psychotherapy

November 15, 2026

The Importance of “Showing Up”

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Woody Allen denies he ever said, “Ninety percent of life is showing up.”

Still, someone did.

Regardless of the author, what does it mean?

It refers to taking chances and working hard; if not welcoming challenges, at least not shying away from them. They often come without an announcement for those who listen for their call.

In and out of my clinical practice, I met people who didn’t “show up,” sometimes literally. Such individuals fail to invest time and effort in therapy or in whatever they claim is important to them.

How many people say their family is the essential thing in life but allocate their hours as if loved ones were second, third, or even lower on the list?

“Showing up” means admitting you value something or someone and strive for consistency between your words and deeds. Of course, when acknowledging the worth of any goal, you take the risk that failing to pursue it, discover it, or maintain it will disappoint you.

Other self-deceptions can also motivate the failure to be present. The parent who claims his children are Number #1 might substitute “quality time” for an inadequate quantity. Providing gifts does not constitute a valid excuse for the absence of a benign and caring adult presence. Worse still is when the parent blames the young one or the spouse for his absence.

Teens are not free of their own self-willed ignorance about what they do. I treated some teenagers who denied that school mattered and didn’t try hard. In this way, they protected themselves against possible frustration.

Better to be considered indifferent than unable to “do the thing you think you cannot do,” as Eleanor Roosevelt noted. The adolescents in question armored their egos against the hurt that comes with the awareness of inability.

Some of these kids might have succeeded with sufficient dedication, persistence, and a little assistance. The decision not to “show up” became a self-fulfilling prophecy, guaranteeing the result they feared.

“Showing up” often brings unexpected benefits, as well. If people associate your face with diligence, they may give you a second look. Your effort and identity stamp you as someone reliable and conscientious.

The memory of those qualities associated with your name increases your chances of being called upon. Someone comes to believe in what you can do, sometimes even an unknown authority who has been told about you.

Is this luck? Perhaps. But by living this way, you will find yourself more often in the right place at the right time. Or, as Branch Rickey stated, “Luck is the residue of design.”

In addition, if you wish, enlist the seven Ps of military training and project management to achieve a thoughtful approach to taking on the world and accomplishing your task:

Prior Proper Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance.

This is not a delicate way to think about your preparedness for “showing up,” but it can be useful, nonetheless.

Determination pays off in unexpected ways. Countless stories tell us how bright and attractive women come to fall in love with men who, at first, make no impression.

Over time, these ladies admired the man who appeared dedicated and sincere in his pursuit (I’m not talking about stalkers). The strength of the man’s personality and the sheer amount of contact allowed her to see him in a fresh light.

Contrast this with gentlemen who are afraid to approach a woman, unable to imagine she might reciprocate their interest. The most successful suitors are those who don’t worry much about rejection, or if they do, refuse to let the potential pain stop them.

They think more about the goal than future disappointment.

There is much to behold when the sun is ablaze, but what you focus on sometimes makes a transformative difference in where you land. Too many of us become as sightless as those who are blind.

A woman I talked with at a high school reunion said that all the attractive girls wondered what they’d done wrong when the boys didn’t ask them out. Most of the young men were terrified! The ones who walked the high wire of romance claimed the field for themselves.

Fear doesn’t get you far in life. We tend to regret missed opportunities more than those we reach for but fail to grab. On one’s deathbed, no one admits, “Gee, I should have done less with my life.” The only exception to this rule of regret is realizing that you spent inadequate time with your children, a belated sadness that trumps much else.

Many tell themselves they won’t act until the moment is right, as if waiting for their feelings to catch up to their desires is a recipe for accomplishment.

Instead, events often turn out the other way around: hesitation changes over time through repeated action and risk-taking. And nearly as often, your emotions can be modified by what you tell yourself about them.

One can decatastrophize the situation by looking at it through an objective lens of reality and the lessons of history, both your own and others’.

The telescopic magnification of emotion and imagination must be set aside.

If fear prevents you from translating your values into visible effort, those guiding matters of importance might as well not exist. If your anxiety leads to avoidance, perhaps you will also miss what psychotherapy can do to put you on the right path in small steps.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is often beneficial in dealing with social anxieties and other fears, producing empirically verified results otherwise unavailable. There is no shame in having fear; everyone experiences it, and some amount of anxiety is useful. However, allowing paralyzing worry to capture all your days must be escaped.

For those who dare to face their troubling anticipations (with a bit of help), life can provide rewards thought unavailable.

Don’t be afraid to change. “Show up” for life.

Remember, “this isn’t the rehearsal; this is the performance.”

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The image at the top of the post is a reporter raising his hand to ask a question of U.S. Army General Ray Odierno at the Pentagon Press Conference on Iraq, June 4, 2010. It is a U.S. Army photo taken by Cherie Cullen.

The second image is a Poster for the Federal Theatre Project presentation of “Help Yourself” at the Musart Theatre, 1320 S. Figueroa, Los Angeles, Calif., showing a bank teller and a woman with bags and stacks of money, 1937, Library of Congress.

Finally, “The Bravery” is an album cover of a release by Kirill Fandeev. All three are sourced from Wikimedia Commons.

