You may have seen here in the past I'm writing a book.  Three to be exact.  One is Mantrap. It's autobiographical.   I've come to realize that I need to offer the reader in that story some background.  I've been writing the back story for some time.  I'd like to share an excerpt of it.  I may share more. 

There is a reason for this too.  If you are a reader of my blog.  I've always asked you to visit my sponsors.  Well in this case I don't request that at all.  I want you to PLEASE leave comments.  I want your feedback, I don't care what it is, just offer your thoughts. 

What is Mantrap about?  It's a story of a man whom for all his apparent street smarts is used by a foreigner for the soul purpose of having an baby and leaving him.  Due to possible legal concerns that could arise from this, Mantrap will most likely have all the names and locations changed.

So with that I offer you this small excerpt from the chapter, "Younger Days" chronicling a time in my life:

Yeah my list of hundreds of girlfriends was in fact mostly a list of girl friends.  I was famous for wasting my time talking to really beautiful girls that really only needed to talk to me about music and innocuous things but never to date.  What guy hasn’t gone through this experience?  I’d say half my list of girls were those that put me in the friend zone and I was too stupid to realize I was never breaking through.

In terms of male relationships, I had a few buddies.  I wasn’t blessed with wit and the lack of guy friends in my earlier youth meant I wasn’t entirely in the know of how to manage friendships.   For instance in my  Sophomore year of school I met Dana.  This guy was an oddball.  Everyone thought he was cool by his ability to make them laugh.  He had a charisma that made him excel at using people for his own gain. This took time to evolve so early on I was his sounding board.  So I thought I was lucky when we became a duo of sorts.  He latched onto my odd interests and I was glad to have a friend.  My kick was the spy lifestyle.  I was into spies and detectives.  Not  the hokey James Bond of the 70’s through 90’s but the throwback spy. 

For me spies and detectives were the ultimate in what men could be.  It required you to be utterly self-assured of whom you were because the world around you could never know who was on the inside. 

To say a spy is a man that lives a double life is too easy.  Sure a man such is this is a cool loner.  Sure he is alone too, but a spy lives an isolated life by choice; in order to be free of confusion.  Regardless of their setting they could be in a crowd but alone in their mind.  That isolated individuality allows them to focus on seeing the world around them on a deeper level.  They could be married and their wife wouldn’t even know them.  Every word uttered by a spy is meant to protect him, his double speak keeps him safe from harm while communicating.  The lexicon of a spy is fueled by shrewd  intellect.    

Hollywood rarely captures the true essence of a spy.  These men live the greatest life of sacrifice, they do what they do for money and their country and if they are caught behind enemy lines, they are lost in time because their own country will deny they exist.   Ultimately the cool loner lifestyle has little if any appeal outside of a movie or book.  The real men living these lives are stoic.  Somehow nature programmed them to be unfeeling and without the same need for human companionship they rest of us enjoy.  

While in my opinion the hardest job in the world is that of a spy, there is also the cold hearted view detectives take on the world.  Similarly to a spy, these men are no nonsense.  Of course they have seen it all; in fact they also see things everyone else overlooks.  Oh yes, they ‘see’ it all.  A detective won’t look at a woman, he’ll hear her words.  Not just the words she says but the force of those words.  He knows if she believes in her words.     Detectives will watch you cross the room and see the power in your step, your confidence or lack thereof. 

These are the men I admired at age 16 and Dana appreciated my perspective and began to share ...    more »

Today I was at the park skating.  A friend of mine and I heading down the walk and a small child around 5 years of age runs by me.  He's crying.  My friend must not have noticed but I did. The little boy is running and crying.  I catch up with him.  "Are you lost?  Where is your mother and father?" 

