June 17: "Light-Year," Bad News, "Sharing Good News"

Billy Collins, the astronomer/physicist (sort of) . . . 

Light-Year

by: Billy Collins

Being the amount of light

that falls every year

on this green pasture

where I pulled the car over

to write down

what I just thought of.

Technically, that's not really what a light year is.  (Astronomical definition:  a unit of astronomical distance equivalent to the distance that light travels in one year.)  But I can get on board with Collins' description.  When you live in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, you are very aware of the amount of sunlight available at any given time.  I remember one particular winter when we didn't see blue sky for over a month.

It rained hard in my neck of the woods this afternoon, accompanied by some good-sized hail.  It's supposed to start raining again in about an hour.  (Confession:  I'm writing this post around 5:30 p.m.)  However, I'm sitting in my office at the library right now looking at an almost clear sky, so I'm not completely convinced that the heavens will open up and unleash again.

I'm supposed to host an outdoor concert on the library steps this evening, but I made the decision around 2 p.m. to move it inside.  If you haven't realized it yet, faithful disciple, I abhor disruptions to plans I make.  Most people who know me personally are very aware of this fact.  Yet, some individuals still delight in breaking bad news to me.  One such person today, shaking head, with a mild expression of concern/amusement:  "Just saw the forecast.  Doesn't look good."

Human beings get a kind of . . . thrill (I guess that's the best word I can come up with) when sharing information that's potentially upsetting or sad.  (Maybe that's why everyone pays so much attention to Donald Trump.  It's not because they believe or respect him.  It's because he's a walking, talking airplane crash--disaster in the flesh.)

On the flip side, good news is always delivered with a spoonful of criticism.  You may have just won the Nobel Peace Prize for battling climate change or caring for homeless squids, and you'll still be the subject of gossip and insult.  Perhaps it's jealousy.  Or just outright meanness.  As the adage goes, misery loves company.

Saint Marty isn't miserable right now.  Just mildly annoyed with the weather.

Sharing Good News

by: Martin Achatz

Bake Grandma's lemon bars

to share at tomorrow's potluck

and count how many people

eat them, smile, then point out

you didn't add enough butter

to the crumble crust.

August 8: Bad News, Concert Reschedule, Vitamin D

Santiago gets better . . . 

He settled comfortably against the wood and took his suffering as it came and the fish swam steadily and the boat moved slowly through the dark water. There was a small sea rising with the wind coming up from the east and at noon the old man's left hand was uncramped.

"Bad news for you, fish," he said and shifted the line over the sacks that covered his shoulders.

Bad news.  It comes in many forms.  These past weeks, as all my faithful disciples know, I've been struggling with some blue feelings.  That's bad news coming from the inside.  Then there's bad news at a job.  Today, I spent a good portion of my time rescheduling a concert that was supposed to happen at the library.  It was a series of miscommunications between myself and the musician.  So, bad news--concert doesn't happen tonight.

Wherever bad news comes from--inside, outside, on the job, at home, in a classroom--it's tough.  It can knock you on your ass.  In fact, that's the first thing that any bad news does.  It lays you out flat.  It's the seconds and minutes following bad news that makes the difference.  You can stay on your back, staring up at the ceiling in a daze, or you can get back on your feet, say to yourself "that sucked," and do something about it.

Now, some bad news if more difficult to deal with than others.  The concert reschedule today was easy bad news.  A poster, four or five emails, a social media post, and personal notifications later.--Voila!  Bad news changed into a minor inconvenience.  The bad news of my blue funks are a little more problematic.  It knocks me down and takes me time to get back up.

After I took care of rescheduling the concert this morning, I played catch-up from my vacation.  Answered my emails and messages.  Talked to a few performers to schedule new programs.  At lunchtime, I stepped outside, sat on the steps of the library, and enjoyed the blue sky and smell of the flower gardens.  Watched clouds drift past the spires of the Methodist church across the street.  Let the sun fill me with vitamin D.

For a few minutes, I felt free and happy.

Saint Marty's blessing of the day:  sun, blue sky, and a church.

November 15: Too Optimistic, Writer Friend, Happiness Breaks

This is what I plan to do.  Partly as a result of my terrible dream, I have been thinking that the landscape of the intricate world that I have painted is inaccurate and lopsided.  It is too optimistic . . . 

