Life's A Beach

Gazing out over the ocean
The wrath of the stormy seas
Pondering how thin
The guise of paradise can be

It takes but a rainy day at the beach
That sends you scurrying for cover
All the truths and lies about utopia
No longer hard to unearth and discover

Some days the sun shines down
Enveloping me in its warm embrace
Others it is shrouded by clouds
And all but hides its face

But it is there either way
This I am certain of and know
Because if it was not
None of these flowers or palm leaves would grow

Presently the wind tousles my hair
Its breath warm on my neck
For whatever hardship today
It promises me a rain check

Things don't always happen
The way that I decide
Things don't always go my way
Not even at the seaside

Some of My Favorite Quotes

Just a few among many of the snippets of wisdom that say so much in so few words.

"...Some poems don't rhyme, and some stories don't have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what's going to happen next. Delicious Ambiguity.” ― Gilda Radner

“I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.” – Albert Einstein

“Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.” – Henry Ford

''Love is what I do for you. Respect is what I don't do because of you. Love is going out of my way for you. Respect is getting out of the way for you. " ―Unknown

"To the world you may be one person, but to one person you may be the world." ―Bill Wilson

“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” – Maya Angelou

“Life is more manageable when thought of as a scavenger hunt as opposed to a surprise party.” ― Jimmy Buffett

"When you learn to accept instead of expect, You'll surely avoid getting hurt and you'll have fewer disappointments." ―Unknown

"We accept the love we think we deserve." ―Stephen Chbosky

"Say something silly. Laugh 'til it hurts.Take a risk. Tell a secret. Sing out loud. Rock the boat. Shake things up. Flirt with disaster." ―Unknown

“Patience is also a form of action.” ―Auguste Rodin

"It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all-in which case, you fail by default." ―J. K. Rowling

"Life is like a camera, just focus on what’s important and capture the good times, develop from the negatives and if things don’t work out, just take another shot." ―Unknown

"Slumps are like a soft bed. They're easy to get into, but really hard to get out of." ―Johnny Bench

"Your future depends on many things, but mostly on you." ―Frank Tyger

"A brook would lose its song if G-d removed the rocks." ―Unknown

"Everyone is a genius, but if you judge a fish on its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing it's stupid." ―Albert Einstein

"A preoccupation with the future not only prevents us from seeing the present as it is but often prompts us to rearrange the past." ―Eric Hoffer

"To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting." ― e.e. cummings

"Anger is our natural defense against pain. So when I say I hate you, it really means 'You hurt me.'" ―Unknown

“The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.” ―Lao Tzu

"Whenever you fall, pick something up." ―Oswald Avery

"Be who you are and say what you feel because those who matter don't mind, and those who mind don't matter." ―Dr. Suess

"Mistakes are what you did, not who you are. However, how you handle your mistakes is who you are." ―Unknown

"Today is the first day of the rest of your life." ―Charles Dederich

"Begin challenging your own assumptions. Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in awhile, or the light won't come in." ―Allen Alda

"As you grow up, you learn that even the one person that wasn't supposed to ever let you down, probably will. You'll have your heart broken and you'll break others' hearts. You'll fight with your best friend, or maybe even fall in love with them...and you'll cry because time is flying by. So take too many pictures, laugh too much, forgive freely, and love like you've never been hurt. Life comes with no guarantees, no time-outs, and no second chances. You just have to live life to the fullest. Tell someone what they mean to you, and maybe tell someone off, speak out, dance in the pouring rain, hold someone's hand, comfort a friend, fall asleep watching the sun come up, stay up late, and smile until your face hurts. Don't be afraid to take chances or fall in love, but most of all live in the moment because every second you spend angry or upset is a second of happiness you can never get back." ―Unknown

"Learn your theories well as you can, but put them aside when you touch the miracle of the living soul. Not theories but your own creative individuality alone must decide" ―Carl Jung

"The best angle from which to approach any problem is the try-angle." ―Unknown

"Life is full of obstacle illusions." ―Grant Frazier

"The trouble with most people is that they think with their hopes or fears or wishes rather than with their minds." ―Nancy Witcher Astor Viscountess

