I am the Filter Man

I am the Filter Man. I come by your house; I stop by your office; I even make roadside calls and can quietly enter a church, synagogue, mosque, or hospital, if need be, to perform my duties. I often visit the halls of Congress. You might say I'm ubiquitous. Which a lot of people get mixed up with iniquitous, which I am pretty much not.

I got the job years ago when the fifteenth Ice Age was announced on Fox News. Immediately CNN had to put their oar in to say there was not going to be a fifteenth Ice Age, but a season of hurricanes that would wreck the planet. And, of course, the New York Times kept repeating that we would all be drowned within a matter of weeks so why worry about an ice age?

Amidst all the confusion, with men and women rushing to and fro, crying "What shall we do?" I remained calm and collected. I had shown an early ability as a boy to filter everything disturbing, exciting, and puzzling, out of my life, so by the time I was fifteen I had no problems with girls, cars, grammar, acne, or my parents. I lived in a world of white sterilized gauze. I was neither oblivious nor paranoid -- I accepted everything that came my way, and then simply filtered it all down to a colorless, odorless, and generally inert mindset. I was acutely disinterested. 

So when the World Health Organization asked me to create filters for others before everyone had kittens, I graciously accepted -- and never looked back.

In Ireland parents get their children to behave and eat their boiled turnips by threatening to have the Filter Man come get them.

In the Ukraine I'm referred to as Uncle Felbish, who brings candy to orphans and makes the lilac bushes weep.

In Brazil they call me "Gnat Strainer" and light candles to me during Mass.

And the Chinese offer an image of me rice vinegar and pencil stubs to alleviate the swine flu. 

I'm really not a bogeyman or a deity. I can't prevent pigs from dying nor do I enjoy snacking on red-haired little leprechauns. I'm just a working stiff. I visit the unfiltered wherever they may be, palace or hovel, and bring to them the peace of a filtered existence. Sometimes I use a physical filter that I install in their ears or over their eyes. Many people need an industrial filter for their mouth. But for the most part I just fill their heads with soothing pap that has been so refined it contains nothing nutritious or savory. Sort of a mental poi, if you will. I place gossamer filters over TV screens, loudspeakers, and most picture windows in the home. I've worked in tandem with the auto industry to have rose-colored glass installed in every vehicle on the road today. 

I've never considered myself indispensable, or immortal. I know that someday I'll die just like everyone else. But I choose not to think about it, to filter it completely out of my mind. And so when I do shuffle off to Buffalo there will be no one to replace me -- but by then I hope to have filtered enough people so that they will carry on my work for me, taking filters to the unfiltered in far off and benighted lands. 

And, yes, Virginia, there is a dangerous amount of fiberglass in every filter. 

