Ponderings and Musings

On October 13, 1996 Earl and I climbed to the top of Rocky Mountain Point in the beautiful Adirondacks. It was a cool, crisp, yet gorgeous day and though the climb was slow, the view at the top was stunning. It was that day, on that mountain, that I got down on my knee and proposed to my then boyfriend.

“Don’t ask it unless you mean it”, was his first response. The second part is history.

On December 26, 1996, overlooking the Delaware River at Penn’s Landing in Philadelphia, I placed a gold wedding band on Earl’s finger and he reciprocated by doing the same for me. The ceremony was of our own design and with little fanfare. We said the things we wanted to say to symbolize the permanent union that began with that moment.

Since 1996, our relationship has grown exponentially and in ways I never thought possible. We survived owning a business together, purchasing two houses, six cars, countless electronics and doodads and like most couples we have had many, many “ups”. We have laughed, we’ve celebrated, we’ve rejoiced and yes, we’ve had our squabbles and our tears. I can be an ass, he can be a jerk, but more importantly we are each other’s counterpart in our relationship. The one percent of “bad” (for lack of a better word) is nothing compared to the 99 percent of good.

There is one thing that remains constant in our ever-changing life, and that is love. I have gotten in the habit of saying to him in the morning, “it happened again.” He says, “What?” and then I say, “I fell in love with you again this morning.” And then we smile and embrace.

Our love for one another is fueled by never-ending trust. I trust Earl more than any other human being on the planet and this will never change. I am always honest with him and he is always honest with me. There’s no compromise in the wording of that preceding statement; it’s just a fact. Without trust in the foundation of a relationship, the rest of it is going to wobble. No trust, no dice.

It occasionally gives people pause when I mention that I am going away for a weekend without Earl or vice-versa. I might go off for a multi-day road trip where quite frankly, he would be bored to tears as I drove mile after mile of interstate and rural highway exploring towns that are really no different than any other town or looking at construction projects or even hanging out with friends by swinging from the chandeliers in another state. On the other hand, he might go to a bear run or to Vegas or to any other place with my consent where I have little interest in going. Some think this may be a sign of a change in our relationship. It’s not. It’s a symbol. It’s a symbol of the trust we have in one another.

No two relationships are alike. My city grandparents certainly had a different marriage than my country grandparents and my parents certainly didn’t emulate either of those relationships. Earl and I have our relationship. And it is glorious and magnificent and more importantly, unique to us. What we have is what we want, with no secrets or deception but with lots of trust and undying love.

And I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

I’m sitting in the car during my lunch hour. Usually I’d have the windows down but right now we have a torrential rainstorm in progress, so instead I listen to the pitter pat of the drops hitting the car.

I find the sound to be quite relaxing. I’m looking forward to a low-key, relaxing weekend. This is a good way to start.

I have a lot of questions floating around in my head lately. I think I’m going to share some of them here on this blog and see if anyone has any explanation or answers to these questions.

In the early 1960s, President John F. Kennedy declared that we would have a man on the moon by the end of the decade. We did, and around this time in 1969 man was setting foot on the moon and putting up an American flag. Everyone was glued to their television. My father has saved the Syracuse Herald-Journal from that monumental night. I would look at that paper as a kid and marvel that I was born before there was a man on the moon.

Fast forward to the 21st century. As Americans we can’t function without technology. Our toasters are electronic, our refrigerators can tie into e-mail, we have hundreds of useless television channels available to us via several different methods of getting this signal to us, our washer and dryer can synchronise their finishing time for our convenience and our car can tell us where to go. Why is it then that our current administration (and the one previous to it) has told us that it will take **twenty** years to put a man on the moon again. We have more technology in our telephone than we did in whole rooms back when we did this the first time around and we have shot people into orbit on a fairly regular basis since our first adventures into space so many years ago. Engineers used logarithms for their complex formulas back then, our home computers can now do all the computations for us.

Have we lost our pioneer spirit? Have we become so embroiled in political correctness and absolute safety that we can’t fathom the risks associated with space exploration anymore? Astronauts know that a ride on a rocket is not like taking a spin in an Oldsmobile; I’m certain that they know the danger associated with going to the moon and yet they sign up for their chance to reach the stars. Why do we hold them back? Have contractors and politicians and governmental organisations become so embroiled in red tape and corruption that it’s impossible to achieve anything outside of corporate greed these days?

I’ll say it again: we have become a nation built upon fear. We no longer have an adventurous or pioneer spirit. We are lazy, we are complacent and we are greedy.

I miss the days when we reached for the stars.

