Hugging the Homeless

 

hug - verb - to embrace someone with one's arms; to express affection (Google).

Just in case you didn't already know, one hug can make a huge difference in the quality of life. Remember the adage, "An apple a day keeps the doctor away"? Well, sub in "hug" for "apple," and you have an analogous aphorism that is completely true. According to RWJ Barnabas Health, hugs boost oxytocin, which is associated with feeling good. They also reduce anxiety, chronic pain, and high blood pressure. In addition, a hearty embrace increases feelings of belonging and safety and strengthens your immune system. In short, if you substituted a sweet hug for sugar on a daily basis, you'd probably live a lot longer.

Hugs can be commonplace for some naturally affectionate people who are fortunate enough to have relations and friends who are accessible and agreeable to hugging. (Don't forget that getting near anyone during the pandemic was verboten. My, have times changed.) 

However, there is a lot of single, unfortunate souls out there who rarely have the opportunity to hug, souls such as homeless people, who are vulnerable to myriad illnesses.  In any case, most don't think of bestowing affection upon those strangers living in poverty. But maybe some do? 

When was the last time you hugged a homeless person?  

Actually, not to one up you, but I hugged one today. Yes, I hugged a homeless person. Being that I was in the right place at the right time (a rarity for most), the chance arose and I took it. I was volunteering as a server at a restaurant specifically for the indigent in Venice, California. Admittedly, I was reluctant to accept the risky invitation at first. After all, the man was a stranger off of the streets. For a few seconds, Fear stepped in and tried to talk me out of the embrace. The man could have body odor, lice, some incurable, communicable disease. As a member of the wait staff, perhaps I wasn't permitted to touch the clients? I probably wasn't. But then the brave side of me took over. Envisioning myself as a lay version of my idol Mother Theresa, I opened my arms after Alex, an elderly regular with a scraggly, white beard and yellowing smile, stood up from chair, asked me if it would be okay, and reached out to cuddle me. I not only let him; I returned the favor. Few took notice of the anomaly as it was so brief, but he and I felt instantly appeased. The volume of sunlight that filled the room increased from ten to eleven. In short, I took a risk, and it paid off. I made someone sans much to be happy for, very happy.

Now will I be walking down Lincoln Boulevard in Venice hugging as many of the homeless as possible? Probably not. But I wish I had more in the way of courage to do so. Mother Theresa would have. Then again, hugging for the sake of hugging was most likely in her job description. If not, she wrote it into it. Maybe it is something we can all do. Write it into our personal job descriptions. Hug the daylights of someone you know or don't know at all without being stingy about it. 

#word-to-words, #slice-of-life, #blog, #blogging, #editorial, #reading, #vocabulary, #ReadersMagnet, #spilled thoughts, #personal-essay, #writing community, #writing, #truth, #society, #hugging, #love, #affection

Soporific Venus vs. Mars

 

soporific - adjective - tending to induce drowsiness or sleep (Google)

The battle between the sexes has been waged ad infinitum for decades despite being complicated by the addition of an alternative gender. In fact, the debate between Venus (female) and Mars (male) has been so overplayed that some might feel that it has become soporific. We've been there, done that so the mere mention of the topic makes us drowsy with boredom.

 I'm going to throw a wrench in that engine. Just recently, via research, I've discovered a major difference between women and men that could just be the cause of an increase in the break-up rate among heterosexual couples: romance. Men and women define it differently. 

Although you may disagree (if you do, you have probably been married for too long), when it comes to perpetuating romantic love, romance is key. Without it, this type of love is just, well, love sans specifics. To men, romance boils down to sex. The more, the better. A romantic date to them reflects testosterone, meaning something physical must be involved. Think fishing, hiking, golfing, skiing, jogging, playing pickle ball. Am I right, ladies? If men are thinking of what their women want at all, at the end of the day, they might include dinner at a moderately priced restaurant. And they might even pick up the entire tab if they think they might have a chance at the golden ring. You know, sex. 

Women, on the other hand, tend to be more emotionally intelligent than their male counterparts. Because estrogen rules us even after it is nearly nonexistent, most of us have a love language that includes affection, poetic compliments (albeit this could be a stretch), and gestures (often a total stretch). A dozen red roses? They are a bit trite, but okay. We'll take what we can get.

