Inspiration

No, this is not where I say, “look within”, or “trust yourself”, not that that isn’t the

way you should go, but this ain’t there. This is here, my own inspiration, and I

won’t be waxing too metaphysical hopefully. But wax off, wax on:

All throughout my existence Spirit, disguised as ordinary human beans, has been

there setting a pick on the free throw line of life.

That is what I mean by inspiration,  actions always speak louder. Words can be

very inspiring too, actions trump em every time tho.

Flowery language with the best of intentions is paled by real action every single

time, hands down, going away, not even close really. Saying is not doing. That being

said, and away we go…

 

 

 Daily Bread

 

Way back when (early sixties), my father was an over-the-road truck driver, and he

called home one year right before Christmas to tell us he was snowed in

around Seattle and wouldn’t be home for awhile. Back then, people still used

pay phones, even put coin in em (five cents for an extra fifteen minutes).

My mother did her best to hide this from us kids, but we were definitely penniless

in N.J.. He had a very good pay-check and no way to get it to us.

I still remember taking the last piece of bread for the last bit of peanut butter and

eating it. Still can’t even stand the smell of peanut butter any more after that, used

to love it. We didn’t eat any thing for two days after that, but I guess word got out,

and one night there was a knock at the door, and in came a couple dozen people,

each with a paper bag full of food, Christmas presents, even a tree. The local church

we attended had heard and was there.

 

Preach by example

 

Some time in the eighties, some where in N.J., a church was re-roofing their place

of worship, and some carpenters had built an A frame over the existing flat roof.

Me and a helper shingled half, and because of the winter weather, couldn’t get back

to it for a month. Then my boss called me on a Saturday night to tell me

the weather forecast for Sunday was nice and warm, I told him I wouldn’t even

consider it, we had a good laugh and hung up. Five minutes later the church

minister called, would I please work the next day. I told him of course I would, and

the next morning we were up on the roof during church services, banging away.

Suddenly on the other end of the building, two guys set up a small ladder on the

existing concrete landing, and the minister walked across the un-roofed half

toward us. More than a little unusual, this was a 4 or 5 inch pitched roof,

flake-board covered by black standard roofing felt paper, with at least a quarter

inch of black ice coating on top of it. I had covered a couple hundred square feet

twice, anticipating some bad weather, took the one layer off to start, but we

weren’t too thrilled even being up there.  Plus it was always melting, and no one

dared step where it was wet.  He was dressed in a suit, Sunday-go-to-meeting

loafers for footwear.  My helper and I both stared, mouths wide open,

could not believe what was happening. He could not have looked less concerned,

and said to me, would we take five so his congregation could have a moment

of silence?

I agreed, literally begged the man not to walk back, to use the ladder I had right

there, he wouldn’t. I wasn’t so afraid for his safety, I just didn’t want to watch

him again. I inspected the bottom of his shoes, totally smooth. We both watched

him walk back across the ice, he didn’t slip once, coming or going. If I hadn’t

seen him do this, I would have sworn it was physically impossible, no sane person

would have done it, he should have slipped at least once. There was absolutely

nothing between him and a two story drop, he should have slipped and fell. He

didn’t even look down to see where he was going, seemed totally lost in thought,

but still the most sure footed walk I have ever seen, and the most inspiring.

I don’t expect anyone to believe this, definitely do not want someone to tell me

there must be a logical explanation, tell me I’m full of it, or otherwise think they

know who how what or why, or even prove they were still at the Holiday Inn.

 

 

Good friend

 

On the morning of January 31, 1996 my phone rang, my good friend aka the G-man

wanted to know if I would play golf. It was supposed to be above 40 degrees,

and although there were still little piles of snow on the course it was the first

golf-able day of the year. I had a grand total of three dollars in my wallet, but he

agreed to loan me the green fees, which turned out to be seventeen dollars. So on

the third hole, at one thirty in the afternoon, I had a hole-in-one. We both saw it

go in, and he remarked that it must be my lucky day, we should go to a casino. He

agreed to loan me another seventeen dollars, he drove the 50+ miles to Atlantic

City, and we both won over $200.00 apiece on my roll at a craps table. I had no

problem giving him $34.00 on the way home.

