March 9: "Eyes," Pretty Honest, One Truth

Billy Collins opens his . . . 

Eyes

by:  Billy Collins

O little twin spheres

echoing

the shape of the earth

and a perfect match

for the blue

curvature of the sky,

no wonder

the dark, descending birds

always begin with you.

Kind of a bleak little image there--dark, descending birds always beginning with the eyes.  Right out of a Grimm fairy tale.  Or an Alfred Hitchcock movie.  

There's an old saying that eyes are the windows to the soul.  The mouth can lie.  So can the face.  Even the body can lie.  But eyes simply can't lie, unless you happen to be a sociopath with an orange complexion and really bad hair.  

However, I believe that most people are pretty honest.  That doesn't mean that all truths are valid.  That means that every individual owns a piece of the puzzle, and if all of those pieces could be put together, the full truth would be revealed.

Here are the truths of today, as seen through my eyes:

1) Winter returned today, with snow and wind and ice.  

2) My puppy likes to bark.  All.  Day.  Long.  At other dogs.  Passing cars.  The mail carrier.

3) I love my wife.

4) I love my kids.

5) I love my sisters, who live only a block away from me.

6) I love my friends who came over tonight to play board games.

7) I love watching movies late at night.

8) I intensely dislike Daylight Saving Time in the spring.

9) Poetry can save your life.

10) Nobody should act out of anger or resentment.

11) Those that love you the most can hurt you the most.

12) Cheese should be its own food group.

13) The Oscars are more entertaining than the Super Bowl.

14) Naps are one of the greatest pleasure in life.

15) Everyone should watch a sunrise at least once a week.

16) Everyone should watch a sunset at least once a week.

17) The movie Wonka is pretty amazing.

Some disciples reading this post might not agree with a few (or all) of my truths.  That's okay.  Peace on Earth doesn't mean that everyone agrees on what the truth is.  It means that, despite all of our different truths, we can still love each other and help each other in times of need.

Saint Marty hopes we can all agree on that one truth.

And also that Donald Trump is batshit crazy.

August 7: Small Pudding, Starving Kids, Cheese

Everybody had something to say about it, but nobody said or thought it was at all a small pudding for a large family.  It would have been flat heresy to do so.  Any Cratchit would have blushed to hint at such a thing.

This little passage is about the Cratchits' Christmas pudding.  The Cratchits live on the edge of starvation, eking out a meager existence on the tiny salary that Scrooge pays Bob.  Yet, nobody feels deprived.  Nobody complains.  They are overjoyed with the food on their table.

This morning, my son got me up much earlier than I wanted to get up again.  After about an hour of being awake, he asked for "round crackers" for breakfast.  Well, Ritz crackers aren't so horrible (not as bad as chocolate milk and Tootsie Rolls), but I wanted to give him something healthy to accompany the crackers.  So I prepared a bowl of Ritz and a couple slices of cheese.

When I handed him the bowl, my son acted as if I had just served him a helping of small pox mixed with fecal matter.  When I insisted he eat the cheese, my son obliged me, as demonstrated by the picture below:

Yes, this is my son spitting his cheese back into his bowl of crackers.  Unlike the Cratchit children, he has no problem criticizing the food that he is given to eat.  Where Tiny Tim and crew would have been ecstatic over Kraft American cheese, my son simply masticates and regurgitates.  I almost used the old saying my mom used on me when I was a kid:  "You know there are starving kids in Africa who would be overjoyed to have that cheese."  However, I refrained from stooping to such an old parental chestnut.  I'm pretty sure Socrates' mom said to him at one point, "You know, Socrates, there are starving kids in Mesopotamia who would be very happy with that wild boar meat."

However, I was too tired to fight this battle.  I will save the lesson of poverty and starvation for another time.  My son got his Ritz crackers, and I got back a bowl of chewed-up cheese and spit.

Maybe Saint Marty will take a page out of Joan Crawford's parenting guide and give his son the bowl of cheese slop for lunch.