{"id":532,"date":"2006-09-15T20:39:08","date_gmt":"2006-09-16T04:39:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/archives\/2006\/09\/15\/my-thanksgiving\/"},"modified":"2006-09-15T20:39:08","modified_gmt":"2006-09-16T04:39:08","slug":"my-thanksgiving","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/2006\/09\/15\/my-thanksgiving\/","title":{"rendered":"My Thanksgiving"},"content":{"rendered":"

A lot of things have happened
Since the last time we spoke
Some of them are funny
Some of ’em ain’t no joke
And I trust you will forgive me
If I lay it on the line
I always thought you were a friend of mine<\/em><\/p>\n

"My Thanksgiving"
Don Henley<\/p>\n

Two days after I got back from Portillo a Mercedes cut me off.<\/p>\n

Oh, I wasn’t in my Saab, I was on the sidewalk, and in California pedestrians have the right of way, indubitably!<\/p>\n

And standing there, contemplating the entitlement of this Brentwood housewife, I thought of the e-mail I got from a woman I don’t know calling me a pig.\u00c2\u00a0 And from there, I remembered how Al Perlman referred to my father’s Mercedes-Benz in the same fashion.\u00c2\u00a0 A decade before he saw the light and purchased his own automobile from Stuttgart.<\/p>\n

Around the turn of the century, Al Perlman keeled over and died outside an elevator in a hotel in New York City.\u00c2\u00a0 My father predeceased him.\u00c2\u00a0 Their petty jealousies, their camaraderie, they’re history, the only people who remember are those who knew them.<\/p>\n

And after the car passed, on this early September day, when the light was suddenly not as intense as it had been before I’d gone to Chile, I realized that in the not too distant future I wasn’t going to be here either.<\/p>\n

Speaking of people no longer with us, my friend Ronnie Gashin succumbed to colitis.\u00c2\u00a0 But when his whole life was in front of him, in the late sixties, at Woody’s Cracker Barrel ski shop in South Londonderry, Vermont, my dad imparted some of his philosophy.\u00c2\u00a0 Saying that since he’d turned fifty, he no longer worried what anybody else thought.<\/p>\n

Ronnie didn’t tell me this story until years later, when fifty seemed ancient.<\/p>\n

But I’m over fifty now.\u00c2\u00a0 Should I care that some woman whom I’ve never met believes that by usage of the vernacular I’m a pig?<\/p>\n

I don’t think so.<\/p>\n

We all need something to look forward to, to keep us putting one foot in front of the other, to keep us going.\u00c2\u00a0 For me that was Portillo.\u00c2\u00a0 Doctor appointments, items that needed to be repaired, they were all delayed until after my trip.\u00c2\u00a0 But now my trip is over.<\/p>\n

I expected it to be a ski vacation.\u00c2\u00a0 I wasn’t prepared for a life-changing experience.<\/p>\n

Every day I live in the intellectual world, one of information and analysis.\u00c2\u00a0 Whereas skiing is a sensual activity.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s something you feel, not something you think about.\u00c2\u00a0 And it made me wonder.\u00c2\u00a0 Did I have the balance wrong?\u00c2\u00a0 With the time remaining, my sunset years, what do I want to do?<\/p>\n

I get a choice.\u00c2\u00a0 I no longer need to worry what about my father’s plans for me, he’s gone.\u00c2\u00a0 And, my mother won’t be here forever.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m entitled to steer, but too often, I give up the wheel.<\/p>\n

Portillo is a flattened society.\u00c2\u00a0 Although it costs a good amount to get there, once you arrive, everybody’s equal.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s only one hotel, one dining room.\u00c2\u00a0 No table is better than another.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s just one class of people.\u00c2\u00a0 And with no trappings to fall back upon, to hide behind, people open up.\u00c2\u00a0 All they’ve got to individualize themselves is their personalities.<\/p>\n

I go to a meeting and some guy who’s looking to upgrade his life tells me about his new project, as I steal a glance at my watch and wonder how long I have to listen until I can leave.<\/p>\n

Katie Couric is hyped as the icon of news even though her reporting skills are almost nonexistent.<\/p>\n

It’s a land of haves and have nots.\u00c2\u00a0 I don’t want to play the game.\u00c2\u00a0 Yet you have to if you want.\u00c2\u00a0 And I want.<\/p>\n

I want to not worry about the bills.\u00c2\u00a0 I want to have flexibility, to take off skiing when it dumps, and not be bankrupted by an unfortunate turn of events.<\/p>\n

I want recognition.\u00c2\u00a0 I want everybody who’s ever given me shit to take me seriously.\u00c2\u00a0 I want all those trying to win through intimidation to be worried about what I say.\u00c2\u00a0 I want the tables turned, I want the playing field leveled.\u00c2\u00a0 As retribution for a lifetime of being fucked with.<\/p>\n

In an unjust society, I want justice.<\/p>\n

But in a country where the President lies and the corporations write the rules is justice a possibility?\u00c2\u00a0 Is one man powerless against the game?\u00c2\u00a0 Is the game even what it’s about?<\/p>\n

Part of me wants to retreat, take a left turn.\u00c2\u00a0 Enjoy the good life.<\/p>\n

But I haven’t earned the good life.<\/p>\n

But at some point my life will be over, and what difference will it make.<\/p>\n

So I keep writing.\u00c2\u00a0 The lousy salesman who just figures if I do something good enough, results will appear.\u00c2\u00a0 Even though there’s no plan.\u00c2\u00a0 But I never believed in plans.\u00c2\u00a0 As evidenced by my lack of offspring.\u00c2\u00a0 I figured you had forever.\u00c2\u00a0 I now realize you don’t.<\/p>\n

Sometimes I feel like I’m on the pulse.<\/p>\n

Other times I believe I’ve got no idea, like after the 2004 election.<\/p>\n

Reward comes from being a member of the group.\u00c2\u00a0 But, like George Carlin, I’m suspicious of groups.\u00c2\u00a0 They end up wearing funny hats and making somebody the scapegoat.\u00c2\u00a0 And like I’ve said above, I’ve gotten enough shit in my life, I’ve got sympathy for the downtrodden.<\/p>\n

I’ve got to go to the east coast in a couple of weeks to celebrate my mother’s eightieth birthday.\u00c2\u00a0 Thereafter, it’s off to Manchester, to attend Tony Wilson’s In The City.<\/p>\n

Then it’s December and it’s Aspen.\u00c2\u00a0 And Vail.<\/p>\n

I know I’ll get reoriented, back in the groove.\u00c2\u00a0 We’ve got no other choice.\u00c2\u00a0 But I’ve gotten a wake-up call.\u00c2\u00a0 Nobody has the answers, everybody gets to choose.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s a great responsibility.\u00c2\u00a0 The sands of time do run out.\u00c2\u00a0 What have I made of my life, what do I want to do with the time remaining.<\/p>\n

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A lot of things have happenedSince the last time we spokeSome of them are funnySome of ’em ain’t no jokeAnd I trust you will forgive meIf I lay it on the line I always thought you were a friend of mine "My Thanksgiving"Don Henley Two days after I got back from Portillo a Mercedes cut […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-8A","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=532"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}