April 7: Cheese and Crackers, Choosing to Be Happy, "Web" Dip

I'm sitting here in my office at the university, eating cheese and crackers for dinner.  Great Value Harvest Vegetable Baked Crisp Snacks and Colby-Jack Cubes.  It's a fairly healthy selection for a Monday night.  Usually, I'm feasting on a peanut butter sandwich and a Nutri Grain bar.  As the saying goes, variety is the spice of life.

I just finished teaching my film class. Brokeback Mountain this week.  One of my favorites.  However, it tends to drive me toward melancholy.  I can't think of a sadder movie.  Maybe Midnight Cowboy with Dustin Hoffman, but it's a close contest.  Anyway, during my Brokeback week, I have to do things to lighten my disposition.  Sometimes, I watch episodes of SpongeBob when I get home.  If I'm really down, I resort to It's A Wonderful Life.

I admire people who can consciously choose to be happy.  I don't understand them, but I admire them.  I had a coworker who always saw the silver lining in every cloud.  Very little could rattle her.  In the five-plus years I worked closely with her, I can only recall two occasions when I actually saw her upset.  (Both times, she was heavily pregnant.)  She simply refused to be sad, or she hid it really well.  She chose happiness.  Every day.

I wish I could cultivate that ability.  I think it would make my life so much easier.  For example, I have a crap load of grading to do this evening.  I am dreading it.  In fact, I'm contemplating typing a novella-length post to avoid it.  My coworker would have already attacked the stack of tests with a red pen, gusto, and a smile.

I thought my Lenten gratitude posts would help me in the happiness arena.  They haven't so far.  To be honest, I've struggled some days to come up with something for which to be grateful.  I find that fact really alarming.  I'd hate to think that I'm naturally pessimistic.  If I'm being honest, however, I have to admit that I just looked at a cup of water sitting on my desk and thought, "I've already drained half it."  Really.  I'm a half-empty kind of guy.

So, I here's my question for the Book of Charlotte today:

Am I a negative person?

And, flipping through the pages, my finger stops on:

...Wilbur stood still and closed his eyes.  He could feel the buttermilk trickling down his sides.  He opened his mouth and some buttermilk ran in.  It was delicious.  He felt radiant and happy...

Delicious.  Radiant.  Happy.


Maybe there is hope for Saint Marty after all.

It's all a matter of perspective...

February 6: A Friend, a Trifle, a Goodbye

One of my coworkers in the medical office retired today.  She's a registered nurse, and I've been working with this woman for almost 15 years.  She's helped me through some pretty difficult times in my life.  Listened when I needed to talk.  Provided Kleenex when I needed to cry.  Fed me when I was hungry.  Never turned me down when I asked her for a favor.

She deserves to retire.  She's worked hard her whole life, and that life hasn't been the easiest.  She has a daughter who suffers from schizophrenia.  Perhaps that's what drew us together--our experiences dealing with a family member's mental illness.   When things got difficult with my wife's bipolar, I didn't have to explain my struggles to my coworker.  She understood.  When my coworker's daughter was wandering the streets homeless, I understood my coworker's helplessness.  Even when our home lives were a mess, we had each other at work for strength.

At the end of Charlotte's Web, Charlotte reflects on her relationship with Wilbur:

"You have been my friend," replied Charlotte.  "That in itself is a tremendous thing.  I wove my webs for you because I liked you.  After all, what's a life, anyway?  We're born, we live a little while, we die.  A spider's life can't help being something of a mess, with all this trapping and eating flies.  By helping you, perhaps I was trying to lift up my life a trifle.  Heaven knows anyone's life can stand a little of that."

My coworker has lifted my life a trifle in the 15 years we've known each other.  I hope I have done the same for her.  Charlotte is right.  We all are on this planet for such a short time.  And most of that short time really is just a series of messes.  My coworker has made my messes a little more bearable, and I am lucky to have had her in my life.

Thank you, Marjie, for being my friend.  Goodbye.

And that's a piece of Saint Marty's mind.

August 15: Don't Ever Tell, Missing Everybody, October Nights

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

Those are Holden's last words in The Catcher in the Rye, and they really speak to my state of mind today.

I've been very lucky in my medical office job.  I work with a person who is not just a dependable colleague, but also a close and caring friend.  Today was this friend's last day on the job.  She's quitting to stay at home with her three young daughters.  It's a great decision for her, but it leaves me friendless and coworker-less in the office.

