Telling the ones you love that you love them, and why

This is one of the four or five most important things we get to do in life. One of my most cherished girl friends from high school and I reaquainted on face book. She apologized to me for "treating me badly" back in high school. Sheesh, I NEVER once thought that, and told her so. She now works counseling unwed mothers, being with them through their pregnancy as they carry it to full term. Some of these young girls have no one else. I'm weeping now just from the joy of having been loved by someone who follows so devoutly in the way as shown and told to us by Jesus of Nazereth - carpenter, fisher, teacher, leader, healer, story-teller, saviour.

Hi Donna! I'm sorry to hear that your folks are ailing. They were always so kind and generous to me, always made me feel I was welcomed and loved in their home, an honored guest at the dinner table, and they trusted me to be good to you (showing their extraordinarily excellent judgement of character)!

I doubt I ever shared this with you, but, it is as good as anything I ever wrote. I was saddened when you realized that I was not the boy friend you needed at that time of your life, but looking back, I was looking for something that was more than you were looking to share, which happens so frequently. But my motivation was honorable, and I did adore you so much (and have grown, thanks to this here facebook thingie, to adore you and admire you all the more:

China Doll
Here is evidence that I was once young, romantic, and subject to heartbreak. Didn't even know I still had a copy of this, written in 1969, when I wore a younger man's clothes. Assuredly, I gave away too much of myself - in those days anyway. Has anything changed?

China Doll

I am a China Doll.
Fragile.
Don't breath too hard,
I might fall and shatter.

The little brown-eyed, blond haired,
four year old child holds me
in his fingers (he can squeeze and I
might or might not shatter, probably
not, he's not yet strong, although he is
as a god with the power
of life and death. Unconsciously
he holds me to set me
down gently to play with
another day or to end suddenly
me. and when he does (he will, for he
knows no better) he may laugh,
or he may cry, but he will be
changed and he will remember.

I am a China Doll.
Fragile.
Don't breath to hard,
I might fall and shatter.

You hold me in your heart,
now, at least. You hold me
more than you will ever know.

A China Coll is at first fascinating,
lovable. But a China Doll
is unsure and even having the
power, he can only hold it impotently
until it inevitably changes hands.

You hold me more than you will
ever know. You hold me to set
me down gently to play with
another day or to drop and end suddenly,
me. you know, or at least should know
that China Dolls break and suddenly;
though if not forever, broken, they are changed.
I can be glued together again, and
again, and maybe I'll laugh and
maybe I'll cry, but I will be changed
and I will remember, and
I will break and break and break and break and break and
break and break again until finally,
I jump. Myself. And shatter
into a million lost pieces.
A China doll.

YOU HOLD ME MORE THAN YOU WILL EVER KNOW.

This was all about you, and your youngest brother, and, of course, me. But the problem with me was that I invested and placed in your hands too much responsibility for my own autonomy, which is never a good thing.

One of my favorite songs is Kathy's Song, by Simon and Garfunkel. But, the problem with that song, is that the poet has invested too much of his autonomy, too much of his heart, in another human being. That's WAY too much to give away, and way to much to put on some one else's plate. Lord only knows, we have enough of our own life to deal with without having someone dump theirs into our laps.

I've developed a wonderful (albeit long distance) relationship with Kathleen Harris, as amazing a human being as ever I've met (and I've met quite a few amazing ones - in the best sense of "amazing"). I re-worked the Simon and Garfunkel song for her, and for what she gives to me, for what we share, and for what we hold on to of our own. Here goes:

I hear the drizzle of the rain
Like a sweet melody it falls
Soft and warm continuing
Tapping on my roof and walls

And from the safe harbor of my mind
Through the bay window of my eyes
I gaze beyond the rain-drenched streets
To L.A. Where my heart lies

My mind is focused, unconfused
Though my thoughts are many miles away
They dream of of when you're asleep
They kiss you when you start your day

And I song I was writing's so soon done
I don't know how you inspire me so
Filling me with God's grace and Love
Always remembering to let me know

And as I watch those drops of rain
Weave their cheery paths and thrive
I know that I am like the rain
When I'm with you I'm most alive

And so you see I have no doubts
All that I once held still holds as true
I stand tall, sharing my beliefs
In the one true God with you

All is inordinately well in my world. I know what I am called to do, and it still leaves me with much time to do much, much more; to learn something new every day; and to rejoice in the simplest of things. I am blessed in so many ways, and you have indeed been one of those blessings.

Warmest regards, deepest gratitude.

Mark

We must always cherish the children in our lives who radiated love, even when we deserved it not

Can it really be 25 years since I first intruded into your family's life, on my birthday, called your dad on the phone because another actuary that we had both worked with said, "You remind me of this other actuary, Bill ######."

