Mayberry Mourns

What a sad, sad day.
In what has to be a national tragedy, beloved actor Andy Griffith, who raised untold generations of kids with his tv son Opie, has passed at 86. I have literally shed tears as if my own grandfather had breathed his last, again.
If that wasn't enough sadness, a local celebrity (how he would laugh), has fought the great fight and lost. Ken "K.C." Carlisle, was one of the first people I had business dealings with when I moved to Dothan, almost 17 years ago. A nicer guy you couldn't have conjured.
As sad as it is, I don't think KC could have asked for better than going out with Andy. Both will be missed and probably for many of the same reasons. The easy smile, the natural warmth, and the feeling that you are among family, are qualities that seem to fit both. As much as I wish l could claim to be friends with either or both, this is just the ramblings of an acquaintance (at best) and a fan.
As a human, it makes me wonder... What legacy will I leave?
From someone who oft doubts the very existence of an afterlife, the sure confidence with which Andy sang the old standards like "I am Bound for the Promised Land", and "When We All Get To Heaven" almost serves as proof positive that he will be playing his old guitar on the front porch with several old friends tonight.
Maybe tomorrow he and KC will go fishing.

Finales, Spin-offs, and Denny Crane

In this month of season finales, I can't help but to consider the shows that last, and those that don't. The ones where you get closure and the vast majority that don't. I can't help but wonder about the shows that run past their prime, and those that "jump the shark" as it were.

If I compare my life to a sit-com, I'm long past funny, past stagnant. I've reached the point where the older couple would adopt a child. Or the smarter co-star would die, leaving a flailing, less than whole cast and a fading star to change careers and/or maybe adopt a kid.
I don't see me adopting a kid and there is no co-star, so I suppose it might be time to look for a spin-off.
New job, new city, hell if I'm lucky, maybe a hot, new co-star.

Or maybe this show has had its run. Maybe it doesn't get renewed or a spin-off. No new Darren, no new neighbor or landlord. Maybe it's time for the traveling one-man show... Shatner style.

If Kirk can become Denny Crane, and Mal can become Castle, maybe, just maybe, there is hope for a new character. Let's just hope I can skip the TJ Hooker and Drive and please, please, the Arachniphobia periods.
Kirk out...
Denny Crane.

Year of the Dork

So I'm watching TV and the disembodied voice of Tim Allen asks, "where is your road to happiness". I'm not sure what that has to do with soup but it made me think. What is my road to happiness? Did I miss the exit? Am I even in the right town? There is no GPS for the road of life but I'm pretty sure if I had one it would sound like Dean Winters in a Geico commercial... "recalculating".

I realized that I've spent the last several years not actively trying to accomplish anything, not chasing any dreams, just coasting along through life, waiting to die. I wasn't even ambitious enough to try to end it. More like a passive suicide.

Now past 40, in a dead end job and living alone, hours from the nearest hint of family, in a town with nothing left to offer, it has become clear that I have wasted at least half of my life (statistically), possibly two-thirds (based on family history).

Not only am I doing nothing, I'm not even pretending to try and change it. I've even given up the illusion that is New Years resolutions.

But I did make a resolution, of sorts, recently. I decided that I am fed up with certain things that I cannot control and fed up with the lack of action that has left me in that position for so long. I decided there were things I want to do or do again.

I had dreams once, dreams I let go of. Some I forgot. Some I gave up on. Some I just let slip away.

Once I figured all this out, I decided that whether I have twenty more years or forty, I was through just waiting for my time to be up. I do not want to go gentle into that good night. Not yet, anyway.

So I proclaimed this the Year of the Dork. My year. The year I go for what I want. The year I stop 'just being' and try to revitalize a stagnant existence. I will cast my lot into the wind and let it choose my path.

I will not take no for an answer... At least not without a reasonable explanation.