Tag Archives: Scandalous Hands

The Road to Diamond, Day 51: “Everything’s Gonna Hurt”

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Inspiration, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

January 18, 2025- So said a veteran athletic coach to a pre-teen with whom he had worked a few years back, and had not seen in a while. This was in reference to the boy saying he was almost twelve, which sparked Coach’s musings on the joys of adolescence. Everything does hurt, physically, mentally and emotionally, as the body goes from childhood towards adulthood. It is one reason why, after taking Developmental Psychology, I let go of any residual anger I might have felt towards those who bullied me in junior high school. They, for the most part, grew up to lead lives of industry and decency. Those who did not were pretty much nasty to everyone. They also died young.

I have had few aches and pains in my life. There was a bad back, after lifting my semi-conscious wife in 1991, in a situation that is too delicate and personal to share on this blog. (It was, long story short, due to an allergic reaction to medication.) The rest is negligible, especially compared to the constant woes suffered by so many of my peers. A lot does hurt, as one gets deeper into seniorhood. I give credit to Life Long Vitality supplements, Zinzino oil, healthy diet and regular exercise. Sobriety also has a great deal to do with it.

After a brief bout with some sort of crud, I woke up healthy enough, and non-contagious, so today was a full one: Farmers’ Market, Zeke’s and a Baha’i spiritual feast. I took in a concert by another of Prescott’s best, a cover band called Scandalous Hands. That was where Coach was advising his young protege’. A while later, a man two years my senior was advising a couple of other men close to us in age about thriving in one’s seventies. He himself looked like a picture of health.

It could happen, one day, that everything will hurt. For now, all I am doing for myself and for others is enough to keep the pain at bay.

The Lion Roars Elsewhere

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Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, Community, impediments, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

March 1, 2024- The sweet older lady carried her box filled with Bell jars out of the small health food convenience market, as I held the door. A few minutes later, as I approached the register with my small purchase, she burst back through the door, still holding her box of jars. As I hung back from the register, the lady told the cashier about her morning. She had encountered a couple, in her gated community, who were going about the neighbourhood, visiting shut-ins and offering Holy Communion wafers to them. When she encountered the couple again, at a local fast food restaurant, she bought them lunch. That was a story worth waiting for!

The old saw states: “March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb.” Lamb-like weather is here for a few days, whilst in the Panhandle region of north Texas and northwest Oklahoma, a furious spate of wildfires, tempered briefly by a wimpy snow squall, has sundered about five communities, leaving wreckage reminiscent of Paradise, CA and Lahaina, HI in their wake. Whether we look at this still extant destruction and blame climate change or over-development- or a mix of the two, the scenes are heartbreaking. No amount of blame can restore what has been lost. Only resolve, and united action, can bring about recovery.

The same is true, for entirely different reasons, as a lion of a different sort roars in Gaza. No matter one’s politics, or religious persuasion, the slaughter of innocents arising from the wanton disregard, by two armies, for human life cannot pass without condemnation. Both armies should stand down-and let both Jewish and Arab people find a common path to resilience. At this point, it doesn’t matter who started it. No community on Earth deserves to be destroyed by the rapacity of others.

This evening, I made my way down to Raven Cafe, for another great performance by local favourites, Scandalous Hands. There was no room to sit, initially, yet as luck would have it, a couple vacated their table, just as I was getting a cup of coffee from the self-service urn. I moved towards the table and spotted another couple who seemed to want to sit. We agreed to share the table, and it turned out they were first time visitors to Prescott. I would have gladly shared the table, anyway, but first impressions matter. They greatly enjoyed Scandalous’ music, and even got up to dance a few times. I gave them a few pointers for activities and music venues, over the next two days they are here, and some other information about the Southwest, as this is their first time in the region.

March is off to a benign start here, though it would only take an errant spark and a gust of wind, to turn the tables. My prayers and positive thoughts, for Texas, Oklahoma, Gaza and so many other places which don’t have the calmness, the serenity or even the festive mood that Prescott enjoys, as March begins.

Hours of Power

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Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, Community, distraction issues, Entertainment, impediments, Inner Struggles, Inspiration, Personal goals, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

November 11, 2023- Settling in, to enjoy ninety minutes of pulsating, original rock songs, by one of Prescott’s most pulsating, original bands-The CheekTones, I was pleasantly surprised when two young ladies I had not seen before sat themselves at the table, joined, for good measure,a few minutes later by two of their male classmates, then by a shyer, more reticent girl.

The first two asked me general questions about my day, and how I enjoyed The Raven-and the CheekTones. It turned out they were mostly there to support one of the boys who was playing a song with Don Cheek and his band. The kid can play! His parents were there, for the moment-as were these classmates. The girls spoke a bit about their after school jobs-shopping cart jockey, beverage pourer at a local burger joint and juice bar attendant. The boys had nothing to say. Then we all turned our full attention to the band.

Don has had a band presence here, at least since I moved up from Phoenix, in 2011. He has been mentoring young musicians for probably twice that long. He inspired, and supports, another local band, Scandalous Hands, who appear regularly at The Raven, as well. The two bands do 95% of their performances in Prescott clubs and outdoor venues-going, every so often, to Sedona or to Parker, on the Colorado River. Such energy conservation has its benefits-and is rather common, to local bands. It’s a huge reason why their performances here tend towards the intense, the explosive and are so inspirational to young artists.

The kids excused themselves, after forty minutes or so, to go do teen-specific activities. They popped back in one more time, towards the end of the concert, just so I wouldn’t think it was because of me that they left the first time. Nah-I was there once, long ago. It was good they stopped back in, though. I had the young guitarist’s finger warmers on the table and would not have been able to return them, save through Don-who has enough to concern himself.

There was a lot of power in the air today. It is categorized, by astrologers and cosmic advisers, as an Eleven Master Day-meaning that its digits, 1+1+1+1+2+2+3, add up to eleven. A pair of ones, written side by side, are also seen by the mystics as being pillars of both male and female energy.

Today was Veterans Day, and there was a long parade, part of which I watched, before heading to Farmers Market, to tend to the only service day I could offer there, this month. In early evening, I sat in on a Healing Devotional, hosted by someone who was attacked last month. She is on the mend, though, and is still working with police in her community, to try and locate her assailant, before another attack happens.

Each of these events had a power of its own, as did the initial responses to my joining subgroups of nextdoor.com. It has never been easy for me to accept compliments and positive views from others, but that is changing-at long last. It does not have to conflict with personal modesty-and is good for building the energy flow that I need, in order to accomplish what lies ahead, both here and further afield. One friend says my travel is foolish, but deep down inside, I think she is only masking her own wish for a more expansive life, something that those who controlled her life for so long would never allow.

Each of us can move ahead, and as long as we support one another, in our struggles with our own egos and with those who would try to stifle us, for their own ends.