Myth #1 “It’s Crowded at the Top”

In my endless travels throughout the world, I , the Zambonesman have done much listening, in addition to answering of questions. Though it may seem that my mission is of a selfless nature, I can assure you that great Zamboni is one very selfish person. That is how I and YOU should be. All your questions and comments teach me, and that is really my goal, to keep learning.

We must all take care of ourselves, after all, guess who was put on this earth to meet all your needs? Me? Your mom? Your therapist? Oprah? No , you!

So in this learning I have noticed several popular assumptions that in fact are very WRONG. The first one I will adress today is the popular wrongness of, “It’s Crowded at the Top“. People generally say this as if like they are saying, “well, good luck but it’s very tough to get there” etc.

don't see a line here — See anyone taking a number?

I have been to the top of Mt. Everest and believe me, it is very not crowded up there. It’s very quiet. You can hear your lungs ache for oxygen and the snow crust on your mucus. Plenty of room, just some bones and initials carved into rock. You are not meeting heavy traffic there, or backstage at winners interviews for Oscars and Nobel Prize. Outside Oscars trying to get view of Nicole Kidman you are smack up against people, but on red carpet there never is traffic jam. Think about this.

People, it is the middle that is crowded. The middle ground where the average joes say, “well I like to do this with my life, but people keep saying how hard and crowded it is in this”etc…

People then say to me, “but Zamboni, what if I do not want to rat-race my way to top and struggle?” To them I say fine, but even staying in middle you have plenty of struggle, so why not set your course for where you wish to go? As Lao Tzu, and old friend once said who is now dead, “if you do not change direction you may end up where you are heading.”

Then another person recently said, “but is it lonely at the top Zamboni?”

No. Zamboni himself is at top of field off all knowing mindless sages and he is not lonely. I have the myspace!

We shepards in Estonia show their high school musical movie to goats and it induce lactation, useful and thanks you two!

Zamboni, What Are You Wearing?

This great question comes from reader, “Sweetstachebro”. It is not talked of enough, what we wear. ! As Mark Twain said or maybe Shakespeare- I don’t really know the difference, “the clothes make the man”. So think of this the next time you go out in public with your cracked toes in flippy flops and a T-Shirt that says like, Hang Ten, or Chico State or something, and jeans that be hanging below your tush- what does this say about YOU?

I wear a bowtie. Now I know there are haters of bowtie who say man who wear bowtie cannot achieve erection. But I can assure you, personally, this is untrue. I have woody of great reknown once a year on the Autumnal equinox that lasts for 16 hours during which time I donate my seeds for charity.

It is very difficult to learn the bowtie tie, it takes patience and the help of a man at Brooks, but it is quite worth it. Isn’t the difficult more worthwhile sometimes? Unlike a regular tie, you cannot see what you are doing because it is right there below your chin.

Sometimes life blinds us- but we must continue, no?

Blazers? Always Harris Tweed. This woven by real people in little shacks on remote islands off Scotland. You look close it even have bits of colorful heather and peat in it. I don’t know what either of those are, but they are best tweeds. In picture I wear red only because it is club color.

Jackets always vintage, always union made, and under 10$ at Army of Salvation. It 50 years old and will still outlast that thing your girlfriend got you from Banannas Republic. Viva Amalgamated Clothing and Garment Workers of Your America!

Yes the jeans are patched. Always patch and save. Like women, clothes only get more beautiful with age, BUT only if you/they do not hide the age. Like snow white hair, you see my jeans proudly wear and are purified by their experiences. They are patched with the shred of a dress worn by a french lover from long ago. Memories of a painfully stony beach on the Riviera.

Above my right hand on the lapel you see a chzotchke of shiny metal. This must remain my secret as if I told you of the Order it is signifying I would have to eat you. Though it is greater to have a future, a man should still retain some of his mysterious past.

Underwear? No. Like Nutrasweet in my coffee; Never have, never will.

sassafrassy — Your Fate is in the Box. Would it kill you to wear a jacket and tie occasionally?

