The Forlorn Duck

If I may be so bold, Hello! -- Please don't hit me, I didn't mean anything by it. Please excuse the mood; it's getting kind of severe, this skittishness. . . . The thing is, I've been doing some fairly intense work on my identity, looking for certain aspects of my personality to put forward. I feel like I've sunk a lot in recent weeks -- I don't know why -- A lot of my former confidence and even joy have gone missing.

My self image right now's at its lowest. And the more I do -- the old stuff I used to do for maximum happiness -- doesn't have the same kick as before. I go to bed sad. I wake up in the night sad. And of course I greet the brand new day, pulling open the curtains to see the new day's sun, in a totally sad way. I've become what I never dreamed I'd be, The Forlorn Duck. That's what I'm calling myself, "FD" for short.

So if you've never liked me before -- it wouldn't be so hard to believe -- please like me now. This Forlorn Duck stuff is worse than you'd think. It's so bad, it's like the experts say, It's hard to get out of it. So part of me says, "Just give up and give in. Be the Forlorn Duck." Part of me counsels resistance, "Put up a good effort of resistance." Then the old me, the confident me, checks in before quickly checking out again, with this, "Stand your ground as the strong confident person you used to be. Gotta run!" My old me apparently doesn't know much about counseling. He needs to hang around a while and do some validating.

I go places, and I see other Forlorn Ducks, by the way not to be confused with Hangdogs or Sourpusses, although I don't want to get sidetracked on technicalities. I see all of them, but it's the Forlorn Ducks I'm interested in now. The biggest problem with Forlorn Ducks is our vulnerability to every little thing. If you know anything about "The Ladder of Easily Helpable Self Images", a chart which I'll scan and post if I can find it, then you know Forlorn Ducks tend to flock in the "Healthy below average" range.

Looking at it that way, it's not as discouraging as it could be. I really think I might be able to overcome enough of it to work my way into "Healthy average." Again, if you like me, then maybe give me even a little encouragement, and I just might make it. And here's something. Even if you don't like me, and don't give me encouragement, I might be able to convince myself that you would have if you knew me better. That theoretical statement could be enough to raise me a few rungs. (I don't know where the Ladder chart is right now; I'd love to double check it.)

I suppose while I'm in this FD funk I should learn as much about it as I can. I'm big into the science of self images and all. I believe this is true, that FD-types, while not desiring contact with other FDs, must have something like a DNA override, an internal attractor/reacher-outer, for mutual protection. And that's why I'm suddenly surrounded by FDs. I need to get out of this quickly, lest the override sticks in place. There's another reason for you to like me. I need your heartfelt consideration, but as I've seen in anguished Facebook pleas for liking, I know that only 2% of the non-FD population will respond. Thinking of that -- 2% is basically low -- it's hard to be encouraged. Yet I am still heartened that it's not less than zero, for where there's 2%, there's hope.

This is horrible! I just need to get a grip! I am more, much more than a Forlorn Duck! What's this? I feel something ... Muscles are returning to my arms? My shoulders and jaws are suddenly squaring up? My solar plexus is starting to flicker, then shine? My feet are widening? I'm standing solid? Yes -- what is this? -- I'm standing solid! One foot up, one down, one up, one down! I'm stomping! I'm stomping again, me! Stomping again! Stomping victoriously! Now I'm turning, twisting, moving in a circular motion, like a human tornado, a powerful whirling humanado, picking up steam and ... emitting a lot of wind. With confidence again! I'm moving with confidence! More, more, more! Pointing my index finger, like John Travolta in the '70s, with all negativity falling away like dominoes, all of it collapsing in a gigantic heap!

The Forlorn Duck has passed away! With this simple exercise, writing up an inventory, that's all it took. I'm already up a rung on the Ladder, all the way to "Healthy average"! With super strength, alive and kicking ... meaning, now I am able once again to help others ... with a renewed push toward healthy self images for all demanded of me! ... We're on the verge, my friends, of a new Drive for Pride!*

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*Drive for Pride was a major self-help series of this blog in 2009-2010, for those with a failing memory.

The Old Days of Razor Blade Disposal

Wouldn't it be fun to see what goes on inside the razor blade disposal of an old medicine cabinet? I can only imagine, which is all I've been able to do, since I've never had the actual pleasure.

I know it must really be something, too, because I've known builders and home-wreckers who've seen it. But like in the battles of war, these veterans are suspiciously silent. In the case of war, they don't want to say what they had to do. With the blades, it must be something similar, too awful to describe.