"Frustration is the gap between expectation and reality." ―Unknown

“There is often less danger in the things we fear than in the things we desire.” ―John C. Collins

“When all's said and done, all roads lead to the same end. So it's not so much which road you take, as how you take it.” ―Charles de Lint

"Giving up doesn't always mean you are weak; sometimes it means that you are strong enough to let go." ―Taylor Swift

Musings of a Sunny Day at the Lake

The sun is bright, illuminating my world. Its warm rays kiss my cheek as I gaze out over the calm cyan lake focusing on everything and nothing. The warm wind playfully whips my hair around my face. In response to the breeze, the dry wheat-colored reeds ripple and whisper.

Although it's close to ninety degrees and feels like summer, many of the trees are still bare, consequence of a late spring. Yet, the bald trees stand tall and proud, not allowing anything to mock them. They may not have their leaves or colorful blossoms yet, as the world expects them to, but they will, at their own pace. There isn't much the tree can do to hurry its bloom along; they are at the mercy of G-d.

Dogs yip at each other; their owners exchange friendly greetings. Runners sprint by, already on their third or fourth lap around the lake. They are people busy with a mission, while I just sit here and wonder what is mine. The ducks honk noisily as if to say, "Yes, go and accomplish something!"

But what? I'm not stuck here on my own accord.

Birds chirp and tweedle, a car alarm wails off in the distance. Water laps quietly against the shore. Cars drive by, their engines thrumming. Bugs click and hum. A woodpecker knocks rhythmically against a tree. A bee buzzes by. Fluffy white clouds of cotton float listlessly through the brilliant azure sky. Flags merrily wave from their posts. An ant scurries across this page in my notebook.

A cacophony of nature that somehow blends together, each thing playing its part in the big picture. And then there's little me sitting on a bench, reflecting on it all, wondering what my piece is in this big puzzle.

Fighting Reality With Fiction

There's an interesting story about a tenured college professor who was fired from her position when her students brought a picture found on her Facebook wall to the college administration's attention. Apparently, this up-until-now respected professor had gotten drunk at a party one night and subsequently posted a picture of that night's festivities -- herself in a skimpy sailor's outfit guzzling a bottle of whiskey. The administrators argued that in no certain terms did they want such a person molding the minds of their impressionable young charges. Of course the professor sued for her job, and for damages, with the argument that her Facebook was personal and had nothing to do with her professional life. The case made its way all the way to the Supreme Court of her state. Their final ruling, based on a study by some important researchers, was that Facebook is the reality that which its users create for themselves. It is the world that they wish they could live in. Thus, whatever was on this woman's Facebook page reflects who she wants to be, and the college had every right to let her go.

This story, or rather the outcome of the case, brings up many important points of how many people hide behind fake or virtual reality, mostly when their true reality gets too painful to face, or maybe they just need a warranted break. It doesn't have to be through the medium of falsifying one's image via social media. There are many ways that this is done: watching a movie or TV show, reading an absorbing novel, getting really involved in a video game, daydreaming, or some other form of entertainment that one is able to lose himself in. Of course, some of these things are healthier than others. They can be great coping mechanisms, as long as the activity does not become one's new reality.

Personally, the harder things are in my life, the more time I spend with friends, or if they're really hard, engaged in stronger modes of distraction. I can confidently say that the first choice is most likely the healthier one, and talking things out, self expression, is probably the best way to cope with challenges, but friends aren't always available or simply cannot always understand. There's also a limit to how much they want to hear you complain. But not only that, sometimes distractions work better. I guess it's really a difference between chilling with friends as a distraction versus spending time with them as a means to vent. I find that self expression is cathartic, whether it's talking things out, writing, or some other form of creative expression. Yet, some things go beyond that. They require heavy-duty distraction.

