It has been a long time since I have made my blog monkey go to the well to draw water.  He is one lazy monkey!  So this week I promise to get his rabid behind to work.  I will force "Nippers" (that is what I call my blog monkey.  to which he usually answers with a shriek and an attempt on my life) to get enough bloggy material for a new entry for each day of the week,

Since I will forcing blog entries I can't promise that things won't get weird.  I guess I don't have to mention that you at this point since I have spent so much of my time talking about my metaphysical poop throwing blog monkey Nippers.  I have no agenda for what I am going to write about.  I could provide you will a moving piece of literature that will transcend time. (odds for that happening: 471,00,000,000,000 to 1) Or what I might write could be packed with so much stupidity that you are forced to pour Windex into your eyes.  (odds 1:1)

Let the week begin!


MONDAY


People hate Mondays.  They hate them like a Bangkok Rash hates penicillin.  Are you a Monday hater?  Why?  What did Monday ever do to you?  Expect for of course to remind you of the week day prison you live in.  Monday is the open handed non-sissy reality slap to our face.  Monday tells us that regardless of whatever joy we embraced over the weekend, the party is in fact over.  For many Monday plays the role of Jason from the Friday the 13th movie franchise.  It shows up to dismember us just when we are about to get our groove on fully.  Instead of being torn apart by a machete however, with Mondays we are ripped apart by thousands of tiny cuts.  Here are some examples of some of those cuts:

* 300 new emails waiting for us at work,  Each email might as well have the subject line of "Why you suck".

* Customers who can never find satisfaction no matter what you do for them.

*Office politics.

*The suicidal driving patterns of Monday drivers.

*Dealing with the story that is circulating around the office about how you had to much to drink last Friday night with co-workers.  That was the night that you did the not very flattering impersonation but very funny imitation of your boss.  Your boss has been informed that it's on You Tube and she would like to see you in her office....with all of your possessions.

Fine.  So maybe there is some valid reasons why Monday's aren't the best.   There may some good reasons why many of us subscribe to the "Kill Monday" movement that exists. 

Well, I don't hate Mondays.  I just don't.  Perhaps the reason for that is because I don't really have any vocational obligations on Monday morn.  I will contend however, that even when I did play grown up and had to work I never really had a problem with that day of the week,  Monday always seemed like a nice new beginning that would help be atone for the God-Awful problems that I caused at work the week before.  Most of my Monday's began with the mantra of "I can't screw things up as bad as last week".  Which was never true, but that little chant of mine kept me from swallowing the Listerine in the morning,

While I sit here writing this at a coffee shop I see a bunch of people with their Monday frowns planted on their cake eaters.  Yes, even on a holiday where a lot of people don't have to work I can still pick up on the negative energies floating around and it's bringing me down like a flock of geese.  From my chair (that was obviously designed for a man who is much taller than me...or at least a fourth grader) I can pick up on various conversations that are bouncing around the Hut O' Caffeine.  It seems as if everyone is so down and unhappy with stuff.  I can hear the typical convo about the person who hates their job.  (I swear that if topics of conversations were ranked that would be #1.)  Then there is the lady behind me who is really pissed that the church she attends served "inappropriate" kinds of baked good after service on Sunday.  (I want to ask her what is an inappropriate kind of baked item?????  Did the Smith's bring their famous Baby Seal Pie again?  Or was it Betsy and her Thong Muffins again?)  I am not kidding.  Everyone here is seemingly complaining about something.  I have not seen this level of group dissatisfaction since the last time I sang in public. 

Despite the high level of angst that are radiating from my fellow coffee addicts this morn, I find myself surprisingly happy.  Not that I am unfamiliar with happiness, it's just that I rarely notice it when it's present.  I often remember being happy rather then ever catch myself bathing in a moment of goodness.  Happiness is one of those things I don't recognize unless it is gone.  Like that kid in fourth grade I used to cheat off of during spelling tests....

It does not take much for me to be happy...I am a low maintenance kind of Hippie.  I can be made happy by things so simple as a well made Egg's Benedict, a new CD, or a watching someone try and fight of a mega-sneeze.  I am the city manager of Simpleville, and I am OK with that.  Just like many people I find myself seeing moments of happiness float by as quickly as it came in.  Days sometimes seem like a series of problems with a couple good moments seasoned into it.  That is not what today is like.  Today I am in a really happy place and it does not appear to be fading.  My happy meter is at a freaky all time high...and I have no clue as to why that is.

As I sit here in contrast to the collection of  America's Most Grouchy that I am surrounded by.  I am trying to trace back to where my bliss began.  It started while I was in line for my Vanilla Bean Latte'.  I was just standing there minding my own business when I noticed that I was standing in place with my hands in my pockets.

Standing still with my hands in my pockets caused this good mood!