I was lucky enough, or unlucky enough, to have had a 24-year romance (not a relationship) with a man who referred to himself as a "gay, straight man" because he was fully in tune with his feminine side as well as his masculine side. He was above and beyond Casanova when it came to pleasing me, both in and out of bed. And most of the nonsexual gestures had little to do with money and more to do with imagination and perhaps, genuine ardor. For example, he would cook me gourmet dinners served before the fireplace. Afterwards we would slow dance to songs we sang to each other. He would draw me bubble baths in a candlelit bathroom, frequently joining me in the tub. Since he rented a small cabin on a flower farm, to prepare for my visits, he would pick myriad bouquets and fill every room with them. Breakfast in bed came every Sunday morning for all of the years that we were together. Even though we are no longer together due to a complication that can't be helped, I will always be in love with him because of his degree of sensitivity, creativity, and selflessness. At present, I am now "unlucky" in that I am so spoiled that no other man whom I have dated since has ever been able to live up to his example. Why? Most men are from Mars; women are from Venus. Ugh. I'm feeling soporific just thinking about it.

The takeaway? Men, if you want to keep women of high value in your life, you are going to have to pony up in the romance department if you haven't done so already. Valentine's Day is vast approaching. Although everyday should be Valentine's Day in a romantic relationship, the actual day is the perfect starting off point for you to spice things up in the romance department. 

Just sayin'. 

#word-to-words, #slice-of-life, #blog, #blogging, #editorial, #reading, #vocabulary, #ReadersMagnet, #spilled thoughts, #personal-essay, #writing community, #writing, #truth, #society, #L.A.fires, #romantic love, #romance, #Valentine's Day, #heterosexual love

Anaphora as It Applies to Life

 

anaphora - noun - repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive sentences or clauses in order to create a drama effect or for emphasis.

When I taught high school English, anaphora was one of the literary techniques that I encouraged my students to use in their writing, mainly for poetic as opposed to dramatic effect. Back then, poetry was appealing. The term and its defining synonym "repetition for effect" popped into my head today at a care center while I was sorting through myriad boxes of clothing to be made available to the survivors of the recent L.A. wildfires. A fellow volunteer and I were told to keep all nearly new items and toss the threadbare. As we went through box after box of all kinds of donations (even designer garb), I discovered via chatting that my comrade in selection was not only from a town near my own hometown in Jersey, but she had worked for a man who had been friendly with my dad. Small world. 

Without prompting from me, she began a new verbal paragraph and told me that many of her friends lost her homes to the fires in Pacific Palisades and Malibu. Using anaphora unintentionally, she dramatically revealed that one of these current domestic mourners had lost more than one house on the same plot of land in more than one fire over a period of six years. The family had been displaced, yet returned to the scene of the natural crime only to rebuild. They just lost the latest version of the home two weeks ago and are already meeting with architects. Why? To rebuild. Really? Anaphora is one thing; deja vu is another. The question that plagues me is why someone would wish to fall down the same rabbit hole more than once.

What makes certain individuals ignorant of obvious patterns? Do they not believe in warnings from the Universe? Heck, for me, one loss would have been enough of a sign to sell the lot and move to Vegas where there is literally nothing to burn but hard-earned wages over and over again via any of the slot machines in the abundant casinos. 

As you know, I am not Einstein, but I do have common sense. But maybe that's just it. "Common sense is not so common" according to punny Voltaire. Some people are willing to take extraordinary risks especially when it comes to real estate. What it all boils down to is money, that abstract, concrete concept that rules the world. A house (particularly a new one) in Pacific Palisades or Malibu will be worth a lot more than the same house anywhere else. Who cares if the owners can't find an insurance company to insure the place? They can always sell the land. Or can they?

I have no time for complications of this nature, which is why I live in an apartment, a distance away from what tends to be burning these days in SoCal. I have insurance, but just enough to replace some of the contents of my 725 square foot abode. If the building were to disappear one way or the other, I would just find another apartment somewhere a bit safer. It would just make sense, though, like anaphora, not deja vu. 

#word-to-words, #slice-of-life, #blog, #blogging, #editorial, #reading, #vocabulary, #ReadersMagnet, #spilled thoughts, #personal-essay, #writing community, #writing, #truth, #society, #L.A.fires, #LosAngeles, #SoCalFires, #Wildfires, #fires, #repetitionforeffect

Karma: Inside the L.A. Wildfire Relief Effort

 

karma - noun - (Sanskrit) - action 

For whatever reason, the definition of karma tends to vary. If you are a Hindu, you believe that karma relates to "the relationship between a person's physical action and the consequences following that action." If you are a Buddhist, karma is "the force generated by a person's actions to perpetuate transmigration and in its ethical consequences to determine the nature of a person's next existence" (Merriam-Webster). The emphasis in all three if you include the Sanskrit is on action. I'd like to think of karma as cause and effect in which balance is involved. Whatever your understanding of the concept is, it is fine with me. Karma is all about actions, how they stimulate reactions. It is more about balance than punishment. You simply earn what you deserve. 