There is something to be said for being able to completely leave your reality for a limited period of time. I totally get what drugs and alcohol hold for a user (an occasional user, as an addict is another story). So in the way of looking for a less dangerous and/or addictive option, fiction fights reality pretty darn well.

Someone once told me that his drug of choice was sleep. When one is sleeping, he explained, he's in cool oblivion, unable to feel any of the pain in his life. The guy is now on prescribed antidepressants, but he did have a point, even though professionally that comment did seem a bit unstable. How healthy is looking for ways to distract oneself from reality? Certainly when "things" become the way we assuage pain it can't be good. That usually ends up in you relying on that fix to get to zero; just ask an addict, whether his addiction is drugs, alcohol, gambling, food, shopping, gaming, porn, or internet, I'm pretty sure he'd agree.

I see distraction as a coping mechanism. There's a limited amount of times that you can talk yourself in circles about something without being able to fix it. Although running away from it doesn't make the situation any better either, sometimes you just need to tune out and turn off for a bit. What it boils down to, at least for me, is that distraction takes one's attention, and the edge, off of the painful/challenging/harsh reality of real life.

To Each His Own

So, another run-in with the sefer-hugging, beis medrash-dwelling male relative. The discussion, distractions and s'vivah. The argument, well, said kinsperson claimed that everyone makes their own choices and can land wherever they want to place themselves in life. I said that not everyone can (or is meant to) sit in yeshiva all day cocooned from worldly distractions, especially not those of the female variety within the realm of Orthodox Judaism.

I've made the mistake in the past calling the B"M a "bubble" to the face of a date, as well as arguing that "in the 'real world'..." Yeshiva guys don't like that very much.

Really, what am I supposed to think/say? Those around me like to blame it on college educated liberalism. Others might argue that college education and exposure to the "real world" helps one to become his true self and break out of the indoctrination of the "yeshivish" education system.

I don't think that there's one golden middle path. To each his own, I say. Yes, the purpose of this world is as a corridor to the next, and we're supposed to find ways to become closer to our Creator, but how we should accomplish this is individual to each person.

I'm not you, and you're not me. My potential and my tafkid is different from yours. You're not Joe and Joe isn't you. If you did what Joe did, maybe that would be wrong, but let Joe do what Joe does, and it may be right for him, even if it's wrong for you. I disagree with the pretense that you must decide he's wrong and you're right, so that you don't get influenced by him. I respect your decision to sit and learn all day (ok, maybe not so much the part where someone else pays all your bills), so please respect my decision and my best attempt to do what I hope will work for me with the tools that I was given.

My challenges are different than yours, and quite frankly, I don't know what yours look like. I mean, to me it seems that you're almost on paid vacation. You get to be involved in intellectual stimulation all day every day, living with your wife who cooks all your meals and does all your errands and laundry, and someone is paying all your expenses.

You want to argue that I'm too open-minded and I let too many distractions into my life? Well, I have yet to be presented with the choice to learn all day, live in a place I love with the person of my dreams, and not have a care in the world.

I pursued a career to take responsibility, to help support a family one day. None of that is even in my control. I wouldn't need things to fill the empty ache in my life if I could've, like you, come home from Israel and gotten married within the year.

It's great that you know what G-d wants from you, because I sure don't know what He wants from me, and neither do you. Had He wanted me not to go to grad school, things wouldn't have worked out the way they did. I mean really, what do you expect me to do? Sit around and be a playgroup morah until a knight in a white station wagon sweeps me away to live a life of learning and taking others' money?

And it's a Wrap!

Not to sound sacrilegious or anything, but I'm kind of glad Pesach is over. Done, finito, nigmar. Eight days of family-time is a little bit too much. It's too long to wear that faux smile and be gracious to too many siblings, their spouses, their kids...too many relatives asking what's new and meaning, "So are you seriously dating someone?" Combine that with no carbs (aside from scrumptious matzah and some potato inventions) for a week, and I'm just about ready to call it a wrap, or a pizza, or some other food that contains real flour not eaten at a meal hosting the whole fam. Now everyone can just go back to their happy little lives and leave me to figure out mine.