Minds are like parachutes: They only function when open. If that is the case, I will probably plummet to the ground most days.
I get so locked into my routines and habits that keeping an open mind isn’t always the first thing on my list. Though every now and then, I do surprise myself. Like when boxer briefs came along and I ditched the plaid boxer shorts that my dad and uncles swore by. Credit Markie Mark for that one. Turns out, snug balls beat swinging balls between two hip-hop thighs every day. So, in that case, change ain’t always bad.
Still, some things I have never strayed from. I’ve kept that Catholic schoolboy look since the ‘70s. Part prep school altar boy, part suburban middle-aged dad. I will say that I never gave in to those white New Balance lawn-mowing shoes. There are limits and I still have some taste.
I’ll admit that I have fallen behind. The world from 1980 to 2020 moved faster than a Commodore 64 loading screen. Technology, fashion, politics, philosophy... it all exploded. When globalization pushed borders, I preferred to stand still.
I think music took a nosedive after the Spice Girls and Green Day showed up. Mtv stopped showing videos and started to make shows about the real world. Maybe it was the mobile phone and caller ID…
…that ruined prank calls and killed the landlines hanging on the kitchen wall.
That was the real turning point when I got flustered with change. That was around the time computer monitors started popping up at desks on the trading floor. Things were changing too fast for me.
I have evolved in my own way. I do like my steaks rarer now. I do try to keep my prejudices clipped and my heart open. I still say “And also with you” at Mass, even if the Church wants me to say, “And with your spirit.” That is a hard sell for this old Altar Boy.
The parachute metaphor works, but I prefer the one from my grade school gym... a bunch of kids pulling tight on a giant parachute from WWII and one brave skinny kid bouncing in the middle, trusting we all hang on. That kind of collective openness, that trust is what I miss. I wonder if Saint Basil’s had parachute accidents covered in their insurance plan.
In the end, whether it’s a parachute or a door, the point is the same.
Stay open and let people in.
Let ideas in.
Let growth happen.
And as Markie Mark once said, “it's such a good vibration, it's such a sweet sensation.”
That is the goal. Black, white, red, brown, purple, or yellow. We all got to feel the vibration. Because it is, after all, a sweet, sweet sensation.
It's Friday and it is also National French Fry Day. On a day when I use the ketchup that I don't put on my hotdog.
Go be astonished and go find Gusto.
Both can always be found with a sixteen inch sausage and a two-liter bottle of Royal Crown on a Friday night......
