As soon as my eyelids shut, a tiny visual wonderland plays before my sight. This is not the lava lamp lightshow I can sometimes achieve when I squint my closed eyes and follow the blood flow. All around me are fascinating colors, textures, and three-dimensional spaces through which I can choose to drift. I can even alter the scenery with the merest effort of curiosity and interest, a sort of conscious dreaming. The panorama pulses to a rhythmic thumping and the landscapes gently rise and fall below me. The sensation is both real and surreal: it is Beth’s heartbeat and breathing beneath my head.<\/p>\n
A brief mental journey back out of this trip and into the past: do you remember hearing the story of the two girls in Durango\u2014 I think of them as the cookie phantoms\u2014 who left an anonymous plate of homemade cookies at a neighbor’s door, then knocked and hid? The anxious woman panicked, imagining some menace, and went to the hospital the next day fearing a heart attack. She successfully sued the girls in small claims court<\/a> (check out the blog linked here, by the way: it reveals some interesting details not often shared on the case).<\/p>\n The third point of the Boy Scout Law says “a scout is helpful.” [Background: I’m pondering each of the 12 points<\/a>, one a month, throughout this year’s centennial of American scouting.]<\/em> This topic seemed at first too obvious\u2014 the classic picture of a boy helping an old lady across the street\u2014 and thus unappealing to me. But it’s hardly my style to take the obvious tack. I choose tonight, instead, a New Ambivalence<\/a>.<\/p>\n Helpfulness can certainly backfire, especially when it is about helping oneself. If the cookie phantoms had primarily been indulging their own desire to do a good thing\u2014 regardless of whether it was appreciated\u2014 then they were missing the point of helping others.<\/em> I will come to their aid yet, but must return right now to the trippy la-la land encircling my head.<\/p>\n Her heart-thump is just below my ear. I move my cheek down off her ribcage, thinking “the human head weighs eight pounds.” (Thank you Ray: you complete me. Along with Rod Tidwell’s rants, you were one of the two bright spots in Jerry Maguire<\/em>. I’m not anti-chickflick, but I am a boy after all.) From my lower position over Beth’s belly, her pulse is still audible. And then I hear dinner gurgling its way down. That sound and sensation, right there against my own skin, returns me smiling to my happy hallucination.<\/p>\n Maguire: Did you know that Troy Aikman, in only six years, has passed for 16,303 yards?<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n Ray: D’you know that bees and dogs can smell fear?<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n Maguire: Did you know that the career record for hits is 4,256 by Pete Rose who is NOT in the Hall of Fame?<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n Ray: D’you know that my next door neighbor has three rabbits?<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n Maguire: I… I can’t compete with that!<\/em>\u2014 Jerry Maguire 1996<\/em><\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n The two-fold premise of this entry I promised at the beginning? Listen to other people’s hearts. And bring them cookies.<\/p>\n Thanks for reading. Cheers,![\"Drugs\"](\"http:\/\/gihamilton.com\/blog\/images\/bronch2.jpg\" "\\"Take")
It’s been a tough five weeks of constant illness, long (but satisfying) working hours, and tension on the home front. In stress and ailment I tend to take care of “number one,” but in the past few days I recognize how hard Beth, too, has made special efforts for my health. Today I took the time\u2014 and it was not painful or difficult\u2014 to return the favor. And here, head-on-belly, in the giddy throes of a real-life hallucination called love, we are helping ourselves to the simple rewards of genuine helpfulness.<\/p>\n
\n![\"Greg\"](\"http:\/\/gihamilton.com\/blog\/images\/greg_signed72.jpg\" "\\"Greg\\"")
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