Cell Phones & Siblings [View all]

[H2O Man]

“What you think, you become.” -- Buddha; circa 500 bc.

“What you think, you become.” -- Gandhi; 1860-1948 ad.


I was talking with my normal brother the other day. He had just picked up a new cell phone, in preparation for a trip to the Old Sod to play golf and watch horse-races. Because my grasp of technology generally stopped with my mastering the abacus, he went into great detail to explain the advantages of his new toy.

When I “yawned” -- a polite attempt to communicate my lack of interest -- he immediately said he would provide details so simple, that even I might grasp them. No matter where he happens to be ( Oregon, Boston, or Ireland being his three favorites), if someone sends him a message, his phone will pick it up. The invisible vibrations of energy, if I recall what I wasn’t listening to, will be received by his toy. For that wave-length is sent out virtually everywhere.

Life is both curious and strange, at least in my opinion. In many, if not most ways, my brother and I are very much alike. That is, I assume, due to the combination of nature and nurture: we have similar DNA, and grew up in the same setting. Our daughters frequently respond to our feeble attempts at humor by saying “tell that to your brother, he’s the only one who will ‘get it’.”

He was the best trainer - corner man I ever had in the sport of boxing. I trusted him 100%. I appreciated that he had the opportunity to learn from two of the best ever in the sport: Angelo Dundee and Manny Steward. I respect that he has, in recent years, come to despise the sport, because of the long-term damage that it does to so many of the fellows who participate in it.

Yet there are areas where we disagree. Often quite strongly, as brothers are apt to do. For example, he often tells me that I have to tell my younger son that he is “not allowed” to box. Sure, I tell him, that worked out so well when our parents attempted to stop us. He orders me to have my boy visit our older brother, a once highly-intelligent, respected member of the community we grew up in. Today, he is a still-breathing corpse, who talks non-stop about UFOs. My children are all familiar with their uncle.

My normal brother is a science-based atheist, something that I respect and endorse. However, I enjoy telling him that we both believe in the same God. He insists that my beliefs are actually almost identical to our older brothers: that there is some higher entity that lives in the sky, keeping watch over the human race that is “God’s” ultimate creation. Yikes!

We were raised in what was known as an “Irish-Catholic” environment, at least until as teenagers, we discovered that skipping church was as easy as skipping school. When he moved to the west coast in the 1970s, he stayed briefly at one of our favorite uncle’s houses. He was disappointed to find that this uncle, who ranked rather highly in the ONI, was a strict Catholic. Since then, my brother has assumed that everyone who is religious/ spiritual is cut from the same general cloth -- be they believers in Santa God, Stained-Glass Jesus, or violence-prone, hateful worshippers of another mythology.

Thus, I took the opportunity provided by his fascination with his new cell phone, to talk about my thoughts about energy and vibrations. While some in our extended family subscribe to a theory popularly known as “reincarnation,” I prefer the miracle of DNA, a living energy force that I suspect better explains certain “mysteries.” I’m able to provide my brother with contact information of some distant cousins -- for they are from a branch of our family that either stayed in Ireland, or came here in the late 1800s and eventually returned to Ireland.

The two brothers that he’ll be meeting are about as ugly as we are. They love horse-racing and golf. One boxes. And they share our deformed sense of humor. That DNA stuff is pretty powerful. I don’t advocate worshipping DNA, but I do think it is a topic that most people can find worthy of consideration, and even study.

Likewise, I think that human beings are, at very least, as interesting as cell phones. I often find myself thinking about how our emotions -- including “love” and “hate” -- transmit energy, or vibrations, that are both visible and invisible. And I find myself thinking of them in the simple context of ripples on the surface of my pond, when I toss food in for the many fish that inhabit my pond. Unlike my brother, who gets to spend 40+ hours each week inside a large university, interacting with highly intelligent men and women, I spend most of my time alone ….and my favorite spot is out at my pond.

Thank goodness that the weather is finally changing. Spring is upon here on the east coast. I’m able to spend more time out at the pond, filling the bird-feeders, and watching my dog Kelly enjoy himself running about, tail a wagging, sniffing every bush and tree, digging holes for who knows what. It’s a nice break from the long winter, and the weird vibrations that bring the “news” to my television, or the often strangely hostile vibrations delivered on DU:GD.

Peace,
H2O Man