Tag Archives: delusion

Cherry

Cherry: (n) a small, round stone fruit that is typically bright or dark red.

Rhonda wanted to impress me.

Traveling on the road, feeling young, my hair down to my shoulders, in a beat-up van, with a few songs I had written and dreams of
greatness, Rhonda had bought into my whole delusion and was along for the ride.

Our relationship was an interesting mingling of respect, lust, spirituality and availability.

One day Rhonda went to the store.

It was rather ironic that she was there because we didn’t really have any money. I had given her just two dollars–one to buy some bologna and one to buy some bread and mustard. (This was back when you could buy bread, mustard and bologna with two dollars.)

About forty minutes later she was back with the entrees, but also with a huge bag of cherries. It seems that she had arrived in the produce section just about the time that the manager was ready to throw away a whole bunch of cherries which he had over-ordered for the appetite of the community.

She saw him heading for the dumpster and she asked if she could have the sweet treats. I guess he must have looked at her bell-bottom jeans, hemp blouse and long, stringy hair and felt sorry for her.

He gave her the whole bag.

There were probably three hundred and twenty-eight cherries in there (not that I counted.)

We ate bologna sandwiches and cherries until we could eat no more. Some of the cherries were old and grumpy and others were soft and too mushy, but most of them were deliciously ripe and ready for consumption.

About an hour later, after eating all these cherries, a volcanic rumble began low in my belly, and crept its way up to my chest. Rhonda too.

We both were in horrific pain from a cherry juice hangover.

We needed to go to the bathroom, but there was no real indication that anything would happen.

So we rolled on our bellies all afternoon with a mixture of pain and gratitude over such a cherry experience.

 

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Broadcast

j-r-practix-with-border-2

Broadcast: (n) a radio or television program or transmission.

Like any good, red-blooded American, I reserve the right to have my own personal definition for words.Dictionary B

You can contradict me with Webster’s realities, but I will explain to you that the intimacy of my experience allows me to screw around with the vernacular.

Such is the case with two words: illusion and delusion.

An illusion, to me, is something I am pursuing which I do very well, and I am waiting for the rest of the world to acknowledge my excellence.

A delusion is something that deep in my heart I know I’m not very accomplished at doing, but I am hoping I will luck out and make a lot of money from it anyway.

When I moved to Nashville, Tennessee, in 1992 so that my children, who were now aging out of their teen years, could settle in and find lives of their own, I maintained one little piece of my vagabond creative persona by initiating a radio broadcast which aired five minutes a day on a local station which had its headquarters in a building about the size of six outhouses.

I was under the illusion that my talent was strong enough and my ideas so clever that they would draw listeners to this little forsaken location on the AM radio dial, and make myself well-known as an innovator.

Matter of fact, I did well over a thousand episodes on this particular outlet before sitting down one day and coughing up a hairball of delusion.

I admitted to myself that I was being clever in a vacuum.

Nobody was listening–and if they were, their appreciation was quite silent.

It was then that I had to define the word “broadcast.”

Broad in the sense of covering much territory.

Cast, referring to being thrown out there.

In the purest sense, my effort was certainly “broad” and “cast.”

But literally, it was more small and spilled.

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Biddy

Biddy: (n) a woman, usually an elderly one regarded as annoying or interfering.

Dictionary BIn the midst of a haze of delusion about my own intelligence, this morning, I once again discovered that a word that I have spelled “b-i-t-t-y” is actually “b-i-d-d-y.”

And believe you me, I have used the word.

Growing up in a small town, I was surrounded by biddies.

Even though I thought they were spelled with “t’s,” the definition held true.

There is some sickness in aging human beings that causes them to forget the total awkwardness involved in learning how things work.

  • No one is born with manners.
  • No one comes out of the womb with an understanding of how to balance a checkbook.
  • No citizen of Earth is hatched with any idea on how to handle his or her genitalia.

Mistakes are needful, obvious and prevalent.

It doesn’t take you long to silence a biddy. All you have to do is look into her past and find the times when she was irresponsible, irreverent or promiscuous.

(It’s not like any human being actually follows the Ten Commandments. We often view them, at best, as suggestions, and more often than not, as annoyances.)

So the best thing you can do as you get older is to develop a great sense of humor and realize there is no short cut to maturity.

It is a painful and clumsy walk through the thorny bramble bushes of confusion.

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Belligerent

Belligerent: (adj) hostile and aggressive.