Which is precisely why I'd like to see it. What kind of mess is it? You know it has to be bad. The old blades were immediately prone to rust. I used to see a blade set out too long on the shelf and it was rusty within hours. And it has to be just like rust on a car; it grows, it creeps, it starts attaching to things, and pretty soon the whole thing falls apart.

Just to imagine, then, what it's like in a well-used razor blade disposal, the blades are attached to one another, a big rusted assembly. Like modern art, maybe, just not as good. Rust is going up in a spiral, like in a cave. Every few days, more water drips in from a new blade entering and from the normal humidity of the bathroom or kitchen. (I have two such disposals, one in the "new" bathroom, made after the '70s, and one in the kitchen, the original one Grandpa shaved by.)

It'd do too much damage to the kitchen, I know, for me to start prying and tearing it out. So all these years, there it's set. Grandpa's been gone since 1977, so that's given the old blades a long time to settle. For all I know, they might be eating through the wall. If that ever happens, I'll take appropriate measures, fight them back as best I can. Use a fire extinguisher.

Grandpa didn't have any qualms about using the thing. For me, though, I look at it as a kind of small terrarium. It's an ecosystem for razor blades, but it's so finite, you don't want to put too much in it. But if you're not using it when you need it, why have it? That would be my original question? Why even have it? Of course it's for safety. When you need to throw away a razor blade, there's all sorts of dangers about putting them in the trash. Anyone could slice open their leg.

But they could've just as easily put in a detachable disposal system, like you see in the doctor's office, the sharps container, where you simply throw away the whole container when it gets up to about a pound. But no, for some reason, back in the old days, they thought, "We'll just hard-wire these things in the wall behind the medicine cabinet." Maybe make them eight inches deep, or better yet, let them go all the way to the floor. The razor blades then, even if you were in the house for 100 years, would never pile up enough to fill it.

Quite the idea, till you start imagining what's going on in there. Rust, doing all sorts of things. For all we know, it could be doing a DNA melt with your whiskers and skin cells, along with the moisture and mold, the house, and the souls of the people there. Pretty soon you've got a wall full of half metal, half spirit ghosts, or other beings come to life. Seriously, why else would builders be so quiet about what they've seen? Why else would builder be the only profession where they beg their sons to do anything but that?

The more I think of it, the more I'm willing just to let it go. I myself use disposable BIC razors. And they won't fit in the slot. The simply go in the garbage. And if there's any weird DNA/metal amalgamating to be done, it's happening somewhere else, not here at home. Still, I think I hear some tapping in the wall!

My Next Life in the 28th Century

I'm becoming an old man in the current century. I'm literally 60. And now I'm getting dizzy if I lay on my right side. That's no good. Obviously, I can't go on much longer. 20 years goes by too fast, and next thing you know I'll be 80, with even more problems. I'll probably be dizzy all the time. So I have to make plans for what's next, what's to become of me.

My idea, which I think is pretty good, has been to make careful arrangements to be cloned in the future. I'm looking toward a distant time -- the 28th century -- figuring that by then cloning will be old hat. Plus, you know, it just sounds good. The 28th century, a nice round number. And distant enough that I can look forward to a fresh start, but not so distant that I'll be dead forever. It might be like the first time I was born: Billions of years passed and I didn't even notice it. What's 700 years?

I'm also optimistic about the 28th century for another reason, that I've always had great faith in the younger generation. These are people who won't even be born for another 600-700 years. Realistically, you can't get much younger than that.

To accomplish this, of course I can't just die like everyone else, forgotten. Before that, I need to preserve my DNA, and let the folks of the 28th century know about me. I'm still working on the DNA, although I have already preserved some samples around my place. And as long as I hold out, I'll be working on it.

The 28th century people will know about me because they will be able to refer to this blog. I'm sure, with Google's efficiency and the government's careful preservation of everyone's records, that the content of this blog will outlive me, in my present incarnation, by many centuries. I have given my exact town and address numerous times in previous posts. Also, I have a prepaid full page ad with all the details in the Daily News to be published on January 1, 2750, right in the middle of the century. That seems fail-safe.

"Please clone me so I can come back. I have a great appreciation for 28th century culture, which I believe will be greatly enhanced by my actually experiencing it in person. So far, unfortunately, I have nothing but guesses about what it will be. Still, that's a lot more than those around me, my ignorant 21st century peers."

