Too Many Bob's

Last week I quietly celebrated my nnth birthday. Suffice it to say I am old enough to drive a car, to remember Howdy Doody, and to know that if I say the secret woid I can divide a hundred dollars. I also share my birthday with Marilyn Monroe, Alanis Morissette and Heidi Klum , and I try not to let it go to my head. Other notables born on June 1^st  include Andy Griffith, Morgan Freeman, Ron Wood of the Rolling Stones, and Frank Morgan, the rich voiced actor who played several parts in The Wizard of Oz, including the wizard.

So what’s in a name, anyway? Silly question, but I’m silly, so that makes it okay to ask. Personally, I think there’s much in a name. For example, famous names from fiction instantly conjure up images. Take Scrooge in “A Christmas Carol,” Scarlett O’Hara from “Gone with the Wind” and Captain Ahab in “Moby Dick.” To say nothing of Moby, himself. Not a bad name for a whale, nor a goldfish, but I wouldn’t recommend it for a baby girl. In addition, we like to name that tune, to sell books that suggest baby names and we like to name the hurricanes we hate.

Even my rat terrier, Lucy, knows her name, though she doesn’t know what it means. (I used to tell our prior dog, a bichon frise named Wolfey, “You’re not a real dog, you know.” He loved it, though my wife thought I was cruel.)

I always thought MENSA, the society for people with extremely high IQ’s, was an acronym for MENtally Superior Aptitude … or Attitude, depending on your IQ & POV. Actually it’s a Latin derivative for table. I find it a little harder to hate them now that I know that.

We still use the names given by ancient Arabians to name the brightest stars in the heavens. The brightest of all stars is called Sirius, which means “scorching.” Altair is the “flying one,” Capella the “she-goat,” Rigel means “foot,”─a big clue to its location in Orion. And Regulus, in Leo the Lion, is "the prince," or "heart of the lion." Whereas the silver bright, summer star, Vega, is "the swooping eagle," Antares is "anti-Ares" or "rival of Mars." Less exciting is Mirfak, which means "elbow." And I decided to stop looking them up at Ascella, for "armpit."

Thanks to Google, I can locate many more names born on my birthday, and I can also locate many others who share my name. Too many. There’s so many Bob’s the name is synonymous with ordinary. But that doesn’t bother me. I was named for my Scottish grandfather, Robert Penman, and told he was wonderful man. My name means “one who pursues excellence.” I can live with that, though there’s too many of us named for him in the family. Three, not counting Grandpa.

Names are most definitely connected to identity. Jesus renamed Simon to Peter, the “rock” he will build his church on. And take the name of Jesus, himself, which means “the Lord is salvation,” or “God’s Salvation”─not a name given to an underachiever. And Christ is not his last name but a title. It’s from the Greek for “Anointed One.” According to the Bible, the very name of Jesus has power to chase demons and do miracles. And I’ve never known anyone to hit their thumb with a hammer and yell, “Oh Buddha!”─which only seems fair (though pointless).

So what’s in a name? Well, according to Ecclesiastes 7:1a, “A good name is better than fine perfume …”  I suppose as "one who pursues excellence," I can live with too many Bob’s.

* Key to the Bob's:  (l-r) Robert Duvall, Robert Mitchum, Bob Sagett, Robert E. Lee, Sponge Bob Squarepants, Robert Plant, Bob Dylan, Robert Downey, jr, Smiling Bob, Bob Russell, Bob Marley, Bob Newhart, Bob the Builder, Bob Barker, Robert Redford, Bob Hope, Bobby Flay, Robert De Niro, Robert Kennedy, Robert Shaw.

Memorial Day

It saddens me that so many think nothing more of Memorial Day than a day off work. So I wonder, why should it matter to remember the fallen, the brave who gave their lives in service to us? After all, they are gone and cannot reap the rewards of our gratitude. Just who is this holiday for?

I learned this morning that Decoration Day sprang, in 1865, from the deep gratitude of freed African slaves, who observed an annual remembrance at the graveyard of 257 Union soldiers in Charleston, South Carolina. In time, it became the day to remember all who died in military service in all conflicts─Memorial Day. Today it marks the unofficial beginning of summer and the blockbuster movie season with parades, fireworks, and the television broadcast of the Indianapolis 500. 146 years from the holiday’s inception, thankfully those parades also include moments of silence, spontaneous applause and standing ovations for the vets who march by.

