[Cross-posted from Facebook.]

Law of attraction? “The Secret?”

Feh.

Nonsense.

New Age bullsh*t.

Right?

And yet…

In Rachel’s high school yearbook, in her blurb (or note, or whatever; I haven’t actually seen it), there’s a reference to the fact that, even then, she craved to live an expat life at some point. And, for the past several years, we’ve periodically discussed moving abroad, looked at professional opportunities for me, etc.

But nothing ever came of it.

About six months ago, Rachel and I had a weeks-long intermittent conversation about moving to Hawaii, where we vacationed once for a week and which we absolutely love.

Live in the tropics!, we said. How great would that be? And we could divest so much of this… stuff we’ve accumulated over the past decade-plus, and live more simply, and in a virtual paradise, with an interesting cultural history and great weather and enormous beauty. Being apart from family and friends didn’t appeal, but separation from the “real world” in both time and space did, to some extent.

But nothing ever came of it.

About a month ago, I traveled up to New York for business, and took advantage of the travel time to “mindsweep” (yes, it’s GTD/Getting Things Done; yes, it may be the front edge of what may be a cult — David Allen is a minister in the John-Roger MSIA nonsense church-thing; whatever; the process works for me) — getting the cruft that’s collected in my cerebrum down on paper and into my inbox for later processing.

Here’s a snapshot of a few of the things I wrote down in what I have taken to calling The Magical Notebook.

w of the things I wrote down in what I have taken to calling The Magical Notebook.

Exhibit A: “Live in Asia for a year,” among other things (which we hope will also come true)

Exhibit B: The Magical Notebook — a Cambridge City, 2-pack from Sam’s Club for I think $9.99. Run out and buy one today!

Katie the Dead Bride, Halloween 2008

Our daughter Katie turned eight in November. She’s a bright, sunny, sweet, sensitive, smart, funny kid.

Unfortunately, she’s had trouble sleeping through the night — and, particularly, staying in her own bed — for the past several months. Rachel mentioned this to the pediatrician at Katie’s “well-baby” (annoys her; heh) checkup.

The doc — a Brit we’ve seen since we moved to Asheville coming up on seven years ago, whom we love and who knows us and Katie very well — put that in the hopper with a couple of other ancillary issues (e.g., nail-biting; eyes often red by the day’s end), and concluded that maybe Katie’s feeling a little stressed out. Her recommendation? A therapist who specializes in helping kids deal with stress.

I’m proud to say that none of us, including Katie, reacted in anything like the stereotypical way to this suggestion. Rachel and I both believe in therapy (as long as it’s not with, you know, my PhD in psychology, completely nuts dad). And Katie seemed totally nonplussed by having someone new with whom to “discuss her worries.”

The appointment was yesterday, and it was fine. If I describe the therapist, Laurie Ivler, as a middle-aged, flowing-skirted, vaguely crunchy kid therapist, the image you get in your head is probably just about dead on. We all talked for about 40 minutes, then she and Katie spoke alone for about 15. We have a plan, and it sounds like a good one. So all’s well.

The very best moment, though, was when Laurie asked Katie about her bedtime routine. It went something like this:

Laurie: “So, what happens at bedtime, Katie?”

Katie: “Well… I brush my teeth and do my rinse. And then I get in to my pajamas. But I don’t like the pants.”

Laurie: “Do you get too warm?”

Katie: “Yeah.”

Laurie: “And then what happens?”

Katie: “Then I usually read or my mom or dad reads to me for a few minutes. And then my mama kisses me good night, and my daddy sings to me, and then he kisses me good night.”

Laurie: “And then he leaves?”

Katie: “Usually.”

Laurie: “Usually?”

Katie: “Well, sometimes they give me a pill to make me sleep.”

<silence>

Laurie [eyebrow slightly raised]: “What… kind of pill?”

Katie [vindictively toward us]: “A round white pill that tastes awful when I chew it!”

<silence>

Rachel: <shakes head>

Matt [laughing]: “Thanks, K.”

Awesome.

It’s true: Sometimes, if it’s crucial that Katie fall off early enough to get a decent night’s sleep, and she’s been having trouble, we’ll give her a half or, rarely, a full melatonin. On the recommendation of… (wait for it) her pediatrician.

In the aftermath of Katie’s little inadvertent (and, of course, ultimately inconsequential) bombshell, I remember thinking to myself, Okay, this is no big deal, but make sure you don’t overreact, or the therapist’ll think you’re covering. Wait, “covering?” My god, you’re paranoid.

In any case, we must have handled it okay. DSS didn’t break down the door in the night. At least, not that I can recall. After all, I was slumbering under the weight of Vicodin and Tylenol PM.

-=-=-=-=-

UPDATE: I just related this tale to my mom, who laughed, then told me about a similar scene with she, me and my brother when I was, I dunno, seven or eight. I don’t remember it at all, but apparently, when the social worker asked each of us to name what made us saddest, my brother broke down into near-sobs, and said, “I never get any mail.”