Like I said, there are DNA samples on my half acre. I have buried samples of phlegm, dandruff, blood, saliva, etc., with the containers clearly marked and wrapped in grocery store bags, which I'm given to believe will never decompose. I'm also keeping samples at the post office, Box 734. (There are also samples of a more personal sort, which I had quite a time producing. I'm reluctant to mention this, only because I don't want ladies desperate for children trespassing on my property looking for the ideal donor.)

If anyone can think of other ideas -- better ways to get the word to the 28th century -- which I seriously doubt, please leave a comment. But let me just say up front, I've already thought of groundhog holes; I just don't see how to make it work.

OK, what's in this for the 28th century? I think it's win/win, as I'm already a time traveler, one who has already straddled two centuries, the 20th and 21st. I have proved my adaptability in different settings. When I was a kid we had a home phone. Now we carry our phones with us. I can tell them about our great progress. Like how we used to use the same phone in our homes all our lives. But now we need a new one every two years. Plus, I'll be able to tell 28th century archaeologists all about our times, how everyone got along so well, except for minor exceptions, like our unfortunate world wars.

What I'm hoping for in the 28th century is the simple life. I figure by then, with the apocalyptic chaos still to come in our time, that life will be generally agrarian, folks keeping it simple, being one with nature, going fishing and whistling. I'm expecting there will be lots of time for reading, pleasant conversation, and congenial village life. Like the Andy Griffith Show, without the conflict.

I'm also hoping, and call me visionary, that when I'm in the 28th century, that I'll be burying my DNA once again, placing a prepaid ad in the newspaper, a sample at the post office, etc., with a message to the people of the 35th or 36th centuries, to clone me again. I'll leave it up to the folks of those centuries to decide which one they think will be best for someone of my tastes and abilities. If the 35th wants me, fine. Or the 36th might tell them, no, they'll take me.

Wouldn't Easier DNA Be Great?

DISCLAIMER - I know very little about DNA or DNA testing. I honestly don't have the first clue about the science of it. But no disclaimer is really necessary, because I don't have the first clue about the science of anything and that hasn't stopped me writing about it.

Hey, everybody knows about DNA. We know you can't father a child and get away with it forever. And we know it's tougher to do the crime and escape the time, thanks to DNA. In a remarkable way, it's like you never left the scene! Yet you know you dashed off just seconds later! But some damned thing, a small thing, usually a hair -- which should've stayed securely attached -- inopportunely loosened its grip and fell.

So we have the wayward hair of a criminal. Or in the case of anonymously fathering children, what you needed to leave behind. With the hair, once they have it, they run it through the DNA mill and, years later, it comes back a match. With your ex-girlfriend, unknown as she may be, when she reappears with your child, they match up samples, and suddenly you owe money. In both cases you can end up with visitation rights.

The thing about DNA, though, is it's billed as extremely hard to test. It used to be it took them weeks to test it. Now, probably thanks to miniaturization, much smaller scientists, they're able to get it done overnight, if needed. Maury Povich gets a lot of the credit for the progress, since on TV time is of the essence.

Now I'm wondering what's the holdup on making it instant, like pregnancy tests or microwaving bagels? And with that, making it equally as accessible, so that all of us could do it. Yes, the police and Maury have had DNA testing as their exclusive bailiwick and would be reluctant to give up their advantage, but that's progress. Once upon a time the rest of us couldn't do fingerprinting either, then ink pads started showing up, in office supply stores of all places.

Personally, I like the idea of DNA everywhere. Right here at home -- I live in my grandparents' old house, and they've been dead since the '70s -- I think it'd be cool to test dust and old sticky spots. I haven't touched some of Grandpa's tools in my whole life, so I might find him still lurking in the garage, in that sense. Then there's my own DNA. I have to have a rich presence here. I used to have a full head of hair and now I'm virtually bald. They'll be finding pieces of me for a century!

If we could test our own DNA, even if the police objected at first, think of how we could solve crime that much faster. There's a crime, all of us descend on the scene, we've got about 200 simultaneous investigations going on at once. Then we come together in an auditorium and one by one present our findings to the group. I can't think of any downside, unless, of course, with the mass of people on the scene tainting the original evidence with our own samples, we ended up arresting each other. But that's a risk worth taking. Most crime scenes had unrelated people there before the crime, this just extends it a bit.

Other than that -- which isn't very exciting -- think of the other possibilities. The more people have access to DNA, the more progress we can make in the science. I'd love it, just as an example, if the DNA testing machine could be rigged to develop a photo of the person, then to make a rudimentary video of him, how he would move, etc., then a hologram type of thing, then who knows what! The twin brother I never had?

