March 7th, 2025

    I came across a single mom when I first moved to Riverside. She walked past my building with her two sons every day. She was probably in her late twenties and the boys were probably five and two at the time.

I’d say hello from the balcony like I usually do with anyone that walks by and makes eye contact. We’d run into each other at Riverside Food and occasionally at the library.

Soon, I received a friend request and then the private messages started happening.

I got to know this lady and her struggle raising two sons on her own. The first sob story came right off the bat. An elaborate tale that would have made for a great episode of “Days of Our Lives.”

I loaned her a little money with the promise that I’d get it back on payday. Then another story and another small loan. It happened a couple more times and I finally made the point that the ATM was closed.

Earlier this week, I received a text on messenger. It started with small chat and went into the latest episode of “Guiding Light” that I knew was going to happen.

The story was a mish mosh of tragic circumstances that didn’t make sense, but ended with...

“I just need twenty bucks to fill my gas tank for work”

I sent her thirty through Venmo and told her that was it. I blocked her on Facebook and finally cut off this stranger that I never really knew.

I did feel some Catlick guilt, but I already have a single mother who strains my finances. I don't need another one.

Here is the reason why I sent a couple bucks here and there to this single mom.

My mom was a struggling single parent. Cecilia was always borrowing from Peter to pay Paul.

Every once in a while, my mom would receive an envelope in the mail with a return address from The Holy Spirit.

Just a plain white envelope with a twenty-dollar bill or two stuffed between a couple pieces of blank paper.

Either a family member or a friend, maybe even a neighbor up the street was sending my mom a couple bucks to get by.

Years later when I was standing next to her bed. Sometime during her last sixty days. I asked her if she ever found out who The Holy Spirit was that sent the money to her many years ago.

I was too young at the time to look at the postage stamp and see where it originated from. I would think my mom could have figured it out that way.

She laid in bed and told me that she thought it could have been one of her aunts. She also had an older sister that was a cloistered nun down in Saint Louis. My mom thought it could have been her as well.

That was the only reason that I gave this single mom some cash here and there. Because someone did the same thing for my mommy when I was a kid.

I’m no fucking Holy Ghost, but I did learn a few things about giving when I was growing up.

And I also wanted to make my mom proud of me. I want my mom to look down from heaven and see that she didn’t raise a little jagoff.

I thought today’s quote was appropriate for today's chalkboard. Even when life gets tough, we can’t expect help every time. We gotta learn to help ourselves every now and then.

Faith, Family and Friends will always cover us when we need it, but we shouldn't always expect it.

I’ll never know who that Holy Spirit was during my mom’s time of need.

I’m sure she had a few of them.

After all, isn’t that what we all are?

An extension of kindness working for a spiritual good.

When the day comes when is join my mom in heaven, we can personally thank The Holy Spirit.

It’s going to be a wintry mix of a shitshow today. Find some astonishment and be safe.

And when you figure out the grabber section…..

...Live by that principle

March 6th, 2025

 It was on this day in 2016 when my mom told me she was dying. She didn’t come right out and tell me, but by the tone of the conversation, I knew my Cecilia Marie was fighting a battle.

Sixty days later, she went to heaven.

For the next sixty days, I will take a journey to define how special the last sixty days of life is. How fragile the last sixty days of life is and how much we take it for granted.

Maybe we don’t take it for granted, but we don’t realize that it is someone else’s will that determines everything.

Every day after the market closes, I walk down to my car with my work wife.

He always says, “See you tomorrow Jumbo” and I always reply, “God willing.”

I think my mom knew on this day eight years ago that the kingdom was calling and The Big Chief’s will was being done.

Catlicks love to suffer. Jesus did it for us up on the cross. My mom suffered and so will I.

I don’t think it was the pain of cancer that hurt my Ma the most. I think she was more worried about me and not being there if I needed her. That was what hurt Cecilia the most during the last sixty days.

How am I going to suffer for sixty days?

Take away my booze, my red meat, my desserts, my hotdog, my pizza, my toast and my orgasm. That’s going to put some suffering in my life.

I’m doing it more as a tribute to my mom for all the sacrifice she made raising a little jagoff named John.

I’m going to come closer to my mom and to the faith that she instilled in me through baptism.