Dillard is faced with revising her notions of the world.  Yes, there is beauty because of the fecundity of creation, the complex and rich aura of the intricate design of the divine.  However, as Dillard concludes at the end of the next paragraph, ". . . we are all going to die."

I have been trying to remain optimistic in the face of all the bad news (national and personal) of this past week.  I was talking to a writer friend yesterday, and he is beside himself because of the results of the recent presidential election.  "I don't know what I should do," he said.  "Civil disobedience?  Protest?  I don't know."  He has been allowing himself small happiness breaks.  He goes for a walk to watch birds on the shores of Lake Superior.  "I try to find some beauty to admire."

That might sound like an extreme reaction to some, but I get where my friend is coming from.  As I said yesterday, my health insurance premiums are going up in January by $100 per paycheck.  I will $200 poorer every month.  That's a lot of money for my family.  This afternoon, I had to sign up for these health benefits, and when I was done, I wanted to vomit.

Civil disobedience is not going to help my situation.  Or protest.  Nobody really would give a crap if I stood outside the health system where I work, holding a sign that says "Slave to Health Benefits" or "My Choice--Food or Health Insurance."  I might make the local nightly news, but that's about it.  Just like the people protesting Donald Trump's election.  The media has already started to move on.  That's the way life works.

So, I will be taking a small happiness break this afternoon.  I won't be walking on the beach or bird watching.  My break will probably involve some form of chocolate.

Tonight, Saint Marty is grateful for the silence of his office at the university.

This sort of makes me happy

May 30: Face of Tragedy, Bad News, Joshua Mehigan, "The News," New Cartoon

With so much correspondence to answer, on many an evening, when she might have otherwise been studying, she [Annie Ives] sat in their living room, at their secretary, chain-smoking Chesterfields, sipping wine, and listening to music as she composed her responses.  That she did not know what to say in the face of tragedy greatly vexed her.  She would write sympathetic notes of response in her impeccable script and enclose an illustrated prayer card that her husband had made up in the office.  Christ giving his blessing.  Finishing with her signature, she handed each to Ives, as he sat by his drawing board, so that he could sign the notes too.  She was not certain that he read each one over, but had often watched his face sadden when, as if wincing, he would sign his name.

The year following her son's death, Annie spends her time answering all the letters of sympathy the family receives.  People whose loved ones have died in tragic circumstances.  A woman who lost her husband in a fire.  Parents whose son shot himself.  A mother with a two-year-old who drowned in a backyard pool.  Tragedy keeps paying visits to the Ives family.

Tragedy is never far away.  This week, floods in Texas that have killed dozens of people.  I met with a friend whose son died of a drug overdose last fall.  My sister who had her parathyroid removed at U of M hospital this week is a good example.  Last year at this time, she had just broken her wrist.  Two or three months later, she would have surgery on that wrist.  Two or three months beyond that, back surgery.  Infections.  Sepsis.  Hospital stay after hospital stay.  Then, for four months, flat on her back in a nursing home, unable to eat or move.

Last night, I was feeling pretty sorry for myself.  After about the third hour of vacuuming and pulling down soggy pieces of my kitchen ceiling, I stopped for a couple moments to get a drink of water.  I was hot.  Itchy from all the dust and insulation.  My nose was running.  I stood by the refrigerator and said aloud, "What have I done wrong, God?  What's my problem?"

Of course, I know that's a pointless question.  Tragedy is not some kind of divine lesson.  Tragedy is simply tragedy.  The product of a world that the human race has abused and taken for granted.  The people who died in the Texas floods or my sister or my friend weren't being punished.   Tragedy doesn't have to make sense.  It exists.  Period.

That doesn't mean that those affected by tragedy don't question the universe, get angry at God, drown in waves of grief.  There's a certain amount of baggage involved in all difficult circumstances.  What ifs.  What if my sister hadn't broken her wrist?  What if the people in Texas had decided to go to Disneyland last week?  That is sometimes, I think, the most difficult part of tragedy, because it is an attempt to assign blame or reason.