Or they might come up with a thing like a metal detector. You sweep a room, like at the Playboy mansion, as a random example, run the test, and you'd have the latest thing, a miniaturized orgy right there on your nightstand. You could collect various human scenes, monasteries, mechanics shops, a March Madness game, or the local Goodwill store. Lots of specimens there!

Probably accomplished science fiction authors have already envisioned this much better than I ever could, especially as they would take some time with the idea and not dash it off in a few minutes on a Tuesday morning. That's fine, I can live with it. Although, as revenge for them showing me up, I could see myself "borrowing" their typewriter, taking all the DNA out of it -- the crap under their fingernails in addition to hair -- and creating a race of mutant science fiction writers, mixing their DNA as I would with lesser human types, like accountants, and putting them out of business. Show me up, will ya?

No, seriously, I don't have a devious bone in my body (eventually the DNA will prove it). I would only use my DNA kit -- Petri dish, eyedropper, thermometer, and roboenlarger -- to do good. One thing I'd seriously like to do, if I could find the DNA for it, is bring back milkmen and their cute little trucks. I'm thirsty for some good old fashioned milk. The good stuff!

Criminals And The Finger Of Suspicion

I've been thinking a lot lately about crime.

I'm not myself a criminal, knowingly or actively. If I were, I wouldn't be writing about it, because I firmly believe the first rule of being a good criminal is to keep your mouth shut. But I do tend to think like a criminal, or how I imagine a criminal would think, since I used to think that if the Soviet Union ever took over the United States I would probably be part of the patriotic, though criminal, resistance. So I'm forever thinking, If this were Soviet-occupied America, how would I misbehave? It might be time to quit thinking like that except I have little actual control over what I think.

The biggest difference between now and when I first started thinking that way back in the '60s, other than there no longer being a Soviet Union, is the increase in surveillance technology. Back then a kid could easily imagine himself in a successful, ongoing resistance movement. I was very stealthy in my comings and goings. I was like a magician in my ability to divert people's attention and do all kinds of underhanded things while they were watching. But with surveillance technology being so much improved now, all they'd have to do is check the video and you're busted.

It seems like we used to talk about these things, too, me and other kids, unless it's just a dream I had. We would sabotage everything the Soviets were trying to do to us. And they'd never catch us, that's how good we'd be. But, alas, not now, with video and DNA, etc., the two biggest killers of anonymity. All they had back then was fingerprints. or turncoat eyewitnesses.

But what I'm thinking about today is crime pure and simple. How hard it is to be a criminal, or how hard it should be if everything's working. I've been reading the crime news in the paper. And it's astounding to me how many people persist in criminal activity, even though they're about guaranteed to be nailed these days. Yet, there they are. A few days ago it was this: A party of guys, four or five, went to the apartment of four other guys. One member of the visiting party was an acquaintance of one of the guys at the apartment. But still, even with this acquaintance, he (and they) robbed them and made their getaway. Is that dumb or what? Before morning they had one of the guys in custody, and I wouldn't want to be the other guys for anything! If you're going to be a criminal, dumb ass, there can't be anyone there who knows you!

I seriously think I would make a pretty good detective. Because I'm always thinking, "If the Soviets were here, etc., what kind of trail would I be leaving if I did this-or-that job?" And I frankly can't come up with the perfect crime! Because I'm running it through my mind, A B C, how they'd catch me. It's not just video at the crime scene; it's video at every point along the way, how they could easily trail you no matter where you went. Beyond that, of course, there's DNA. You drop a hair follicle and you're done for. And I'm taking into account hairnets, shaving my head, a complete body shave! You shave and there's bound to be at least one hair left on your clothes...

OK, if it were a matter of national security, sabotaging the Soviets, it'd be a small price to pay to give your life for the country. But to give your life to rob someone at their apartment when they know you? Not near as lofty!

But there are criminals who are a lot more cagey. Like guys who come from out of state, rob a bank, then immediately go to a different state. They've got the advantage of no one knowing them, and they're going where no one knows them. But they're still up against the same thing. The Soviets, or in this case the proper American authorities, have ways of dealing with them. Cameras, the ability to phone ahead to other police departments, profiling, and other forensic resources. Footprints, tire prints, torn jacket on barbed wire. It's not a good way to make a living! Let's say you get $50,000. Big damned deal! $50,000 is peanuts. If you go to prison for 20 years, you traded freedom for 2,500 bucks a year. You can easily find a job, even in today's tough job market, that would pay more than that. Crime is idiocy.