The other day, I'd had a pretty rough morning, and a worse afternoon. And I was rather tired of being Jim Puckett. That happens to me sometimes - I just get really tired of, well, me. There's an old story about an AA oldtimer giving a newcomer a ride home after a meeting. The newcomer says to the oldtimer, "Here in a minute, you're going to do something that I wish that I could do."

The oldtimer says "What's that?

The newcomer says "You're going to let me out and drive away".

I often wish that I could let me out and drive away. I suspect that there are many folks out there who get tired of themselves, but I also suspect that a lot of them don't know that; they really believe that it's the other guy who's irritating them. But - in my own case, and I know others who have the same insight - it's usually our own shortcomings in others that irritate us. I see something in you that I hate in me - however, in my own case, I happen to believe that there are mitigating excuses for it, or maybe it's not so bad; meanwhile, I can tell that YOU ought to be locked up for it, or maybe you should just get ten lashes and we'll forget about it.

On those days when I'm really tired of being me, I like to nestle down in my easy chair and watch Elwood P. Dowd meander around downtown with his friend Harvey, having drinks at Charlie's Place and headed over to Blondie's Chicken Inn. Now, I don't want to be drunk (when I was drunk, I was not a pleasant, smiling, happy drunk like Elwood) and I don't want to get locked up (at least, not any more) - but, outside of those attributes, I would love to be like Elwood P. Dowd.

I tend to think that I would fall far short of any attempt to emulate Elwood - but then I wonder; why? Why can't I be like him? Answer - I'm too frightened.

It seems to the casual observer that Elwood might be at the mercy of all of those big, mean things out there that can scare a fellow - weather. Government. Economic forces. Muggers. Bad coffee. Sixteen-year-olds who make a B- in English, even though they have the vocabulary of Will Buckley on steroids.

But that's not true, as it turns out - it's only when we resist those things that they can harm us. The pain is in the resistance. And Elwood doesn't resist, at all - anything that happens, well - "that's fine, that's just fine, oh - and my regards to you, and to anybody else you happen to run into."

So, if I'm willing to not resist, then I can be like Elwood. I can greet the rest of the events of the day like Elwood would greet them. If it doesn't matter if my son graduates from high school or goes to college; if it doesn't matter if my wife spends all of my money on dishwashers and bronzed switchplates; if it doesn't matter that I can't run without getting pain behind my knee; if it doesn't matter if folks in an AA meeting misquote the Big Book to read "just don't drink, and go to meetings"....if none of those things (or anything else) matter to me, if I don't resist the way that things are, then I can be like Elwood.

It's a lofty goal - but a worthy one.

Of course - it also has to not matter if I fail at that. Okay, now we're getting recursive :)