November 8, 2026

When Someone Uses You

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The people we think of as friends don’t always act that way.

In one case I recall, a patient of mine was in an intimate relationship with a cross-dressing man. She accepted his desire to use some of her clothes, but felt taken advantage of when he didn’t return them.

When you want those close to you who ask for your time, help, sex, grocery pickup, or loans they rarely repay, you may have a problem.

You fear losing them if you become noncompliant.

They only contact you when they need your services.

Finally, you are unsure of yourself—uncertain whether you are generous and kind rather than selfish.

Some folks treat you like a candy machine requiring no coins to deliver the product into their hands. You are thought of as reliable and uncomplaining.

Reciprocity is a word they do not understand.

Imagine you were to list their shortfalls. They might register disbelief and injury at what you said.

At your job, such Individuals might take credit for your work, blame you for their errors, and talk behind your back while smiling when they interact with you.

Sexual partners can come to expect you to make a living for them. This might involve their routine job losses, your having to supply their living expenses, and paying off failed investments.

Providing their post-high-school tuition, or their attempts to start another new, surefire, can’t-miss business that never works out, also add to the financial woes you’re expected to remedy.

Those on the losing end of similar predicaments ought first to reckon with what has kept them from standing up for themselves.

Therapists are used to encountering individuals who have long endured people who take advantage of them, perhaps since childhood.

When they begin to address these one-sided relationships, the results are complicated. They often don’t realize they will be tested as they try both to change the nature of the affiliation and keep it going on a less distressing level.

Maintaining the connection is not guaranteed.

Mark this down. Anyone making a brave, face-to-face effort to repair such relationships must prepare for the worst. Alleged friends may lean against the new version of yourself, hoping to reclaim your earlier, more docile and accommodating form.

Let’s assume you turn away from being the comrade’s private candy machine and become more like a slot machine.

The candy machine is dependable, reliable, and consistent. Every time your chum inserts his coins and makes his selection, he receives the item he chose. You are the prize he expects, not a chocolate bar.

He assumes you are at his service 24/7, without putting money into your pocket.

The slot machine is a different story.

Your thoughtless pal’s knowledge and life experience tell him that the machine’s failure to pay on one occasion doesn’t mean he won’t be a winner the next time or the time after that.

It might take him a long period of failure before he concludes that the machine is broken beyond repair. Broken from where he stands, but not for the now gifted human who refuses to be someone else’s sucker.

Do you want to be the one who waits on another when he makes a request?

Perhaps you have delivered the desired results on an intermittent (or inconsistent) reinforcement schedule. Reinforcing for someone else, not for you. Don’t do what the other asks intermittently. Doing so only encourages further requests and makes them harder to extinguish.

You used to show up and do your master’s bidding each time he asked. Now you only sometimes fulfill his needs, a choice that still works against you.

By giving him what he wants on occasion, he is likely to do two things:

  1. Try to charm you back into the dutiful individual you were.
  2. Tell you that you’ve changed for the worse, have become selfish and unlikeable, and tries to make you feel bad about yourself in the interest of your returning to duty.

Getting the picture?

If you become consistent and reliable (like the candy machine) in responding to another’s desires and pleadings, the other party will become aware that repeated requests will do no good: the answer shall be NO every time.

And once they have learned this (you will still have to hold your ground before he gives up), your peer makes fewer requests of you after the first.

But if he perceives you as similar to the slot machine, you’re in trouble! He keeps at you because he recognizes one failure at winning doesn’t mean the game is lost. Perhaps the second try will work, or the fifth, or the fiftieth.

This fellow grasps your nature better than you know yourself. He is aware that he has a good chance of wearing you down and pestering you until you are both long gone.

His assault includes threats to stop the friendship you have, so that you return to your previous butler-like self.

The message is simple. Say what you mean and mean what you say. Do what you say you must do.

Every time you give in, it gets harder because you are reinforcing the kinds of behavior in your friend that you are trying to extinguish.

It will work only if you stay the course.

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The top image is a Slot Machine by Jeff Kubina from the Milky Way galaxy,

The next image shows Two Grotesque Heads Facing One Another in a Circle by Gaetano Piccini (1727). Both pictures are sourced from Wikimedia Commons.

November 1, 2026

When Something Goes Wrong: Projection and Rationalization

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Something goes wrong. That’s where it begins. Life turns, often in small ways, not as hoped for or expected.

As a child, you lose a game you hoped to win. The paper you handed in to your teacher received a poor grade. And then–oh no–you bombed a test.

Blame the game winner and say that he cheated? Tell yourself the instructor was a hard grader? Go home and curse the other guy under your breath? Claim the election was stolen?

There is some value to this. It makes you feel better and think better of yourself. If you tell your friends and your parents, perhaps they buy into your victimization.

Of course, sometimes life is unfair.

However, adults who cannot accept responsibility are not uncommon. They blame the other fellow, project their own flaws on him, and point to the man’s color or customs.

Those who encourage such feelings can stir another’s sense of unfairness to a boil:

At last someone understands me. He knows the problem is not mine; it’s those other guys.”

Great literature sometimes allows us to learn more about such defense mechanisms and transports us into the lives of others, while informing us about our own.