A Sentence About Why I Need Baseball

(I had to write this, Zamboni doesn’t do sports)

So you snap at your kids and they do that saracstic little OMG face and you snap back at them for that and they say, “what face?” and there are tears and it gets all ugly and you wish you hadn’t said what you did and there are more tears because now you’re angry at yourself so you get more angry at her and all the time you realize all these years are going by so fast anyway and what does it all add up to and you want to rewind or at least stop time but you know you can’t so you go home and in a huff you turn on the TV and no one’s talking but you discover that the Phillies and the Reds are in the 12th inning, tied at 4 a piece and you just start watching and the 12th becomes the 14th and everyone in Philiadephia gets up and sings again take me out to the ballgame for the 14th Inning Stretch and suddenly you and both kids are on the couch inching a little closer together and laughing sleepily because now it’s the 17th, then 19th inning and it’s 1 a.m. in Philly and they have run out of pitchers so the second baseman has come up to pitch and he retires the side with all his teamates smiling and laughing and the boy went to sleep in the 16th but the girl, the cusp of teenage girl is now asleep on your shoulder waking up just long enough for you to tell her, “they won it in the 19th” and time stopped for those 7 innings you watched because baseball has no clock and you realize that’s why you need it because sometimes you just need to stop time.

Where are the cool parents?

here’s my question for the Z man: Where are all the cool parents? My husband and I desperately need cool parent friends…but we can’t find them. While I was never a parent in California, I remember feeling very conservative while living there and now that I live in the East..I feel like a freak.

We just need that other couple that are not all about their things or their yards. The couple that can let kids be kids and not hover, the couple that are happy to let the kids play, while the adults enjoy a glass of wine…with out being total tramps! the couple that don’t over manage and over schedule their children’s lives and think public school sucks.

Dear Reader, I will try and help.

This phenomenon is quite a blight on parenting in the US but quite unfamiliar in my home Estonia, where parents continue to smoke cigarettes and stare blankly out at the world in existential way even while their children climb perilous, outdated and rusting jungle jim.

In this country parensts think they must pay close attention always and so are unwittingly bringing up little neurotic praise leeches who can’t function on their own.. Today we have teens who can get 1600 on SAT but not fry egg or clean toilet because they’ve never been trusted with any work.

But I digress. Most of the cool parents go to spawn in Alameda, Ca. This is a small island town near Oakland where you see more hotrods and Betty Page hairdos than Baby Bjorns and Hummer-Strollers with sippie cup holders.

uss cool — This where I take my kids in Alameda, they have real jets on this! Also good Tiki Bar in town.

But since you are on East Coast, I suggest this:

Go where cool people are who you wish to meet. Rock climbing gyms, stock car races, naked bowling alleys and the like. And seek out on Craiglist, “wanted: parents who aren’t total dorks for two martini playdates” etc. Seek, and ye shall find says the bible.

In short, when the lame parents call, lie and say you are busy. Or, invite them to a cocktail party, “with Bugs Life Showing On Loop in Den” and see who shows up – these you keep as friends. Good luck- and be the parents you wish to meet!

(Thanks to Katja for aiding me in my confusion on this one…)

will do the trick — Zamboni Jr. watched for 12 hours straight once in which time I am on Vegas bender.

Milkshake of Meaning: Ingredient #1

The first ingredient in my milkshake is darkness and dreaming. It is Pomegranate. This actually very healthy despite symbolic add-ons from Zamboni.

“A man must dream a long time in order to act with grandeur, and dreaming is nursed in darkness.” -Jean Genet

We spend so much time as children, then as young people, then as adults, dreaming of tomorrow. “I will do this, …be this”. Zambonesman, which is me, dreams of playing Carnegie Hall in the year 2020. This is grandeur, no? I don’t even know if this place is still existing- is it? Perhaps by then it will be “Triscuit Pavillion” or “The Malt-O-Meal Dome” but still it is my dream which I guard. They are our great possessions, but only if we take them seriously. Otherwise it is just like smoke or wind from ass.

Pomegranate seeds were given to Persephone by the tricky Hades, king of under-place, so that she would have to return to the darkness half of each year.

When we read the myth as children, we think that is all bad for her, “oh poor thing she has to be away from mommy for 6 months each year, yadda yadda…” But really, the myth is telling us we need to spend equal time in the dark places as the light. The juice of this is blood red like the rushing blood under surface of our skin. It is also very hard word to spell but hey Devil, I have spellchek biotch! FACIAL!

Take that Fiend! POW! (Stay tuned for next ingredients…)

Hardest Question for Zambones?

Dear Zamboni-

Learning about all the greatest philosophies in human history seems hard- can I just do this by drinking a milkshake instead?

Luce Natas

Very tricky, “Luce”, nice try.

I recognize this reader to be none other than the arch nemesis to Great Zamboni himself, yes simply rearrange the letters in other direction and you have Lucifer, or SATAN!

