Life in this alternate universe

Image credit ChatGPT

It’s been about a decade or so since I stopped writing regularly here for Headstuffing. 

Life just changed. 

A lot. Holy cow did it change. To the point where it seemed to be a parody of itself. 

Yeah, that’s about the time that Donald Trump came along and won the 2016 election for U.S. President.

And that’s about the time we all collectively fell into this black hole and went spinning on through the worm hole and were spit out into this alternate universe.

Then we had the pandemic. The pandemic that terrified us to the point where we insisted it was true, that getting vaccinated was a pre-requisite  to being alloed back into society as long as you worte a mask as well. To the point where now we all question just what really happened there? 

Please don’t think I mean it wasn’t real – it was indeed real –  but we do have to wonder how the hell it came to be that the whole world agreed to shut down. 

And it did shut down. 

And then it opened back up – but different. You experienced it as well. And I bet for each of us it was very different in very different ways – with vague commonalities – like working from home and finding old masks in winter jackets – and not being able to toss out that left over COVID test kit in the back of your bathroom cupboard under the sink. 

When we did start going back to work in our physical office workplaces, I found myself asking those I hadn’t seen for the last year – much in the same way I would ask “how was your vacation?” or “Did you have a nice weekend?” – I would ask “So .,. how was your pandemic?” 

 Some would tell me about how incredibly stressed they were … others how bored … and others would tell me about the loved ones they lost … and yes … we lost a couple of our work colleagues as well. 

And I would feel like a jerk, because when they would ask me, I would reply along the lines of … “Frigging great, I loved it! After my wife left me and that horrid relationship was finally over and me and my daughters started figuring out how we were moving ahead I met the most incredible wonderful woman – and we joined forces and went through the most wonderful global lock-down together!”

And we did. And that wonderful woman is now my wife. And the pandemic gave us the most unique opportunity to really get to know each other.

I guess that while this alternate universe – now a decade later – doesn’t seem to be very kind to our geo-political or economic wellbeing, it has in fact been a very wonderful decade for me and Jac. But right now at this moment – this week after Easter 2026, this week after the successful landing of the Artemis 2 space mission. This month after the U.S. attacks on Iran are spiraling out of control, our alternate universe seems to be heading to an apocalyptic event that none of us could have imagined, having survived the cold-war with the USSR. But now Russia’s attention is focused on Ukraine. And China seems to be sitting by quietly ready to take advantage of whatever opportunity such calamity could leave behind in it’s wake.

They say that each decision we make – each time where a choice exists – where more than one path is presented to each of us – that there is an alternate universe for each path or choice or decision we didn’t make or take.

I wonder which opportunity it was that brought me down this one.

Even if I knew, and even if I had that opportunity over again, I’ll tell you this quite sincerely ... 

I wouldn’t change a thing.

The time on my hands

What do you do with three weeks off?

That’s my conundrum today as I begin the longest summer vacation I have ever taken.

In this period of global pandemic, there’s no place to go.

When I made the decision to take these three weeks off, our plan was to travel as our new group of five – Jackie and her daughter Mackenzie, myself and my two daughters Alannah and Ashley-Rae. Her family in St. John’s Newfoundland had reached out to invite us all and we all agreed to jump at the chance of such an adventure.

An adventure for sure for me and the Brill Girls, but for Jac and Mackenzie it would be a great visit back home.

Jac was telling us all of the great sites we would see – like icebergs floating down past the oceans edge of town – and the beautiful rolling landscapes – and all the great people she loves that we would meet. And we all got excited. The pictures all look so beautiful.

“We’ll drive” explained Jac, “It’s a long drive but it’s all so beautiful. And we will ride the ferry overnight to the island province”.

“How long does the ferry take?” asked Alannah.

“About nine hours, and I hate boats”, laughed Jackie. “But we will be there for St. John’s three weeks of summer”

So I booked my three weeks and two days off from work or the long trip.

And then the pandemic got worse instead of better.

Now we have rules like wearing masks in public places and social distancing of six feet and social bubbles of no more than ten people and washing and sanitizing everything you touch.

Some of the provinces in our path out east instituted rules like if you enter that province you have to self-isolate for ten days before you can carry on with your trip. How would they be able to enforce that? I don’t know. Do I want to find out? No – not with the kids with us anyway.