Dictionary B

I began my journey to becoming a better human being the day I realized that nothing can really offend me unless I privately fear that it’s true.

In other words, you can accuse me of all sorts of evil, but if I have no awareness of such iniquity dwelling in my heart, being belligerent is unnecessary.

I become angry and hostile when other folks stumble upon my insecurities and speak them aloud, making me feel that I must attack them to protect my own delusion.

So for years, I was very upset if someone called me fat. It wasn’t because I was skinny, it was because every time I looked in the mirror I saw a fat man–yet felt that it was nobody’s damn business to confirm the obvious.

On the other hand, you can tell me all day long that I’m not the best piano player in the world, and I will not only nod my head in agreement, but also explain inadequacies of which you may not have been aware.

The presence of belligerence is the absence of confidence.

For when we are satisfied that all is well with our soul, it is very difficult for other people to interrupt our well-being.

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Anderson, Marion

dictionary with letter A

Anderson, Marion: (1888-1959): U.S. Opera singer initially barred from giving concerts in the United States because of racial discrimination. She gained international success and became the first black singer to perform at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City.

It is the great lie that leads to the perpetual delusion: a pound of effort brings a pound of result.

This delusion has created a society of expectant, demanding and frustrated participants who spend more time complaining about the rejection of their efforts than they do devising more intelligent angles.

When I see the definition of a pioneer like Marion, it nearly brings tears to my eyes. Not only did this woman have to go through all of the training, education, struggles, auditions and vocal exercises to become an adept opera singer, equal to those around her, but because she was a woman and had dark skin, she had to exceed the quality of her peers.

Hers was a life that required one hundred pounds of effort for every one pound of result.

I am both humbled and encouraged by such a story.

  • Humbled because I realize how unwilling I am to endure tribulation and difficulty to acquire what I perceive to be my just share.
  • But I am also encouraged that there is within the human heart the passion and energy to overcome persecution and dispel bigotry through the display of excellence.

The Daughters of the American Revolution refused to let her sing at their convention because she was black. Eleanor Roosevelt scheduled her to perform on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. It was a much better gig.

But you see, sometimes you must be willing to endure the loss of a present possibility to gain a future bonanza.

What caused Marion to do that? What gave this woman the spunk and spiritual moxie to ignore the ignorance around her and sing like a bird?

I don’t know.

But I’m glad it’s not magic. I’m glad it’s not limited to the black race or just to women.

It is available to anyone who is ready to shed the delusion of equality and persevere with great energy … by continuing to do what we do when others say we don’t.

 

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Abscond

by J. R. Practix

dictionary with letter A

Abscond: v. to leave hurriedly and secretly, typically to avoid detection of or arrest for an unlawful action such as theft.

Absconding is a three-part process. Tricky business.

First, you need a plan. Second, you need to execute it well, and third, you need to cover your tracks so you don’t get caught.

Since I never plan to apply this principle to a diamond heist, the closest I ever came to “absconding” is what I shall refer to as the Great Hot Fudge and Marshmallow Cream Caper.

When I was a kid,  during commercials of my favorite cartoons, I really enjoyed slipping into the kitchen and acquiring a scoop of hot fudge from the refrigerator or a similar dipping into the marshmallow cream.  Here was the problem: after a while, the addiction drives you so frequently to the ice box that it becomes very difficult to hide your “absconding” of the container from your mother and father, who apparently meticulously view the contents of all such treats in the freezer.

It also was difficult to take a little bit from the containers and still satisfy the itching need.

So what I came up with was … water. After an evening of absconding hot fudge from one jar and marshmallow cream from the other, I slipped into the kitchen and dribbled some water into each container, stirring them up thoroughly. It made it appear as if the vessels still contained the same amount of goodies as they once had. My parents would be none the wiser.

I can tell you that I was extremely impressed with my ingenuity. It seemed to work. For a whole week, I pursued this practice–until, on the following Monday, I went to the refrigerator and discovered that there was NO marshmallow cream or hot fudge sundae, which had been purchased to take care of the sweet monkey on my back.

I took a deep breath, trying to gain control, and attempted to figure out how to broach the subject with my parents without drawing attention to my greedy need. As it turned out, I didn’t have to wait too long, because my dad asked where the hot fudge was. My mother replied, “I stopped buying it and the marshmallow cream because they were too watery.”

From that point on, I was never able to abscond hot fudge or marshmallow cream via my silver spoon. Because to get my mother to purchase it again, I would have to admit that I was the source of the dilution.

I thought it was better to keep up the delusion.