Tragedy has a way of happening, no matter how much you try to control life.  Grace resides in how you deal with any tragedy that befalls you.  Annie Ives tries to console other grieving human beings.  My friend tries to educate her students about mental illness.  Once my sister has recuperated, returns home, perhaps she will go back to work as a nurse, helping other people struggling with limiting health problems.

Saint Marty thinks grace is God's response to tragedy.

The News

by:  Joshua Mehigan

What happened to today?  Where did it go?
The raindrops dot the window and roll down.
One taps the glass, another, three at a time,
warping the view of black tree limbs and sky.
Long hush, quick crescendo.  Wind leans on the sash.
Behind me in the shadows sleep two cars.
Nearby, like something small deposited
tenderly, by a big wind on the bed,
my wife sleeps deeply through the afternoon.
The sky is gray.  What color is the sky?
Rhinoceros?  Volcanic dune?  Moon dust?
Breast of mourning dove?  Gray butterfly?
Blank newsprint.  There's no news, no news at all,
and will be none,
until, at long last, in the other room,
one light comes on, and then another one.

Confessions of Saint Marty

November 13: Good-bye, a Friend, Bad News

"Good-bye!" [Charlotte] whispered.  Then she summoned all her strength and waved one of her front legs at him.

Reading Charlotte's Web as a child was one of my first experiences with death.  The sentence above sent me into paroxysms of grief.  It really felt as if I had lost a family member.  The book itself has taught generations of children the hard lessons of life and love and friendship and loss.

I just found out an hour ago that Dave, a friend of mine who has been battling pancreatic cancer for a couple of years, passed away.  While I can't say that the news was a surprise, it certainly took the wind out of my sails.  I played in a band with Dave.  He gave my daughter piano lessons.  One summer, when the original drummer bailed on me, Dave showed up at the last minute to play the drums for a performance of the musical Nunsense which I directed.

In short, Dave has always been a generous, wonderful blessing in my life.  Musically, I've never met anyone like him.  He could play any instrument you put in his hand, from a mandolin to a flute.  He could play jazz, blues, classical, big band, church hymns.  Everything.  And he did it with humility.  He wasn't showy, despite all his talent.

I will miss Dave.  I'll miss the looks he gave me when I played wrong notes during a song.  I'll miss his lectures on chord progressions and transposition.  I'll miss his humor, when he would play "Amazing Grace" and segue seamlessly into "King of the Road."  He made music fun, and he made worship a joy.

Good-bye, my friend.

Saint Marty's heart is a little heartbroken tonight.

Gone too soon

September 15: Bad News, Philip Levine, "Going Back"

Before I announce the poet of the week officially, I'd like to say a few words about poetry contests:

They suck.

Now that I have that off my chest, I am happy to announce that Philip Levine is the Poet of the Week.  Levine was born in Detroit and is what I would call an elder statesman in American poetry.  He's won just about every award available except the Nobel Prize.

The poem I chose for tonight comes from Levine's Unselected Poems.  It's about loss and memory.

Saint Marty lost a poetry contest today, and he hopes to put it out of his memory.

Going Back

by:  Philip Levine

I opened War and Peace to reread the scene
in which Natasha's brother Petya
falls in his first battle, and Denisov turns
from the boy's body to lean against a wattle fence.
In memory I heard a man so wracked the Cossacks
thought at first they heard the yelping of a dog.

Before I could locate the exact page I found
maple leaves I'd brought back from the East
in 1972, seven perfect blood red
pansies pressed for safekeeping, a dried thistle,
poppy or rose petals so dark and fragile
they glowed in the lamplight like shavings of oak.

Beneath them the author's words seemed frozen
in a common language no one understood.
"The cause of the delay was Natasha's skirt. . ."
Outside the sky darkened.  By the open window
with David Ber I sat, with Yenkl Tsipie,
Abraham, with all my lost, while the rain fell.

One of my heroes

December 20: Concern for Your Future, Bad News, Fairy Tale

"Do you feel absolutely no concern for your future, boy?"

Old Spencer asks Holden this question near the very beginning of Catcher.  He's trying to make Holden feel some concern over flunking out of yet another school.  Of course, Spencer makes no impression at all on Holden.  Holden is a little too far gone to accept Spencer's "common sense" talk.