You all know that I Great Zambonesman long ago sold my soul to the devil in exchange for my life and all wisdom when I was drowning in sub-zero Arctic waters. (This is why I urge parents to be teaching their children to swim as soon as you can) As part of that deal, the Horrid one told me that I may breathe this mortal air for as long as I can, but when I meet a question that I cannot answer- in that instant my soul will be swept back into the fiery pits.

Since I have been answering all questions with obscene wisdom for the last 75 years, obviously the evil fiend is becoming impatient and trying to trick me- neverthelss I will have to carefully weigh this question and come forward with answer soon or you will no longer have Zamboni around. Watch this space for answers coming soon to this Mephistophelian conundrum.

satan — Be not fooled! At first the question seems a simple no?- but for the devlish one- there is always trickery in the details. I will think now for 24 hours.

Question from “Huge Fan” about Saturn

Zamboni,

How does one deal with their Saturn Returns and all the life questions that come rushing with this period in your life?

Thank you.

from,

A HUGE fan

For those beside Huge Fan who may be clueless what is retutning where. I offer this from the Wikiweb: “In astrology, the Saturn return is a phenomenon which is described as influencing a person’s life development at 27 to 29 or 30-year intervals. These intervals or “returns” coincide with the approximate time it takes the planet Saturn to make one orbit around the sun, i.e. 28½ years. It is believed by astrologers that, as Saturn “returns” to the degree in its orbit occupied at the time of birth, a person crosses over a major threshold and enters the next stage of life. With the first Saturn return, a person leaves youth behind…”

Yes my friend and fan, the time has come for you.

Like Athena tells Telemachus in the Odyssey as he searches for his father, “you are no longer a child, you must put away childish things.” I wouldn’t go that far. Zamboni reccomends you never put away eating ice cream, karaoke or fart jokes, as all three are proven to prolong life- as long as they are accompanied by a high fiber breakfast. Don’t cross threshold of adulthood without taking small suitcase of childishness with you.

You have come to that place in life. Too old for a keg party, but too young to have job with health care. Too old to have bedazzled cellphone but too young to push baby stroller. Zamboni knows this well. It was at the age of 28 and half that I decide to leave the castle in which I was raised from age 14 on (my cheese farmer parents left me on the Baron’s doorstep then, due to poverty) and joined the Estonian Air Force.

saturn — The 70's Disco Dancer of the Solar System, who wears rings any more!

You tell me you have “questions that come rushing,” at you but are not specific. This tells me you are either too shy to include them, or that perhaps you already know the answers, somewhere, to the questions you have. Since you are fan of hugeness to me, you must be of intelligence, so perhaps the ladder is true.

Best to adress these questions one at a time:

Q: Should you keep following that dream and juggling three waitress jobs or do like mom says and take that job in aunt Carol’s real estate office that pays good?

A: Follow Dream. You are living once.

Q:Will boyfriend ever ask me to marry him before my hair is gray and memory lost?

A: Only if he gets scared he lose you. Like this Beyonce say, “put ring on this you man”, I get lyric right, no?

Q: Will I ever get free of my parents shadow over me?

A: Not quite- even Zamboni was in therapy for this with actual Freud- didn’t work. (Also second hand cigar smoke gave me hives.) Just try and see it for what it is, Shadow.

Q: Will I have children?

A: Yes. I know this because you are big reader of Zamboni, an act which itself has been known to impregnate many women and even one man. Hope you read and signed disclaimer when you subscribed.

So my dear reader, I hope I guessed at some of your questions. You are growing up. But go into your mom’s photo album, see a picture of you at half your age. Look into the eyes, really look. See that excitement, that hope? That has not changed. You are still you. At 74 plus change you will still be that. “Old”, “young”, “child”, “adult”- these are only words that no one feels inside. Saturn only “returns” from our perspective. Be like Saturn itself- always moving and never stuck in one place. But if you do return to familiar ground after 28 years, of course it will look new!

I have spoke- but your gut tells you more than I.

Conceive it!

What We Live For (5)

(Zamboni to return soon- but till then-)

It doesn’t get much better than this:

1. My brother gets married. I’m the best man. (Well, I wasn’t really but The World’s Most Beautiful Bridesmaid says to me over too much wine at rehearsal dinner, “so just ask him!” so I did, hence the upgrade.) But I really was all the time. This I realize now.