I'm trying to avoid feeling sorry for myself, but I'm not succeeding very well.  I'm sure my attitude will improve in a few weeks.  At the moment, however, I see long days of work without breaks or help or laughter.  I have other friends in the surgical center, but nobody who understands the frustrations and stress of the business office.  And nobody who will immediately know if I need help/support/a sympathetic ear/a shoulder to cry on.

I have gotten all of these things from my friend in the past.  She's seen me through some of the darkest points of my life, when I could barely utter a coherent sentence let alone deal with patients.  She's had my back for the past five years.

So seeing her walk out the door of the office for the last time this afternoon was a little like Holden watching his sister, Phoebe, riding the carrousel at the end of Catcher.  Phoebe keeps going around and around, and Holden just sits on a bench, happy to watch her, knowing the moment is fleeting, as temporary as the heat of July.  The chill of October nights is right around the corner.

I'm feeling that chill right now.  I'm already missing my friend, and she's only been gone about four hours.  I know change is inevitable.  That doesn't mean I have to be happy about it.  I just have to sit on the bench and watch it happen.  Holden's right.  Change makes you miss people, especially people you care a great deal about.

And that's a piece of Saint Marty's mind.

What a load of crap!

April 2: Trying to Remain Positive

I'm a lucky guy.

I have a partner in the medical office who is the best coworker a person could hope for.  She's supportive, hard-working, positive, and funny.  She also has three small children, one of whom is only six months old.

I've known for a while that one of her goals for a long time has been quitting her job.  She wants to be a stay-at-home mom.  I don't blame her.  Her husband makes good money.  If I could stay home with my daughter and son full-time, I would.  It would be a great gig.

Today, she made her plans a little clearer.  She's going to sell her current house, which is gorgeous, and buy a house and parcel of land next to her parents' home.  It will drop her mortgage payment enough to allow her to stop working.  And, at that point, I will want to open a vein.

Yes, I'm selfish.  Yes, I'm jealous.  You see, I've wanted to sell my house and get a new house for, oh, about five years or so.  My coworker, in the time I've known her, has accomplished this feat twice.  If I owned her current abode, I would never want to leave my house.  Ever.  That's the jealousy. 

The selfish is not wanting to lose her as a coworker.  She makes my life so much easier and happier.  If I end up a solo act in the business office again, it's going to suck in the suckiest suck way possible.

One of my other coworkers asked me at lunch, "What are you going to do when she leaves?"

It was a question I wasn't prepared to answer.  It was a question that I thought was a little mean.  It was a question that simply took the wind out of my sails.

Saint Marty is trying to remain positive.

Jealousy is an ugly thing

March 1: Sleep Tight, Ya Morons!

...I put my red hunting hat on, and turned the peak around to the back, the way I liked it, and then I yelled at the top of my goddam voice, "Sleep tight, ya morons!"...

That's Holden's famous parting line when he leaves Pencey Prep at the beginning of The Catcher in the Rye.  I really have no idea why I started this post with that particular passage.  It called to me this morning as I was flipping through my copy of the book.  Holden doesn't care for anyone at Pencey, so his exit is intended to wake up his classmates, let them all know what phonies they are.  Of course, at the end of the novel, when Holden is in the hospital, he starts missing people, even the "morons" from Pencey.

I think that's pretty common for most people.  Even if you're working at a crap job, completely miserable, there are people who make your life a little bit easier or happier.  For instance, I desperately want a full-time teaching job at the university, but I know that I would miss my coworkers in the medical office if I got that position.  Through the stress and heartache of the last twelve or so years, they have helped my, held me, listened to me.  They are good people, some of my best friends.

No, I'm not hinting that I have been offered a full-time professorship at the university (I wish!).  I'm simply saying that I take my friends for granted, and I shouldn't.  One of my best friends with whom I work just applied for another job.  It's a good job, one she would be really good at.  I support her in her decision.  Heck, I even wrote her resume and cover letter.  However, there's a tiny side of me that doesn't want her to get the job.  A tiny, very ugly side of me.  A jealous side.

Since I'm confessing things, I might as well admit something else.  Another of my coworkers is thinking about selling her current home and buying a new one.  This coworker currently has a gorgeous three-bedroom house with two bathrooms.  The house in which she's interested has five bedrooms and four bathrooms.  I can't imagine having that much space to live in.  I can't even bend over in my kitchen to tie my shoes without bumping my ass against a wall or a counter.  Yes, it's that small.  My ugly secret is not that my kitchen is small.  My ugly secret is that I don't want my coworker to get that new house.

