“Thursday night showers. Lows in the upper 30s. North winds 10 to 15 miles per hour. Chance of rain 100%. And Friday, cloudy with a chance of rain and snow showers in the morning. Then partly cloudy in the afternoon. Highs in the upper 20s.”…. a weather report.
Lasted about as long as microwaving a bag of popcorn, then repeated.
The Old Man laid in a bed about double arms reach away, maybe more, doing what he’d done most of his non-working, non-drinking, time that wasn’t occupied with crossword puzzles and solitaire — watching TV.
I’m not sure if you know this, but Chemo/Radiation doesn’t just kill cancer.
It kills everything — tastebuds, appetite, key areas of the brain, hope.
Everything it touches dies, and some people survive.
The Old Man wasn’t going to be one of them, and without tastebuds he’d only eat Jawbreaker sized Lemon Drop candies.
“CRUNCH”…
His teeth had always made a God-awful screeching sound when he ate, and it felt like a pencil getting jabbed into my ear.
He knew it annoyed me, so that day, to amuse himself, he made extra effort. It worked for a while.
“Chance of rain 100%. And Friday, cloudy with….”
14.
A notebook sat heavy on my lap.
I grabbed a pen. The old man’s teeth screeched.
TV noise filled the room.
“Thursday night showers. Lows in the….” 26
Note to Self:
“Don’t waste your life worrying about stuff that doesn’t matter, especially when in the presence of people that do.
We only get a few moments together. Make them magical.”
Paying attention to stuff that matters doesn’t come easily. The world is a noisy place. And most of the noise in all our heads.
The trick is to Shift How You Think and Make the Narrator of Your Life Tell Better Stories, and that’s a difficult thing to do.
Life passes quickly,
doesn’t it.
High School Graduation, 1994 seems like yesterday.
From Buffalo, Ohio to Kent State University, then out to California. Twenty-seven addresses in 6 different states, a short stay in Brazil and wound up settling down in Texas of all places.
Looking back, it seems to me that things manifest the way they need to, even if sometimes it’s not what you imagined, planned, or wanted.
Like saying Goodbye to Mikey…
…The Old Man chomping lemon drops, the guy who had no clue that Friday would be “cloudy with a chance of rain and snow showers in the morning” even though we’d heard that shit 50 times in a row.
Around the 60th time, all of it stopped being annoying.
It’s funny what happens when you stop needing people to be anything other than here.
Did I mention that Chemo and Radiation scramble brain circuits?
It does.
It’s a weird thing to witness, and probably a worse thing to experience.
As a witness, you sit a room with a body of a person you knew. They are even a little bit there. It’s surreal. And it teaches you stuff. But, sometimes they come back online. Just like that.
“Lows in the upper 30s. North winds 10 to 15 miles per hour.”
Dad came back online. Started dropping bombs. Went a little something like this.
“Boy, don’t say nothin’. Keep your damn mouth shut. Don’t know how long I’ll be here. My brain ain’t working right. Can’t find words.”
It’s not often I keep my mouth shut. But, I kept my mouth shut.
“You got a damn good woman there.”
It’s true. If you met her you’d know right away. She’s so kind and sweet. Patient.
“And you turned yourself into a damn good man. Don’t be a McAuley and screw it all up like I did when my dad died.”
BOOM!
“Don’t let the anger control you.”
BOOM!!!!
“And promise me something.”
My mouth open, but not letting anything come out. Not a sound or my breath. And part of me, to this day wishes I’d never heard these word.
“Start writing again.”
BOOOM!!!!
He continued.
“Boy, you changed my life. Taught to me see things different. Wish I knew that shit when I was twenty, could a been better for you, a good man like you are. Maybe I wouldn’t have messed it up so bad. Don’t mess it up. Get back to doing what you’re ‘posed to do. Write. If anyone is crazy enough to change the damn world, it’s you. Get on with it.”
He plopped a Lemon Drop in his mouth, and crunched it with a smile.
That’s pretty much the last conversation we had.
A few days later we transferred to the county home.
A few days after that, the hospice lady came with Morphine.
Mikey’s last day, like his whole life, he suffered.
Uncle Chuck and I sat next to him. It was brutal for all of us. At some point, we needed a break.
I was back at the Trailer eating pizza, crying, and throwing all his stuff in a dumpster when he took his last breath.
My heart didn’t fully break until a few days later.
It’s still a little broken.
Let me ask you something.
Have you ever broken a promise to a dying man?
Dad asked me to write something that would help him when he was younger.
I feel like teaching him that he had the most valuable resource in the universe at his disposal his entire life and didn’t even realize it.
Human Attention Is The Most Valuable
Resource In The Universe.
You have the power of creation inside of you.
We all do.
And I want to help you learn how to harness it, so together we can create a better tomorrow.
Today is the most amazing time to be alive in the history of mankind.
And I am afraid for most people. It doesn’t seem like they’re paying attention to the right things, or building the right skills. Worse yet, a lot of people I adore are planning for a future that isn’t likely to exist.
Consider this.
Back in the day; music – vinyl became 8-Tracks, then became tapes, that turned into CDs, which become downloads, and are now free to stream through any number of services.
The music industry changed.
And now, social media, gives independent artists the ability to rise out of obscurity, top the charts, sell stuff, and put money in the bank – even if they have questionable talent – because attention is everything.
Just like music, more things will dematerialize very soon.
Everything that seems normal today, will be old fashioned in just a few years.
We won’t return to normal, so you should probably start preparing for what’s coming.
You have a choice.
You can choose to maintain a confrontational relationship with reality, or learn how to play the game – the inner game that creates reality.
A War is fought for your attention.
Fought at every level, corporations, Nation-States, family, foes, and friends. Me. Everyone.
We’re all fighting for your attention.
I want to show you how to mine your attention for gold.
Because I believe in the Golden Rule. If you don’t have enough gold, you’re living by someone else’s rules.
Once you reorient your attention, and get out of your own way, the world becomes a better place instantly.
Inside you is a creative sacred space, a place of knowing, and I want to guide you to it, and help you create something that matters.
We have no clue what tomorrow will bring, unless we create it.
Just understand, it might get a little weird.
The old man used to chuckle, “That boy ain’t right.”
He wasn’t wrong.
The following pages is a collection of stories, ideas, and advice from some amazing people. And me. I hesitated sharing this.
After all, I am a newly divorced man who tends bar at the age of 48. I might not be the best person to give any sort of mentorship.
We’ll start the conversation with Breaking Free from Attachment, and get into the power of stories and how to harness them.
Then, you’ll get a crash course on system’s theory and how to turn your life around in 90 days or less, and we’ll talk about why most self-development doesn’t work.
After that, we’ll talk about the GAP between where you are, and where you want to be. And Finally, I’ll share with you an over view of “The Tao of Tim.”
Click the link below if you are interested. No email required.
Hope this helps.
Love your face!
Tim
PS. I hope you watched the video. It could be the thing that changes everything. Even if you don’t continue, I think you should listen it.
Speaking of links. Throughout these pages you’ll see things to click that open up nuances in the conversation; deepens it.You don’t have to click, it’s a choose your own adventure, just like life.
Some of those links lead to some cool articles, videos and whatnot. Please understand. Some links go to Amazon they’re affiliate links and I get a few pennies if you buy the books I recommend.
Those books changed my thinking, and eventually my life, and I hope they do the same for you.
PPS. This one’s for you Mikey. Sorry I lost a good one. Miss you every day.