The Naming Bureau

I'd only been down to the Naming Bureau once before, when I needed a name for the growth on my neck. It hadn't gone well. They sent me to the Neck department, where I was told that I had a medical condition, not a neck condition. So I was sent to the Illness department, but they refused to see me and shot me over to the Growth department -- and they were closed for the day because one of the managers had passed away and everyone was at his funeral. My doctor wouldn't treat me until I had an official name for the growth on my neck, which kept getting bigger and redder. Just as I was at my wit's end the thing broke open and drained completely, leaving just a small black scar behind. 
This time I determined to play it safe, so instead of heading to one of the departments I glided up to the Information desk and smiled at the lady buffing her knuckles with a chamois cloth.
"Good morning" I said politely.
"Good morning" she replied in a neutral voice. "How can I help you?"
"Well" I began, "you see, I'm a little bit confused as to where I should go for a name. Not sure what department this falls under, and I was wondering if you could help me find the right place to go."
"I can try" she said, still in a very neutral voice; but she did make eye contact with me. "What is it needs naming?"
I held both my hands out to her.
"My hands smell like boiled yams" I said. "Even after a vigorous washing."
She sniffed at them tentatively, then nodded her head.
"They do indeed" she affirmed.
"Who do you think is in charge of naming such a thing?" I asked.
"Well . . . " she hesitated. "Well . . . let me contact my supervisor about this. One moment please." She swiveled away from me in her chair and spoke into a small green pillow, which immediately began quivering. She murmured something into it, listened intently, and then swiveled back to me.
"Mr. Mumby will be with you shortly. If you would take a seat over there . . ." she indicated a row of cement blocks covered with shards of broken glass.
"Thank you, I appreciate it" I replied. Politeness costs nothing, as Winston Churchill used to say.
I didn't have to wait long for Mr. Mumby. He was very tall and lean, and wore a red paper vest. We shook hands and then went into his office, which was filled with bags of marshmallows.
"It's marshmallow season, y'know" he said, grinning. "I think we'll have a bumper crop this year!" I couldn't help warming up to him.
"My hands . . . "I began.
"Yes, yes" he interrupted kindly. "Ms. Pitts explained your situation to me. May I have a whiff?"
I held out my hands for him to smell. He took his time, inhaling slowly several times. Then he sat back, taping his chin with an unsharpened pencil.
"I'd say they smell more like russet potatoes" he said, but I could tell he wasn't talking to me -- he was in a deep ponder, talking to himself. "Russet, with just a hint of fingerlings. The Ag people might be interested in this . . . but, no . . . they're understaffed as it is. Hmm . . . perfumery? They might enjoy taking a crack at it . . . they don't have much to do nowadays . . . or else Cuticles might take a whack at it . . ."
He continued to stare into space for a few more minutes, taping his chin with the pencil. Then, his face composed into a firm executive decision, he addressed me.
"We shall have to take one of your hands" he said. "It will be carefully sliced up and distributed to a dozen different departments for their input. We'll contact you once we reach a consensus."
"Wait a minute" I said nervously. "You want one of my hands?"
"Certainly. This is a complex situation that requires teamwork and deliberation -- not a snap decision. I wouldn't doubt that you'll get a mention on our website, too!" He gazed at me speculatively, like I was already in a petri dish. I no longer warmed to him, or even thought he was altogether human.
"No way are you taking off my hand!" I said emphatically. "What is this place, a butcher shop? I'm outta here!" I stood up to leave.
"Please calm yourself" he said mildly. But the look in his eyes was deeply sinister. "Don't make this any more difficult than it already is." He pressed a button on his desk. "I will have you escorted down to our Editing department."
Ms. Pitts was at the door, with a pair of handcuffs. But as far as I could see there wasn't anyone with her, and she was just a shrimp -- so I pushed her down and ran out of the Naming Bureau.  
So far I haven't been contacted or arrested by the authorities, and I've joined up with a Nameless group that is resisting the Naming Bureau and everything it stands for. 
If you'd like to contribute to our cause, leave money or sandwiches underneath the viaduct down by the feed mill. It's tax deductible. 

Direct your inquiry

Jeffrey R. Holland

"In matters of faith and conviction, it helps to direct your inquiry toward those who actually have some!"   Jeffrey R. Holland.

Asking fools is easy, and I do it all the time;

their answers often tickle me and make me feel sublime.

Alas, I ask too often of those who have got no sense

what to do -- because the are just sitting on the fence.

Away! you knaves and simpletons who haven't got a clue --

Fruitful spirits I must seek to get a better view!

White as Snow

Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

Isaiah 1:18

The Lord of Reason is thy name;

thou only can relieve my shame.

Gaudy crimson pride and fault

are drowning me -- O Lord, exalt!

Cleanse me like the fallen snow;

cover me with woolen throw.

Help me to renounce my sins

so happiness with thee begins!