I don't mind looking petty, small, and jealous.  Everyone who knows me also knows this side of my personality.  I joke about it.  I make fun of it.  But it's always present.  I spend a good deal of my life regretting the things I don't have instead of being thankful for all of my blessings.  That's reality for me.

Maybe that's Holden's reality, too.  He's never happy with his school or friends or mother or father.  He's never happy.  Period.

On this P.O.E.T.S., I'm going to be happy.  It's the weekend.  Spring break next week.  Life is good.

Sleep tight, ya moron, Saint Marty.

This guy doesn't want my coworker to get that house, either

August 31: Remove Me, Haunt Me No Longer, Anger

"Remove me!" Scrooge exclaimed.  "I cannot bear it!"

He turned upon the Ghost, and seeing that it looked upon him with a face, in which in some strange way there were the fragments of all the faces it had shown him, wrestled with it.

"Leave me!  Take me back.  Haunt me no longer!"

Scrooge is quite upset with the Ghost of Christmas Past by this point in the novel.  The Ghost ends his time with Scrooge by showing him some very painful scenes from his past.  Scrooge reacts with violence toward the Ghost, having experienced enough guilt and remorse for the time being.  He wants the Spirit to simply go away.  Scrooge is pissed.

I am quite angry today.  It's not really a focused anger.  I look at or think about something/somebody, and I get really mad.  I'm also pretty tired, so that doesn't improve my humor.  Thank goodness I don't have to work with a lot of people this morning.  Human interaction is not going to be one of my strong suits.  I might as well embrace the fact that, like Scrooge, I want people to go away.  Period.  Leave me alone,  Haunt me another time.

Working in a business office isn't really conducive to isolation.  The other person I'm working with this morning gets under my skin a lot.  The way she talks.  The way she interacts with patients.  The way she makes makes noises with her fork when she eats breakfast.  I just want to dig her heart out with a dull spoon.  Metaphorically, of course.  But, I just grit my teeth and bear it.

If my state of mind this morning is any indication of the way the rest of my day is going to proceed, perhaps I should find an empty room and practice some primal scream therapy.  Or take a nap.

Saint Marty is hanging on, but not by much.

Don't touch my desserts!

January 24: At the End of a Long Day

I'm trying to find something inspiring to say.  I'm at that point in the day where my brain is ready to go on vacation.  My son is in bed, and I'm trying to get ready for teaching tomorrow.  It doesn't help matters that my blood sugar is a little low, and I haven't had my daily dose of caffeine.


And the nominee is...handsome, rich, talented, and generous

The Oscar nominations were announced this morning.  I watched it live on the Today show.  Looks like George Clooney is going to have a good year.  (Does George Clooney ever have a bad year, really?)  He's nominated for best actor and best adapted screenplay.  I love this guy.  He's good looking.  Smart.  Talented.  And a Democrat.  I couldn't ask for anything more in a celebrity.

Meryl Streep was also nominated, and she may actually have a chance this year.  I mean, she's already won the Golden Globe.  Perhaps her luck will hold out.

My fortune is changing, as well.  My coworker, the one who transferred to a full-time position in another department, has decided to transfer back to her old job in our office.  That means I can actually take days off, go on vacation, and maybe accept morning teaching assignments from the university.  My life will be drastically improved.  My coworker discovered that working full-time sort of interferes a great deal with raising small children.  Plus, she's pregnant, due in September.  Frankly, I think that's the detail that tipped the scales.

So perhaps 2012 is going to be Saint Marty's year.  And George Clooney's.  And maybe Meryl Streep's.

December 5: Quality of Mercy, Daughter's Birthday, Christmas Potluck

Today is my daughter's eleventh birthday.  At exactly 7:29 this morning, she will have been a part of my life for one decade plus one year.  That's really difficult for me to believe.  The best thing I can say about my little girl is that she really is a good person.  There is not a mean bone in her body.  When she is confronted by meanness, she really has a difficult time.  She just wants to be friends with everyone, and, for the most part, she succeeds.

Happy birthday, baby

I don't know if I had anything to do with creating this wonderful, beautiful, funny, goofy, caring creature.  She humbles me.  When I'm in a terrible mood, she'll go into the kitchen and bring me a cup of water, a banana, or an oatmeal cream pie.  Last night, I was watching her dance to her new Wii game, Just Dance 3.  She was amazing, graceful, gorgeous.  Forgive a daddy for gushing, but my kid is truly a blessing in my life.