The best things in life really are free, and I’m not talking about a hole-in-one, or a

lucky win at A.C., but a good friend is what I mean.

 

 

Spirit is everywhere and it finds you

 

On my forty first birthday, which just happens to be halloween, at ten o’clock I

decided to take a walk along the Delaware river. I walked the three blocks to

Delaware Ave, and started the stroll. I was immediately interrupted by a hoot,

which came from the gnarly old tree directly in front of me, and about fifteen feet

up was a very large great horn rimmed owl, roughly three feet tall. I had never seen

one before, we stared at each other for a few seconds before he flew out over the

river, which was glassy calm, black water, and of course was framed with a full

moon. I mentally thanked the Spirit for the experience, that was about all the

thought I gave it, continued my walk, about one mile up, then a mile back.

One year to the day, I was doing the same walk, same time, and about a mile down

the road, stepped onto the nearby riverbank to have a smoke and gaze out over the

flat glassy water. After a moment I heard a snort, I knew what it was before I

looked, but here I was about fifteen feet from the biggest buck I had ever seen,

with a very large set of antlers. Again, we stared at each other a few seconds, until

he leaped and bounded away, across the road and thru some yards. I had lived in

this town all my life, taken the same walk more times than I could count, had never

seen either species before or since.

Again, I mentally thanked the Spirit for the experience, this time praying that next

year I could see an eagle, because I had never seen a wild one before. Then I

continued my walk, about one mile along the road along the river, then three

blocks home.

Forgot about the whole thing, and the next year my good friend the G-man and I

went to Ocean city, MD for a day of golf. We drove down the night before, stayed

at a motel there, got up, had breakfast, and had a very enjoyable morning round at

the municipal course there, called Eagles’ Landing. After a great lunch, I

called just about every course in town for prices, but they all seemed way too much.

It wasn’t that I didn’t have the money, but $80-$150.00 for a round of golf just

seemed crazy, so we headed on home. But on the way out of town, on a seemingly

back road, there was a brand new golf course. We pulled into the freshly paved

parking lot, and my friend wouldn’t even get out of his car, the course was

obviously new and not even open yet. But since we were there, I would try. As I

walked into the clubhouse, there were two carpenters putting up cabinets, and I

enquired about playing. The carpenters turned out to be brothers, and owners of

the course, they offered to set us up with a cart and let us play for free, if we would

just give em a written opinion. I ran back to the car, my playing partner was more

than a little incredulous, but five minutes later we were in a cart at the first tee.

I was teeing up my ball on the tee when I first saw a dot in the sky, and it was as if

someone in the clubhouse had said, “Okay, cue the bird.” It soared from what

seemed miles away, right down the middle of the fairway, fifty feet directly

overhead, never even flapped once, and we locked eyes for a moment. It all seemed

very surreal and I was sure I was dreaming, but we both went on to play what I am

sure was the most difficult course I had ever seen. It had what we both

described as a par five that was a long, dark alley, straight and narrow. After the

round we chatted briefly with the two brothers, one of which confessed he

had not only designed the hole, he had already eagled it. Most people scoff at the

very idea of golf, most people who actually play never even get close to

that score on an easy par five, this hole was maybe  fifty yards wide and about

six hundred yards long, an eagle would be quite a feat even for a pro player.

To me it seemed impossible, but what did I really know about impossible, I just

thought I did. We gave the two our written opinion of the golf course, (our opinion

certainly wasn’t worth much to us) and drove on home to Jersey. It was on the way

home that I remembered the previous two years, and marveled that I had

completely forgotten about everything, yet this had happened.

Oh yeah, before I forget, the name of the golf course was Ocean Resorts, and I

would highly recomend it to everyone!