2. I offer to drive said Bridesmaid (plus 2 others just as lovely) to my place of lodging so she does not have to travel many miles to hers and mine being “only five minutes” down the road. I get lost and am for 90 minutes circling through blackness of Sonoma coyote country. I call my brother who has GPS app and talks me through it all despite him being waked from pre-nuptial bed. But with this bridesmaid beside me and Stray Cat Strut bombing down two lane nowhere I am both hating myself and loving myself for being this lost. Finally finding the place but just narrowly averting death by wakened dog at 2am and not averting being woken up by never shutting up rooster at 5am- even all this can’t kill high.

3. Then the wedding. And I know by his and hers smile that “encouraging” brother to get the hell off the pot and finally ask this girl to marry him was rightest thing I ever do.

4. And the toast. Wasn’t so much that it was great toast. (Though hearing rooster through throbbing head at 5am does give me epiphany: my brother is my GPS- and now his wife is his.) It was just to be there, doing that. I can’t explain right. Let me try: To be the best man, to have the responsibility to give the toast, to see these two, everyone, these moments that happen once in your life, the love I feel even now thinking of this. It makes so much bearble, even necessary. To be needed, to be loved, to be important to people- if that’s all there is in this life; I’m okay.

5. Oh, and the manicure was fantastic. The oily arm and finger massage so nice. Her name was Joanne, told me all about her kids and I told her things I’d never tell you. Definitely the only kind of hand job you want with your brother in the room. This isn’t Rome after all. -jw

lost highway — "all who wander are not lost" I myself was... but we finally found bar like Twin Peaks- "should I stop in" I says to my bro "yes yes of course!" I do and they have great jukebox and a local with goatee and trucker hat writes out directions for me, talking to me slow, like I am five and french.

What is a manicure exactly and is it for man?

“Well by the dirt ‘neath my nails I guess he knew I wouldn’t lie” -Bob Dylan, Motorpsycho Nightmare

The above question comes from Mike T.C. from Cambridge Ma. and I will answer it since Zamboni is receiving a Persian Salt Immersion for the next 48 hours in which any toxins received from the “evil eye” will be purged from him. He believes.

Believe it or not Mike, my brother and I are both getting manicures this weekend before his wedding. It was his wish. He is very excited about it and says they are quite luxurious including nice hand and arm massage. Of course I was skeptical. It was not the male bonding ritual I would have chosen or imagined, but I am keeping an open mind. A strange fact: before battle in the Coliseum, Roman gladiators would have each hand rubbed on the breasts of two Ethiopian slaves, then massaged with Eucalyptus oil and butter. Since their match would end in death for one or both, it was thought that these smooth hands would ease their entry into the Underworld.

I just made that up but that doesn’t mean it’s not true.

So Mike, since it has the word “man” in it and since it requires us to sit in a chair and reflect whilst our appendage is stroked by a stranger, I will simply quote Cole Porter for your answer, “nice work if you can get it.”

But beware of facials. Just cut yourself two slices of cucumber and put them over your eyes. Good luck.

Next week Zamboni faces questions about depression, pocket squares, and what the fuck is a green tea soy latte.

How does a travel agent help us reach a place that is not on any list of destinations?

The above quixotic question comes from SK Dance, living in the swamplands of Louisiana.

What is an “agent” of change? Who is the “travel agent” of our life? What did we do before google maps?

SK, you also ask, “is it permissable, however mildly, and with whatever ambivalence, to rage at the miles and years it takes to reach a destination?” This tells me that much later in your life than you wished, you finally find what you were looking for. Yes, it is always permissable to rage. It is complaining and whining which annoys Zamboni. Rage is good. Rage, rage, against the dying of the light and so forth.

Zamboni understand, I do. Being an ageless timeless spirit, but more accurately speaking 124 and a half years old, I know something about endurance. Zambones still not find soul mate despite very pricey services of one-eyed Estonian witch/matchmaker who promise results over fourteen years ago. I am feared to curtail her services because her one eye can be evil, but I am hopeful.

alice olive captures this — alice olive sees the stairs, routes and shadows of all the ways- but is nice no?

Look at it this way; the longer your search, the more stairs you climb up and down, the sweeter it is when you find it. You may rage against my use of cliche, but is true. It’s not Zamboni’s fault that sometimes it takes 1000 miles to find your shadow or your soul mate- god makes many sick jokes like this. Think of the platypus and the fart. Also, pity the poor people who even after 1000 miles don’t see the sign that says, “Welcome- You Are Here”.