This morning, I received an e-mail from a person who has gotten herself into a very difficult circumstance.  She was asking me for a letter of reference.  By saying "difficult circumstance," I am not even approaching the level of shit this person has gotten herself into.  I thought long and hard about whether I should write the letter.  I believe "Marcy" deserves to be punished pretty severely for what she has done.  However, I also believe in the quality of mercy.  I wrote the letter and sent it to her.

The letter I wrote did not excuse Marcy's actions.  In fact, I said she needs to be held accountable for what she has done.  (I'm sorry for being so evasive, but I really can't discuss details.)  However, I asked for some kind of compassion.  I wrote a letter I would want somebody to write for my daughter.  If my daughter got into this kind of difficulty, I would want somebody to acknowledge her goodness.  That's what I tried to do for Marcy.

My coworker and I are having a little Christmas potluck this morning.  My coworker is leaving for her new job at the end of the week.  My life is going to become much more complicated come next Monday.  Anyway, she and I always exchange Christmas and birthday presents.  So this will be our annual Christmas party.  I made and chicken, cheese, and broccoli quiche for the occasion.  I also have her Christmas present.

I'm really going to miss my coworker.  She's a good person and caring friend.  While I like to say we'll stay in touch, I know it won't happen.  We'll exchange cards at Christmas.  Maybe we'll run into each other at Wal-Mart every once in a while.  For the most part, however, this will be the end of our close friendship.  That makes me quite sad.  As most of my disciples know, I don't do well with change.  This one really cuts close to the bone.

So, as you can tell, it's a morning of very mixed emotions.  Joy and compassion and sadness.

Saint Marty's just a mess.

June 28: Spiritual Journey, Spiritual Auobiography Workshop, Indifference

I just spent a little bit of time doing a writing exercise for the Spiritual Autobiography Workshop I'm leading tonight.  The assignment was to divide your life into the major periods of your spiritual journey.  I did this same exercise when I taught Spiritual Journaling last fall.  The previous time I did it, I wasn't really sold on the divisions I came up with.  This time, I think I was more honest with myself, and the result is truer and a little scarier.

I came up with nine divisions for my spiritual journey:

1. Childhood:  Dad's struggle with church
2. Adolescence:  Indifference toward God
3. Undergraduate Years:  Religion as a way to make money
4. Graduate School:  Reconciling academics and faith and sex
5. Marriage:  Childless years
6. Celeste and Bipolar:  Some time in the desert
7. Sexual Addiction and Separation:  Being a single parent, more time in the desert
8. Gideon:  Being blessed
9. Sexual Addiction Again and Healing

A lot of those time periods have some pretty difficult struggles associated with them.  I've turned my back on God more than once in my life, mostly because I thought God had turned Her back on me.  At this moment in my life, I don't feel like I'm on completely sure spiritual footing.  I think I'm on better footing than I have been in a long while, but the horizon isn't clear of all storm clouds.

Wandering in the desert

The reason I'm writing about this subject is that I was pretty astounded over how much mental illness and addiction has touched so many areas of my life.  I've wondered for a very long time about God's plan for my life and how my wife's bipolar and other problems fit into this plan.  I've been trying to figure out how to take the dross of my life and turn it into gold for a long time.  I'm hoping this spiritual autobiography is going to be the first step toward figuring out the shape and direction of my journey.

All this may sound pretty deep and heavy.  It is.  I've never been much for authors who spend a majority of their time analyzing the lint from their bellybuttons.  Such seriousness tends to turn me off.  However, I've been preoccupied all day with this line of thinking, and I can't shake it off.

It doesn't help that I'm currently working in an office with a person who seems to have some kind of grudge against me.  This person has been pretty much ignoring me all day long, or interacting with me as little as possible.  It's put me in a very bad mood.  I like this person, have always gotten along with this person.  Now, it seems as if all that good will is gone.  I tried this morning to be friendly, joke around the way we normally do.  The response was colder than an iceberg.

One of my best friends just made me read an article about detachment.  Basically, the philosophy of the author can be summed up with one statement:  "I love you, and I don't care what happens to you."  That seems fairly cold-hearted to me, but it may be the tact I have to take with my coworker who's giving me the cold shoulder at the moment.  (My initial reaction this morning was a big, fat "fuck you," but I've had a few hours of reflection.  I have settled into a state of indifference now.)

I don't have anything funny to lighten up today's post.  As I complete writing the sections of my spiritual autobiography, I will share them with you.  Stay tuned for the installments, mixed with poetry and cartoons.

Saint Marty's going to try to lighten up now.

Letting go and not caring