Tag Archives: envision

Aquamarine

dictionary with letter A

Aquamarine (n): a light bluish-green color.

This may sound very selfish, but one of the fringe benefits of the recent civil rights afforded to the gay community (aside from the fact that we live in a free country and it was basically inevitable once the belly-aching ceased) is that we no longer have to be threatened by other men saying “that’s gay.”

It has become a taboo.

It used to be a perpetual, common horror.

I remember many years ago when leisure suits were both leisurely and in fashion, I found one at a discount store, marked down, which happened to be my size. It was aquamarine.

You see, the problem was that even though it was a much more colorful era, certain hues were still looked upon as being suspect of your sexual orientation. Add to the fact that I was a piano player, and you had the makings of a San Francisco gay parade.

Not only did I get an occasional sneer and sidewise comment, like, “Nice color, big boy,” but I also began to envision that I was being stared at by the entire world, viewed as a “man lover.”

So paranoid was I that I started prancing around like John Wayne and using the deepest timbre my voice could muster. When wearing the aquamarine garment, I was always quick to point out that I was married and had fathered children from my own manly source.

It was crazy.

Finally, even though I loved the outfit, I purposefully “accidentally” forgot it at a motel. (What I mean is, I actually did forget it, but remembered it by the time I got to the elevator and decided not to go back for it.)

So somewhere in Yuma, Arizona, there is a big fat man wearing an aquamarine leisure suit … who obviously has much more confidence than I do.

 

 

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Thank you for enjoying Words from Dic(tionary) —  J.R. Practix

Altitude

dictionary with letter A

Altitude: (n) the height of an object or point in relation to sea level or ground level

Whenever I drive up a mountain in my van, even though I can feel the strain on the engine, I am always grateful because of the perspective I gain by climbing higher.

I don’t want to become overly philosophical here in discussing things that normally can be registered on an altimeter, but there is something magnificent about increasing your vision by ascending.

It reminds me of a story in the Good Book of a chap named Zacchaeus. For the sake of the reader (and spell check) I will refer to him as Zack from this point on.

Zack was a short dude. When Jesus came to his town and Zack picked up on the energy of the crowd, he was unable to see what the source of the excitement was because of his…well, because of his lack of altitude.

So instead of bitching and complaining, Zack ran ahead of the crowd to get a better look, only realizing that his situation was not improved–only distanced. For when the crowd arrived he would still be too short to see.

So Zack did something really smart. He climbed up in a tree. He let his attitude increase his altitude. Or maybe better stated, he let his altitude rejuvenate his attitude. Because he did, Zack was able to visualize–and also increased his possibility of being seen–so much so that Jesus calls him down from the tree and spends the afternoon with him.

So what is the lesson?

If you want to see better, climb a little higher. It not only increases your own vision of life, but gives others a better chance … to envision you.