Earl and I are just back from a nice dinner out and a stop at Staples. My work schedule just kicked into overdrive with the onset of tonight; as the big project I was mentioning before has relegated me to the midnight shift for the rest of the week. To get my head into the right place, I have tomorrow during the day off from work, aside from a mandatory conference call.

I have mentioned before that I have a recording/creative studio in my office here at the house. This is where I make my DJ SuperCub mixes, record a commercial or two here and there and work on various other projects. One of the issues that I have had with the studio over the years is the fact that I have a stool that is too tall for the counter instead of an adjustable chair designed for the type of setup I actually have.

Tonight we bought the chair I need to bring all of it together.

I have already made a video using the studio computer whilst sitting in the chair and I can already tell you that this has opened up a world of possibilities in my creativity. Sitting in a chair that is the proper height without the fear of spinning off the thing and spilling over onto the counter has helped me find my creative mojo again. The iMac is a dream to use when you’re not hunched over like you’re just back from Notre Dame. People, I feel the ergonomics!

Now, let’s see what I do with my free time tomorrow!

I have mentioned before that one of my preferred ways home from work takes me through Amish country. The drive brings me through several Amish communities, each marked by their own little one room school house and cooperative work on a barn or something similar. One of these communities sells cedar chests, another sells quilts. Today I noticed that one of the houses had opened their normally vacant baked goods stand so I decided to stop.

I picked up a blueberry pie as a treat for tonight.

If memory serves correctly, Grandma Country baked pies on Friday back when I was a kid so for some reason I always think of Friday night as pie night. I have never had an Amish made pie before, but it was quite impressive looking and I imagined it would be just as delicious. The young girl working the stand wasn’t particularly chatty; she handed me my change in a shy way that seemed slightly peculiar as she tried to avoid touching me. She seemed startled when I wished her a good day but I smiled anyways. She didn’t smile back.

And I was right, the pie was delicious. I’m looking forward to another piece tomorrow night. I think I’ll stop by that stand again the next time it’s open as there was a considerable number of goodies to choose from.

Shortly after starting my new job here in the Jtown I brought a radio to work so I could softly listen to some tunes in my cubicle. Even though I have a prime location in the cube farm next to the windows, there isn’t much in the way of radio reception in my little world of technology. Aside from a smattering of religious-oriented stations that sounded like a lot of people yelling in a peculiar cadence, the only other scan stop on the dial was 94.1. On my first stop on the station they were playing “The Main Event” by Barbra Streisand. This was followed by the theme from “Hart to Hart” and then one of the Supremes’ early hits.

Groovy.

I had never listened to 94.1 in this area before and it turns out that the station is fairly new as it’s a simulcast of the much older 1440 AM. WFNY is a locally owned station and touts it’s “Variety Format”. It’s slogan is the Glove Cities Favorite.

I’m listening in the car as I type this entry. They are currently playing “Everything Is Beautiful”, which was preceded by Sheila E.’s “The Glamorous Life”. Now this is variety. I love it.

Since the specialty of my radio days was the imaging of the station (I picked the jingles and the “Mr. Voice” as well as a bunch of other things), I always pay very close attention to how a station sounds between the songs. It sounds like WFNY has chosen a local singer to sing their jingles, which are a cross between 40s jazz, a bit of a skee-bop thing and melodies that remind one of the introduction to “The Jetsons”. I. LOVE. IT.

In these bland, generic times where every Main Street is faltering, only to be replaced by a Wal*Mart, Lowe’s and nation wide Burger Bomb joint and augmented by corporate owned radio where the tracks are picked by a computer and the air “personality” is on five stations in five states simultaneously, it is a refreshing change of pace to listen to “the little guy” do the local radio thing and just play what the hell he wants. It’s a reminder of what once was.

And it makes me smile.

Here’s one of the jingles I just captured in the car. You can’t hear me say “That’s awesome”. Sorry the video is out of sync. I need to figure that out.

http://www.jpnearl.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/wfny.wmv

I have a hard time speaking in front of people. Even if it’s just one person. I guess it could be a sort of lack of confidence that causes this because I occasionally don’t trust what comes out of my mouth. You see, I stammer. I stutter. And occasionally I just freeze up and say nothing while the words churn in my head, blocked by some invisible barrier in my brain that prevents them from flowing from thought to mouth. Occasionally words jump into the thought stream and pretend that they’re what I wanted to say, when in reality they aren’t related at all. There is occasionally uncomfortable silence when the words are blocked; there is a slight awkwardness when the same word comes out repeatedly and honestly, there’s downright confusion when my forehead should have a big “?SYNTAX ERROR” sign plastered across it.

