Whirled Peas

I’m sure a lot of folks around my age remember the classic bumper sticker that asked its reader to Visualize Whirled Peas. When I read it the first time, I could clearly see a can of mushy peas in a blender being reduced to a smear the color of dry grass. Sometimes, when life gets complicated, I revert to that image. It’s not particularly consoling. It is mostly just a vivid reminder that at least I’m not currently a nasty green puree. Or a stain of red mush drifting in and out with the tide, or a smoking hole in the ground. I’ve been a fraction of second from a number of those undesirable conditions. Occasionally the result of my own hand, but I’d prefer to think usually not.

So why the pleasant thoughts today? It seems like the slot machine of life is taking way more nickels that it’s giving. I suspect that’s mostly because I haven’t been in full control for the last several weeks. The outcome of various maneuvers were and are clearly in doubt. The Christmas Holidays were a big contributor. Kinda dragging on the control cables when you’d like to know that you’re getting the crisp control deflection you’ve asked for. The frigging “panic disease” going around isn’t helping either. (I’m not referring to SARSCoV2 and its now very well documented characteristics, but rather the unpredictable reaction caused by fear of the ailment. A brilliant aviator once told me, “Feeling the need to ‘Do something!’ often results in the wrong thing.”) In this setting was The Big moment of the book launch. It got mixed in with the swirl of paper face masks, red and white candy canes, and gingerbread houses, and then came out the other end looking like a big pile of ginger brown poop flecked with paper shreds and peppermint chunks. Yep. Life is like that sometimes. But hey now, at least I’m not a smear, stain, or hole in the ground. So, we get to set this thing up again, and push forward. Maybe the next pull of the lever will get me straight bananas!

Happy 2022!