In 2003, I had open RNY gastric bypass surgery. “Open” as opposed to laparoscopic, which means the surgeon made a 10-12 cm slice down the middle of my abdomen. (Answers to the standard questions: Yes, it was totally worth it; I lost about 130 pounds, although have gained back about 15; no, I wouldn’t really recommend my surgeon; no, you can’t see my scar; yes, I would totally do it again, but laparoscopically, not open… see below.)

Because I’m a moron, I didn’t follow the recovery instructions closely enough — didn’t take enough time off work, didn’t take enough care not to lift heavy stuff, etc.

So, between 2003 and 2008, I developed a nice CD-sized incisional/ventral hernia in the middle of my gut — a roughly circular zone, just below my ribcage where there was nothing except abdominal wall between my skin and my organs, most notably my liver (rather than the ripped six-pack of muscles I’d had before… ha ha ha ha ha). This was occasionally uncomfortable, always weird-looking and potentially dangerous — say, in the event of a car-crash. However, it did give rise to any number of impromptu performances of an adaptation of the Black Eyed Peas song, entitled “My Hump,” so it’s not like it didn’t have its upside.

Repairing the hernia was possible, but would require a long recovery with at least 3-4 weeks off of work and no lifting anything heavier than 5-10 pounds for about six weeks, and nothing heavier than about 25 pounds for, well, ever. (So don’t bother asking me to help you move.)

When my company announced it would close for a few weeks at the end of the year, Rachel and I decided the time was right to find a surgeon and finally get the humpectomy, over the holiday. Turned out that a guy we knew through Carolina Day School, Dr. W. Alan Bradshaw, was a national proctor for just this kind of surgery — the kind of doc who attracts students from around the country to come and learn at his scalpel. The schedules worked out perfectly, and on Tuesday, 12/23/08, I went in for the surgery.

The procedure is laparoscopic, which means there’s no big incision. As I understand it, the procedure was, roughly:

• Drill a hole in the abdomen
• Pump in a bunch of air to create space to work
• Drill another hole; insert a camera
• Drill another hole; insert a little robot-arm with various and sundry tool attachments
• Use a hot knife (or maybe it’s a laser) to remove any “adhesions,” or scar tissue that prevents a clean separation between the skin/fat layer, the muscles and the abdominal wall
• Pass a rolled-up sheet of polyester mesh, significantly bigger than the hernia, through the tool-hole
• Unroll it and fasten it in place with sutures to the abdominal muscles, and titanium tacks to the abdominal wall
• Take everything out
• Deflate the patient

They wound up using the largest possible sheet of mesh — 37 cm across, which doesn’t sound that big, until you do the math: that’s more than 1,000 sqaure cm of leisure suit in my gut, man! Sutured to muscle in eight spots, and with more than 60 thumbtacks fastening it to my abdominal wall.

Hence the Percocet, which I’m basically off now, dammit.

I was in the hospital two nights (one longer than expected), came home mid-day on Christmas, and will be recovering here until I return to work on Jan. 12, and the office two weeks after that.

In time, the mesh and the muscles and the wall should sort of meld together, creating a safer and more comfortable — not to mention sleeker and more aerodynamic — abdomen, and opening up all kinds of new career possibilities: model. Belly dancer. It dizzies the mind.

Can I just say that Rachel and Katie have been amazing throughout this process? Imagine being eight years old, and not only having your daddy in the hospital in a lot of pain, but also voluntarily restraining yourself from opening most of your gifts until he comes home at noon on Christmas day.

Noon? Heck, by noon on Christmas day when I was a kid, I’d already played through and forgotten about most of my gifts.

So, that’s my story. Feel free to ask your questions below.

(If you hunger for more detail, you can find tons of disgusting videos on YouTube. This one’s relatively short, and not all that disgusting, and narrated by a Brit, so it all just feels very genteel.)

Ever get a song stuck in your head? Now, imagine having the song stuck in your head, only it’s played on multiple harmonizing kazoos, accompanied by a scowling menace in the lower-left who scats the drum part.

I’m trying to imagine the sequence of events that could lead to someone making this video.

Trying.

And failing.

Enter the Kazoo Man – CollegeHumor video.

-=-=-=-=-

I got roped in to singing with the “Starlight Carolers” (not my name), with whom I’ve been “singing” at the Biltmore Estate, at the lighting of the Menorah… er, Christmas Tree in Fletcher, NC, where we used to live and my parents- and sister-in-law still do.

It was a lot like the lighting of the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree, except that

• instead of Al Roker, we had some woman named Cheyanne who kept calling us the “Starlight Singers,” which made me feel very cheap
• instead of Tiffany ornaments, there were big plastic stars
• instead of the Harlem Boys Choir, there was, well, us. The Starlight Singers.

Actually, it was nothing like the lighting of the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree.

Our normal director, who organized the entire group and usually both gives us starting notes from a pitch pipe and sings tenor, so we other tenors have someone who actually knows the harmony to follow, was playing trumpet in the accompanying brass ensemble. So we hunted for our own notes, and struggled to hear ourselves as the bitter swirling wind whipped the words from our lips… and toward the back of the stage, away from the crowd.

