does someone like Steve Corbett cease being a reporter and start being an advocate?
2. How do we know that Steve Corbett (the reporter) doesn't skew the news based on the activities of Steve Corbett (the advocate)?
3. How can Steve Corbett be sure himself that his opinions don't skew his "hard news" reporting? Maybe he doesn't actually care if one bleeds into the other. Maybe that's his intent.
   
4. At the end of the day, isn't there supposed to be a wall of sorts between reporting the news and issuing editorial opinions? In the financial world, we have this concept of a Chinese Wall to prevent obvious conflicts of interest, but yet such a separation doesn't seem to exist when it comes to the news.

Now the cheap-n-easy retort to all of the above is something like...

"Come on, people are smart enough to know when they are being given news and when they are being given an opinion"

...which always reminds me of the late Paul Harvey. Why? Paul Harvey was (in)famous for weaving commercials into his newscasts, hoping (in my humble opinion) that the millions who listened to him would mistake, for example, the latest miracle vitamin cure commercial with real announcements about real cures. It just doesn't sit right with me, precisely because some people are not smart enough to distinguish the news with a carefully crafted opinion piece.

In the end, it all comes down to intellectual honesty. I know, that's probably too heady a concept for a blog (and down right ironic for the Internet), but it's the best two words I can think of that encapsulate the notion that we all know that there is a difference between reporting hard news and issuing hard opinions. We all know it, but yet some want us to think that such a line either doesn't exist, shouldn't exist or doesn't matter. I think it does, but then again I'm just a pension guy.