He says, "I don't know."  I ask, "Can you point to them?  What direction did you last see them?"  He can't answer.  He's crying.  I'm wondering how could with so many people in the park could he just lose his parents and no one notice?  I'm also thinking about my own safety.  Here I am with a child and I don't want anyone to walk up to me and pop me in the face.   The world is so weird anymore.  I'm careful not to touch the boy but I sure felt bad for him.  Thoughts of when I was a little boy came to mind. I once was lost in a department store and they had to call my parents over the public address speakers.  I think it's happened to some of us.  And it's an emotional time for a kid. 

I begin to comfort him, "Don't worry, your parents know you are not with them and they are looking for you right now.  We just have to get you both together."  Meanwhile I'm looking for anyone to call out and take ownership of their kid.  He's crying. "Look, you are doing the right thing. You are out in the open where they can see you.  Don't leave this spot.  Don't let anyone touch you and don't go with anyone but a police officer." 

Now the park is right across the street from a state troop.  I point to ...   more »

I got to thinking about regrets.  It's important not to regret life.  Your future is predicated on your past and the path that brought you to now is worth something; no matter what bad has taken place in the past. 

However I have thought, are there exceptions?  Can there be regrets that don't change your path or leave you bitter?  I have a few.  Here is one that comes to mind:

I regret not taking the women I truly loved out to my special place on my boat when I had it.  I recall summer days when I towed it down to the Upper Chesapeake alone.  It was always a private experience, one I enjoyed -- solitude solitaire.  The simple experience of backing the boat into the water and tying off.  I'd return from the car and drift off downstream.  With the water patting the edges of the boat and my engine off I'd stand on the bow with my trolling motor silently passing the no wake zone.  Then on past the islands, under the bridge and off to the Susquehanna flats of the upper Chesapeake.  I remember a ritual I would have was listening to an especially melodic version of Sadeness Part 1 (Meditation Mix) by Enigma (now my gift to you).  I would play this as I departed, and when I returned.  Once I reached the last bridge I'd take off towards the center of the flats with the wind in my hair and the high mountainous shapes of land surrounding me.  The cliffs of Turkey Point off in the distance made me feel isolated and safe.  I remember how the water would lap at the sides of my boat and I'd read for hours.  It was my time.  I'd look up at the cliffs of Turkey Point and ...   more »

"You probably shit morals don't cha Lars."

Those are words of an old friend of mine many years ago.  A friend said those very words to me after he caught me rambling on about my faithfulness to a girlfriend I was with for years.  I was expected at the time to sow my wild oats and be one of the boys. 

I've been married one time.  I thought I married my true love.  I recall early in marriage we were on a trip abroad and my wife and I were ocean side in an expansive hotel pool.  I walked about in the water with her buoyantly in my arms throughout the pool as she laid out facing upward to the sun trusting me to hold her up.  If I close my eyes now, I can recall feeling the water up at my hips ...the feeling of her skin at my fingertips and the warmth of the sun touching her face.  Water dripping down the sides of her cheeks with her hair flowing in the water. 

There is a reason I am so descriptive.  I was in love. I spent a lifetime getting to that moment. 

I took moments and memories such as that and leaned on them in tougher times.  When she would come home from work and rage over the vacuum being left out or complain that I was home too often for her to miss me,  I would recall why I married and reasoned that I could count on her despite tough times.   I spent a lifetime looking for the right woman. One of distinction with brains and beauty, one that believed in family, one that pulled her weight and was as comfortable outside in the sun as she was inside in a dress.  There were other things ...   more »

When I was in high school I had two friends.  One was a good friend, the other one was a charismatic user. We all have those type of friends in our lives from time-to-time.  The three of us were very different.  But we enjoyed each others company.  Harmony is predicated on differences.

There was Dana, the charismatic user.  Funny as hell, could make anyone laugh.  He'd say stupid things like, "If I was a big green frog, I'd say 'what up! I'm a big green frog!'" And people would laugh at his delivery and sense of humor.

Then there was Mike.  He was a ladies man.  He nailed just about any girl in the tri-state area.  He enjoyed that recognition too. 