Take The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. Tom Joad, the story’s hero, reframes cowardice into practicality, moves from fight to flight, and converts hesitation into wisdom; all with the help of a man who has already rationalized his own diminished life.

We rationalize because we must — to live comfortably with our motives and our choices.

We all do it sometimes, and some do it all the time.

Steinbeck’s novel is set in the Dust Bowl era of 1930s Oklahoma. Newly available machines enabled rapid, widespread plowing and cultivation of the native grass: an act of misguided surgery.

The grass was essential to bind the earth to the land. When drought came, not only were conditions insufferable, but crops died for lack of moisture. The earth became unmoored and blew away.

In some areas this “worst hard time” persisted for eight years.

Dust storms blackened the sky. The fine dark particles invaded farmhouses, killed animals, and impaired breathing. Visibility could be reduced to a few feet on a given day. The dust-occluded air produced occasional darkness as far away as New York City.

Tom Joad was a young man just released on parole after four years in McAlester prison. He killed a neighbor who attacked him in a bar fight. Tom and two acquaintances are on the land that once belonged to his family.

The Joads were evicted in a bank foreclosure. The men notice a police car coming to investigate.

Muley, one of Tom’s acquaintances, is an older man who experienced the merciless attitude of the bankers, their agents, and law enforcement officers as they evicted most everyone in the area while Tom was in prison.

The bankers and the police rationalize as well.

He and Tom talk about the vehicle heading in their direction:

TOM: We ain’t doin’ no harm. We’ll jus’ set here. We ain’t doin, nothin’.

MULEY: We’re doin’ somepin jus’ bein’ here. We’re tresspassin’. We can’t stay. They been tryin’ to catch me for two months. Now you look. If that’s a car comin’ we go out in the cotton an’ lay down.

TOM: What’s come over you, Muley. You was’nt never no run-an’-hide fella. You was mean.

Muley agrees with Tom that he is not the same man he was. Changing conditions changed him. He knows Tom’s nature is to fight, especially on the land where Tom grew up. Muley also reminds Tom of his parole. Any “trouble” and he will be sent back to prison.

TOM: You’re talkin’ sense. Ever’ word you say is sense. But, Jesus, I hate to get pushed around! I lots rather take a sock at Willy.

MULEY: He got a gun. … He’ll use it cause he’s a deputy. Then he either got to kill you or you got to get his gun away an’ kill him. Come on Tommy. You can easy tell yourself you’re foolin’ them lyin’ out (in the cotton) like that. An’ it all just amounts to what you tell yourself.

Landscape

Indeed. Tom follows Muley’s advice to hide from the police rather than confront anyone.

As with other (mostly unconscious) life strategies, the way we explain our behavior to ourselves can help or harm. Some of us automatically rationalize so many choices we lose touch with who we are and how we hurt ourselves and our fellow man.

Others reflexively come to unnecessary and unflattering conclusions about their deeds. They blame themselves and interpret events in a self-deprecating fashion.

In effect, each of us has our own internal “make-up” artist. It is the part of us who tries to put a “good face” on the reasons we do what we do, the better to look at ourselves in a friendly mirror: one not too revealing of uncomfortable defects.

Think of a situation in which you fail to achieve your goal. Many explanations are available:

  • I’m a loser. (Here you’ve taken a single disappointment and indicted your entire being and character).
  • It was his fault. He was unfair. (In this example, right or not, someone else is blamed).
  • This is a temporary setback.
  • Perhaps I need to approach situations like this differently. (Possible adaptation and learning come into play with this explanation).
  • I did the best I could. (Defeat is acknowledged, but there is also a self-comforting understanding of the event).
  • “Every knock is a boost.” (This was one of my dad’s expressions. He reinterpreted his defeats as exercises in strengthening his character.)

Many other examples might be offered. Cognitive-behavioral therapists help patients reframe their beliefs and assumptions about themselves and the world. They hope to free clients from self-damaging “self-talk.” CBT counselors encourage a reality-based yet adaptive approach to thinking about and explaining our behavior to ourselves.

You and I are left with the question that Muley raised in his conversation with Tom: what do we tell ourselves?

Something to think about.

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The top photo is titled Dust Bowl, Oklahoma. It shows a “father and sons walking in the face of a Dust Bowl storm in Cimarron County, OK,” April 1936. The picture was taken by Arthur Rothstein. The second image is Dust Storm Near Beaver, Oklahoma; July, 14, 1935. Both are sourced from Wikimedia Commons. If the Dust Bowl is of interest, you might want to watch The Grapes of Wrath, the 1940 movie adaptation of the Steinbeck novel. Henry Fonda stars as Tom Joad. The film is widely considered one of the 100 greatest American films. The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl is a terrific oral history of the period written by Timothy Egan. Finally, don’t miss Ken Burns’s documentary, The Dust Bowl.

October 25, 2026

Being Remembered

What might it be like to be a ghost? In addition to witnessing the future, you would discover what the living talk and write about. Not their legacy, but yours, once you are gone.

Will you be remembered? Did you leave a mark on the world? Did the impact of your existence last only as long as it took you to write your name on the ocean’s sandy shore, gone once the tide came in and erased it?