Something so simple has served as a launching pad for my smiley soul.  Is it because I think my toe holders are so awesome that whenever I glance at them I get a warm spring in my heart?  Well, since my feet resemble those of a hobbit I am pretty certain that they specifically have anything to do with my mood.  I think my the root of my current state of non-prescribed induced happiness has to do with the fact that some of my best memories I have ever had involved me standing somewhere with my hands in my pocket and my feet firmly planted in the ground.

A little confusing I know.  Let me explain by describing some of these memories.  Each of these I can be just cut and pasted into the scene.  In each of them I am just standing in the same pose experiencing something life changing.

I can remember standing with my hands in my pockets the first time I saw the ocean.  I was ten and I was in Mexico with a friend and his family. We had just gotten out of the car and I went racing frown to the beach to get a glimpse of the water.  I remember standing with my toes dug into the sand and looking out into the blue.  I was overwhelmed.  I could hear the waves pushing closer and closer to the shore and I felt as if at any moment it could swallow me up like a little crumb.  I imagined the life that was exploding under the surface of the rolling water, and the countless of drops of water that made up this body.  My hands were in my bermuda shorts and I was frozen in place as the sea winds pushed through me. I felt small. This was my first spiritual experience that I can remember.  I knew then that the only way something so perfect could exist was by some sort of creator.  I felt in tune with life.

Then next time I remember striking that pose was years later in High School.  I was on a church retreat in the middle of the Mountains of Wyoming at a center that is long gone by now.  This place was very secluded and quiet.  I remember going walking one night with a couple of now life long friends.  I recall vividly as we walked acrossed a bridge over a river in the middle of a forest.  I stood there on the bridge and stared up into the sky above.  Hovering above me were thousands of little lights in the sky.  The sky was no longer the vast darkness that I remembered from when I looked up at it in my city.  We were miles away from any man-made lights and the sky was able to present itself in it's full glory.  I was overwhelmed.  The night sky was alive with shooting stars, constellations, galactic clouds, and never ending glowing orbs.  I felt small as I stood there with my hands in my pockets looking up into the infinity.  I was frozen in place with my friends as we became an audience for the celestial beauty that hovered. I felt in tune with life.

Years later I am in the position again. There is organ music, and the smell of flowers in the air.  My feet are uncomfortable, and my knees are shaking, but I am planted into the carpet of St. Mary's Cathedral.  I am about to be a married man.  At this point I have a thought a second lighting up my mental switchboard.  I am concerned about if my family is getting along with my future wife's.  I am worried about the reception.  I am nervous that maybe my fly is open.  Then terror showers over me from a self-made hurricane of stress....did I have the wedding rings???  I place my hands in my pockets to look for the little suckers.  There not there!!!  My brief moment of bladder loss ended when I then realized that it was not the Groom's responsibility to carry the rings.  It was my brother who was the best man.  Whew!!  I remember letting out the breath I had held while searching for the rings when the music changed.  Suddenly I saw Jennifer walking down the aisle.  I was overwhelmed by her radiance.  The energy of the moment vibrated into me like some invisible pulse that shot from the back of the church up to where I was standing.  As I stood there with my hands in my pockets my knees quit trembling and my stress melted away.  I was no connected to the life that was in front of me.  I was humbled by my wife's beauty...and I felt in tune with life.

I remember a cold winter morning standing in the cemetery in front of my fathers gravestone when I finally felt peace in his passing.  This was years after he died.  The wave of comfort that moved over me was instant and lifted me from a very dark place.  I was overwhelmed.  Standing there on the dead grass with my hands warming in my coat pockets I felt as if I was given permission to get over my sorrow.  The pity party ended right then and there.  

Just last summer in the Rocky Mountains as I watched my eight year old autistic son present the art he had worked on all week long during his time at camp.  He was connected and in the moment.  It was then I figured out that he was an artist and I was a witness to a soul doing exactly what they were created to do.  During thats moment I fast forwarded ahead in my life to the countless other moments of pride I am going to have for my children during the course of their life.  I recognized that no matter what limitations I have as a father my children will thrive despite having to deal with me.

Of course there have been other moments in my life that have formed me...but these are the ones that I remember standing in exactly the same way I was this morn here at S'Bucks.  I can assure you that the birth of my kids were profound moments for my life, but I was not standing there with my hands in my pockets during that moment.  I can also assure that if I had been just standing there in that manner while my wife was in labor I would have been stabbed in the eye with a plastic hospital spork.

So as I begin my blog week I am kicking it off with a bit of optimism.  I have beautiful memories that are taking residence in my cerebral summer home in my skull for at least one day.  I have no doubt that tomorrow I will be complaining about the fact that I have not been discovered by reality TV yet.

Ok Nippers, take five!