The Chalkboard will probably focus more on this sixty-day journey between today and May 6th.

Slap me if I start complaining about missing chocolate eclairs or hotdogs smothered in onions and mustard.

The funny thing about May 6th, 2016…

…I see my Ma more now than I did prior. I realized heaven is much closer than Indianapolis.

It’s going to be a sunny day for a walk. I’m going to find astonishment in how much my shadow has changed in the last week.

March 5th, 2025

 I went over to a place yesterday that I’ve been celebrating Mardi Gras at since the early 1990’s. I was dancing on the bar thirty years ago. The same bar that I was eating my redbeans on yesterday afternoon.

I had a hard time getting my big ass up on the barstool, I sure as hell couldn’t pull off doing the Mardi Gras Mambo on the bar today.

Besides the redbeans and rice, I had some jambalaya and an order of shrimp served over grits. I had a hurricane when I sat down and another one during my meal.

Unlike the year in the late nineties when I had thirteen Shanahan hurricanes. I only had two this year.

I had to order George a cheeseburger to take home. I ordered a cup of coffee and a piece of key lime pie while I waited for my to go order to be completed.

That was it for Mardi Gras 2025.

I got home at four-fifteen in the afternoon. Handed Big George his dinner and walked back to my bedroom.

I hung my Mardi Gras beads up on the hanger in the back of my closet. This year I grabbed my boobie beads and my voodoo doll beads.

I put on some sweats and turned on the news. Four-thirty on Fat Tuesday and I’ve turned into my Oldman.

The last cocktail that I had until May 6th was a Shanahan's hurricane. My beads are hanging up until Tuesday February 17th, 2026.

Time to kick into Lent and “The Sixty Days of Cecilia.”

Today was a boring Chalkboard for a boring Ash Wednesday.

Time may change me, but I can't trace time

March 4th, 2025

      I left you Chalkheads hanging with the Monday Morning Chalkboard. I never picked up the chalk because I didn’t know what I wanted or needed to say.

We had an interesting weekend here in the Divorced Dad District. The Shepkids mom spent the weekend in the hospital.

Hazel sent me a text Friday morning saying that mom was sick and she was worried. There was no school on Friday, so it was a good thing that Hazel was there for her mom. Hazel called 911 and was strong throughout the entire time.

The point of today’s Morning Chalkboard should be the heroic spirit shown by my daughter, but I already knew that I had a tough baby girl.

I’m taking the therapeutic angle this morning. The one that I’ve been formulating for a couple of days.

I thought about that vow that I took and how I ended up breaking it.

…in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death us do part.

I wasn’t there Friday morning for Hazel’s mom. The journey of life took me on another path, but the two trails still run parallel.

I often chalk that I just need to get Hazel to eighteen and I will finally have this lady out of my life.

The thing is, I’m never going to have the Shepkids mom out of my life. My Oldman told me on the morning of our divorce,

“Moose, be amicable with this woman and know this…..When the both of you are gone…. You’ll still be together in eternal peace. So get this crap settled honorably.”

My Oldman also told me that when I married this girl, I married her family and he was correct again. To this day I’m still close with my mother-in-law. Hell…I didn’t divorce her, I divorced her daughter.

And she has become a beacon in George’s life. Just like my grandmother was for me.

Back to Hazel’s mom. She’s out of the hospital and hopefully on the road to recovery.

As long as she and I have the three products of love that we created…

…we are together in sickness and in health.

And as much as we don’t like it, we will be doing it ‘til death do we part. We just don’t love and cherish each other anymore.

Though the fucked up thing that I’ve been formulating these last couple days.

As much as I hate her, I realized that I still love her. I don’t cherish her, but the Shepkids do and that is the most important thing.

At one point over the weekend, Hazel blurted out…. “She’s your ex fucking wife!”

“What does that mean Hazelnut?”

She angrily replied, “you don’t need to do any of this for mom. You guys aren’t married…”

That was the line that had me formulating for the last seventy-two hours.

I’m going to have this broad in my life well after Hazel turns eighteen. We don’t sit next to each other at school events, but maybe someday we will dance together at a Shepkid wedding.

We better start getting along now, because she’s going to be everywhere I turn in heaven. Which sounds more like purgatory than eternal happiness.