When we were both 16, a friend of mine hoped for more. “I want to do something great in my life,” he said. His time on earth did afford significant acclaim as a college professor who won awards for his teaching. Students thought the world of him, and he wrote a couple of books and many journal articles, though they were not widely read. In his eyes, none of this reached greatness. 

The importance he placed on lasting fame became a kind of self-torture, though he didn’t intend it to. 

While he focused on reaching the top of the ladder, his family, friends, loving wife, travel, and comfortable home were insufficient to free him from his fixation on an imaginary, unnamed achievement. 

What about you and me? Well, your children will remember you if you have them; your grandchildren too, if you are given enough life and the opportunity to connect. There will be videos and photos, but no guarantee that they will be perused. 

Many incidental traces of your existence might be put in a box or on a thumb drive. 

A lock of hair and the sound of your recorded voice will last, while the scent of your skin and the fragrance you applied to your body will fade, along with your embrace, and all the kisses, laughter, and smiles that enriched your being.

If you showed kindness and helped others, worked to repair the world, were a transformative leader, or pursued a helping profession, you will be remembered by some of those lucky enough to benefit from your talent and effort. Of course, expert teachers cause ripple effects that extend far beyond the students’ presence in their classes.

Past two generations? Unless you achieved lasting fame, time will likely render your name one of those little recalled. Nonetheless, you needn’t succeed to fashion a name that survives beyond you. Sinners as well as saints also make their mark. 

The drama of your story, the laughter, the pain, the tears, the joy, the gain, and the loss will vanish unless you write your autobiography. No formal scorecard of your life will exist unless you were a professional athlete or Olympic champion.

Ah, but there are exceptions. My friend, Tom Saler, wrote a book about the symphony and opera conductor Carlo Maria Giulini. It is still in press—the only English-language biography of the remarkable man whose life he described. But do note that it is Giulini’s life that is examined, while the writer’s life is not well known.

I expect Tom’s name to survive. That, by itself, is remarkable.

Many of us have created resumes or CVs (Curriculum Vitae). These offer an academic and professional history of a life, but are impersonal. They list one’s surface accomplishments such as university degrees, jobs held, honors, essays, and published research. Job applicants are expected to provide this to their prospective employer, typically a page or two.

Regarding books and the capture of how one moved and spoke, video interviews and memory compilations like Storyworth have become popular, often as gifts from adult children. The loved one chooses questions for the parent to answer, one per week in written or recorded form. After a year, a book is created. 

I have written one of these myself, 400 pages worth.

Why? 

For my children and grandchildren, no one else. 

This is not to keep anything from others. Beyond some of my blog followers and friends, however, I doubt anyone else will care about my thoughts on the time I lived in, the life I led, the things I accomplished, and where I found meaning as the days of my life dissolved. 

Much of what is in the book will not surprise my blog followers. The difference is that some of what I have written for my children and grandchildren is more personal.

None of this means I have dismissed the accomplishments of my working life. I am happy I achieved what I did and believe I have been a lucky man so far. Why “so far?” The ancient Greek sage Solon reminded Croesus, the wealthiest man in the world, that one should never call oneself fortunate until the very end.

I never anticipated the doors that opened for me, but I had the wisdom to walk through them and try to remold myself as I came to understand my weaknesses: what I didn’t like about myself. 

That is part of my story too, but the actual achievements are not much thought about by me. They are in the past, a place I do not now inhabit. 

In the present, I am more focused on the modest amount of time ahead and on what I can do to make the world a little better. Of course, I expect to maintain the relationships I’ve had for many years for as long as possible.

As you might have concluded by now, I am comfortable with the notion of fading away once I pass away. 

Never did I hope to become Napoleon or the aforementioned Giulini. What I have done is more than enough. 

From my perspective, I lived through the best moment in world history in the right country, a land of opportunity and safety, though, regrettably, not for people of color. 

My parents’ modest income was not an impediment to attending fine universities and a splendid graduate school. 

I made marvelous friends and held on to many of them for most of my lifetime. Love pursued me from an unexpected place, and within the family, my wife, children, and I fostered abiding affection. 

My life was crowned with the people I touched and who touched me. I evaluated close to 3,000 individuals and joined others in the shared effort to improve their lives. Some of these folks taught me more than a little about bravery and resilience. I was privileged to receive their emotional openness and trust. 

Over more than twenty years, I had the opportunity to record interviews with many of the men and women of the Chicago Symphony. Their voices and mine live in the Chicago Symphony archives. 

In the recent past, I have decided to say some things to friends—things I have not told them before. It is the why and how of my appreciation of them as we sit together at breakfast or lunch. 

None of us can predict when our end will come. Best to communicate to those we care about why they are precious. 

Were you to ask me what has been the most essential element in my life, I would say it without hesitation: time. The time to do the things I have done, to make mistakes and try again, and to encounter the people who made a difference to me. 

Beyond that necessity there is something more. Should you wish to hear what is most important in the life I have led and am leading, the answer is simple: love.

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The first image is “Coming into Miami Last November from Argentina “ by Laura Hedien, with her kind permission. The last is Mucha’s 1905 Madonna of the Lilies.