It would have been adventure though - like the old Smokey and the Bandit movie. Only we would be the illegal cargo instead of Coors beer.

Imagine us driving down the Trans-Canada highway – reaching a roadblock at the Quebec – Nova Scotia border – a Gleeson-like provincial police officer complete with polaroid sunglasses standing in the middle of the highway with a bullhorn for us to pull over, and Jackie swerving to the right to heading for a flatbed trailer parked on the shoulder with its rear end down on the ground – like the perfect jump ramp – and Jackie shouting to us all to “hang on – this is going to be fun”.

“Yeee-Hawww” I would shout as the SUV flew through the air.

After the airborne Dodge Durango landed with a couple of bounces, she would have to lose the RCMP chasing us on horseback she would ride down into the valley of the median and up the other side of the highway that people heading west would use – swerving between the oncoming traffic – and the moose and elk that just naturally wander out on the highway.

That would be an adventure.

“Now that’s just stupid” Jackie will say when she reads this.

“I don’t know”, I’ll reply “you’re a pretty crazy driver”

“But now we will never know” I would say before she had a chance to get mad.

Besides, the police would have caught us at the ferry anyway.

So now I’m trying hard to think of what to do for fun on this three weeks of vacation.

“Work on your house Fred” everyone will say.

Everyone will say that.

And everyone would be right. I have a list so long of all the things I need to do – both inside and out. De-tangling it from the past to open it up to the future. Rooms to clear out and carpets to clean or pull out and replace with other flooring. The garage is a horrible collection of things sat down quickly to get them out of the car or another room in the house. A couple of trees to cut down or pull out on the north side of the house. An old car to clean up and sell. A spare room downstairs to clean out to use as my work-from-home office in three weeks’ time. Painting and multiple trips to the dump.

The list is daunting. Overwhelming in fact.

Well, the problem of what to do is solved.

I wonder if three weeks is enough?

You don’t mess with the Brill Girls

Last year, my youngest daughter Ashley-Rae was determined to update her old iPhone to a newer one.

She saved her money for a couple of months and kept her eyes peeled online for a deal. Finally, by the fall she had saved up enough to buy an almost new model and she found a guy online who had what she was looking for. Ash negotiated the sale with the guy online and then came running out to the living room where I was watching television.

“Dad you have to take me over to Jake's Roadhouse for 6:00 pm” she said excitedly.

“Why?” I replied in my typical Dad fashion.

Ashley explained her desire for a new iPhone, how it was the most important issue on the planet, how hard she worked to save her money, and showed me a couple of pictures of the one she found. She was talking so fast she kept running out of breath and would take a deep breath and continue on speaking way to quickly understand some of the important parts.

So I asked her to tell me again – slowly – so that I could understand her and so she wouldn’t pass out in mid-sentence.

She rolled her eyes as if I’m the dumbest Dad in the world and began again – only this time more slowly.

We held the regular discussion about how expensive it was and was she sure she wanted to throw all her money she worked so hard for at this. And of course, being the most important thing in the world – she assured me it was. She then explained – slowly – the arrangement to meet in the parking lot of Jake's Roadhouse.

Skeptically – I agreed. And we hopped in the car to drive to the other side of town to Jake's Roadhouse.

Halfway there – on route – Ashley received a text on her perfectly good old iPhone from this seller guy.

“Dad – he says to meet him at the Smoke and Spice instead”.

“huh” I replied. It’s just down the street but my skepticism was growing.

We arrived at the Smoke and Spice rib joint and she texted the seller guy that we were here. A couple of minutes later – a well-groomed bearded fellow in a silk patterned shirt appeared in the lot – walked past our car noticing us on the way by. He opened his back door and pulled out an iPhone box. Ash and I got out of the car together as he approached. He held out the phone – till wrapped in plastic – and handed it to Ashley-Rae. She in return handed him her savings.

I reached out my hand to shake his and said softly but firmly to the seller guy “she’s worked very hard and saved a long time for that money – if this isn’t legit then I will find you”.

“It’s legit” he said with a smile and handed me a business card for a mobile phone shop in town. “You can always reach me here”.