The Big Lie

I want to revisit my abortive attempt at detente with Amy to highlight an interesting determination we made together  -- before permanently burying the whole contaminated matter in the bowels of Yucca Mountain.
As I may have mentioned, the day after we had our little tete-a-tete Amy emailed me that she wanted no further contact with me. Okay, I emailed her back, you're the boss.
That evening, as I was relaxing with a desultory viewing of Hotel Transylvania on the FreeForm cable channel, she pulls up to my patio. I hastily jumped into a pair of flannel pajama pants and welcomed her in with a quizzical smile.
"I thought you said you wanted no more contact" I said by way of preamble.
"I blocked your email account, so I didn't know if you got my message or not" was her reply -- which she made sound perfectly logical. Then she started to ramble on and on about a variety of inanities that have no place in this narrative (thank the good Lord.)
But at one point she said something that forced me to interrupt her.
"I had to practically raise the children myself because you were always off playing circus . . . " she began.
"Wait!" I held up my hand, a bit imperiously perhaps. "Wait. Y'know something, we've been saying that, agreeing to that story for a long time -- but you know and I know that it just isn't true. If we go back, year by year, the truth is I spent most of my time at home, not on the road. We just let that traveling story evolve out of resentment and laziness."  
She didn't want to do it; she resisted the idea; but I took us back, year by year, over our 15 years of marriage, and we toted up the approximate amount of time I was away from home with the circus. And believe me when I say Amy has an exceptionally keen mind when it comes to the times and seasons of our married life together. My time away from home came to just about five years, in total. One third of our time together. The other two thirds of the time I was at home, working regular, usually miserable, jobs or moping about unemployed, reading to the kids at night, taking Amy out on dates, holding down Church callings, and writing several novels, plays, a humor column for the magazine 'Circus Report,' and my autobiography 'Clown Notes.'
I'm not blaming Amy for perpetuating the myth that I was always away from home with the circus -- for I always do it, too, when talking to anyone about our failed marriage; it is an easy way to explain why we failed as a couple. BUT THAT'S NOT WHAT REALLY HAPPENED.
She admitted as much to me, and we both agreed that we would probably go right on telling that lie to acquaintances and the grand kids instead of trying to straighten things out. It's just easier. We had relaxed in each other's company enough by then to grin and chuckle about it. So now you know the real truth. And . . . so what? Doesn't matter in the least, does it? But I felt like it was a minor victory for me, and for sanity in general.
After she left last night I dug into my memories of the time after the divorce, and I can say with assurance that THAT is when I really did my traveling -- with circuses, down to Mexico to teach English, and off to Thailand twice. I was never in one place for more than six months. My restlessness was obsessive and morbid. Only poverty, a stint of homelessness, and failing health have slowed me down now so that I no longer want to hit the road as a clown or go back to Thailand to teach English and chase girls. These days part of my nightly prayers never varies -- I beg God to let me die here in this little apartment, because I never want to travel again, never want to move again, never want to sleep in a strange bed again, or have no bed of my own to sleep in at all. I have arrived at what I hope is my final destination and safe harbor, please God . . . 

**************************

An email response to this post from my friend Rob:

Before I read your latest, I wanted to tell you a few things, so I won't forget.  Tom subscribed to the New Yorker magazine.  I chose an article to read that looked interesting.  Something about sin and the effects of it.  It was some fiction piece about 5 pages long.  I got through the first column and thought it wasn't very good, and that you are considerably better.  I read a bit more on a later column, and I couldn't sit through any more.  I don't know what their criteria are.  Maybe you have to be someone important somehow.  But I can tell you I'd rather read your stories than the one I tried to read.  

The second thing is at the end page there are three cartoons.  I guess someone draws something and then people get a chance to add text, and they have a contest to see who had the funniest/best one.  There were a couple of good ones, but you'd do just as well.

Okay, now I'll read your latest...

Well, I don't know what to think about the last part about the safe harbor.  I can understand a bit of it, in that I don't desire to be in anyone else's bed, or get involved with another woman.  And those travel experiences are exhausting and lonely and troublesome, because I don't just sit and enjoy what's around me.  I don't know that I've learned my lesson yet.  I've been thinking of trying to get to Cuba for the music, mostly, and Africa for the antipode, partially.  I'm losing vacation time when I don't take it and keep working.

The fact she came back to visit you indicates to me that you still have some sway with her.  She was probably a bit moved that you wanted to be amorous with her, and got a kick out of feeling in control.  So, you did that for her, and maybe that was what you wanted to do.  Maybe it wasn't a subconscious thing you did.  Maybe you planned it, knowing what the outcome would be.  If so, you are superior to her, and she fell for it.  She came back to you with a lame excuse of not knowing if you responded.  Congratulations.  You won after all.

It's good you set the record straight with her regarding time away, if that's the real reason for the breakup.  It doesn't matter, though, because you both know each other well enough, and at least you can talk.  I cannot talk with my ex nor do I ever want to.  She has totally convinced me it would do me no good, and she'd still think she's perfect.  Your Amy is a lot better than my ex.