I, on the other hand, have great concern for my future.  The bad news I was expecting last night came late this morning.  I have been playing the organ at my wife's church for close to 15 years.  I am no longer an organist at my wife's church.  The people who hire and fire at the church chose to hire a different organist.  I've been told not to "take it personally."  I'm finding it difficult to follow that advice.

I work for two big organizations.  A university.  A national health care system.  People at these places appear and disappear regularly.  And I'm sure they're told not to take it personally.  Working for a small, local church is different.  I've known the people in this church since my wife and I were dating.  My wife and I were married in this church.  I worked under five different pastors at this church.  I felt safe at this church.  I thought I was family.

I was wrong.

I've been preparing myself for this news for quite some time.  It's been in the works for close to three months.  I've done nothing wrong.  I didn't hold parties with underage kids in the sanctuary.  I never showed up on a Sunday drunk or hungover.  I've gotten phone calls at ten o'clock on a Saturday night and showed up the next morning to play for a sick organist.  I've been dedicated and loyal and dependable.

If I'm sounding bitter and angry at the moment, I'm sorry.  The news is still a little raw.  I'll be better tomorrow.  I'll progress to depressed and despondent.  I know I'll be fine.  It's simply going to take me a while to figure out my next move.  I have just lost $200 a month in income.  That's huge for my family at the moment.

You know, there's this story I know about a church organist name Gregor in the village of Mitchell.

Once upon a time, Gregor the organist got a note from the vicar of the church.  The note read,

Dear Gregor,

Please don't bother showing up for work any more.  We've hired an accordionist to replace you.  We're starting a polka service.

God bless,

Vicar Ted

That morning, lightning struck the steeple of the church, and in a matter of an hour, the entire building was rubble, smoke, and ashes.


Moral of the story:  God hates polkas.

And Saint Marty will live happily ever after.

I didn't show up dressed like this, either

December 18: Interrupt My Worrying, Waste of Time, Headaches and Knots

...I probably was still looking out the window, but I swear I can't remember.  I was so damn worried, that's why.  When I really worry about something, I don't just fool around.  I even have to go to the bathroom when I worry about something.  Only, I don't go.  I'm too worried to go.  I don't want to interrupt my worrying to go...

I'd forgotten about this little passage.  Holden worries.  About Jane and Allie and Phoebe.  He worries about kids on the playground and "fuck you" graffiti in a grade school.  He worries so much that he ends up having a breakdown.  Catcher is really a portrait of Holden's mind unraveling.  Because he's "so damn worried."


I spent all day waiting to hear bad news.  I don't need to go into detail.  My point is that I wasted about twelve hours.  Worry doesn't really accomplish anything.  It's a pointless exercise.  Nothing really bad happened to me today, except for the fact that I gave myself a huge headache and knots in my shoulders.

I've always been a worrier.  I believe that, if I expect the worst, and the worst doesn't happen, I've somehow won a battle.  That doesn't mean that the worst won't happen tomorrow.  However, I can't really control anything about tomorrow.  Pretty much, all I have control over is the next word I type.  I know, when I'm done with this post, I'm going to work on a poem.  Then, I hope to get to bed a little early tonight.  That's what I have control of tonight.

Saint Marty's going to leave tomorrow to the worriers.

I forget this sometimes

July 23: Missing Everybody, Bad News, Prayer Over Blessings

...Don't ever tell anybody anything.  If you do, you start missing everybody.

Those are the last two sentences in The Catcher in the Rye.  I find a lot of wisdom in them.  Holden, after telling the story of his breakdown, is now experiencing regret.  It sort of makes sense.  Speaking about an experience, describing it, digesting it, allows a person to come to terms with it.  Holden is missing all of the people in the novel, from Ackley to Jane, because he's finally dealing with the losses in his life.

I've had a really good couple of days.  The trip to Curtis, Michigan, and the poetry reading were really good for my state of mind.  I got away from my day-to-day stresses, and, for a little over 24 hours, I got to be a full-time poet/teacher.  I was around people who wanted to listen to me.  I was with writer friends who treated me like a peer.  It was good medicine.

I checked my e-mail before I sat down to write this post.  I got some bad news.  I applied for a job at the university.  It wasn't full-time, but it was an exciting opportunity.  And the salary was great.  It would have lessened the burden of having my hours reduced at the medical office.  Well, the job is no longer available.  In fact, the job simply doesn't exist.  It's not going to be filled.