When we got home – Ashley-Rae took the phone out of the box and started the instructions for setting it up. When it got to the point of putting in the SIM card, her SIM card was not being accepted in the new phone. So we hopped back in the car and took it to the store where Ashly-Rae bought her phone plan. An older fellow my age was working. He fumbled with it for about a half hour and then confessed “I don’t really know how to do this, can you bring it in tomorrow when the manager is here? He will fix it in no time”.

I had to work the next morning but my eldest daughter Alannah promised to bring her.

That morning, while I was at work, I received a phone call from Alannah.

“Dad, the guy here at the store says the phone is stolen”.

“How does he know that?” I asked.

“The serial number on the box is on a list of stolen phones”, replied Alannah.

I reached in my wallet and pulled out the business card the fellow had given me.

“I’ll take a drive over to this guy’s store later and find out what’s going on!” I replied.

“No Dad, I got this. Send me a picture of the card” said Alannah firmly. I did so and sent it to her phone.

“Don’t you be confronting this guy alone. Go to the police” I said.

“We’re on our way there now Dad”.

”I’m walking into a meeting now – but keep me posted okay?” I said.

I was hosting this meeting so I set up the room’s video conference to call the rest of our team in Toronto. Our team had been working together for a couple of years together so while we waited for all the participants to gather in each meeting room, I told them the story of the stolen phone. All agreed it was horrible and showed interest in the dilemma. I told them Alannah was taking Ashley-Rae to police department –and all agree that it was likely useless. And then we dove into the agenda of the meeting.

About fifteen minutes later I received a text message.

’The LaSalle police weren’t interested. Heading to the Windsor police station now’ read the message.

I told the attendees of the meeting the status update and we continued through our work session.

Another fifteen minutes later another text message arrived.

‘A lady officer at the Windsor Police was interested but couldn’t leave right now. So we are heading to the mobile phone store.’

Again I conveyed the message to the group and after a few minutes of discussion – all agreed this was more interesting than our working session. But we continued on with our work. And again fifteen minutes later – I received another message:

‘The guy who was working at the store said this guy doesn’t work there, but he told us he works at the Volkswagen dealership down the street.’

Twenty minutes later my iPhone rang. “It’s Alannah” I announced to the group.

“Put it on speaker phone – please” they all chanted.

“Hey Alannah what happened?” I asked into the phone.

She told me it was done and I asked her ”Can I put you on the speaker? I have a room full of people all dying to know how this turned out!”

“Sure!” said Alannah proudly. So I hit the speaker button and put it next to the video conference microphone.

And Alannah told the story:

“Ashley texted the fellow and told him the phone was stolen and we were outside with the stolen phone. Ashley told him either he comes out in the lot now or we are coming in and we will make a big noise about it.”

“Hold on”, said the guy.

Shortly the same bearded seller guy appeared from the mechanic’s bay of the dealership. Ashley-Rae and Alannah got out of the car and yelled ‘OVER HERE!’. The seller guy ran to his car. He grabbed a couple of boxes and came over to Ashley-Rae.

“I’m so sorry about this” he said. And he gave Ash two boxes – one was for the newest larger size iPhone in red and the other was a wireless charger. And he asked for the old phone box back.

Ash opened up the old phone box – took out her SIM card and said ‘Make the new one work first!’

The fellow unwrapped and opened the new iPhone box, started it up, answered the few questions on the screen and then put the SIM card in.

“It worked Dad!”

The whole meeting team in Windsor and Toronto erupted in a cheer.

“What was that Dad?”

“That was both Windsor and Toronto rooting for you guys” I replied proudly. “Well done”.

And the rest of two sides of the meeting chimed in with “Way to go!”, “That’s so great!”, and ”Great Job Honey!”

“Thanks!” said Alannah, “You don’t mess with the Brill Girls”.

Just like falling off a bike

I’m trying very hard to return to writing my stories here on headstuffing.

My problem is that there is just too much to say. The world has gotten so strange.

“Just write”, I tell myself. “Just write something”.

You have to start somewhere right?

“Just get back into it”.

Just start typing a bunch of words and it will all come back to you – like falling off a bicycle – right?

What? It’s supposed to be “like riding a bicycle – not falling off one?”

Okay – well which is easier? Falling off, right? No? Well you must be pretty good at it then.

When I fall off a bike the thought before I hit the ground is always “… man this is going to hurt”.