Speaking of happiness….

Today is The Mardi Gras!

“Laissez les bons temps rouler!”

I’ve got the beads, if you got the boobs.

Get out today and get some gumbo, drink a hurricane and join the second line.

Find astonishment and let the good times roll….

March 3rd, 2025

 

        Charlie Chaplin quote

March 2nd, 2025

 I looked in the mirror this morning and saw my dad when he was in his late fifties.

Crows feet flaring from the outside of my eyes. Three ruts along my forehead formed by the perplexed thoughts that I had. Pruny skin over my collar that is early onset gobble-gobble chin.

…and I was wearing a white crewneck t-shirt stretched out from a hard night sleep.

My dad was getting tired when he was at this age. Stressed by the threat of forced early retirement in a career that he thrived on.

Having hindsight, I can see my dad was getting warm out by the years of bowing his neck, lowering his shoulders and pushing through life’s hard days.

I didn’t realize that my dad was quickly aging at the time.

Tomorrow, I will see something else when I look into my mirror. I will see the person that I have woken up with since the 1960’s and I kind of like that sweet bastard.

Whatever we see when we look in the mirror is a fanfuckingtastic human being who is worth loving and caring for.

I know I sound like Stuart Smiley on this first Sunday of March, but I’m not bullshitting you.

Look into the mirror when you walk away from the Morning Chalkboard and marvel in who you are.

On a fun note….

Mardi Gras is this week!

Let the Good Times Roll!

Let’s go out and be Bacchus the next couple of days. Bacchus is the Roman god for good times and joyous parties.

I first met Bacchus playing quarters at a high school party many years ago. We don’t hang like we once did, but our memories are golden.

I’m going to hit it hard these next couple of days. It has worked out perfectly that Mardi Gras is right before my “Sixty Days of Celebrating Cecilia.”

One last chocolate eclair, one last hotdog, one last glass of bourbon and pint of beer. No pizza, no steaks, no sliders, no orgasms, no Alpines and not even a grilled cheese.

The biggest thing missing during my sabbatical for my Mama…

… the polish sausage smothered with grilled onions and a swipe of mustard on opening day.

Look into the mirror and be astonished in what you see

March 1st, 2025

 Let’s start off the month of March with some Billy Shakes.

It comes from “12th Night” which is a romantic comedy that involves a shipwreck, a love triangle and cross dressing.

Shakespeare is saying that you don’t find love, but love finds you. My Oldman said something similar in his Grawbowski style, “Son… you get more on accident than you do on purpose.”

He was right again…..

Spring is here and it is time to clean out the closets and pitch unused crap. You never know what you might find jammed in a box in the corner of your garage.

Maybe you’ll find love that was lost or an old watch that reminds you of wasted time.

Today is the first day of meteorological spring. The parade of newborn colorful clutter will soon explode across the fields and forests. Get your chores done early and make time to watch shit do stuff.

We share a National Day today between pigs and peanut butter. I couldn’t think of a better way of starting the month that will soon bring flowers to the corners of the neighborhood.

I mentioned toast on the Chalkboard the other day.

I’m thinking rye toast spread with peanut butter, three pieces of bacon, a mashed banana and a drizzle of honey is the best way to jumpstart March.

I’m on that somabitch right after I tell you to go find astonishment.

Go find astonishment

February 28th, 2025

 The last day of February has finally arrived. Possibly the worst month of the year and my least favorite. I like June and October, followed up by July and November. Thank goodness the worst month of the year is the shortest.

Not much to talk about this morning.

I’m probably going to watch a couple Gene Hackman movies this weekend. Forest Park Irish parade is Saturday and the Chicago Hounds Rugby Club play on Sunday down the block.

If you go to the parade tomorrow, look for me at Shanahans.

On Sunday I’ll be sitting in my regular seat during the first half, section 126, row 3, seat 22. During the second forty minutes, I like to move up to the southeast corner near the bar area.

Look for me…

Time to roll into Friday and balance geopolitics and the agricultural markets. My computer has been chirping throughout the overnight session. Hopefully the month ends will a ton of business.

Let’s roll with astonishment Chalkheads and don’t forget about the planets aligning tonight.