The good part about this news is that I told very few people about the job.  I didn't "tell anybody anything," as Holden says.  Only a few family members and friends know I applied.  Therefore, I don't have to explain what happened to a large group.  When my wife gets home tonight, I'm going to have to tell her.  That will be one of the hardest parts.

The other hardest part will be not having anything to look forward to this coming fall.  My coworker in the medical office is quitting.  That means all the business office duties will be falling on my shoulders.  Everything.  And I will have to do it all with reduced hours.  Less money, more work.  I'm trying to not feel sorry for myself at the moment, and I'm not succeeding.

So, I'm going to end this post with a prayer over blessings.  It will be my prayer of the week, and I hope it will remind me of all the good things that I've experienced over the last couple of days.  I certainly hope it won't make me start missing everybody, like Holden at the end of Catcher.

Dear Big Guy in Charge of Blessings,

Thanks for all the wonderful people I met in the last day or so.  Thanks for my writer friends, Jen Howard and Sue Harrison.  Thanks for the people in Curtis, Michigan, who arranged the reading.  Thanks for the great night at the Chamberlin's Ole Forest Inn, for the food, the drinks, the warm, comfortable bed.

Thanks for the hug and kiss my son gave me when I got home.  Thanks for my wife saying, "I'm so glad you're home.  I really missed you."  Thanks for the mozzarella-and-bacon quiche we had for dinner tonight.  And now, thanks for my quiet house.

I'm holding all these blessings in my heart tonight, trying to stave off disappointment.  Help me to remember the goodness this week, and when I start backsliding into worry, lift my eyes upward.  To light.  To hope.  To blessings.

Your child,

Saint Marty

Finding peace in Curtis, Michigan

July 18: Ed Banky, Car, Bad News, Piece of My Mind

Ed Banky was the basketball coach at Pencey.  Old Stradlater was one of his pets, because he was the center on the team, and Ed Banky always let him borrow his car when he wanted it.  It wasn't allowed for students to borrow faculty guys' cars, but all the athletic bastards stuck together.  In every school I've gone to, all the athletic bastards stick together.

I'm not a basketball player or an athletic bastard, and I don't attend school or teach at Pencey.  But I could sure use Ed Banky's car right now.

The bad news from the mechanic at the dealership came a lot earlier than I expected.  He called me around 10 a.m. to tell me my car was done, but he had to talk to me about "an issue."  "An issue," in mechanic talk, amounts to an $800-plus repair.

I kind of sat at my desk, speechless.  Finally, I said, "Well, I can't afford that right now."  To be honest, I don't know how I'm going to afford it later, either.  That kind of money doesn't come my way very often.  Actually, that kind of money never comes my way.

I'm beginning to intensely dislike auto mechanics and cars.  Owning a vehicle is a necessary evil for people who live in rural places like the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.  I put about thirty miles on my car every day simply driving to and from work.  Taking the bus isn't an option, and riding my bike down the highway at 4 a.m. is not an appealing proposition.  So, I own a car that's becoming more expensive to keep on the road than raising my two children.

Here's the thing:  the first car I owned was a 1978 Dodge Aspen.  I inherited it from my older sister, and, aside from a brake job or two, it never gave me a lick of trouble.  I'd bet that Aspen is still running somewhere in the world.  It was a solid, reliable car.  Every car I've purchased since the Aspen has given me costly migraines.  My Ford Freestyle is the latest in a long line of headaches.

Cars used to last longer than car loans.  A lot longer.  I offer my Aspen as evidence with over ten years' of good service.  The car I owned before my Freestyle, a nice little Mercury Sable, lasted one month past the date I made my last payment on it.  Then I had a close encounter with a deer one foggy morning on my way to work.  My wife's Subaru has a laundry list of ailments, and we just payed it off about two months ago.

I want to own a car for once in my lifetime that I can drive for a couple of years without failing brake pads or ball joints or spring nut filters or whatever.  Two years without a single car repair.  Two years of just oil changes and tire rotations.  That's all.  I don't think that's too much to ask of Ford or Chrysler or Dodge or Subaru.  Make a car that lasts longer than a team of oxen, for God's sake.

