Hats off to 2023 for being a year. Some things happened. Others didn’t. It was a barrage of poignant moments begat by ever humbling circumstances. The choices made were a range from skillful to not so much. Here’s a hopeful limp across the Roman Catholic finish line.
July 4 and wake up with a chipped tooth, a couple of loose ones, a black eye, and lacerations on your face. Several months later, you’re short a front tooth, revealing a vast space the blackest black you can imagine. I swore long ago that I’d off myself if I ever lost a social tooth. But I’m still here, and with a replacement tooth to fill the void. Aging and poor life choices are too much fun, which is why it’s important to acknowledge your shortcomings, visit the dentist, and take medications only as prescribed. Take a Xanax on
La Serpiente Emplumada. It was delicious, as was the company, which I sorely miss. We both spent much of the first year and a half of her living in the building in isolation. I was dying; she was terrified and made anxious by the whole COVID thing. It wasn’t until I locked myself out of my apartment that we finally connected in a deeper, more meaningful way. A fellow Virgo, we both skew intuitive and curious about the permeable layer between what we know and see and what we think and feel. Just a few months into our blossoming friendship, she decided to move out to the ’burbs for more space, to be closer to work, and give her lady pupster more room to grow and play. As a going away, we had a taco feast from my favorite neighborhood taco spot,
jockeying for takes the wind out of one’s sails. But I’m optimistic for the future, and I know where I want to go. Join me on my journey. My current client is an education nonprofit based in Boston, and I work with a team I’ve never met except for the occasional Zoom call. Distributed teams and totally remote companies make working for anyone anywhere part of the new reality. This also means that the talent pool for each and every position includes anyone with a pulse and a WiFi connection. Jobs are filled by the time I’ve fulfilled a request for more info that came in just a half hour ago. The wasted hours, days, and months doing interviews with companies then learning of a sudden strategic shift eliminating the role I’d been
‘holon,’ which is something that is simultaneously a whole in and of itself, as well as a part of a larger whole. I said that sounded like a circumpunct, which is a dot with a circle around it, an ancient symbol that symbolizes consciousness. The dot in the middle connotates Source, the I-am-ness, the origin. The circle on the outside represents the expansion that you have done wth your soul through all your experiences and all your lifetimes. The holon in a way relates to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, representing the creation of the material world. It references Gnostic thinking and early mystical Christianity. The Lyft driver asked me what I thought the smallest thing that exists is. I said God. He said Love and Truth. He said his favorite word is
Daddy issues took center stage IRL – a married architect, the leader of a European sex cult, and a Jewish mensch all up for the title of #1 Dad. At the end of the day, I’d rather the issues find a more appropriate digital home, which is why I’ve placed them here in the bottom right-hand side of a website dedicated to 2023’s highs and lows. Estranged from my actual father since 2018, it’s only natural for me that a good amount of mentorship and care come from a father figure. Oy vey.