One of the liberating things about focusing on self-expression for its own sake is that you don’t ever need an excuse for it. This piece is purposely called Part II, because I put a story up just about a week ago and I made it a two-parter, like a before and after kind of thing. So, I am beginning writing this follow up around a couple of hours before midnight on the east coast. Let me tell you, if you spent as much time as I did around NYC, you know it is the alarm clock for the world. It doesn’t matter where the New Year starts wherever you are, because it starts in NYC!

I am not sure when I’ll finish this, because it depends on just how shitty the first read through is for me. I purposely didn’t want to think about what I’d write as a follow up to Part I. God knows, I try not to bullshit you as much as I possibly can. All week, I stayed good on my promise not to think at all about Part II. I think maybe you should read Part I before this. It’s free, so no big deal!

If there were cameras following my every move in this space, there would be no indication that I was thinking beyond reading Part 1. What is great is that I can make up the rules as I go along. I decided to leave my mind alone until I sat down at this very moment and let the keys take me where my mind felt like going for a few minutes.

It seems like the last two years were lines of time blurred into memories that could have been the diary from a time on another planet, which is mostly how it is feeling to me. Looking ahead is not a view that seems to be terribly encouraging to me either.

So, I am now trying to think about the year ahead, with just a very small measure of focus, believe me. I tell you, it is a helluva lot easier than trying to make sense of what has happened. As a committed Gemini, there are always two streams of thought flowing into any moment. I always separate my own, small world from the infinitely large galaxy I inhabit, along with all of you.

You know, when 2020 ended, there was a feeling that the coming year would be different. Whenever we look ahead, with the past as the reference, there is this idea that the coming year will be different. This time, it seems like we all lost a year, because this year has ended just where the last one did.

Before  I sat down to write this time, my reading glasses had mysteriously disappeared, a misplacement that has rarely happened, certainly not when I am about to begin a story. No, I didn’t panic, rather it felt like a moron’s metaphor. Here I am, thinking about what’s to come and my damn glasses are gone! I decided to keep on going with this story and understanding that it is not what happens, it is how we see it unfolding………..

It was New Years Eve when the above paragraphs were written. I had a feeling it would likely be a couple of days before I figured out where the hell I wanted to go. I am the classic prototype of George Carlin’s routine, but I am the anti-Stuff, the other side of accumulation for its own sake. Losing things is a lot less frequent when simplicity is the mantra. 

While I purposely wanted to continue my initial, word sit down without my glasses, I did want to find them. Forgetfulness slowly creeps on you with age and I don’t remember when it began to make itself felt. How’s that? There was only one place they could be and that was somewhere in my car. Earlier in the day, I changed shirts in my car, in order to put on my Foster and Feinstein T-shirt, because Foster and I did our Youtube show in the afternoon. My glasses had to be in the pocket of my work shirt and had to have fallen out in the exchange. With the help of a flashlight, they were sitting right where they dropped. I smiled.

It is now two days later and 2022 has already had the head start of one day, with no hope of catching up with it. My glasses are perched on my nose, but they don’t bring any more clarity for looking at what’s to come. My astrological double vision forces me to look inside, whether thinking about myself or the world I share with all of you.

Beginner’s mind is a favorite subject in Zen and the title of great book by Shunyru Suzuki. It is certainly not a stretch to think about this idea at the start of a new year. At any moment, we can sort of call a do over and look at ourselves, as if we are seeing everything for the very first time. The baggage of our lives is cast aside and we carry nothing, but the present.

Now, on day two of 2022, at least for a while, looking ahead fits snugly into my consciousness. As for me, I know I will continue wrestling with my age, impacting on every aspect of my life. The rhythm of beginnings and ending is life’s dance and I will keep trying to learn the steps. Absolutely everything starts from within and ripples outside ourselves. It is the way of the world, always has been.

I want to get better and better at being whomever Larry is to become. At this precise moment, the church bells of the Lutheran church down the street rang out. I kid you not. Starting this story with the loss of my glasses and pausing at this moment, the bells of hope ring out to punctuate what words cannot. I woke up to a pounding rain. The sun is now shining.