All of this surprises people when they find out that I used to be in radio. I had a hard time with it, except when I was completely alone in the studio and building. Then it was just me talking to a microphone, and as long as I used a hip Ted Baxter voice and concentrated really hard on mimicking what a radio DJ was suppose to sound like, I was okay. The confusing part of my speech was kept relatively at bay. Then I’d put on a long song and walk across the street to grab a pop or something and ask a co-worker in my ‘normal’ voice, “Want something to drunk from Thruways?” Translated, that meant “Want something to drink from Kinney’s?” (the store across the street).

A startled glance.

I listen back to some of my aircheck tapes and I wasn’t really fooling anyone, I mixed up my words more than most. I would stop midsentence. Growing up I remember my Mom having a hard time trying to get a word out here and there; perhaps it’s hereditary.

I rarely address people by their name, though I know their name, because I’m afraid the wrong name will come out when I’m fully aware of the correct name. This makes for a social gaff and some get offended. Especially when they are a vice president of the company or something. So I smile and make with the pleasantries anonymously.

Do I dislike this part of this whole experience of mine? Not really, though I do wish that I could speak like the best of them in front of an audience. I wish I sounded suave, articulate and eloquent like Alec Baldwin or President Obama.

But that’s not who I am. A friend reminded me that my friend Jeff and I have something in common (Jeff stutters and stammers from time to time like I do). I’m content to be me: the one in the corner silently smiling, remembering every word, every name, every detail and not saying a thing about it.

I guess I have my own brand of eloquence.

I have a fear. I fear that I am going to lose my gay card. That’s right ladies and gentleman, I walk that fine line of being a card carrying gay and just being a down low geek that likes guys. I have done two things this week that brings this fear to the surface, but I am going to be a big man and admit these two things in public right now.

1. I am no longer a Mac boy. I am a PC. I replaced my MacBook Pro with a brand new Lenovo Y560 running Windows 7. Using my Microsoft TechNet subscription, I was able to upgrade it to Windows 7 Ultimate. It’s pretty sweet and I have loved this computer right out of the box. The configuration of this computer in a Mac would have cost me $2650. I paid $1310 (including tax) for my Lenovo. I think the savings was worth it.

And! Not only am I no longer a Mac boy but this has been compounded by the fact that I jumped AT&T ship and am now thoroughly enjoying my Motorola Droid on the Verizon Wireless network.

And! I bought a Zune HD. The Zune HD does not get the credit it deserves. The device rocks and I totally recognize it for the good solid piece of equipment that it is.

2. I can’t get into “Glee”. I mentioned this last fall during the first half of the season and one would think that I should truly enjoy “Glee”, being an ex-band and chorus fag but I just can’t muster up any energy about the show. I’m sorry. I have tried. Last fall I talked about the Sue Sylvester character being excessively frightening. Either they have softened the character up or I have mellowed out because she’s pretty much the only thing I look forward to now. The auto-tuning of the musicians is making me insane and I have to admit that I enjoy the fact that the fake pregnancy story line has seemingly been dropped.

Earl, Jamie and I usually watch “Glee” courtesy of the DVR on Wednesday night. During the actual broadcast of the show, Twitter and Facebook are both breathless explosions of, well, glee, about how great the show is but I’m just not seeing it. I do find Puck mildly enjoyable on the eyes and as I said before I’m enjoying Sue Sylvester this time around but other than that I think the whole series completely jumped the shark with Joan Rivers Olivia Newton-John. And I know, I’m going to lose even more gay points with the Joan Rivers/Olivia Newton-John joke in that last sentence but I can’t help it, Ms. N-J looked shellacked.

In celebration of Mother’s Day, Mom joined Earl, Jamie and I for a nice dinner. Earl cooked up one of his usual feasts and we used the fancy plates, the dining room and everything. It was a very nice experience for everyone involved. I even kept my elbows off the table.

As Earl cleared the plates and gave Mom and I a chance to just chat a little bit, we caught up on family stuff and got into a little bit of a discussion about how time marches on and how things have changed. I casually uttered something during the conversation that I have said a few times over the years and it wasn’t for a few moments that I noticed that tears had welled up in my Mom’s eyes.

I had said, “I wouldn’t change a moment of my childhood. For better or for worse, the good or the bad, I wouldn’t change a single thing. It made me who I am today and I think that that’s a good thing.”

It’s the truth. I wouldn’t change a thing. I’m a lucky man to be able to say that and I recognize that. My mom thanked me for that wonderful Mother’s Day gift to her.

No Mom, thank you and Happy Mother’s Day.