That's a piece of Saint Marty's mind.

Anybody want to trade for a couple of bulls?

June 17: Bad News, Spiral, Magic 8-Ball

I received some bad news at work today.  It seems the health care system which recently acquired the hospital where I work has sent down an edict that no clerical staff are allowed to work overtime any more.  That means that the overtime money that usually helps my family make it through the summer has suddenly gone the way of the passenger pigeon.

Here I sit in my office at the university.  I had to leave my other job because I'd already worked too many hours.  I'm in a downward spiral at the moment, imagining everything from bankruptcy to foreclosure.  In one of my fantasies, an asteroid hit the hospital and took out the entire administration building.  That was actually quite pleasant.

I don't know what I'm going to do.  I don't know if or how my family is going to survive until the checks from the university start coming again in late August.  Basically, I don't know anything.  It has been a pretty crappy few days for bad news.

My question for Magic 8-Ball Monday is pretty simple:

Is my family going to make it through the summer financially?

And the answer from that wellspring of positivity, Holden Caulfield, is:

"She's fine, thanks.  I haven't seen her too recently, but the last I--"

I'm going to take that one to the bank.  Too bad I can't cash it.  I'm going to be "fine," according to Holden.  Of course, "fine" for Holden is a nervous breakdown and pneumonia.


Saint Marty needs to stop spiraling.  Now.

Anybody got a spare parachute?

November 30: Bad News, "A Cry Like a Bell," A Poem

A good poem on a bad day

The reason I'm in a bad mood today/tonight/the rest of the weekend/possibly until New Year's Day:  my wife got fired from her job today.  She's taking it much better than I am at the moment.  I've been angry all afternoon long.  Right now, I'm in bed, in my pajamas, typing this post and trying to avoid interaction  with any person.  In the mood I'm in, it's best if I just pretend that I've suddenly developed a case of acute onset muteness.

I have been posting poems on Friday evenings for the past few weeks.  Despite my foul mood, I will not disappoint any of my disciples who have tuned in for a poetry fix.  This poem is by Madeleine L'Engle (yes, she of A Wrinkle in Time fame) and comes from her collection of verse titled A Cry Like a Bell.  It's a Christmas poem, because I'm trying to rekindle my yuletide spirit.  While I don't think L'Engle is a great poet, she has her moments.  The poem below is one of those moments.

Saint Marty is going to have some liquor spiked with eggnog now.

The Bethlehem explosion

And it came to pass in those days that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.  And Joseph also went up from Galilee . . . to be taxed, with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.  Luke 2:1, 4-5

The chemistry lab at school
was in an old greenhouse
surrounded by ancient live oaks
garnished with Spanish moss.

The experiment I remember best
was pouring a quart of clear fluid
into a glass jar, and dropping into it,
grain by grain, salt-sized crystals,
until they layered
like white sand on the floor of the jar.

One more grain--and suddenly--
water and crystal burst
into a living, moving pattern,
a silent, quietly violent explosion.
The teacher told us that only when
we supersaturated the solution,
would come the precipitation.

The little town
was like the glass jar in our lab.
One by one they came, grain by grain,
all those of the house of David,
like grains of sand to be counted.

The inn was full.  When Jospeh knocked,
his wife was already in labour; there was no room
even for compassion.  Until the barn was offered.
That was the precipitating factor.  A child was born,
and the pattern changed forever, the cosmos
shaken with that silent explosion.

February 6: Bad Day, Bad News, Bad Mood

Bad day.  It started out bad.  I could not wake up this morning, despite an infusion of Diet Mountain Dew and some dark chocolate M&Ms.  Mondays are usually slow in the medical office where I work.  It wasn't slow.  The phone.  Add-on surgeries.  The phone again.  Faxes.  More add-on surgeries.  Phone.  Phone.  Phone.  Missing equipment.  Phone.  Surgeries.  Phone.  Phone.  Friggin' phone.

Bad news.  About 10 a.m., I received an e-mail saying that I had to pay nearly $400 in taxes.  By next Tuesday.  I wanted to put a bullet in my temple by this time.  On top of the phone and the surgeries and the phone and the missing equipment and the phones, I had to figure out where I'm going to find $400.  I checked all my orifices and came up empty-handed.

