The Ballad of John and OH NO!

My much missed friends continue to drive the nails into the coffin of my self-image by posting photographs of our recent get together in the wilds of WI.

I don't begrudge them the photos, mind you; the rest of the photos (the ones minus me) are a welcome break from the realities of my current predicaments. It was a great weekend (read: DAY) and I have not laughed so hard or so long for a long hard while. It's nice that they captured all the singing, cake and sandwich eating, running through the forest in my four wheeler, "does that fire look on-purpose to you?" glory.

But it depressed me to see the chin. And the bald spot. And the other multitude of sins.

And yet, I ate a lot of cake.

So, lately I've been pretty miserable. I'm not sure as to the exact cause, but I will attribute it to a decided lack of interest in anything. I understand that they produce narcotics to mitigate this feeling, but you know me and drugs.....if you manufacture, I will imbibe. And then, proceed right to addiction, and I've been down that road and although the weather started lovely and the landscape was..well, pretty cool.....I did not, as they say, stick the dismount.

I would rather be miserable and in charge than happy and hooked.
I gotta be me.

My point is.
And I DO have one.

I was dragging my morbid and tired old body home this morning, at around the time you are were getting out of bed, and I was thinking that sleeping is the only real hobby I have anymore, and how that can't be good.....

And the radio begins to play Journey.
Don't. Stop. Believin'.

And all of a sudden, I'm in 116 Gries Hall in Marquette, Mi, it's 1981, and we're singin' at the top of our lungs, in proper harmony, and Steve Perry sings so high I think the top of my head is going to fly off of my body......

And emotional memory kicks in, and I'm smiling like an idiot, swaying to the music, got the sunroof open and the tune cranked up to eleven. And it's cold, and it's morning, and after this song is over, I'm going to smile until I forget, but for RIGHT NOW, RIGHT THIS FREAKIN' MINUTE, I've got a 34 inch waist, a full head of hair, theatre is more than a distant memory, and I'm living for this ONE moment.

And I begin to think about golf.
And how, in golf, you can suck out loud for seventeen holes; you can put the ball everywhere but in the cup, and the only thing you're thinking about is tying your clubs to the railroad tracks, and taking up knitting.
But on the eighteenth fairway, you take out a three iron, and you hit the ball so well it winds up nine inches from the cup. A perfect layup shot.
And you think, "if I could put three of those shots together, I could par a hole."
And then, "If I could put a couple of par holes together, I could, perhaps, go pro."

And it's going to be that one three iron shot that brings you back to the god forsaken game next week at the same time. Just for the hope of it.

So.
If I can have one minute of this week where I don't think about how the years are spilling out before me like some hopeless brick road.....

Sing on!