I am actually impressed though Tim, that you have always been kind to her.  You've always professed your love for her.  It was her who made the mistake of leaving the marriage, and going so far as to break the temple thing, and yet you don't hate her.  I probably would.

You came to mind at least three times today.  I won't go into them specifically, but you've had a good influence on me in a number of ways.  I'm grateful for our friendship.

That and 10c will not buy you a cup of coffee.


And another email response to this post from my friend Bruce:

Thank you for sending this. It does bring a sense of resolution--in several ways, including your sense of where your life is and how you want it continue.  

But my biggest takeaway is--wow! the two of you achieved some honest communication after all! And it's worth noting that honest communication has to be two-sided at least if "communication" is taken in its literal meaning of sharing, communion, mutual partaking (which suggests mutual understanding).

Verses from Stories in Today's New York Post -- The secret séance rituals of America’s largest Spiritualist community -- Southwest flight attendant caught pilots watching bathroom livestream:suit -- Trump launches Twitter attack on Pelosi over impeachment bid.

Normal folks can ill afford/messing with a Ouija Board/If you want to raise the dead/visit an ex-spouse instead.

@ericspitznagel

**************************

Peeping Toms are pilots sly/as they cleft the azure sky/They like bathroom landscapes, so/that explains why they fly low.

@benfeuerherd

***************************************

Trump and Twitter are like twins/almost like they're sharing skins/When the prez has got a beef/he will tweet for quick relief/and Pelosi feels his wrath/from his raw online warpath.

@LevineJonathan

Out of the midst of the fire

 Did ever people hear the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as thou hast heard, and live?
Deuteronomy 4:33

Some hear the voice of God and live

among their fellow men.

But others, when that song is sung,

are not quite sane again.

Still and small, that voice is hushed

but cannot be ignored.

I've heard it, Lord, I've heard it --

and I then went out and roared!

Postcards to the President

Verses from Stories in Today's New York Times -- Justice Dept. Is Said to Open Criminal Inquiry Into Its Own Russia Investigation -- A Forecast for a Warming World: Learn to Live With Fire -- They Know What You Watched Last Night.

When hawkshaw versus hawkshaw there's an awful whoop-de-do.

Investigating your own boss will put you in the stew.

I recommend  the DOJ just take a long vacation,

and let us common citizens police our own damn nation.

@ktbenner  

@adamgoldmanNYT

***************************

And so our world has gone to blazes

while we sing the fulsome praises

of a president gone mad

who sees ev'rything in plaid.

Yes, I speak ad hominem --

and his cronies I condemn.

Let us hope the world survives

with more than insects in their hives!

@thomasfullerNYT

****************************

When watching the boob tube, take heed
lest all of your data they bleed
to figure a way
to get you to pay
for stuff you just really don't need.
@tiffkhsu

For the love of Amy

On a whim, I called up my former wife Amy yesterday, Thursday, October 24, 2019, to invite her to dinner. She accepted. What follows is my report on our proceedings together. There are also email responses from friends I sent the sad tale to, and something from my daughter Virginia, which has almost no bearing on this story but I felt like putting it in anyway, and then Amy's crushing, final email reply that I received today.

I cleaned up the joint in preparation for Amy’s visit this evening. Even flushed the toilet. Got the couch turned around so we could sit on it to watch movies . . . 

When she drove up to my patio door at 4:15 this afternoon I was a little surprised -- I thought she said 5. I greeted her warmly. She smelled heavenly. I pressed her to me; her skin was soft and yielding. I kissed her on the lips. She didn’t resist, so I tried for another; this time she coyly turned her head, and so I nuzzled her neck instead. I completely lost my head and blurted out: 

“I’ve missed you so much . . . “

So much for my plan to play it cool as a cucumber. Restraint was not to be my major theme this evening.

Ghostbusters Two was on cable when she arrived; I asked her if she wanted to go out to eat right away or sit and watch the movie a while. As I hoped, she opted for watching the movie. She started to sit in the big upholstered chair, but I swooped down on her and with an amorous waggle of my eyebrows I quoted to her that famous line of Groucho Marx to Margaret Dumont: 

“Ah, Mrs. Rittenhouse, won’t you lie down?” while pointing at the couch. She laughed softly, accepting my invitation. 