Finally there was me. I was a loner, a Johnny Silent. I had unusual interests.  I loved spies and detectives. I liked a movie called My Name Is Nobody. I enjoyed being unnoticed.  But I was also eager for the attention of friendship. 

The three of us met in a strange way.  I had first met Dana and we hung out some.  A lot of people tried to be Dana's best friend, but in some way I was feeling like I was on that track for a short while.  Later I met Mike separately on a trip.  He in fact didn't attend our school.  So when I introduced Mike to Dana, the three of us became fast friends.  My love for spies and detectives spilled over.   We sought out things that were spy oriented.  Once at the mall we found jackets branded 'spy jackets' which were reversible and turned into a sack.  Sure enough we all bought one.  Thankfully they came in different colors otherwise we'd have looked like fools.  We rarely if ever all wore them at the same ...   more »

Have you ever heard someone say, "I wouldn't never normally do that, except for the life experience."  Some things in life you do just once so you can say you did it.  Take for instance bungee jumping.  Remember that fad?  Everyone had to do it just once.  I never did it.  Perhaps I should have. 

But that's not to say I'm not a guy that doesn't get out there and try new things.   I'm willing to do things unconventional too.  Heck... look at how I met my wife.  It took some unusual set of circumstances that lead me to be willing and try to meet a mail order bride, but I was willing to try something unconventional for nobel reasons. 

A friend of mine is hiking the entire Appalachian Trail.  Now that is a life experience.  Very few people will be able to make that claim.  He's definitely got one up on bungee jumping.   He's doing the walk with his wife which to me is aces.  That's the way to live, have someone you care about to share the best life has to offer.  They will always have something to talk about with that experience, let alone the bond.

Some of us have never been to New York.  That is a place everyone should visit.  I'm spending my weekend there this week so that comes to mind. I have a photo with the tickets from that day in the frame of the time my son and I travelled to the top of the Empire State building in Manhattan.   Visiting special places means a lot more if you have someone to share it with.    I suppose visiting places is something you would put high on a list of memorable life experiences.    From the Great Wall of China to the Eiffel tower.  Visiting places of such ...   more »

I'm feeling a bit introspective about life tonight.   I can't say for sure, but I may have saved a life which has made me quite pensive.

We all hear people tell us, "Everything happens for a reason."  I've been considering that. 

This all started a couple months ago when little league had a First Aid Clinic I attended.   I sat in the front row thinking "I'd like to be ready if someone ever needed me."  Yet I just didn't think my time would ever come.  After all, it was a mere passing thought in a train of thoughts.

Tonight I arrive at little league for a board meeting to learn it is canceled.  I decide to hang out with friends a bit, order a bite to eat over at McGlynn's and relax at the fields taking in an evening of perfect weather.  I could have just went home, but I didn't.   An hour goes by and I'm heading back to my car.  

Suddenly two young girls about 14 dash by me and the one is screaming to her mother ahead of them, "She's choking!"  I pick up my pace behind them and her mother tries futilely to dislodge what is caught in her daughters throat.   I've run up to her now thinking this is now getting serious.  A full 10 seconds or so has gone by and she is starting to sway as if she may lose consciousness. I couldn't see if she was turning blue but I could sense the panic in her friend and mother. I step in and I give her about five hard slaps in the upper back as I learned and then finished the Heimlich Maneuver.  I stayed calm but it was like an out of body experience while it was happening.    After the second thrust it worked.  A ...   more »

Continued from My Name Is Nobody - PART ONE OF TWO

On the surface this story is simple. What attracted me to My Name Is Nobody were the many levels of symbolism and life lessons spread all over. Take for instance the story of the little bird. I posted that as an article last week for fun. If you read the article, its about a little bird that falls out of a tree. A cow comes up and drops a dung heap on it to keep it warm, then a coyote comes up brushes it off clean and then eats it. I left you readers with pondering the moral to the story for yourself.

In the movie My Name Is Nobody, the main character Nobody tells that story in the middle of the movie. He leaves Jack Beauregard in the same quandary, he says, “My grandpa said you have to figure out the moral for yourself.”