Yes, oh ray of light, shining so bright,
Dancing so gracefully all day
Dancing so gracefully all night

I seldom read my e-mails at this addy any more, and so just found this tonight, after an interesting five days in a mental hospital (checked my own self in - anything to get away from my father, at the time, who was being quite the jerk, what with my mom having died and all, he really ought to have offered me parting words other than these: "Who's going to take care of me?" {as I left to wend my way on my own to a mental health clinic, ending up not at the one I sought - transportation still being something of an issue with me - but another one, which got me rested up, my blood pressure down from 195 / 140 to about 140 / 85 and my blood sugars from about 325 to 125 ... my oh my oh my oh my - some bad sugar habits had evolved, my sweet one})

Ah, yes, them; fathers. So often entirely clueless about how to treat their daughters and all too often cavalier by too much with their quips when they should have kept their mouths shut, their tongues tied, and their ears opened and been prepared NEVER to judge .... but, by and large, it is not in their nature.

So, I blog (probably the world's most prolific bloggers, not merely because I run about 19 of the things, but because I post 100's of postings - ugh, horrid syntax - per week, when I'm all a'fire)

MarkGanzersBlog.Blogspot.Com was my first blog.

I tried to kill it, by not posting, and three months later, I was getting over 200 hits a day. I now post international issues there.

MarkGanzersInsanityBlog.Blogspot.Com -- US politics, cultural commentary, media criticism

MarkGanzersWritings.Blogspot.com -- my creative writing

MarkGanzersPhotos.Blogspot.com -- stuff from my extended families

You might be interested.

Or not.

From everything I ever knew about you, you were a bona-fide Genesis I child - perfectly formed in God's own image, and you were good. None of this could have possibly changed. You are now the you you always were going to be, joyous, loving, and yet .... honest, righteous, courageous. And these traits, while all are admirable, and we are taught all are traits we should attempt to attain and hone, these are traits that are virtually never appreciated by, hmm, how shall I say this next word ... assholes?

Too harsh perhaps. Too crude. Not appreciated by those whom ostensibly have power over you - parents, teachers, preachers, cops, bosses, etc, etc.

It terrifies them to be told the truth - most people are ill-suited for what they do - they just fall into it. They are lazy, incompetent, sometimes willfully so, sometimes just mismatched with where their true love of doing is and what they are doing instead is - doing in order to worship at the altar of consumption, at the altar of appearances, at the alter of never criticizing the institution which pays for their daily bread, and their useless toys, and poisonous food, and unhealthy attacks on their intellect and integrity.

But, I speak in generalizations; I speak mythically.

But, because I once knew you, and quite well, because you were always the BEST ANGELA you could be (and you gave this matter more than a little thought - you were kind, caring, sharing, giving, forgiving, nonjudgmental, but oh so brutally honest - as in "the emperor has no clothes" that honesty which the child's eye always sees, and which the child's heart and mind cannot keep silent on -- because the weak are exploited, and this is wrong, and the child always knows right from wrong.

I want you to remember this always:

you made a broken, middle-aged man feel loved
you were a model of what a free spirit this fat, balding,
middle-aged man might become
if only he were to free himself from
the unrewarding job of always trying to please everyone
and in the end pleasing no one,
least of all, his own self

And thus the poet / mystic / wrote: To thine own self be true.

And these words, to me, will always define you.

I am here, as you can see, or

xxxxxxxxxx@yyyyyyyyyy.com (only my most cherished and beloved of friends know of this e-mail)

and still at (847) @@@ - zzzz

And I love to ride the rails on the weekend unlimited rail pass
And thus do I pass through Chicago frequently,
And have come to find many comforting places
And friends who welcome me back again and again

And if you would like me to be your friend (still)
Then I shall be (and I always will)

With Love to you, and ALL You LOVE,
Mark Raymond Ganzer
(VARK)

We have witnessed a Diety (albeit flawed) that flew amongst, over, and all around us

When he was younger and (perhaps) only dimly
if at all aware of the transient nature
of his athletic gifts, Michael Jordan routinely
performed improvisational acts of acrobatic genius.

Now, at the zenith of his physical maturity
with the accumulation of myriad miracles
as part and parcel of his psychic/physical being,
his statements – his legacy – his gifts to us -
he has measured moments when
he seems to make time stand still
and use space as a three-dimensional
step ladder twisting and turning his body
to supernatural affect; defying gravity
and all the known laws of physics.

He has done this all before,
He has done this all the long.
He can no longer even amaze himself.