I put my arm around her shoulder. I massaged her neck. I drew her to me for a kiss. Then she asked, just like Margaret Dumont, “What are your intentions, Timmy?”

“I’ve missed you” I reiterated, “and I want to visit with you and take you out to dinner because I have missed your company. And I want to cook for you -- that would make me really happy.” 

 She floored me with her response.

“What am I supposed to get out of all this?” she asked.

Completely flummoxed, I held her hands in mine and stared at her like a beached carp. 

“What . . . what do you mean?” I finally stammered.

“All this affection and taking me out to eat -- how do I benefit from any of it?” she helpfully explained. 

I could only gabble at her like a man with his mouth full of peanut butter. A free meal? A makeout session on the couch like the good old days?  The offer to cook for her whenever she liked? These meant nothing to her?

I saw I was on the slippery slope to abject bondage to her every whim, and I hadn’t the willpower to apply the brakes.

“I’m very vulnerable when I’m with you” was what I finally said.

“I know” she replied. And then she looked deep into my wildly gyrating eyes and placed my hand on her thigh. Then placed her hand over my hand. Oh, she is good. She makes Mata Hari look like Phyllis Diller. 

Fortunately, the movie took an interesting turn at that moment -- so we resumed breathing and watched Dr. Venkman’s shenanigans for a while. Would he and Sigourney Weaver ever reconcile? Would Amy and I ever reconcile? 

Barbarian that I am, I began to press myself on her, little by little. She didn’t resist -- but she didn’t respond, either. This was not the passionate Amy of old. Her smile was still beatific. Her breath was honeyed myrrh. Her silken hair ran through my fingers like warm, fine-grained sand. But she did not, would not, or could not, return my open and frank passion. So I backed off. 

During a commercial break for Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, she divulged to me the reason for her slow response to my confession of unbridled passion. Today, this very day, she had felt inspired to move to Seattle as soon as she possibly could. She was making arrangements to sell her car and get an advance on her salary (she works for Amazon.com in Draper as something called a trust facilitator -- she gave me the job description but I’m still as vague about it as before.) And so, while happy to see me once again, she needed to know how becoming friends, or more than friends, could help her in her ‘calling’ to go to Seattle. She didn’t ask me if I would go with her. We both knew that was not part of the plan. 

At this point I excused myself to use the bathroom, where I pounded my forehead against the medicine cabinet mirror until some micro-fractures appeared (in the mirror, not my forehead.)

I came out, resigned to accepting the craziness and see where it would take the two of us.

The movie was over. We went to Good Thyme Eatery down on Center Street here in Provo. Amy had the kale caesar salad, strawberry balsamic beets and arugula, a bowl of chicken pumpkin curry, and a large Nutella cookie. She took a cup of raspberry/ginger tea. She also got a big bowl of rocky road chopped ice cream. They pour cream and sugar onto a surface that instantly freezes the cream, then use a pair of Ginzu knives to chop it up with additional ingredients like at Beni Hana -- except it’s frozen, not fried. I had no appetite, so ordered a small bowl of squash soup and a saucer of mashed potatoes with goat cheese. 

We spoke of me taking her to see the Downton Abbey movie, and then cooking her a nice dinner at my place tomorrow. At first she was enthusiastic, but then her ears started to leak. 

Her ears start to leak, she explained to me back in her car while she cleaned them out with a dozen cotton swabs, whenever she is exposed to insincere flattery. Which, she said, is what I had been giving her all night.

“But I was just trying to be transparent with you, complimenting you, telling you what I think and how I feel about you” I said desperately, seeing our movie and dinner slipping inexorably away. 

“You’ll have to change that” she said as we drove up to my place.

“Care to come in for a nightcap?” I weakly asked, hoping against hope that she would want to come in and talk the night away.

“I’ve got to do laundry tonight and then do initiatory work at the temple before going to work tomorrow” she said. How could I cajole her out of that without appearing to be a cad?

“May I have a kiss goodnight?” I meekly asked. 

“No you may not -- my ears will really start gushing then” she said primly.

