Pouring Music From a Cup

Note: This essay originally appeared under my previous blog's banner, "Pouring Music From a Cup" 2015. The sentiments remain the same, though, no matter where we are, as long as we are father and son.      My man child turned 18 in November and spent his first birthday away from home. He got a visit from the parental units that weekend because there happened to be a home football game and his mama wasn’t about to let the day of her first-born’s birth go unacknowledged, if only on a minor scale. But the man child wasn’t able to come home to be properly recognized, which is where birthdays should be celebrated, until Thanksgiving. Even then he only had a couple of days of down time at home . . . just enough to kick off his boots, raid the refrigerator a few times, and monopolize the couch and TV remote before gathering his things and heading back to the Land of Higher Education. Wanting to maximize our time together, he and I spent an evening at Cavender’s western outfitter

“I believe that there is a hidden hero in every man and a hidden angel in every woman.”   She calls herself Lili, though that’s not her real name.  I do not know Lili. We haven’t met— not yet. To tell you the truth, I’m not even sure what she looks like. Yes, I’ve seen photographs of her, but they were rather dark and pixilated, and that, I think, was intentional. She says she doesn't feel comfortable presenting pictures of herself in public, but I guess in this circumstance she felt she had to. What’s speaking to me about this odd beginning to what, perhaps, may eventually evolve into a genuine friendship, or even relationship, is that it speaks of a certain humility on her part not often found in others. This may well be a time when I will be forced to accept the person based upon who she is on the inside before I find myself drawn to what I see on the outside. You know that old war horse: accept me for who I am . That’s tough to do when you’re immediately distracted by the costu

          I mentioned in my last post that I've been away from social media-- my blog and Facebook in particular --for the last eight months. I said I had my reasons. I said I wasn't sure I wanted to be back. I'm not very comfortable around people, even less so in forum where I can't see their faces or hear their voices. I need to look into a person's eyes to know whether they care, whether they're telling the truth. But my instincts (my spirit guide?) suggested it was time to give it a try, so I'm giving it a try. For a while.           I am not the kind of person who makes friends easily. I am not one who turns heads when I enter a room. I am the kind of person, it seems, who has a quiet impact on the people I meet. They don't notice me until I'm gone. And that's okay. My ex-wife always used to say that I am the kind of person who craves attention and "attaboys," but that when they come I don't want them. I run from the spotlight

        Marcher seul sur la route.         It means “walking the road alone.”         Starting back in 2011 or 2012, somewhere in there, I created my first blog site. It was called Pouring Music From a Cup and its banner photograph was the view from the top of Guadalupe Peak, the highest point in Texas. You may remember it.        A few years later I put a collection of my blog posts together, 42 of them, and self-published the collection in a book also called Pouring Music From a Cup . The cover of the book was c reated by a young artist named Summer Westover, and it looked like this:        However, like the blog, I chose to put the book to sleep last autumn. The reasons don’t matter. The point is, the book is resting comfortably on Amazon, along with my other books, and won’t awaken again until it is kissed by a beautiful wandering princess. You can’t see or buy any of my books with the lone exception of a little horror novella I wrote called Jellybeans, Curse of

The following text thread speaks for itself. My youngest, now 20, is staying with his grandparents for a couple of weeks before he flies to Maryland to help me move back to Texas. It began with me asking how things were going. Son - Things are fine, time is moving pretty fast but it’s amazing how slow this year has felt. I feel like I can remember something about every week since early February. I’m not the only one who thinks this year resembles 1968 fairly closely. Me -   I heard a historian on NPR today say that the recent events reminded him of 1968 also. The major difference, he said, is that   this time people have time to get involved because they’re unemployed or on lockdown, out of school, etc. Son -    I wouldn’t want to erase this period away, it’s been incredible to see. You no longer can claim “blah, blah we all got involved   back in the day, none of you youngsters protest.” I’d be out there if I wan’t living out of my suitcases pinned between family   memb

I’m calling for a boycott of this year’s presidential election. Who’s with me?  I wasn’t old enough to vote in 1972 (I was 17), and of the elections I’ve participated in since I became a legally eligible voter, things have not gone well, whether my candidate won or not. So this go-round, I’m staying home. I will not be a party to validating any of the fools on either roster. Here’s a snapshot of why: When I was a teenager in the very late 60s and early 70s, I knew it was a dirty, corrupt world we were living in. I’d witnessed the Kennedy and King assassinations, watched Detroit, L.A., Newark, Chicago, and a whole host of other stellar U.S. cities go up in flames in protest and race riots, learned of the murders at the Rolling Stones’ free concert at Altamont only a few months after the success of Woodstock (thank you, Hell’s Angels!), and sighed in disgust as I watched the evening news reports of how our very own Ohio National Guard used live rounds to quell an anti-wa