Yet how does karma relate to the recent Los Angeles wildfire relief movement? I'm getting to it. Since moving here from Jersey in April, I have found that the residents here are, for the most part, not stereotypes. Most of the angels in the City of Angels are transplants from other regions of the country or world. Most of us are here to live out fantasies acquired during childhood. I'm here to do what I can for the homeless community that has just grown due to loss of property caused by the recent wildfires. The cause has produced a generous effect of much generosity, defying balance, however. 

To illustrate what I mean, this past Tuesday, I volunteered to sort through bag upon bag upon bag of miscellaneous clothing donated by miscellaneous Los Angelenos who went out of their way to do their own sorting (through their closets) to come up with wearable items for the newly homeless. Over the course of nearly three hours, a fellow East Coast come-here and I micro-organized over thirty trash bags of clothes only to notice more donations in leaf bags, tumbling through the door en masse. The quantities were daunting. When I asked the higher-ups at the facility where the bags would eventually wind up, no one could give me a straight answer. Basically, my question was ignored. I walked out of the center, hoping that the clothing would find itself to the right, needy individuals and not to a landfill somewhere out of town. 

Just what am I getting at here? Karma does include cause and effect, but perhaps balance is a moot point. Does too much of a good thing lead to balance somewhere down the line? Will the clothes eventually be found and worn by just the right people? I hope so, but I don't know. What I do know is that if you believe in the karma that establishes your place in the next life, the citizens of L.A. who are going out of their way to give to the needy are all going to the best possible next-life alternative. The angels of Los Angeles will find their place in actual Heaven. 

#word-to-words, #slice-of-life, #blog, #blogging, #editorial, #reading, #vocabulary, #ReadersMagnet, #spilled thoughts, #personal-essay, #writing community, #writing, #truth, #society, #L.A.fires, #LosAngeles, #SoCalFires, #Wildfires, #fires

A Public Service Announcement

 

Hello, Readers of Word to Words...

I am experimenting with a new platform, Substack. As of now, a subscription is free. However, if I attract more readers, I may monetize. 

The web address is gwynenglishnielsen.substack.com.

Thanks for being loyal followers! 

Gwyn

The L.A. Ashes: Is There a Phoenix?

 

conflagration - noun - large, destructive fire

On the third of January, I left my present home of Los Angeles to spend a week visiting friends and family in my former home of New Jersey. Within days of my departure, winds blew, sparks flew, igniting destructive flames throughout portions of the City of Angels, reconfiguring the landscape. From Jersey, I flew to Las Vegas where I played the unfamiliar role of refugee until the air quality was breathable. Now that I am back in L.A., the conflagration continues. When it will end, no one seems to know. 

Already, the wealthy displaced are using their monetary advantage to secure replacement homes that are few in number. Already, there is price gouging in the real estate sector while the fires still burn. Already, the opportunists are finding opportune moments to secure all opportunities while the "middle class" wonder whether it would be worth their while to take what little they rescued and move to higher, moister ground, perhaps Helena? 

It all seems nightmarish, but is there a phoenix waiting to emerge from the ashes of what was once unparalleled beauty, natural and manmade? 

In order to answer the question, Americans have to step away from the 24-7 news cycle, ubiquitous, disparaging New York Times editorials for long enough to grasp perspective. Everyone knows that the media and those associated with it tend to enjoy exaggeration for effect. It keeps the customers coming back; the advertisers pleased. Okay, hold on. I'm not saying that the L.A. fires haven't been any accurate pejorative synonym one can find on Google. They have. What I am saying is nothing is as it seems to be, especially depending on where you are standing. 

Case in point, from a safe enough distance away in my hotel room in Vegas, from watching CNN news feed, addressing concerns from friends and family back east, I formulated the impression that I would never be able to return to Los Angeles again as my city of choice was mired in conflagration and destruction, havoc reigned. When I returned yesterday afternoon, that is not what I found. I found nothing amiss. The skies were blue, the rolling hills, mountains, mainly green, the flavor of the air unnoticeably different, the 405 still bumper to bumper at 3:30 in the afternoon. And I asked myself, How could this be? 