I remember as a kid watching Memorial Day parades in my home town, even marching in them as a Boy Scout. I recall visiting my father’s grave, a vet who returned from World War II but died from a stroke when I was 12. Someone always placed a flag on his grave. I was too young to question who.

My brother and father both served, though both returned safely from war. I know Memorial Day mattered to them. The brotherhood forged in battle runs deeper than all friendships, and for my brother, Bill, volunteering at the VFW meant giving back, an expression of his gratitude and compassion that he never tired of. Army, Navy, Marines, regardless of how they served, he shared a comradery with all vets until cancer stole him in 2005. Dad died the year before my brother was drafted. They never had the chance to share the comradery.

To ignore the memory of the fallen is to ignore their sacrifice. We can’t thank them directly, but we need this day to remember that our freedom came with a cost. I’m no legalist and as guilty as anyone for getting excited about a three-day weekend ahead. But when I flip that steak on my BBQ, I hope I’ll remember the price that was paid for the freedom to do so.

Something About Nothing

Have you ever considered starting a blog? Me either. Well, actually I secretly wanted to. I just had nothing to say. Not that nothing isn’t something, mind you. It’s just that, what can you say when you have nothing to say?

But certainly nothing, itself, is something. Shakespeare thought so. He wrote Much Ado About Nothing, a comedy centered around lovers having a “merry war.”

And they say, “nothing ventured, nothing gained,” which certainly applies to me on many a Sunday afternoon as I watch Seinfeld reruns. You might say I venture nothing, and I get it, and that’s something … I think.

And if space is a vacuum, is that nothing? In 1995 astronomers pointed the Hubble Space Telescope at a tiny region of empty space between stars in Ursa Major, and exposed a photo for 10 consecutive days, just to see what they’d find. (Astronomers are such rascals. Never leave them alone with a telescope for 10 days.) The resulting picture revealed over 3000 galaxies, each containing billions of stars. Now that’s something!

But black holes in space. Now there’s a whole lot of nothing─matter compacted so tightly that even light can’t escape its gravity. Stephen Hawking, made famous for his work on black holes, puts his faith in nothing, literally. In fact, he believes the universe created itself from it. In his latest book, “The Grand Design,” he’s quoted as stating, “Because there is a law such as gravity, the Universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the Universe exists, why we exist." Apparently Mr.Hawking has never been to Washington D.C. All those laws we have seem to come from somewhere, and his statement begs the question, “who wrote the law of gravity?”

On a more personal note, I recently found God in nothing as I waited 4 ½ hours for my wife to complete surgery. The operation was relatively routine, but any surgery involving the spine and full anesthesia is not without risk. We kissed goodbye, knowing there’s always a remote chance of becoming the, “almost,” in “almost never occurs.” I did the same as everyone else seated around me. I read. I prayed silently. I looked around. I paced. I prayed. I prayed more. I read more. (By the way, did you know Robert Redford is originally from L.A. and started out his career as a painter in Europe? You can learn a lot by reading AARP magazine. But I digress.)

So after living about 180 minutes-by-minute, the magazine rack and my book on photography didn’t cut it for me. I wanted it to be over. It wasn’t painful, I just resisted living in the present tense. I sat and silently stared at the windows, taking mental note of the shift in sunlight during my wait. I drew near to God when I prayed, and it certainly mattered. But that was a very long 60 seconds ago. What about now? I resisted living in the present.

How silly of me to fight  what I couldn’t change. My body lives each minute, but I can still pass time by losing myself to thoughts, longings, hopes and fears, filling the time with anything other than what’s happening in front of me, especially if it’s ordinary. To live in the now seemed grueling, because I sat alone in the mundane. It was alright to wish the surgery would end, but why resist the moment when I could travel it with the creator of the universe. In my moment of nothing I found something. He’s been waiting for me all along. Unaccompanied by life’s distractions, I heard his gentle whispers and knew his peace.