I believe I have conceived of a good solution for men whose bodies, like mine, are not suitable for wearing jeans as they are now configured. In my case, because my gut STILL has greater circumference than my hips, a belt—even a relatively tightly-cinched belt—will not hold the pants up. Unless the hands are at the ready, the jeans can suddenly fall to the floor, causing considerable embarrassment. The tightness required to make a belt actually work is so great that the belt and its buckle dig into the flesh and painfully compress one’s internal organs. My solution seems simple: a onesies-inspired piece of clothing that marries jeans (or any pants, for that matter) to a shirt. The links between the two elements of clothing would be concealed through design, with one’s shoulders bearing the weight of the jeans by way of the connection between them. The specifics of the design will require someone with far more expertise than I, but I think I could work with a good clothing designer to come up with a prototype. An expert clothier/needleworker would be required to assemble the mock-up. Once viewed and experienced in the real world, I feel confident it would become the clothing of choice for men (and women) whose bodies do not comport with current fashion design.
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My almost-10-year-old car has only a touch more than 120,000 miles on it. Well-maintained and serviced (and it is), it should easily last another 120,000 miles. The second 120,000 miles probably would take more than 10 years; most likely a good bit longer than I will last, considering the condition of my health. Whenever I allow myself to entertain ideas about replacing it, I remind myself of these points. And I contemplate the costs of buying another car, versus keeping the one I have; buying would be FAR more expensive. The only potentially compelling argument in favor of replacement involves improvements in, or new, safety features. A not-so-compelling argument is my desire for the smoothest, quietest, most luxurious ride I can afford. That argument might hold more sway if I had reasonable expectations of taking my car on long road trips. But any such expectations are not particularly reasonable; more like fantasies. So, for now, I continue to be ready to fight sudden bouts of new-car-fever. Only time will tell whether I win the battle. I hope a long time passes before I have to say I lost. But I’m too wise to make promises; I know too much about my fickleness and hypocrisy.
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Morality is not always a simple matter. For those of us who believe an individual’s murder is an immoral act, for example, we tend to believe the murderer should be stopped and/or punished in some way. But what if we could save the life of one innocent person—and perhaps two or three more—by taking the lives of ten proven serial killers? Would saving the lives of the killers, and allowing the innocent to die, be a moral act? Or would we be more moral by saving the individual and allowing the ten killers to be executed? What if we did not just allow the executions, but performed them ourselves? Morality is an incredibly complex concept that is defined as much (or more) by elaborate sets of circumstances as by rigid, black and white rules. If one agrees with that, then, morality is situational. And if morality is situational, are ethics…based on morality…also situational? Such ruminations can challenge life-long assumptions and beliefs. At the very least, pondering the morality of unthinkable acts that, from a specific perspective, may be the only “right” things to do can cause one to doubt the certainty of morality and immorality. Doubting and questioning one’s own moral core can be among the most disturbing things to cross our minds. We want absolutes; absolutes are illusions in an environment in which reality is circumstantial.
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Gratitude and condemnation can live side-by-side in a world full of goodness and injustice. Too much of either one can knock a person off-balance, altering perspective so much that it is impossible to have a clear view of what is real and what is a self-fulfilling attitude of joy or sorrow. Though it might seem counter to common sense to hold on to enough condemnation to balance joy, that may be the only way to retain even a shred of sanity in the face of a flood of injustice.
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Early to bed, early to rise. Even though I was in bed for eight hours—and slept moderately well for five or six of them—I can feel my energy draining from my body this morning. The thick grey layer of fog outside my window is blocking the sun and keeping the the sky from any morning brightness. That’s an ideal visual environment for sleeping; a pleasant dimness that wraps around one like a protective blanket. Just enough light to prove, when opening the eyes, that one is awake and alive.