In the final moments of the story Jack Beauregard writes a letter to Nobody telling him he’s figured out the moral to his grandpa’s story of the little bird. His answer seems as relevant now as it could ever be. It’s a lesson I took with me forward through my own life.

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My name is nobody. That line seems to read sadly doesn’t it? It is far from it. It is in fact an important part of my life. It’s a line that empowered me. It offered me hope and it became a way of life for me.

When I was a mere boy of 14 I was in search of my identity like most early teens. While some boys were established jocks, some boys had scholastic skills that seemed unfair, and others had charisma, I had none of these at the exceptional level in which I felt I knew what I’d do with my life.

At best I had a love for music and sang in my bed at night. That is another story.

From an early age I admired men of mystery. Men that said little, or if they spoke, their words protected them. Two types of men that fit this mold where spies and detectives. Spies would always speak in public with words meant to communicate yet protect their agenda and identity. Little of their life was open on the surface. A spy lived a sad life however because those that loved them most, may never know them, including perhaps a wife. With detectives, they saw life through a different prism, and like spies their senses were sharpened to what they saw in day-to-day life, let alone situations that required finely tuned instincts. Spies had secret lives and lexicons, while detectives read secrets. These people made sense to me. I have always been drawn to those skills. These type of men lived a life where they were essentially unseen, could blend in and saw the world around them in a way other people took for granted. I admired spies and detectives because they were strong and comfortable with being, nobody. They live around us invisibly. They are nobody.

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Today I was just about brought to tears.  While taking my youngest son to breakfast we learned that the restaurant'scash registers were utterly down.  They could not accept my bank card. I had no cash.  And frankly, the family is in a tough state right now due to the on-going custody battle I'm still in.

I tell my son, "I'm sorry buddy, I don't have cash and their machines won't take my bank card."  He understood of course.  We walk to the car and I drum up some coins.  I tell him we may have enough in change to make due.  My son even produces one, "Here Dad, take mine."  It was a dime.  It was a humbling moment.    Damn I love that kid.

We go back inside with enough for food but not for drink.  A man and his wife that watched us leave earlier approached me.  "Here take this, I have grandchildren and they would be devastated if they had to leave without eating."  I was speechless.  I looked at him and thanked him, telling him that we only needed enough for drink but he was already turning and walking away.  My eyes welled up a bit.  Just a bit.  But I felt it.  The kindness of a stranger. I was dumbfounded.  My eyes welled up a bit and I thought, "With all I've been through, there are good people."

We paid for our meal and I gave the rest of the money to my son asking him to thank the man for what he gave and that we only needed enough for a drink.   Obediently he ran over and back.

Call me sensitive or whatever.  But it meant a lot to know people that didn't even know us were willing to be kind.  I can bear witness to ...   more »

WHERE AND HOW IT ALL BEGAN

VIDEO: Skating At Home

Some time ago when I was a boy of 14 I learned to roller-skate.  I had to.  Every friend I knew was at the roller rink.  I didn't consider the learning curve, I just did it.  By the age of 16 when I could finally drive and didn't need my parents to drop me off at the skating rink I almost didn't have much use for it.  But I continued as it was a great place to meet girls. Let's face it, I was 16.  But eventually even the lure of the female persuasion couldn't keep me at the skating rink, there was a lot of world to see and I hung up my skates for some time.  Eventually I'd learn to snow ski and later on water ski.  My strong ability to skate came in handy.  I once tried to ice-skate and found that it was not the same as skating on four wheels, this made me wary when the a new type of skate came along... the inline skate or rollerblade as many people will call them still.  They are called inline skates because the skate wheels are inline, centered under your foot.  Believe it or not an out-of-line skate has come on and they may be my next purchase, just two wheels and they are on the side of the foot.  I've listed at the bottom of this article some good skating resource links.  NOTE: Remember you don't need speed skates for recreational skating.  You don't want to jump barrels in speed skates, you only need good pads and a helmet.  You should also own wrist guards too if not round out the whole set with elbow pads IF you intend to jump, grind or slalom.  If you are learning, these are must have investments.  But I'm getting ahead of myself... let me tell the story...