October 18, 2026

Homecoming

We invest a lot in the idea of home. Even if we don’t think about it, the old residence claims us. Our roots are to be found there—the place where some of our most intense experiences and feelings occurred.

At its best, “There’s no place like home.” At its worst, no dwelling is as destructive. I’ll address both sides, in order.

Our neighborhood is the location of firsts: the first place we lived, the first day of school, our first friends, our first love, our first victories and failures.

One of my best memories came early, when I had my mom and dad to myself much of the time. The folks and I went to a drive-in movie (a spot where you enjoyed films from your car, parked in a giant lot in front of an enormous movie screen).

The film was The House of Wax. It was summertime in 1953, and I was six years old.

I was small enough to lie across the car’s back seat (in the time before seat belts). Sleepy after a long day of play, I half-listened to my parents’ conversation as we returned home.

The rhythm of the car and the sense of safety that comes from the illusion of parental omnipotence and perfect benevolence made me feel as happy as I ever have been.

My bed beckoned, waiting for me in the refuge called home.

They sing songs about love, and almost as many about the innocence of such experiences and places.

Remember Homer’s Odyssey? Odysseus is sidetracked on his return from the Trojan War.

Over 10 years, he escapes the Cyclops, the Sirens, and all manner of trials and nemesis to return to Ithaca, his kingdom. His wife Penelope waits for him, fending off the advances of suitors who want her (and Odysseus’s estate) for their own.

Telemachus, his son, also waits. When Odysseus reaches Ithaca, he must battle the suitors and defeat them with the help of his only child.

Mankind hopes for family who will take our side. These are the relatives and friends who remember us and will always be there for us. People who have unending faith in us. People who love us and still exist in a place called home, long after we departed.

Think of The Wizard of Oz. It’s the same story, with a young woman, Dorothy, as the heroine.

Swept away from home by forces beyond her control, she searches for allies to help her find the “Wizard of Oz,” who can transport her to Kansas. Similar to Odysseus, she encounters an evil witch who makes her life miserable. Dorothy must survive many trials to return where she belongs.

Many of us, properly motivated, might write an autobiography about our quest for something worthwhile and the hurdles we overcame to reach a happy ending. The average life can have a heroic quality.

At last, Dorothy finds herself returned to the family farm in Kansas, where Aunt Em, Uncle Henry, and the people who love her reside. The movie ends with her words: “There’s no place like home.”

When comfortable, we often say we feel at home. In baseball, our goal is to score more runs than the opposition. How? By crossing home plate more often than they do. Doing it at one blow is called a home run.

Sports teams play better on their home field, supported by their loyal fans, stand-ins for family. And a part of our heart breaks when the stadiums of our youth are torn down and replaced.

We go to high school and college homecoming and to class reunions to encounter the old, friendly faces tied to us by the memory of home. Of course, these places and people age, but we still care about them.

Home is a place most humans idealize. Parents are rarely as perfect as we imagine them to be in retrospect. The good old days improve with age and distance.

The home (and the family therein) can also become a concept that is (like politics) “the last refuge of scoundrels.” In corrupt families, loyalty is placed above morality and decency. One member of the home covers for the others’ hateful, abusive, or illegal actions.

In such situations, the authority of parents, in particular, will trump any possibility of fairness.

Denial reigns in this group of blood and bloodied relations. Pity the individual who comprehends things as they are. The clarity of his vision requires that he be treated as an outcast.

Home and family have such a claim on us that we do not always recognize their dark side.

Blood relatives who are cruel, abusive, or dishonest demand the illusion of a loving group for fear of losing control and being exposed. Some other members, usually children, can be comforted by accepting that view to the point of moral blindness.

Unlike the Wizard, an unmasked kinsman, the scoundrel behind the curtain is not benign.

The loyalty, love, and attachment attributed to family are fitting for those who demonstrate caring and affection, not make-believe. In those families less satisfactory and less honest, most of a lifetime can pass before realizing what home was really like.

Home, then, seems like a den of thieves.

Harold Pinter’s play, The Homecoming, lifts the veil on such a place.

Watch it only if you dare.

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The first painting is Your Hands are Like Two Shovels, Digging in Me, 2021-22, by Julie Mehretu. The second is Untitled by Joan Mitchell, 1959.

October 11, 2026

A Contemporary Reason for Amusement

Time for entertainment amid moments of hopeful anxiety. Let’s start by getting our vocabulary straight. The least I can do is help you understand what you are worrying about with a little laughter.

Here is some amusement to bridge the gap to brighter days.

The Supremes: 

In the recent past, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court expressed concern over the Court’s loss of popularity among his fellow citizens. Mr. Roberts need only consult one of the Supremes’ greatest hits, “Where Did Our Love Go?

Diana Ross will explain it as we dance.

Electoral College:

Male virility and dominance of women are much discussed among those who believe the Bible requires godly designed inequality of the sexes. Some clergymen point to God creating a woman out of Adam’s rib as evidence.

When the plan leads to family wreckage, however, the supposedly superior gentlemen should be required to apply for admission at an electoral college or The University of Escape from Misguidedness.

The faculty is made up of women. Sadly, few testosterone-laden fellows pass their tests, despite needed education to pound home the idea that the fair sex is first class, not a group of runners-up.

