Tag Archives: 1985

Coordinate

Coordinate: (v) to place or arrange in proper order or position.

“Where am I?”

I find that many people spend too much time trying to figure out, “Who am I?”

There is some childish notion that we can be separate from the rest of humankind without any regard for the flow of the times, and be able to maintain our autonomy without finding ourselves lonely and out of step.funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

It is not 1955. We do not have television shows where men and women who are married have to sleep in separate beds. We are allowed to say the word “pregnant.” Chauvinism is no longer an acceptable behavior, or even one that can be winked at as just part of “human tribe banter.”

It is not 1974. We are no longer going to tolerate a President who breaks the law and tries to cover it up. (At least I hope not.)

It is not 1985. We are no longer promoting greed and believing that the AIDS virus is a punishment from God against the gay community.

“Where am I?” is a very important question. If I am not able to coordinate what I believe in some sort of harmony with the world around me, I will not only be ineffective, but can quickly gain the reputation for being bigoted and notorious.

While I am sure some people are frightened that we’re losing the moral fiber of our society, a decision was made millions and millions of years ago by a Creator—to imbue His creation with free will.

Free-will opens the door to evolution. Evolution invites change.

There is only one immutable fact: if we don’t love our neighbor as ourselves, we will always be out of step and out of time.

We must coordinate with the world around us.

To do so, we must honor where we are much more than who we are.


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Arcade

dictionary with letter A

Arcade: (n) short for video arcade

In 1985, the average babysitter cost about two dollars an hour. Usually an additional dollar was added for each child you encumbered upon the hapless watcher.

So I had three children, and that meant I would be paying four dollars an hour to have them observed by a stranger for a certain length of time so that I could escape and regain my sanity.

What I discovered was that it became much cheaper to drop the three of them off at the new, popular video arcades with a roll of quarters, tell them to spend it wisely and that I would be back in three hours.

The arcade was a tremendous babysitter–sometimes literally a hundred machines captivating the interest of the youngsters, with no sharp edges, tobacco or alcohol temptation or any danger that they might pursue mischief instead of destroying asteroids.

It was truly amazing.

I will grant you that they would come back from this experience in more or less a catatonic state of wonderment over when the next time would arrive, when they would be allowed to enter the mystical world of imaginary enemies and victories.

But it was quite pleasant due to the fact that it was a place your offspring could go which was separate from your home, and then they would depart and you could gradually nurse them back to consciousness of eating, chores and bathing.

When these systems became portable and could be planted in your house, the whole procedure changed. Once a child was addicted to video games, all conversation ceased, meals were ignored and the idea of cleaning one’s room was eschewed in the pursuit of killing Gargons.

 

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