Los Angeles County is one of the largest in the country. It is over 4,000 square miles. The affected communities make up 60 square miles, the size of Paris, but roughly 1/70th of the total land area. It is no wonder I didn't see or smell anything. My path didn't take me through the affected regions, my apartment being ten miles from the holocaust. Largely, L.A. is still what it has always been: a great, internationally recognized city that is still functioning 24-7, not missing any beats.

I may not be a seer, but I do know this. Los Angeles was not named the City of Angels for no reason. All of us here are contributing to the salvation of the lost. Many of us do this routinely anyway, fires or no fires. Person vs. Nature is a literary and real human conflict that has plagued us long before "global warming" and "climate change" were even in the lexicon. Government has proven to be inept. But the people, "We, the People" will persevere. Is there a phoenix to rise up from the ashes of destruction? Yes. We, the locals, the millions of feathers on the wings of the phoenix, will rise together.

#word-to-words, #slice-of-life, #blog, #blogging, #editorial, #reading, #vocabulary, #ReadersMagnet, #spilled thoughts, #personal-essay, #writing community, #writing, #truth, #society, #L.A.fires, #LosAngeles, #SoCalFires, #Wildfires, #fires

Distorting Reality in "A Complete Unknown"

 

distort - verb - to give a misleading or false account or impression of. (Google)

The real magic of the cinematic art is that it can take a slice of reality and reconfigure or distort it. Setting, a pedestrian place in particular, can be twisted, transfigured, or transmogrified so that it can appear to be somewhere else, a completely different locale, perhaps one that isn't as glamorous as the original. 

Case in point: the recently released, Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, produced by and starring Hollywood's current hottie, the actor Timothee Chalamet. The movie, which authentically portrays a slice of Bob Dylan's rise to fame, was shot almost entirely in my home state of New Jersey. Even the scenes that are supposed to take place in Greenwich Village, practically a stone's throw away from Jersey, were staged and recorded in Hoboken. What I found astonishing is that the outdoor concert footage depicting a great lawn in what is supposed to be Newport, Rhode Island is actually one in Echo Lake Park, a bit over a mile from where I grew up in Mountainside, a don't-blink-otherwise-you'll-miss-it hamlet, hugging Rt. 22, famous for being the former home of the infamous godfather of N.J., Gip DeCarlo–also a character in Jersey Boys–whose sons I had attended school with. How the production company found the park, I have no idea. Maybe I don't want to know? The very familiar looking motel used in the film is also not in Newport, but in Cape May. 

Since I had known the actual locations before seeing the movie, I found veracity to be distracting. For instance, during the concert scenes, I kept looking for evidence of the Echo Lake Park I remembered: the wooded acres where I would hike with friends in the fall, the lake itself where I would ice skate and the hill where we would sled in winter, the playground where I would watch my daughter climb the monkey bars and listen to her laugh as she negotiated a path through the play set in spring and summer. Although some of the concert audience was C.G.I.ed to seem a lot larger, I could still make out some familiar trees and even a portion of the lake surrounding the extras. As a result, suspension of disbelief became impossible for me, yet not for the Los Angeles natives in the theater, who seemed completely convinced that they were in Rhode Island along with the cast members. 

Good for them! They left the house believing Mountainside was Newport. I left the theater believing my little town had finally found its place in the sun, the sun of Hollywood. Who would have thought? Not I. Not in my wildest dreams would I have imagined that the park down the street, 25 miles west of Manhattan, would ever, could ever touch the imaginations of millions the world over. Yet it is. Hmm. Miracles can and do happen. 

The takeaway? Never say never? The next small borough featured in a big movie could actually be your own, the one attached to your childhood. It may not have the same name or even the exact same look, but you'll recognize it. And the memories that will come flooding back will be yours alone.

Happy New Year, readers, wherever you are. Although you might disagree, I think 2025 could just be a magical, miraculous year. We'll see. Stay safe and stay positive :).

#word-to-words, #slice-of-life, #blog, #blogging, #editorial, #reading, #vocabulary, #ReadersMagnet, #spilled thoughts, #personal-essay, #writing community, #writing, #truth, #society, #film-review, #movie-review, #A-Complete-Unknown, #BobDylan, #TimotheeChalamet, #gwynenglishnielsen, #Hollywood