Condominiums: Many parts of the country are short on affordable housing. Some poorly educated politicians, however, do not think more condos will solve the problem. They tell us we have plenty of condoms already, having mistaken condoms for condos.

House of Representatives:

A name change is in order: the House of ill Repute. The Speaker of the House’s primary interest appears to be ending workdays before he and his colleagues do any work.

Artificial Intelligence:

Yuval Harari — writer, historian, and public intellectual — believes we humans act stupid. He points to the human tendency to make mistakes despite warnings.

Take Artificial Intelligence. These talented, nonhuman agents are taking independent actions not programmed into them and risk causing far more damage unless put on a leash. Mary Shelly’s character, Dr. Victor Frankenstein — the man who made the monster — would understand.

The Scent of the Senate:

We search for wisdom, but often find bad sense or none at all in this hallowed hall. Many monied senators wear expensive if empty suits.

The Wizard of Oz did the casting. The scarecrow lacks a brain, the Tin Man searches for a heart, and the Cowardly Lion—well, you grasp his nature. Though he is short on courage, the beast sustains the bad habit of leaving his droppings all over the place. No wonder some think it stinks.

White Christmas Nationalism: 

Here is a remedy for those misguided enough to believe this country was founded by men who wanted white Christians at the top of all important lists.

Perhaps they can be persuaded to accept a less off-putting prize. Doubtless, those who ruined the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool can be engaged to spread fake snow to cover Washington, DC if the real thing doesn’t arrive on its own.

We do lack authenticity in lots of our leading politicians, don’t we? Will they fathom the difference between the fake and the real? I imagine it is all news to them.

A Little History:

The famous newsman for the Baltimore Evening Sun, H.L. Mencken, believed it to be difficult for a bright and decent man of the people to be elected to a worthy office. He thought of the average voter as a part of what he called “the mob.” The following comes from his column of July 26, 1920, over 106 years ago:

“The larger the mob, the harder the test. In small areas, before small electorates, a first-rate man occasionally fights his way through, carrying even the mob with him by force of his personality. But when the field is nationwide, and the fight must be waged chiefly at second and third hand, and the force of personality cannot so readily make itself felt, then all the odds are on the man who is, intrinsically, the most devious and mediocre — the man who can most easily adeptly disperse the notion that his mind is a virtual vacuum.  

“The Presidency tends, year by year, to go to such men. As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.”

Might it be time to prove Mencken wrong?

“Live Long and Prosper”

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The black-and-white photo is of H.L. Mencken. It is sourced from the Library of Congress.

October 4, 2026

Stupidity Takes Over — My Own

I did not expect to write anything like this until today. I might as well make my humiliation public. At least a little bit. But the whole story needs some juice, and it’s not quite ready for that.

Here is what I can say. I made a mistake that has a temporary cost. I injured myself, but the blow is mostly to my ego. Luckily, I still have one.

So what can I tell you?

Here are some hints.

I will offer two pictures, one of which will suggest part of what happened, while the other might reduce future opportunities for events such as the latter.

Consider this an opportunity to stretch your brain a bit. For me, it was a learning experience. Funny how one moment you are standing up and the next you are down for the count.

When I have more energy, I might give you the whole story.

A tough road, but I imagine I will find laughter along the way. Indeed, I already have. As the comedians like to say, comedy is tragedy plus time.

Don’t worry, there was no tragedy here. I am still writing, walking, and talking, after all.

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I don’t have the source of the first image, but it was provided by a friend. Thanks, Greg! The second photo appears to be from Indonesia and has no identification. This is how it is described:

“Me on March 17, 1987, at the age of 21 months….” There is a bit more, but it would give you too much information. A handsome young boy. The source is Wikimedia Commons, if you care to search. Obviously, it is someone I don’t know.

September 27, 2026

Self-Defeating Behavior and the Path to Loneliness

What price would you pay to be extraordinary?

I will tell you a story of one young woman who paid that price and then some.

She offered an example of how we sometimes defend our self-image at the cost of our happiness.

She was a patient of another psychologist; I filled in for her treatment needs for more than a decade whenever he was on vacation.

Gloria (not her real name) had a tragic early life. Victimized by her parents’ verbal and physical abuse and neglect, she became an easy target for schoolmates.

This woman was unfortunate to be born with below-average intelligence. Her movements lacked grace, and her facial features were unattractive. But Gloria could be sweet and engaging, able to approach strangers and make conversation no matter her long history of rejection.

Even with multiple disadvantages and misfortunes, Gloria, by the time of middle age, might have had a pleasing social life except for one thing: she believed herself to be the world’s unluckiest person, the record holder for having suffered the greatest misfortune in the planet’s present and past.

Moreover, she felt compelled to recount her tale of woe to those she met—too much and too soon.

The outcome was predictable. They shied away from her, rejecting her once more, and adding to her claim as the most ill-treated human in recorded history.

I am not exaggerating here; I once asked her to compare herself to various martyrs and sufferers of tragedy. The list included those who had been tortured, casualties of natural disasters, concentration camp victims, Jesus on the cross, and those plagued with disfiguring and painful illnesses.

