My Apotheosis

For after all what is man in nature? A nothing in regard to the infinite, a whole in regard to nothing, a mean between nothing and the whole; infinitely removed from understanding either extreme. The end of things and their beginnings are invincibly hidden from him in impenetrable secrecy, he is equally incapable of seeing the nothing whence he was taken, and the infinite in which he his engulfed.

                                                                              Blaise Pascal

               As a post pubescent young man staring out of my bedroom window watching local debris swirl in the windy gusts autumn provides I often dreamed of the day when the huzzahs of the masses would bathe me in its elixir and thonged, callipygian handmaidens would carry me in a jewel encrusted palanquin to Valhalla. Once ensconced the handmaidens would do my manly bidding my bodily desiccation a testament to their unbridled passions. I saw myself as a mover and shaker of gargantuan proportions whose thunderous hammer blows were the legal tender of a supplicant society.The masses would wait with baited breath for my apocryphal announcements and I would dine on the sweetbreads of lesser gods. Internationally renown I would traverse the countryside like a pale rider smiting all who would question the integrity of my worldview. I saw myself living life like a dashing man for all seasons, swashbuckling myself into greatness but whose hopes ultimately would be shattered by the evolutionary joke of terminal acne and a bum’s proclivity for sloth.

            We all have secret lives where we slay the dragon, bring miscreants their just desert, free the people, save the republic, and still be home for dinner by six. Oh, I too had dreams that would place myself on the face of some fancy schmancy Mount Rushmore. I’M SMAHHHT! I KNOW THINGS!!! I thought the curing of AIDS would be my ticket out of a Palookaville, but my lack of training in any of the appropriate fields sandbagged this quest, my restorative, however ineffectual to HIV made for some pretty, damn good barbecue. Maybe if I could figure a way to mend the hole in the ozone with giant knitting needles or invent some intergalactic caulk the Swedish Nobelstiftelsen would anoint me with its most hallowed prize. However, my skills as an environmental scientist are even more rudimentary proven so by the committee’s suggestion that my only real qualification would be selling roach clips at the Toke N’ Bowl in Amsterdam.

            I certainly wasn’t wealthy enough to buy my way in either. Rich people give money to have hospital wings named after them so after they croak we can receive succor from their behest and they thusly can live on after their corporality comes into question. The Sid and Lillian Rosenthal Gastroenteritis pavilion at Cedar Sinai Hospital is a great example of how you can achieve apotheosis even though Sid Rosenthal used to be a slumlord who made a fortune in section 8 housing. Apotheosis has its privileges.

            Most of us feel that way, full of vim and vigor dreaming the big dream, but few of us can ever pull the trigger and achieve an apotheosis worthy of Zeus. Mostly, Man lives on the greatest drug of all…hope. As Emily Dickinson once wrote “Hope is the thing with feathers”. The proliferation of state lotteries is a great example of a culture of hope wishing greatness for itself. As human beings our great dream is to achieve the greatest glory with out any of the sacrifice if that is achieved through the serendipitous arrangement of ping pong balls so be it.

            Kinda creepy and junk wouldn’t you say Wally? Trapped between the ridiculous and the sublime like a rat, dead ends on either side. Pascal was right when he said that man is “a nothing in regard to the infinite, a whole in regard to nothing” This was in 1634 for crying out loud! PASCAL WAS SMAAAHHHT…HE KNEW THINGSSS!!! Man contents himself to be mired in stasis paralyzed to move in any direction. He wants to be great, to stand out alone in the world and yet at the same time belong to the herd. What is the apotheosis that allows him to do this, to be cock of the walk, to strut his stuff while at the same time allows him mooring to the incomprehensibility of being? Having been so thoroughly unskilled in any field that might produce a decent apotheosis myself I resorted to the only one I knew that would accept the delusion that the imprimatur of Schneider had a chance to live on after I bowed my last. I put a few loads into my old lady’s washer and had a couple of kids.

            Sadly, having kids is the best most of us can do especially if you work at a job that involves a paper hat. Well, you get my drift. Any slack-jawed yutz can have a throw down with his beautiful Romina and pop out wailing hatchlings. However, it is the only way to immortality I know of that involves Sixty-nine. For most of us who took life’s myriad possibilities and pissed them away like a race horse on derby day the care and feeding of the young is our greatest calling. If kids are our only true apotheosis why isn’t parenting regarded with more esteem? Why do we regard the most mysterious and yet tangible creation with such indifference instead of embracing it like the Holy Grail it is?

            For starters, the administration of having kids BLOWWWWSSS! Think of root canal for 25 years straight with no Novocain and you’ll get the picture of what it is to raise the ultimate black hole, where light cannot escape, all energy collapses back on to itself and if you’re lucky will give you the stink eye if you so much as look at them.

            Why would anyone voluntarily create a being out of pure nothingness just so he can indenture himself to an investment that is the ultimate lost leader? Because when all is all said and done having children is like smoking crack. When it stinks a polo mallet is never close enough. When it’s good it’s the greatest buzz you’ll ever know. Unfortunately that’s one percent of the time. The other ninety-nine percent is spent looking for crack. When they won’t listen, won’t clean their rooms and continually fight with each other, that is akin to not having any more crack. If you knew in advance that parenting was nothing more than the daily management of an investment that fights you at every turn why would any of us ever do it? 

            So where is this goddamn crack, this ultimate high, this shit that keeps us from sapping the little ingrates and throwing them into a lake bound in burlap bags filled with rocks? I will tell you sir that the restraint one must muster to prevent very bad things from happening is as close as I will ever get to revealing the true nature of raising a child. But as grave as my portrayal is it is the crack I crave and it is the crack I shall have.

            The reason we do it is because there are moments so powerful in the connection between parent and child that it is as close to the Godhead as we’ll ever get. I experienced this every time I changed my daughter’s diaper. The dirtier the better. It didn’t matter what kind of nasty pate I would find, because in a strange way it was my pate. The DNA was the same. I would admire the stinky little pyramid as I slavered Desitin ointment on my daughter’s bum-so Pavlovian is the smell that no matter when or where you ever smell it again you automatically think of baby ass! Why do it if the buzz were not so incredible? Try bathing your one year old son without taking a nice bite out of that little tush or try not weeping watching your daughter sing Memory saving a swirling production of Cats from disappearing down the drain or witnessing your son make an impossible catch while three old timers sitting in lawn chairs beyond the centerfield fence cheer and all you can think of saying is “best damn player I’ve ever seen” right out of The Natural. He’s no Roy Hobbs that’s for sure, just your son whose underwear stands straight up when he takes them off at night. Are you the father? They ask. The crack, the crack, we do it for the crack!

             The key to parenting is to raise them to want to leave, to achieve a mortal greatness that has a chance to help Mankind and not be some 40 year old chowderhead living in the family basement. You know this chump, comes in shitfaced at three in the morning. Mom snaps out of bed and makes him prime rib while simultaneously removing the hash marks from his tighty whities with her gold plated, monogrammed hash mark brush the sad ass gave her for Mother’s Day. You want a kid who looks at life like it’s a giant smorgasbord, all you can eat.

            My love for my kids is the only illusion I most unabashedly bask in. Who knows if its really real or just natures way of keeping us interested. Who cares? When my son came into my darkroom one day when he was six and saw a nude come up in the print developer he said, “Dad, that lady doesn’t have any clothes on!” “I know. She’s a model. She models for your Dad.” Without missing a beat he says, “Why would they listen to you?” The crack…