“When can I see you again?” I said, much against my will -- this whole thing was turning into a cliched adolescent angst-fest. 

She scribbled on an index card from her purse, then handed it to me.

“I want you to watch a Jordan Peterson seminar on YouTube and listen to several Dr. Les Carter podcasts about honest communication first. Once you’ve done that call me and I’ll think about letting you take me out again” she said.

That, my friends, should have been the straw that broke the ungulate’s back. Striking a manly pose, I should have sternly told her that I would never knuckle under to any kind of ultimatum just for the pleasure of her company. We would be equals, or nothing.

But instead I replied mildly that I would give it a whirl and let her know when I had finished. Maybe by Saturday, and then I could take her to see Downton Abbey . . . ?

She gave me a soft glance and a brush of her hand across my cheek. But answer was there none.  I could smell aloes on her. And now I write this all down -- perhaps as my last will and testament, for, if I’m not mistaken, I have just been drained of my heart’s sap and most of my backbone is now jellied eel. I can’t be long for this world . . .  

Rob Reed’s email response:

This kept my attention, and I have no new thoughts you haven't already had.

Her question of what she was going to get out of it would have ended it for me.  Her question of your intentions probably would have brought out the truth from me -- but that would have ended it for her.  Why she even bothered to come over I don't understand, if she was planning to go to Seattle. She got all smelly for you just to prove to herself that she still has power over you, and then to prove her superiority by telling you to listen to some rich self-help person about honest communication -- all that's kinda disgusting to me.  You're both smart people, and can hold your own in most any conversation, but she is shallow and conceited. (Sorry, I know you still love her.) She reminds me of my ex, who will never ever admit to herself the possibility that she could have been wrong about something. She's so beyond hope and help that the best thing for me to do is to not think of her.  (I did tell Tom that I'd respect him if he did treat his mother nicely even though he knew how I felt toward her, which is really, really, really badly.) Your ex may be the only one who can get your motor running, but still that doesn't mean you could ever be happy with her. And she would only get your motor running so she could kill it and then leave with a laugh.

When I first "separated" from the ex, subconsciously I thought I should show her that I still loved her and cared about her.  I had a picture of her on the table in the front room where I had moved to. She came over and saw it. Why the hell did I do that when all it did was reinforce her sense of superiority?  I should have just told her I detested her and the was the worst person I had ever known, and she was the biggest mistake in my life, and that she was the exact opposite of what a Christian should be like.  Perhaps I didn't say those things because I knew she held the cards for future negotiations regarding the kids and my financial state. Of course it turns out that she turned the screws as tightly as the law would allow.  Totally disgusting.

But I try not to think about her.  I still have to deal with her to some extent in the future probably with regard to the kids.

See, I haven't told you anything new.

I suggest you publish your piece for all to see, so that she'll be seen for the person she is.

Thanks for sharing.

Nathan Draper’s email response:

Wow! Great story Tim! This could be the start of a whole new genre. This would make a great podcast for seniors.

Sorry it didn’t end better! But hey!!! You must feel good about making the attempt! You got in the game! You hit the playing field. More than most can say....you’ll feel better soon!

From Virginia:

Ive seen that you've been sending these to us, and the poems are very good. What does it mean that your comment was approved, though? Does it mean they published it in the Times? 

Also, I showed Cecilia Dumbo for the first time this week and she loved it. She's not into princesses a whole lot, but boy howdy does she love animals. While watching Dumbo, I can't help but think of you and your time in the circus. Does Dumbo miss the mark for being accurate about what the circus is about? Does it bother you to watch it because it's inaccurate? Just wondering. Hope you're staying warm up there. It's rainy and cold here, and the girls got their shots yesterday so they are feeling pretty crummy. Crummy weather to match their crummy moods. Do you like pecans? We have 3 trees in our front yard that dropped their fruit and we've gathered quite a bit. We can send you some if you'd like. Let me know, take care of yourself!

First things first -- YES! Send me all the pecans you -- I love ‘em!  My address is

Tim Torkildson

650 West 100 North  Apt 115

Provo  Utah 84601

I send dozens of poems to the NYT each week  -- most never see the light of day. When the online paper decides to post one they send me that email, so I forward it to you or Madel or Daisy just to show you the old man is still alive and kicking.

