Crossing a line in the Ether

Written but not published May 8, 2016 by David L Lewis

On a Sunday morning some years back an elder came and asked if I’d sit in with him while he counseled a single woman. No man, it should be here noted, need ever be alone with any woman except his wife.

My task at the time was to sit silently, unobtrusively. Me, being me, of course had to speak out of turn. What came to mind and which I told the woman at the time has served me well these now 30 years on: “I do not know how you feel because none of my life’s experiences match your circumstances. This does not mean I do not care, only that I do not understand.”

It was with this in mind that I wrote last year in a blog entitled “Sorry for your loss”:

“Maybe it’s what we saw on some TV show. Maybe it is just what we’ve come to say because we don’t really know what to say. For my part, I take a person at their word. I believe they really are sympathetic, even if they can’t find other words.

“Overall ‘sorry’ seems better than ‘I know how you feel’; unless, of course, the speaker really does know. The most strengthening words come from those who simply say: ‘I’ve been there. It will never be the same, but it will get better than it is now.’”

I keep thinking I need to Google the stages of grief, if only to figure out if I’ve gone through them and have yet to come out the other side. I suspect I have not; or at least not as long as I cannot bring myself to visit the grave. [see FOOTNOTE]

Today, though, I crossed a line I didn’t know was there into something like liberty. A pastor who’d been a customer and whom I didn’t really remember called about a computer problem. He reminded me he had prayed for us right after we reopened the business and had said at that time, as people do, “I know how you feel.” The caller wanted to apologize for having said that – it’s just what you say.

It seems this man of God had similarly lost his 30 year old daughter Easter Sunday; and only now could honestly say, “I know how you feel”.

Somehow I found myself the counselor, assuring him of what others had told me at the time and which I’d since seen confirmed by a year’s experience: “I’ve been there. It will never be the same, but it will get better than it is now.” To which was added -- just not today.

And thus I found myself having crossed an invisible line in the Ether. There will always be grief in our hearts, of course. But somewhere I’ve crossed from losing my son and close friend to being a voice of those who really are “sorry for your loss”.

theDaddy!

FOOTNOTE: Posted to Facebook May 31, 2018
THREE YEARS SIX WEEKS

First year in tax preparation business an “older” woman came in explaining that filling out forms was something her husband always did. She cried as she thought of him. Being a wanta-be pastor I asked the obvious, when did he pass? “Seven years ago.” I hadn’t much actual experience with grief, but did think seven years was enough. Time and life teaches otherwise.

It has been quite a while since I thought “I’ll ask my dad” – only a few less years since I started to call my brother, Terry. It’s been, more or less, about a day since I had something to tell Nathan.

Once told Susan I was going to live in Brazil until I die, and be buried beside my wife and son. But, I had not been able to bring myself to visit Nathan’s grave.

Today, because Kay was with me, I went to his grave site.

 

Tax Time Travail

by reformed former tax preparer David L Lewis

“Anyone may arrange his affairs so that his taxes shall be as low as possible; he is not bound to choose that pattern which best pays the treasury. There is not even a patriotic duty to increase one's taxes, nor public duty to pay more than the law demands." Supreme Court Judge Learned Hand (1872-1961)

Now that the moon has gone back to wherever it hides in the daytime, the news people can go on to the next immutable natural phenomena -- Tax Time! It gets to page one in the news just now because the busiest time in tax business are first two weeks of April - when folks expecting to owe money file at late as possible.

In the interest of full disclosure, I operated tax preparation businesses over fifteen years. Every year IRS would “improve’ the forms. As Henry Block said, “If they stopped making changes to the laws and the forms, we’d go out of business.” Truth is once you filled out one or two the rest were easy.

Of course it’s been quite a while since I filled out those forms, so I may be a bit rusty on the subject. Let me see if I’ve got this modern taxation thing right.

1. The government prints the money. They do this very well and frown on anyone else doing it for them.

2. We have to use their currency which they issue to us, even though its value consists solely in how well we trust the issuer.

3. Then, every time money passes from one hand to the next for “value received” the government wants back some of the money which they themselves printed.

4. For example, if the kid who cuts your grass earns more than $400 in any calendar year, the government wants back part of the money it printed. If they don’t get it, well, federal prison at Leavenworth Kansas is lovely in the Spring with lots of grass to cut.

5. Finally, congress says they can’t do such & such because they don’t have enough tax money; but they can pay for this more Popular thing with borrowed money -- providing a benefit which their donors will almost certainly filter down to us, eventually.

So, why can’t the government just print themselves enough money to pay off all their bills and let us have the rest? That would certainly end a lot of tax time travail.

Ain’t this a great country or not?

theNoLongerTaxGuru

 

Blogging About Blogging

“Only a blockhead would write for anything but money”

(quote attributed to 18^th century writer Samuel Johnson).

In 2008 the Brazil Times solicited bloggers. I had no idea what a blog was. Kay convinced me to look into it (some nonsense about writing being my ‘art’). The “pay” was to be free subscription to paper, which I never got. Also signed some paper work as reflected in end note.

It’s not that I’ve had a lot of trouble finding something to say. The Times website posted about 350 of my blogs under header My View From the Back Pew; and 75 print articles in the paper under The Not a Computer Geek. For reasons some will understand, I stopped writing for the Times in 2015.

Since November 2018 I have written 165 blogs on the blog machine Matthew set up for me. My first blog on this site was copy of my first blog for Times. About a year ago I undertook to write 500 or more words each week for this blog thingee (yes, yes. I know, Jen was behind this, too).

One of my problems is that I’ve never had any one thing to blog about. I’m not an expert in much of anything, and never will be a particularly prolific writer because my eclectic mind is fascinated by a multitude of sins. Try to write assuming everyone on Facebook will read it, while knowing few will. Have left over from all this ‘tons’ of stuff which I started but didn’t finish – most now out of date or never worth starting.

About once a year I “decide” it is time to stop writing these inane blogs. This is one of those times.

     Pretty sure it is no secret my body hath betrayeth me. I’m having a lot more times when can’t think clear. My hospice nurse said it’s all right to get discouraged about all this; so I consider myself justified in so being.
     As old men with failing hearts often do, I look back on my life which hahas passed t oo quickly, and forward to the world I see coming for which I feel so unprepared. It becomes harder and harder to feel optimistic about the future of this life and more curious about the next. Do they even need blog writers in heaven?
     Mostly, though, have come to feel I really have nothing much more to say. Turns out every thought I have these days has already been written [even this diatribe was cannibalized from something I wrote in 2012].

Not sure what’s next in my blog ‘career’. Who knows, though, might yet think of something new I just have to write to find out what I think.

As lady on TV says, Watch This Space,

theDaddy!

For any interested, my first blog on this here site is available at: https://blogsbythedaddy.blogspot.com/2018/11/by-way-of-introduction-what-follows-in.html. 

Please Note: This blog was first published on the Brazil Times website
This is part of complying of Blogs posted from May 17 2008 to May 10 2015 on the Brazil Times website under the by-line MY VIEW FROM THE BACK PEW.  Not all Blogs can or should be included -- that's well over 150,000 words which nobody much read the first time around.  And, some will be edited for timeliness, relevance, or just plain keeping short enough to be read. These Blogs can no longer be found on the Times site annind are reproduced here from original document files; my understanding is they remain “property” of the paperve, so acknowledgment is given.