Many of you who read my work here with any regularity are, from time to time, kind enough to offer that you think that the work is pretty well done.Thank you.
And I won’t insult either of our respective intelligences by offering you any of that “aw, shucks” stuff.
I know what I’m good at.
And I know what I’m not good at.
Put tools in front of me and tell me to tune my car’s engine or you’ll shoot me, you might as well just save us both the time and pull the trigger now.
Damn it, Jim, I’m a writer/composer/broacaster, not a mechanic.
Having said all that, I’ve reached a point in my creative life where I don’t have to “embellish” the resume, as it were, when it comes to my writing.
In other words, if I use a line somewhere, either in print or on the air, and didn’t write it in the first place, I have no problem in fessing up, even overtly giving credit where its due.
For example, often, when folks greet me with “hey, how are you?”, I reply with what has become a stock, and admittedly flip, reply.
“It ain’t easy bein me.”
I do put in a lot of effort with tone, though, so that, hopefully, that answer comes off as fun and self depracating, as opposed to self pitying.
I use the line.
I didn’t write the line.
If memory serves, it was the reply that Andrew McCarthy gave Ally Sheedy in the movie, “St. Elmo’s Fire” when she asked the same question.
In case you’re wondering, by the way, the answer to your next question is, simply, that it happens to be another of those things that I’m good at.
Remembering obscure pieces of dialogue, et al, from movies that most people never saw, let alone remember.
I’m still working on a way to turn that “skill” into big bucks.
Trivia doesn’t pay nearly as well as tune ups.
Meanwhile, back at the line.
I found it popping into my head, without any outside stimulation, this morning as I perused the coverage of John Edwards and his admitance of his extamarital affair.
And it crossed my mind that Edwards, not to mention his wife, et al, could probably make pretty good use of my stock answer these days.
Wonder if any of them have ever seen “St. Elmo’s Fire”?
And for anyone reading my words at the moment and bracing themselves for what they expect will be some kind of veiled condoning of Edwards’ behavior, take a breath.
Not going there.
Where I am going with it is here:
John Edwards is a human being who was tempted, succumbed to temptation and now has to deal with the consequences of his actions.
He has to answer to his God, his wife, his children, his family and those whose respect HE feels he wants to try to continue to enjoy.
Everybody else just needs to shut the hell up.
Because it is, at the bottom of the bottom line, none of our damn business.
That goes for EVERYBODY else. Most especially the motor mouthed commentators and “experts” who are, bet the farm, dissecting every little tile of this mosaic on the Sunday morning news and talk shows as we speak.
Or as I write this piece, to be more precise.
And let me be very clear on one thing.
It is not for me to say that what John Edwards did is okay.
Nor is it for me to say that what John Edwards did is wrong.
Because it is, simply, not for me to say.
Nor is it for you.
Or anyone else.
Unless you are his God, his wife, his child, his family or any one whose respect HE feels he wants to try to continue to enjoy.
And please don’t waste my time or your own by offering up any “higher standard”, “role model”, “leaders lead by example” crap.
Because we elect human beings to lead us.
And human beings are beautifully complex, and flawed, beings.
If you think that one single person, now or ever, who has been given a position of authority doesn’t have at least one thing in their life resume that requires forgiveness, you’re just being naïve.
I should read the Bible more.
I don’t, but I should.
If only because there are some pretty well written lines in there.
That thing about glass houses comes to mind.
And there’s a witty little “judge not, lest ye be….”thing that I recall.
Oh…and check this out.
“There was only one perfect human being in the history of mankind…and look what happened to Him..”
I did write that one.
As far as the earlier one….I can still honestly answer on many days that it aint easy bein me.
But John and Elizabeth Edwards and their circle are welcome to it as needed.
And so are you.
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