I got my flu shot two weeks ago -- didn’t have any after effects at all. I’m surprised by the many old geezers here in my building and at church who scoff at flu shots, saying they are no good or make you more sick than the flu. I had the flu 2 years ago and felt like I was gonna die, so I always get my shots now -- besides, they’re free!

We’ve had dry crisp sunny weather here most of the time -- just perfect for going out for a walk. And I need to get out and walk more -- I put my back out a few weeks back and it’s been a struggle just to stay upright, let alone walk! But I’m doing better now. I haven’t actually been to see a doctor since last May (a new record for me!) but I’m scheduled to start seeing my thyroid specialist and my dermatologist and my gp again all in November. The roads are all tore up in Provo, so there’s no bus service for me to take to my clinic so I have to scrounge around for rides, which I hate doing. I might start asking your mother for rides to the doctor, cuz we’re getting tight again . . . 

I took her out to dinner last night and we talked a long time -- she seems open to reestablishing some kind of relationship, although she is moving out to the West Coast as soon as she gets enough money saved up. While she’s here she wants to come over to watch movies on my big screen and let me make her special organic free range grass fed dinners. So, I guess we’ll see how that goes . . . 

As far as your Dumbo questions go, I love that movie too -- although I’ve always been a bit disturbed by Dumbo and the mouse having to get drunk to discover their true talents.  I equate the circus with being young and healthy and joining the Church -- all very joyous things, so the celebratory spirit of Dumbo I can relate to, even though I knew plenty of old and disappointed and sour people with Ringling; but that was never me. Not back then. I seemed to get really sour in my forties, though -- but now that I’m 66 I feel pretty happy and carefree again. I guess that’s because I believe I am getting a second chance to be funny again through my writing. It’s a great feeling to wake up and know you can make people smile and laugh. 

Give my regards to Andy and the kids. I hear Daisy is coming down to visit you during the Holidays; maybe she can bring the pecans back?  Love, dad.

Hello Tim,

I have been considering the advances you have made toward me in the last 24 hours. 

I appreciate the gesture but I am still very puzzled that you would decide to try connect after such a long time and after the bitter way we separated.

If you recall, I had said things that were distasteful to you and you had said you want nothing to do with me.

I did walk over to your place earlier in the summer time and I told you the things I had appreciated from our relationship. 

I had expected that if anything was of value from that connection, you would have done something then.

In considering the long term effects of a relationship rekindled with you I must decline.

I do not want to have anymore contact with you at all.

Sincerely,

Amy


And just today I got a belated email response from Bruce Young:

Wow! I guess that's my response both to the situation and to your writing. 

In regard to the situation, I have to say I don't really quite understand what happened--and though, as they say, I would have to have been there, I'm not sure even that would have entirely done the trick. I'm not sure YOU quite understand what happened. 

But with my even more limited apprehension, here's my impression: First of all, it sounds as if she is being controlling, even if some of her methods are charming or alluring. Her insistence on your learning how to communicate honestly seems to me ironic, even perhaps a symptom of her own blindness or self-deception. What I mean is that--like many of us who get on hobby horse and use it to judge other people--we think we have mastered a skill by virtue of being obsessively focused on it and using it as a lens to assess other people. But in fact, by doing those very things we reveal our own defect in the matter, and we perhaps unconsciously use what we do to blind ourselves to our defect. 

That was a long winded way of explaining why I think she was bearing down on you about honest communication and in doing so was badly misjudging you. 

In any case, from your report it doesn't sound like there's much hope for a genuinely positive close relationship between the two of you. She's definitely giving you mixed signals, but (as you note) her focus seems to be on her own agenda, and she doesn't feel she has much use for you unless she can reshape you into what she imagines you should be. 

It's sweet in a way to see how easily you were falling for her. But I'm afraid I think that this way lies not only angst but madness. I'm afraid you're going to have to keep sublimating. They say that much of the greatest art, music, and literature of the world came from frustrated people who were sublimating their desires, turning them into something transcendentally good. 

I look forward to learning more as we chat one of these days.

Meanwhile, my best wishes for your happiness.

Bruce