Bad mood.  I'm in a terrible mood.  I've been in a terrible mood since about, oh, 10 a.m.  That's over twelve hours of bad mood.  I still have not arrived at any four-hundred-dollar plan.  Can't sell my blood (diabetes).  Can't sell a kidney (no connections).  Can't sell a story or poem (not from lack of trying).  That leaves me about $395 short.

That's Saint Marty's day in a nutshell.  Long on bad.  Short on cash.

December 28: Bad News, No Windows

My wife got some bad news this morning.  She's been waiting to hear about a permanent job as a teacher's aide in a preschool classroom.  She spent almost all of December subbing with these kids, and she thought she'd bonded with them.  My wife called the office this morning to see if the organization had made the decision about who was going to be hired permanently.  The decision was made, and it wasn't my wife.

My wife was crying on the phone, and I found myself getting really angry.  And worried.  As a family, we've been struggling for a while.  This job could have really made a difference.  A few extra hundred dollars a month would have allowed us to start saving money again, instead of constantly draining our bank account.  Since my wife's unemployment ran out, we've had one bad thing after another happen to us, financially.  It's pretty much sucked.  Even the thought of my wife earning some extra income was allowing me to sleep easier at night.  Now it's back to tossing and turning.

Some people would say, in circumstances like this, "God never closes a door without opening a window."  I'm here to tell you that little piece of wisdom is a load of shit.  I've been looking for a window for the past several months, and all I've found are more closed doors.  My wife's news this morning was just the latest in the series of doors that have slammed shut in our faces.  My nose has splinters in it.

Yes, I'm giving into discouragement.  I'm pissed and frightened.  Things need to start looking up soon.  If not, in a few months, I might not be able to make house payments or car payments.

Saint Marty has his hand on the panic button.

Care to join me in my anxiety?

November 9: Bad Weather, Bad News, Good Attitude

The weather has turned miserable.  Walking to teach class this afternoon, I got drenched.  Not just drenched.  It was like I'd been sitting in a dunk tank in my L. L. Bean winter jacket, and one of my students hit the bull's eye with the baseball.  My jacket and pants were dripping.  I spoke to my wife earlier this morning, and she told me it was snowing like a bitch at home.  I don't think I'm going to be able to avoid the snow today.  In fact, considering the moistness of my outer garments, I would say the probability of me not seeing snow tonight is about, oh, nil.  Unless I drive home with my eyes closed.

Got some bad news this afternoon.  My coworker in the medical office was offered another job, and she accepted the position.  It's great news for her.  More money, which she needs.  More hours, which she also needs.  I'm happy for her, but I'm also thinking about how much more difficult my life and job situation are going to be in about six weeks' time.  My ability to teach more flexible hours is gone.  My ability to take time off for whatever reason is in the shitter.  And my ability to get a variety of tasks completed during a workday is fucked.  It isn't the kind of news I wanted to hear today.

Now, I know what I should be thinking.  I should be thinking more positively.  I should try to imagine this change as an opportunity, not a prison sentence.  It's all about attitude.  See the glass as half-full.  If life gives you lemons, make lemonade.  The grass is greener where somebody takes a shit.  I know all that good attitude bullcrap.  As you can tell, I'm not really buying it right now.  Talk to me in a couple of days.  Better make that a couple of weeks.  Actually, let's shoot for a couple of months.

Saint Marty needs a drink right now.

Won't be getting this any time soon

October 20: The Lost Week Ends

This whole week has been a blur of cold medicine and bad news.  I'm glad it has come to an end.  I am staying positive.  I will not say anything about coughing all night long or the lack of groceries at my home at the moment.  (We hit Walmart tomorrow.)  I'm not going to bitch about being rejected by The MacGuffin.  I did enough of that this morning.  I'm not going to express any negativity about the shitty economy or job situation or the fact that I'm going to die as a part-time adjunct.

Nope.  Only sunshine from me tonight.  So...that's about all I have to say.  My wife is waiting for me to arrive home.  The kids are probably driving her a little nuts.  It's too cold to play outside now.

Saint Marty, walking on sunshine tonight.  Sort of.

Gilda, telling it like it is!