Deep dark and constantly available to be planted anywhere you don’t want is crab grass, long stringy vines with heart shaped leaves in your back breaking water starved flower garden, family members applying for a part time gig telling the tales of the Grim Reaper, your sliding foot in bowling slightly turns to the left the moment you deliver the ball and those below eighteen living free under your roof still can’t undertake the proper position of delivering the trash outside and the dirty dishes in the kitchen sink.
I’ve never doubted your ill feeling. It’s always the tiny things that carry the most weight. Look at the list one more time and see if you can identify the common thread that connects these lingering frustrations…it’s called Commitment Creeping.
The big city bank you’ve dumped funds into for 15 plus years creatively has developed new financial charges that now include your mother’s dog Larry. The grocery store chain loves to show off their 22 checkout lines but only two are open. Popcorn at the movie was $9.50 with free refills last week but has mysteriously leaped up to $11.22 today. That’s ok, use your debit card, the bank will hand out twelve dollars and put the change in your savings account.
Commitment creeping is what we live, eat and breathe every day and every once in a while the mind, body and soul accept the challenge while slipping into a pair of Batman Underoo’s to take on the world. Perennial is a very powerful word…like fire ants, you can kick down my mound but tomorrow is always a brand new beginning.
Stepfather Joe wasted tons of hard to locate energy blaring those drill sergeant vocals into my teenage face, “If you don’t do something around here today I’m going to take away your…your…um…what do you have that I can take away?” Exactly…who moves when you’ve got nothin to lose?
The boss, kids, cousins and the fry cook at Walter’s Fine Dining shouldn’t always be on the receiving end of your bad day blues. The father who moans about never getting family time but spends ninety percent of his awake hours playing golf learns the hard way how fast the tiny monkeys grow up. The daily runner and weight lifting workout king that pushes themselves way beyond normal expectations then wrap up the night with a greasy burger with a sack of fries then wonder why the doctor sternly warned them, “There could be blockage in their heart.”
My biggest weakness is chasing dreams; once locked on, nothing gets in the way of reaching for that bright light linked to success. Now ask me about the last time I went home to Billings to see the parental figures. In the same sentence tack on why the weathered old cedar tree cut down at the beginning of spring still sits on the path the deer used to make their way to the winter wheat and clover planted for them to eat.
It doesn’t matter what psychologist, psychotherapist, religious leader or Mafia connection you consult with, they all use the same explanation when it comes to bringing commitment creeping to an end: Until there’s something tragic, dramatic and way over our heads too hard to explain…there’ll never be change.
Fancy gyms with swimming pools, indoor walking trails and nifty neat weight machines and fit and trim diet planning nutritionists love them some quality human spirit from December to March every year. I’m going to lose weight! I’m hitting the treadmill to get this booty in fine shape for summer! No more cake! Forget those chocolate shakes! Chinese food is great but not after today!
Commitment creeping…
The only way to beat it…you’ve got to get sick. Something has to pick up your world like a Yellowstone National Park snow globe and wreak havoc on that tiny bear with her cubs inside.
Don’t you think if the Chicago Cubs truly wanted to win the pennant race the first step would be to stop trading away those that are really good and want to play? The Cubs make millions being America’s biggest losers. The moment they win the love affair is over.
Michael Cera is no different—the constantly whiny voice nerd, loser, freak show that spent his summer talking to RollingStone Magazine about how he’s made too much money and doesn’t know what to do with it will never change unless he’s dumped like Tom Cruise. Look how much better his flicks have become! I loved him in Knight and Day with Cameron Diaz. Tropic Thunder was unstoppably out loud to this moment hilarious.
Ok here’s the thing…you don’t have to wait to get sick or something bad creeps into your unwritten chapters. If you wanna dump commitment creeping be a big boy and girl and cut it loose. The last thing you want to do during that final moment when earth created air slow dances with your hardened lungs is to sit up and cry out, “I forgot to call my Mom on her birthday!”
I’m going through it right now…there comes a time when everything you’ve promised yourself is no longer stacked in Space Saver plastic boxes. One look into your private closet and the only thing seen are the child’s eyes that once stared at you in the mirror softly asking, “So watcha wanna do when you grow up? I’m digging the idea of _______ (fill in the blank)
This is not a midlife crisis! It’s physically making a connection with everything that’s disconnected you from being you. No matter how hard you try Sears will always has a brand new tool you’ll never use but for some stinking reason you’ve got to have it.
In 1997 it was my goal to replenish an inner city forest with a fresh coat of White Pines. Little did I know thirteen years later those six inch seedlings would stand nearly six feet over me. I walk through them as often as I can touching each trunk with the palm of my hand not because I’m their tree Daddy but a passerby who wants nothing more than to wish them a beautiful day. After I’m gone there’ll be a new Poet in the forest…that’s the one that’s going to make it. Through the powers of unexplained nature my fingerprints will remain, convincing the traveler to do only one thing…write everyday.
arroecollins@clearchannel.com
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