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I used to imagine the Rebel Richard Bush sang about.  The young boy that left home with nothing but heart and came home a man.  The opening open guitar chords would always give my solace thinking that rebel was worthwhile.  Later the guitar work was simple and perfect, the keyboards seemed so ready for the 80's yet smooth and perfectly selected for production value.  The whole song had heart.   When Bush would belt out his passionate verse... "So be kind when he approaches.... cus that Rebel could be me!" at the end of the song you really knew he meant it, and you got the idea he really wanted that girl to take him to heart.  I hope she did.  Richard if you are reading this... you were a way cool guy I looked up to.  I hope life has treated you fair.  Your music still lives with a lot of us.   If you'd like to learn a bit more about on of my favorite bands The A's, read here.

 

When The Rebel Comes Home

 

He’s a refugee from the highway

Out there fighting for years

Whether for God or glory

He’s been traveling through his tears

He always feels like the next step

Will surely set him free

So be kind when he approaches.... cus that rebel could be me!

 

Doesn’t know the roads been dying

Dying for so many years

He’s been traveling in darkness

He’s been traveling in fear

 

He left long ago as a young boy

Left the young boy in him behind

Now his reasons for leaving

Are just a little hard to find

 

When the rebel comes home,

Please don’t leave him alone no no!

Let him rest his head on his shoulder

You can't insult this ...   more »

This is a true story.  The year was 1989.   It was summer.  I owned a small boat, a fifteen footer.  It was small runabout with a 65 horsepower engine and it wasn't always reliable but I was happy it worked the times I put her in.   I always enjoyed using it for freshwater pond fishing but it was a fiberglass tri-hull suitable for ocean or bay fishing. 

I named my boat the Malaise after a car in the Speed Racer storyline.  The Malaise (Ma Lahz) was also known as the X-3 and it was a car that when it showed up, other cars crashed, like a bad omen.  And I remember some bad luck with my boat so I thought the name was appropriate.  Not until this moment did I realize what it also meant as I pen this story.

My best friend from high-school Keith Wright and his friend Earl Parsons were with me this day.  Keith and I had been toying with the idea of forming a band.  That time had no yet come, but we were good friends that did a lot of fishing together and we went as far as to buy motorcycles so we could pal around and do day trips on them.

I had begun to use my boat to meet girls and I'd float around a lot on my own too.  It was a great time in my life.  I didn't realize it so much at the time. I recall using my boat a lot on the upper Chesapeake.  I'd put in at the Perryville Fish market which is now gone and replaced by condo's.  Kinda sad I thought when I saw it happen one summer.   No more easy access to the Susquehanna flats and no more playing volleyball ...   more »

Her name was Lisa Butler.  She was Italian, but fair skinned.  She had a real short Sheena Easton hair cut and look to her. She was about 5 years my senior and very much a dignified but sexy woman.  She was classy in every way.  She drove a Volkswagen Passat and her cloths were always from the finest of ...   more »

I just sent this story to a friend in e-mail and figured it was worth sharing. :) The photo at right is at Confetties (Keith-Guitar Chris Base, Mike-Drums Lars-Vocals & Fran-Guitar off camera to right)

I was in a Delaware band named Hard to Get. We were a 5 member 4 piece band that played back in the early ...   more »

This story is for all you men out there with kids that look up to you.  If you are a father, you should know your children look to you to be invincible.  They rely on you to be strong at all times.  About 4 months ago my son started commenting that I was not in as good ...   more »

Ever wanted to go back and impress people that didn't recognize you for what you knew you were?

I don't mean showing off.  I mean being recognized as something different than what you are tagged as. 

Guess what I was in high school.  Was a I a jock?  Perhaps I was a prep or ...   more »