My sometimes-client assured me her lot in life was far worse than any of them. Justice therefore required strangers to provide the understanding, sympathy, and support she lacked.

Gloria pursued comfort and affection with a vengeance, insisting on what she asserted was her due. Her sense of entitlement, her demand that humanity should and must deliver it, drove people away as she strove for the love she had never had.

This woman’s therapist explained to her the self-defeating nature of this strategy, and the need first to establish relationships based on something beyond the other’s willingness to listen to her sadness and anger.

His patient didn’t accept it. The world and the rest of the human race owed her devotion (so she presumed); the sooner, the better, and it was only fair to expect them to deliver what she wanted.

Gloria understood that people might lack patience or interest in accepting her premature self-disclosure. As a consequence, you might well ask, why did she repeat the same behavior with the same bad results? Why not try something different?

After much reflection, here is the best answer I can offer.

First, Gloria’s desperation, neediness, and hunger for affection made it impossible for her to restrain herself from lunging at the thing she desired. More importantly, the one thing the client valued above everything else was her self-appointed status as The Most Unfortunate Person in World History.

Now, you might say that you wouldn’t want that particular title, but think about it.

I suspect that designation gave Gloria the only form of distinction possible in her life.

Without it, she became no more than a sad, angry, lonely, unattractive, unaccomplished, anonymous person. With it, however, this individual enlarged herself into someone exceptional, who stood out from the crowd, a noteworthy presence, the most remarkable one in eight billion souls.

The nourishment she received from licking the wounds attendant upon this awful position in life provided her with some solace.

Gloria, I imagine, if she is alive today, would deny my explanation of her misguided conduct, and I cannot promise it is accurate.

Let me ask you this:

Have you encountered acquaintances, friends, or relatives who persist in undermining their own happiness, regardless of the advice, therapy, or wise counsel offered by others?

Have you sometimes wondered why they do so?

Often the answer isn’t “logical” in that it doesn’t “make sense” from an intellectual standpoint. It might be emotionally convincing, however, as I believe it was for Gloria.

If, deep inside, she didn’t think the life she wanted was within reach, her actions suggested that she had found a method, however troublesome, to give herself the internal recognition it wouldn’t otherwise supply.

Gloria was dealt a bad hand in life. Her response to that deal of the cards is instructive. She chose a dreadful fantasy, a story about herself that compensated her for her adversity, even as it fueled her continued loneliness.

Perhaps, on balance, her invention of a notable identity compensated her enough for all the rest.

Was she “crazy?” She certainly was diagnosable, but we all make repeated missteps in life.

Others in our lives, past and present, deserve some compassion. Maybe even the kind Gloria wanted.

Before you condemn her, consider whether pity might be a better choice.

Gloria would have appreciated that.

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The top image is a Young Queen Elizabeth (1952), charcoal pencil on paper, by Darey popoola. It was sourced from Wikimedia.com

September 20, 2026

Love Letters Once More*

A pity. The age of instant electric communication has robbed us of one of the most touching ways to express the heartache — the exquisite pain — of a love who is out of reach.

Over 70 years ago, only a letter (or a then-expensive telegram) made it possible to contact one’s far-away love.

Such was the case for my parents during World War II.

Spouses in marriages that age well tend to retain very fond memories of their early days together. Whenever I saw a new couple in marital therapy, I asked them how they met and what drew each to the other.

If the relationship still had “life,” these questions invariably warmed the conversation. The partners retained enkindling memories of the “honeymoon” period. The spark of that early time — “the days of wine and roses” — continued to fuel their relationship.

My father entered the U.S. Army on December 12, 1943, and was honorably discharged in March 1946. Most of that time was spent overseas, in places like England, France, Luxembourg, Belgium, Switzerland, and Germany. The day he and Mom received the news of his inevitable departure for wartime Europe, she was attending her cousin’s wedding.

The tears that everyone thought reflected her response to the marriage ceremony were about something else entirely.

—

I don’t have any of my mother’s letters to my dad, but only some of those he sent to her, mostly as World War II was dying down. They married late in 1940, so their relationship was still fresh when he left for the European theater.

His April 1, 1945 letter includes a dried-out daisy that he picked for her in Paris. His words surely reflected the thoughts of many that day:

My Adorable Sweetie Pie,

This is Easter Sunday and everywhere in this world people have gone to church to pray that this terrible war will soon be over. I, too, hope so for many reasons, but mainly that I can return to you and stay, and that (my brothers) Eddie and Harry need not be exposed to any more danger. Do the folks know about Harry being wounded? I hope not…

It ends:

Do you know, sweetie, that I’m simply wild about you. Gosh, I love you so. Great big kisses and hugs from the lonely husband who loves you.

My dad’s letters frequently tried to cheer up my mother. She lived with her parents for part of this time, and my future grandparents were no love-match.

Many people believed the war would go on for years more.

My mother’s only brother was eventually drafted and put in training for the invasion of Japan. That event never occurred, of course, as the Japanese surrendered after Hiroshima and Nagasaki were destroyed by atomic bombs.