And it always does.

But I’m not going to write about falling off a bike. That would simply be a waste of everybody’s time. Mine and yours. Hell, you probably already stopped reading.

“But what CAN I write about?”, I ask myself.

“I could write about Trump?”

See there’s a problem right there. That’s all anybody talks about anymore.

It’s way too easy to discuss Donald Trump. And it’s way too difficult. How could you come up with anything new that the late-night talk show guys or the political pundits on both sides haven’t already come up with?

Well, let me give it a whirl.

I’m a John McCain conservative.

“We don’t like John McCain because he lost the election – to Barack Obama” say the Trump base. The newly proclaimed “conservatives”.

“He lost because he ran with Sarah Palin” I reply.

“But we love Sarah Palin” reply the Trump base.

And this makes you come to a level of understanding. We should have seen this whole Trump era ushered in when the Republican Party got behind Sarah Palin. “I Can see Russia from my back yard [in Alaska]” – that Sarah Palin.

Ahhhh ….

John McCain was a war hero. He was a prisoner of war (which is Donald Trump’s reason for disliking him – because he got caught). He knew how to reach across party lines, and get stuff done. That used to be considered a huge positive attribute for a politician. To work together with a colleague of a completely polar opposite point of view to come to a mutual agreement to pass a bill that benefits both sides of that opposite polarity boundary. A win-win result.

We used to call it compromise. A negotiation to a positive conclusion. But now we call it concessions. I looked it up the word compromise in an old Webster’s dictionary from 1978 that  I keep still on my bookshelf and it read: “To reach an agreement of mutual benefit by two opposing sides”

Then I looked up the definition on-line. This is what popped up:

“an agreement or a settlement of a dispute that is reached by each side making concessions.”

Concession means ‘give up’. To Concede. Not exactly a positive win-win mentality anymore.

So now, to compromise Is now to concede or give up your position.

And that’s sad.

Both sides of the political spectrum now believe this. And the negotiation tactics of the day reflect this. The left and the right. It either has to be all the way to the left or all the way to the right. The negotiation tactics of today are that there will be no negotiation with “the other side”.

You have to pick a side, they will say. And if you’re not with us then you are against us.

And the pendulum swings back and forth faster than ever before and the faster it swings the higher the end of the pendulum reaches at each swing. More extreme. Because those in the middle of each “your either with us or against us” side keep switching sides because the other side swung just a little to far on that last swing.

Right?

No Left – No right – damn it’s left again, wow did we ever go right, Holy cow the next swing left will really be extreme – and the next swing right even higher.

The momentum of it is hard to stop.

But we have to figure out how to slow this political pendulum down. We need this pendulum to spend more time in the middle.

Or civil war is going to break out.

And this swing of the pendulum is not just “an American condition”. It’s global. You see it across the world.

Look around the globe. Look at the places where the pendulum doesn’t swing it all. It always stays locked in the extreme position. Places like Iran and China. Places like Russia and North Korea to name only a few. Their political pendulums are stuck so high that if it swung on a clock face the pendulum would be frozen at one or eleven o’clock.  

Notice that these places are all the same places led by regimes where the leadership in control will stop at nothing to enforce their ways? They concede only the bare minimum to avoid a populous overthrow – like we saw in the Asian Spring era earlier in this decade. And they enforce with an iron fist.

But they all eventually fall. All that hold too tightly to power eventually lose their grip – and fall to their demise. The higher up the pendulum, the farther the drop.

Left or right. It doesn’t matter. And Those on the left will say the examples I gave above are all on the right. And those on the right will disagree and say those examples are all on the left.

No negotiation. No compromise.

Compromise means concession now, remember?

And this has happened throughout history. The result has always meant the downfall of every civilization that has come before. Every empire before us has fallen or greatly diminished to less dominant state.

Power will shift. But to others who simply want to attain the control. Sometimes on the same side of the pendulum, and sometimes all the way to the other side.

At some point we have to re-embrace the original definition of compromise. We have to get back to looking for win-win solutions to our problems.

We all have to recognize each other again. Or maybe we all need to start recognizing each for the first time?

It should be as easy as riding a bike. All it takes is balance, eh?

But if we can’t find our balance, we will fall off that bike.

And if we all fall off, man is that going to hurt.