And we, having watched all this blessed while,
in disbelief and awe, as the divine and human kind
intersect in this temporal time-space-and place,

We have come to take much too much for granted,
and only the taped highlights will allow our progeny
to see the Miracles of Michael which miss entirely
the entire point of being Michael Jordan!
And that is this: to show what one human being
can WILL himself to do, to defy gravity,
to over come the odds after failing
even to make his high school basketball team.
THAT is the true MIRACLE OF MICHAEL -
that he persevered, and after many losses,
and many losing campaigns, trooped on valiantly,
ultimately to TRIUMPH, again, and again, and again,
and again, and again, and again -
and NOT FOR HIS SAKE ALONE,
but – and these were always the keys
always the critical things -
he did it for the team; for those newbies,
veterans though they may have been,
who had yet to win a ring, and for THAT thing,
did Michael exhort his colleagues in greatness
the incomparable Pippen, the Genius Rodman,
The yeomen – Grant and Cartwright,
The one who could not be defended – Kuckok
The three-points specialists –
Kerr, Paxon, Hodges, Buechler
The one from down under – Longley
The one who sacrificed his
offense the better to play defense – Harper
the cutest NBA All Star ever – Armstrong
the best announcer of them all – King,
the brilliant late season pick up
whose father was a Motown singer – Bison Dele,
The defensive specialist / three-point shooter Brown,
those whose names all (save we few) have forgotten -
Blanton, Courtney, English, McCray,
Hansen, Hopson, Randall, Sparrow, Nevitt,
Haley, Simpkins, Caffey, Steigna,
Nealey, Tucker, Walker, Levingston,
Booth, Burrell, Klein, LaRue, Vaughn
the Williams' – Scott and Corey,
the hydra heads – Perdue, Wennington,
Edwards, Salley, Parrish
And the glove-fitting coaches – Jackson/Bach -
The two of these – Jordan/ Jackson so attuned,
so in synch to the ultimate objective
to be World Champions, nothing less,
and to do so year in and year out,
With all the distractions, with all the pain
of preparation required, all the focus,
almost 100 games per year, and all the training
required, especially in the off season,
for it is the work one does in the off season
that determines the progress that player will make
as a professional NBA player,
but also as a trusted team mate,
who will thoroughly know, understand, and
most importantly, ACCEPT the role that
the TEAM requires of him,
Yes, THAT was the greatness of MJ
Not that when he soared he flew,
But that in order to win, it was sometimes
necessary that he soar; in order to inspire,
to DEMAND 100% of his team mates
(nothing less was acceptable; nothing more required)
One had to be selfless, one had to know one's limitations,
and in Michael's case – the sky was the limit,
there were no limitations, but, in order to accomplish that – to play basketball on THAT über-surreal plane
of athletic performance, delimited by physics,
as it is presently understood,
that DEMANDED that Michael play as a Deity
like a Deity of a very ancient time,
When the gods walked the earth,

It was simply that, of Michael
That his will to win on the basketball court
Was so strong, so intense, so focused,
That it required him to unleash the inner deity
Which resides in each and every one of us.

And if Michael Jordan could unleash his inner deity,
As have others who have come before him,
And as have others who will came after,

Then, why can't we all?
What holds us back?
Is it our will that holds us back?
Or is it that we have not imagined
What we could accomplish
If we were to let go of orthodoxy,
Let go of the limitations we are told that bind us

What could we do, if only we were to
be like Mike?

(And if Jesus Christ Incarnate were to return to earth
(Again, in this time-space-and place intersect,
(Would you be entirely surprised to see Him
(Leading by example His life as a professional
(basket ball player? Or perhaps a singer
(in a Rock & Roll Band calling itself
(Blessed Union of Souls, and singing
(“I believe that love will find the answer
(I believe that Love will find the way.”)

Dedication to my beloved partner - Tom Sucher

Friend, Partner, Mentor:
All these and more, you have been to me,
and hopefully I have been to you.

To know you is to understand
that at the core of your being
to be “your friend”
encompasses a life-long compact,
a commitment and a loyalty
quite rarer now
than in supposedly simpler times past
When a man's word and his good name
counted for everything.

These things I have come to know,
because of your teachings,
You have lived them, by your steadfast examples;
by your consistency, and by your constancy.

Your highest compliment, you have said,
was given to you in a moment that would have
hurt and broken many not so given
to understand, that to “lose” a job
for having “too much imagination to be an
insurance executive” was neither a set back nor a defeat,
but an Affirmation of the things which you
most Value and cherish.

The simple things: Family, Friends, Food, Laughter,
Music, Song, Beauty, Faith, Hope and Charity.
And the greatest of these,
the tie that binds,
the leitmotif which weaves its way
through the fabric of our beings;

The greatest of these, my Friend,
my Partner,
my Mentor,

The greatest of these, is Love,
Your Gift to us all.

'Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free,

'Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,

And when we find ourselves in the place just right,

'Twill be in the valley of love and delight.

When true simplicit is gain'd,

To bow and to bend we shan't be ahsam'd,

To turn, turn will be our delight,

Till by turning, turning we come round right.