Stateside, it was well known that many U.S. soldiers were not faithful to their girlfriends or wives back home. My mother must have expressed such a concern in a letter to which my father responded on April 4, 1945:

You signed this ‘Your Best Sweetie,’ but it should have said ‘Your Best and Only Sweetie,’ because that is what you are. Does that answer your question? And now to answer your air mail of March 13th. It started with that gorgeous poem about Spring and, gosh sweetie, it gave me goose bumps to know that ‘the day I return will be your Spring.’

Victory in Europe came on May 8, 1945, but my father would remain there until late February of the following year. The time passed slowly for both my parents-to-be, as noted in his missive of June 18, 1945:

I know I could perk up your morale if I came home, but they won’t let me just now. I know, too, how much your heart and body ache for me because I am undergoing the same each and every minute. You are vital to my complete happiness.

My mother suffered from tuberculosis before my folks were married. It would recur again in the 1950s. My dad was mindful of the fragile state of my mother’s health:

Sweetie, you are working much too hard for a little girl who isn’t well and you must cut it out. Gee, I wish I was around to protect you and snuggle you in the thunder and darkness of the rain.

Poor darling, you even talk to my picture, begging me to come home, and how I wish I could answer that I’ll be home in a few hours or days or weeks. But it will be a while yet and we must just be patient and hope and pray it will be very soon. The good God above must see how hungry and helpless we are without each other and I am sure He will answer our prayers soon…

All my love belongs to you, sweetheart, every drop of it.

Dad’s letters talk of many different things: day-to-day life in the Army, the problem with officers, places seen, family matters, army food and the much better food they sometimes had after Germany’s defeat, gifts and money he was sending Mom, the progress of the war, the first Bastille Day after Paris was liberated (at which celebration my father was present), and even references to the children they hoped to have together.

On July 9, 1945, my dad sent Mom a page from the Army’s magazine Stars and Stripes. That portion of the magazine featured pencil drawings of the beautiful women at the Folies Bergère, a famous Parisian show featuring popular entertainment and scantily clad female performers. On it he wrote the following:

This will give you an idea of what the Folies Bergere is like. I’d rather look at you, though.

Not everything my father witnessed brought a smile, however. This comes from October 19, 1945:

We have two colored boys (black men) in our convoy, who were carrying our postal equipment. When we went to supper here in Germany, the Sargent who ran the mess hall made them eat in a separate room. The colored boys were fighting mad for which I can blame them little. I complained about this treatment to the mess Sargent, who said that the First Sargent had made it a rule. I went to the latter and told him off plenty (my dad was by now a Staff Sargent). His answer was that I didn’t have to eat in the mess hall either if I didn’t like the rules.

So this is for what we fight. I finally talked to the colored boys and pacified them somewhat.

On February 14, 1946, the end of the seemingly endless wait to return home was near. By now, Dad had been 11 days in La Havre, not yet assigned to a ship for his cross-Atlantic voyage:

Well, at least I will be with you soon and I know ‘wonderful you’ are waiting with all the love and devotion a guy could ask for. I love you, sweetie.

On February 26, after 12 more days in La Havre, he was headed home.

—

In the mid-1980s, 40 years after these events, I asked my 75-year-old dad what it was like the first time he saw my mother again. His most moving recollection wasn’t their actual reunion; rather, it was the first time he heard her voice when he called her on the telephone, just after he arrived in New York.

His voice cracked as he described that moment, and tears came to his eyes.

Soon after calling, he must have written her this postcard:

My last letter to you. From now on I’ll tell you in person. Gosh, it will all be so wonderful soon.

Here’s to the soldiers, women and men, who have taken Dad’s place in the Middle East. May they too come home safely and soon.

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*I have posted this previously. As you can imagine, the story it tells continues to touch me. I hope it does the same for you.

September 17, 2026

The World We Choose to See

Late in his life, Francisco de Goya created La Riña. The painting shows two men, stuck in muck and mire, attempting to beat each other with clubs.

What is stunning about the composition of this one of his 14 black paintings is how it contrasts the brutality of the antagonists with the staggering, sectionalized beauty of the landscape they inhabit.

When you study a mural, what do you attend to? Much depends on what you wish to encounter.

I have been in galleries where some people give towering art little time, while others spend 30 minutes before the same vivid creation.

One might say such choices depend on individuals’ education and experience, and you might be right. Or perhaps the day could not encompass all the museum’s magnificent holdings.

But let’s think about this Goya canvas differently—darkness and light, richness of color, too. The men, armed with cudgels, face off, focused on nothing but each other.

Imagine you could remove the fighters from the picture and step into a fast drive through the countryside. Wouldn’t you miss the staggering beauty of nature’s gift?

Much depends on what one wishes to find, what one doesn’t, what one treasures, and what horrifies one to the point of tears.

Humanity lives in a tension between enlightenment and ignorance, necessity and flight, courage and cowardness, and happiness and unhappiness.

These individuals, too, do not recognize the sublimity of their surroundings or value it enough.

The risk includes the destruction of irreplaceable humans and a paradise vulnerable to erasure.

Steve Schmidt, a man of no small intelligence and insight, reminded us this week:

Each generation receives civilization on loan. Its obligates us to preserve it, strengthen it, and pass it forward.

Consider this an opportunity.

Yours and mine.