Stuff I've Learned

[cnorman18]

Sitting here watching Monterey Pop. 1967, the “Summer of Love.� I was 16 then.

Rock and roll legends -- Grace Slick with Jefferson Airplane, my favorite; a voice like a crystal razor blade. Janis Joplin; 40 years dead, and her ferocious passion still fills the screen. Jimi Hendrix, the Mamas & the Papas, the Who, Simon & Garfunkel. And bands you kids have never heard of: Canned Heat, Country Joe & the Fish, Big Brother & the Holding Company (that was Janis's band).

It was an innocent time. We were all so young; we were gonna change the world, man. All those kids with flowers painted on their faces -- the guys, too -- dancing and laughing in the grass; they’re all in their 60s now, or older. I wonder if they remember, and what they think if they do?

I’ve learned a lot since then; survived an obsessive "relationship," a nightmare marriage, and bounced through a half-dozen careers; changed my religion, changed my body, and my politics have moved from far left to far right and back again and are now all over the spectrum depending on the issue. But I think I’m still the same person I was then -- still kind of innocent somehow, still with that fragile thread of hope in my heart.

Here’s what I’ve learned as I make it to 60. I don’t claim that any of this is original or brilliant. It’s just what I know to be true.

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Love isn’t something you feel; it’s something you do. I understood that before I was six.

Someday you’re going to die; make what you do here count, whether there’s anything after or not. I got that one before I was four.

Inside your own head, you are always alone. You can let people in there if you choose to, but you can’t keep any secrets if you do.

There are all kinds of lonely, and married-lonely is the worst.

Don’t do what they tell you because they tell you to; do what you know to be right. Yeah -- no matter what. You might get fired, but you didn’t want to work at a place like that anyway.

Tell the truth. It’s the right thing to do, and lying is hard anyway. You have to remember all the lies you’ve told before.

You don’t have to tell EVERYTHING, though. You don’t have to make sure that the people you don’t like know that. That’s junior-high stuff. Grownups just leave each other alone.

Be who you are. What’s the point of getting people to like a “you� that doesn’t exist?

Insist on being a real person, not a cog in the machine, and the machine will break down wherever you walk.

Labels are lies. If you're part of a "movement" or a "party," left, right or center, at some level you're letting other people think for you. All of them are right on some things and wrong on others. Think for yourself and don't follow a crowd -- any crowd.

The ultimate value isn’t found in ideas or beliefs, anyway; it’s not in a political principle or a theology or a system of ethics. It’s in actual human beings -- and NOT, let us emphasize, in the IDEA of them.

NOTHING has more value than a real human being, and there is no crime greater than the disfigurement and crippling of a human heart.

The aggravated form of that crime is to do it for fun. That won’t send you to Hell; being a person who rejoices in others’ pain IS Hell, whether you know it or not. No one will ever really love you. No one can. You have no heart to love.

It’s your job to make the people around you feel good. Yes, even the jerks. They’re going to feel bad enough without any help from you.

Sometimes you have to stand up to the jerks to make OTHER people feel good -- but it‘s not your job to punish them.

That’s not about posting your ideas on the Internet -- it’s about how you treat the people you see every day. ALL of them. Crack a gentle joke with the tired old woman checking you out at Wal-Mart; give her a little break from the endless line of people who treat her like furniture. You’ll be amazed at how good that makes you feel, yourself.

That's also how you prevent yourself from BECOMING furniture. Make that sort of thing a habit and you’ll be a happier person, all the time -- because you will be a PERSON, and not a cog in the machine.

(Here's the new stuff, that I’ve learned in the last six weeks:)

Fantasies aren’t necessary when you’re really in love with a real person, and not with your tired old dreams.

She won’t be anything like what you hoped or expected. She’ll be herself.

All the stuff they say in movies and books, about how wonderful love is, is all true -- but the difference between thinking and hoping you’re in love, and the real thing, is the difference between watching a movie and living a real life.

If you’ve never done anything but watch movies, you won’t know that till you meet her… and then you’re riding the hurricane.

It’s the difference between Kansas and Oz. Remember when that door opened?

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We can still change the world, man. But we can only do it one heart at a time. Get to work.

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You’ll notice I haven’t said anything about God. If you understand why, I don’t need to tell you; and if you don’t, it wouldn’t do any good to try.

[McCulloch]

Sitting here watching Monterey Pop. 1967, the “Summer of Love.� I was 16 then.

I missed out. I was seven. Went to Expo '67 with my parents and not Monterey with the hippies.

She won’t be anything like what you hoped or expected. She’ll be herself.

Brilliant!

[cnorman18]

Sitting here watching Monterey Pop. 1967, the “Summer of Love.� I was 16 then.

I missed out. I was seven. Went to Expo '67 with my parents and not Monterey with the hippies.

Yeah, I missed it too; just saw the movie -- but I DID see in '67.

Missed Woodstock too, darnit.

Met Elvis once, though.

She won’t be anything like what you hoped or expected. She’ll be herself.

Brilliant!

Nah. SHE is, though.

[JoeyKnothead]

[cnorman18]

"Stand up, my son. I too am only a man."
--Saint Peter

I've been asked this before: "If you so smart, how come you ain't rich?" Good question. Answer is obvious.

[Baz]

I like some of your thoughts (It must be an age thing I was born in 51 as well. Close to what you where saying it is defiantly better to give than receive, no disappointments there you get to feel good when ever you want. And in my case I never know how to say thank you properly anyway.

[cnorman18]

I like some of your thoughts (It must be an age thing I was born in 51 as well.

'50, for me. But I appreciate the sentiment, and you're probably right to a degree. Age doesn't equal wisdom, but you don't get to 60 being egregiously stupid, at least not about stuff like blowing all your tubes out on hard drugs, boffing strangers, or driving drunk.

Close to what you where saying it is defiantly better to give than receive, no disappointments there you get to feel good when ever you want.

That even works for sex, and that's what makes a Great Lover.

Don't ask.

And in my case I never know how to say thank you properly anyway.

Like this (and I mean it):

Thank you!