Vote It Like You Live It

“Politics is how you live your life, not whom you vote for”- Jerry Rubin

Tuesday June 7, 2016  4:50 am

Thousand Oaks, California

I, along with The Dude and my fellow Californians, will go to the polls today and vote in our primary.

I will vote the way I have voted for the last 35 years; responsibly and  informed, choosing leaders in which I have confidence will carry America forward with experience, integrity, sound intellect and, perhaps most importantly, great heart.

This is not an easy year to do this.

One of the greatest intellectual minds of our time, Noam Chomsky, had this to say to The Guardian recently when asked how he would cast his vote in this year’s Presidential election:

 “If I were in a swing state, a state that matters, and the choice were Clinton or Trump, I would vote against Trump. And by arithmetic that means hold your nose and vote for Clinton.”

Hold my nose and vote?

Flatter me and call me old-fashioned but…that stinks.

I refuse to hold my nose. Or any other part of my anatomy, even though two of the three candidates sicken me all the way to the gutter they’ve dragged our country to during this Presidential Primary.

When it came down to choosing a candidate, I finally went with a quote I heard a long time ago about politics. Jerry Rubin, an American activist and 1960’s counterculture icon, once said: ““Politics is how you live your life, not whom you vote for”.

My hope is that he said that before he became a successful businessman  in the 1980’s.

Like a lot of the other iconic 1960’s counterculture activists.

So it’s Bernie Sanders for me. (Even though the only thing I think this country will ever allow him to lead is a Passover Seder ). Bernie Sanders’ has his aware, solutions-based feet planted in the present, with an intelligent eye towards the future based on a watchful and learned eye on the past.

The important thing is this: Voting is not only my right and civic duty as an American, it’s also my voice.

Even when nobody’s listening.

Which, I’ve learned in this life I have to make, is sometimes when its most important for me to speak the loudest of all.

The Theory of Relictivity

relic
noun | rel·ic  |\ˈre-lik\

     something that is from a past time, place, culture, etc.

Examples of relic in a sentence:

1. a crude stone ax and other relics of the Neanderthals

2. in my grandparents’ attic are many “groovy” relics from the 1960s
-Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary

Tuesday, May 24, 2016  6:25 am

Thousand Oaks, California

Would you touch up the Mona Lisa? Refinish B.B.King’s classic guitar, “Lucille”? Or rebuild the Great Wall of China?

No. You would not.

And neither would I.

Even though The Mona Lisa, B.B.’s Lucille and The Great Wall are all old, we wouldn’t, not one of us,change a single thing about the way they look. In fact, the more ancient The Great Wall becomes, the more we value and admire its ability to endure and withstand the tests of time.

B.B. King’s guitar is…well, B.B. King’s legendary Lucille. ‘Nuff said.

And The Mona Lisa only seems to become more beautiful over time, ageless in her beatific, luminous beauty.

Relics are like that. As they age in years, their value grows.

Think  fine wines, classic cars, antique furniture, heirloom jewels and vintage clothing. Even the humble postage stamp. Think museums. The fact that they’re relics is the very thing that we value, the thing that makes them so exceptional.

This is a little phenomenon I like to call The Theory of Relictivity.

And why it does not apply to you and me, to human beings, I do not understand.

And frankly, that dog just does not hunt.

At 52, I am just beginning to become aware of The Theory of Relictivity and I’ll tell you something right now, I’m not playing.

I was born in December of 1963, officially qualifying me as a “relic” according to Merriam Webster’s above definition. By some statistics, that places me onto the planet during the last month of the last year of an epic population explosion called the Baby Boom.

Being a Baby Baby Boomer started working for me in my early twenties as everyone, and I mean every fucking one, turned thirtysomething. After I graduated from college, my peer group was, for the most part, at least ten years older than I was, thereby making me the little sister to an entire generation. So I never really felt “old”.

Until I did.

Until I hit fifty.

Fifty was The Great Equalizer.

Once I passed the 50 mark there was no more JV.

We were all Varsity now.

And for me, everything threw craps at once.

My long hair turned grey. There were laugh lines. (But nooooobody was laughing.)

One morning I woke up and I could not see a motherloving thing. First came the magnifying readers and then full-blown prescription glasses which were not a fashion statement, but , literally overnight, as necessary as toilet paper.

Then the kids grew up, moved out and into their lives. And I didn’t just go through a little “Boo Hoo My Children Are Gone” Empty Nest episode. Oh no. I went through some sort of extended play “Battlestar Gallactica Super Size Me Mid-Life-Crisis War of the Worlds High Seas Adventure California King Encyclopedia Brittanica Baconator Stretch Limo Triple Venti Espresso Jumbo Jet I’m Drinking What You’re Buying Poseidon Adventure Bat Shit Crazy Fries On The Side Three Scoop Banana Split Are We Fucking There Yet” Empty Nest Syndrome kind of thing that almost killed me.

For real.

By the time that smoke cleared, I weighed 98 pounds and had almost drank myself to death.

Just in time to go through menopause. Where my ass looked like bread dough rising, the only item of clothing that fit were my socks and I was all Seven Dwarves at once, all the time, everyday. For one year.

I’m much better now.

I really am.

Like…an aged wine or whiskey. Like The Great Wall of China or The Mona Lisa.

And I’ve got me some soul.

Like B.B. King.

Hence: My Theory of Relictivity. That the older I become, the more I seem to gather real value. And the less I want to change a thing.

Because age happens.
If you’re lucky. Considering the alternative.

So don’t fucking cry.

Choose something different.

Embrace your relictivity. It’s yours, whether you do or not, just by the mere fact that you made it this far. Surviving is always a celebratable thing.

Wanna thrive? You gotta just…love the shit out of it.

My daughter La Belle, who is 25, calls this living your best life.

I didn’t teach her that.

She taught me.

I’m choosing the way of La Lucille, the way of The Great Wall of China and The Mona Lisa. The way of fine wines and gleaming antiques. I’m choosing The Theory of Relictivity in this life have to make.