It all sort of felt like one of those scenes from one of those movies where a high school band plays, and they’re really not all that good, but the crowd knows how hard they played, so they clap anyway.

At one point, just as we were starting “Rudolph,” my cell phone rang — a former colleague and good friend. For kicks, I picked up, said nothing, and we started singing. His comment after: “What the eff was that dreadful caterwauling?”

I’m sure he was just kidding.

But I’m increasingly feeling like (a) it’s much worse than I have integrated into my world-view and (b) those in charge of policy and execution are doing the same, which is (c) flirting with disaster.

It’s time they buckle down.

Maybe time I do, too.

A national emergency should be declared immediately. All three branches of government should be working 24/7 to facilitate avoidance of further economic demise and the anarchy such poses by providing conjoined leadership. A Manhattan Project Economic summit/legislation should occur NOW not later. For America to step back because of our Constitution’s dictation of January 20, 2008, for installation of PE Obama, given the current state of affairs and an uninvolved lame duck president, is pure folly… At this juncture, our government is failing us.

Krugman, O’Neil Make Dire Economic Predictions.

In the post, I mentioned the “righteous rage” I felt, and I suspect we all feel, the more we learn about what’s happened to our financial system. It’s the helpless anger we feel when bad things happen to good people (like us, of course) and the fiery vitriol that wells up inside us when good things happen to bad people (like the Wall Street CEOs).

But let’s remember a few things.

The market was de-regulated by politicians and policy-makers. They were elected, or appointed by those who were elected, by the collective us. Elections have consequences.

“Bad” decisions were made by CEOs and managers and grunts, all of whom were acting in their own perceived best interest — quarter-over-quarter, year-over-year revenue results, and revenue growth and profitability increases… because, collectively, with our instant-gratification, beat-the-market, retire rich and young obsession, we demanded it.

Those CEOs and managers and grunts were put in an impossible situation by our collective greed and decades-long erosion of the safeguards that previously held them in check. Do what’s “right,” sacrifice results, get canned; or do what’s expedient, get rewarded, and do it again.

We created an environment in which CEOs and employees could be fired for not maximizing profit. In the armed forces, it’s known as dereliction of duty; in the corporate world, fiduciary irresponsibility.

Sure, many of them got rich, and many of us have been and will be screwed — maybe for the rest of our lives.

But we were all complicit. We share the blame. And we deserve a little of that righteous rage, ourselves.

Those who have suffered an about-to-burst gall bladder and a kidney stone will generally attest that the pain of the latter is surpassed only by the former.

I have the latter right now. And, as Rachel will tell you, my pain threshold isn’t exactly legendary to begin with.

Happy Thanksgiving!

At this stage, the pain hits me in the lower back and side. It clutches the bundle of nerves in a white-knuckled fist that, no matter how I twist and turn and stretch and shift, simply won’t relax. It’s too insistent to ignore, too intense to breathe through (although I have, like a Lamaze student huffing inhalants), too persistent to ride out.

Vicodin helps, but slowly. While I await the relief, I find that the only thing to be done is… experience it. The pain pulls me into the moment, and shackles me there. The more I struggle, the tighter the shackles.

The only way to loosen them is to… stop struggling.

And when I stop struggling, I just sort of float there in the moment. The pain’s there, too, but it stops… mattering so much. In fact, the less I think of it as “pain,” the less I think of it at all, the less it matters. It still burns, but burns through. Burns clean.

It still clenches, but I slip through its fingers.

I just breathe in, breathe out, repeat.

And, somehow, I’m free.

And, really, how different is that from the pain of a declined business proposal, a marital spat, of fearing for our financial future, of feeling tiny and insignificant in the universe?

Breathe in, breathe out, repeat.

Go free.

But until then, this one will have to serve as a little bit of a catch-all.

For posts like this one, for example.

In 1989, Michael Lewis wrote the non-fiction, semi-autobiographical book Liar’s Poker. The book described Lewis’s experiences as a bond broker in the 1980s. Despite excellent reviews, I’ve not read it. Maybe someday.

I have, however, read Lewis’s excellent Portfolio piece, “The End,” about the current financial collapse. “The End” nominally profiles hedge fund trader Steve Eisman. Eisman first called bullsh*t on Wall Street’s shenanigans years ago, even as he leveraged his superior understanding into millions in profit.

If, like me, you lack a deep understanding of why the dominos fell (and keep falling), read it. Now. And enjoy the righteous rage.

• Portfolio: The End
• Wikipedia: Liar’s Poker

This is my personal blog. Although I work at, own and operate, or am otherwise involved with a variety of companies (most notably RentBeep.com, a rental property tenant-finding site), the opinions expressed here are mine, not theirs.

I’m not entirely sure what I’ll post here. Probably some notes about family goings-on, some photos, some links I find interesting… I guess the kind of stuff most people post on their personal blogs. But with, you know, that special Matt Fischer je ne sais quoi. And you get it for free. You lucky devil.