Barb Caffrey's Blog

Writing the Elfyverse . . . and beyond

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Sunday Reflection

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In the past few weeks, I was reminded — forcibly — that life is incredibly short.

There is a Biblical quote that comes to mind about such times. It’s from Psalm 90, verse 12. “So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.”

It seems to me that too many people in this world forget both parts of that equation. Time is very short, so we have to work hard to find wisdom as our days are numbered and we have no idea when the end will come.

I try to find wisdom, teachings, and purpose wherever I can, partly because I know how short time is. (Ask anyone widowed young, and they’ll agree with me.) The other part is, I’ve always tried to find common ground with other people whenever possible, in the hopes that light can shine not only in my life, but in someone else’s life, too.

There are many things I’d do differently, if I had more energy, health, financial security, and overall stability. But seeking out purpose and wisdom would not be one of them.

As the ancient proverb says, “Time and tide wait for no man.” Please remember that, and don’t put off until tomorrow what you could do today to make someone’s life a little better.

Written by Barb Caffrey

March 3, 2024 at 1:22 pm

Posted in Faith, Informational Stuff, Inspirational stuff, Prescient observations, Religion, Widowhood, Writing

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Discussing Daughtry’s SFnal, Dystopian Single, “Artificial”

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The other day, I heard a new song from Daughtry, the band fronted by former American Idol contestant Chris Daughtry. Daughtry is known mostly for their single “It’s Not Over.” That’s a hopeful song, in its way, about the ups and downs of relationships. But the new song, “Artificial,” definitely is not hopeful. In any way.

“Artificial” is about human beings being supplanted by robots, AIs, synthetics…the world has turned poisonous, and the scenery looks like an old Mad Max movie, which sets the scene for the dystopic lyrics. For example, the second verse includes the lyrics, “No sickness, no dying, no disease/no begging for mercy on your knees. No God, no religion, no beliefs.” This may seem somewhat innocuous, especially to secular humanists, but the choruses definitely aren’t. “Welcome to your worst nightmare. Days are getting dark, you should be scared. It doesn’t have a heart. Plug into the new you…the death of who we are is right here.” (I jumped a few lines down, thus the ellipsis.)

Because Daughtry himself is muscular and fit–especially for age 44–he plays himself being uploaded into the “perfect,” human-looking robot. Fortunately, or maybe unfortunately, it doesn’t exactly work out.

Now, why did I say fortunately, or maybe unfortunately? Well, in this dystopic nightmare of a world, that’s apparently the only way you’re going to survive. It’s a travesty; it’s not human, as the lyrics say. The whole bit about “no begging for mercy on your knees” is about compassion, and about how the robots–or whatever they are–don’t have any. They’re just beings, without true emotions; they think, but they don’t sleep. They can’t admit to fear, even if they feel it–then again, they don’t feel much of anything–and it’s obviously not the way a human being wants to live.

There is a second level to “Artificial,” though, that’s more relevant to me as a writer and editor. There’s a real problem right now, that’s grown significantly worse in the past five years, with AI programs grabbing hold of people’s work–whether music, art, writing, you name it–and not paying anything for this. If one, single AI was the creation of some guy in his basement who had no money at all, then maybe this wholesale “borrowing” (read: using without paying) would be understandable even if still wrong. However, the AI programs are being developed by some of the biggest and wealthiest companies in the world.

They don’t have an excuse. They should be paying writers, musicians, artists, etc., for the use of their works if they’re going to be used to try to bring about a better and more comprehensive version of AI (artificial intelligence).

So, the lyric “It doesn’t have a heart” in “Artificial” could, conceivably, be talking about Google. Or Microsoft. Or whomever else that’s trying to develop an AI. If they had hearts, working souls, and even an ounce of compassion, they’d not have taken so many different people’s work without paying for it.

They certainly don’t seem to have ethics, either. Or they’d be paying writers, musicians, etc., for their work. As they should.

So, getting back to “Artificial,” Daughtry seems to be saying that in the not-so-distant future, there will be copies of what he does. Purporting to be what he and his band have actually done. (Maybe he’s referring to deep-fakes, in an elliptical way.) But it’s “ice cold, mechanical. Artificial.”

A real musician, a real band, playing in real time (even if it’s recorded and played back in any medium), has a nuance and resonance that, so far anyway, synthetic programs can’t match. The sound, itself, may seem to be easily replicated, but it’s not.

You might be asking, “Barb, what are you talking about? The YouTube video will always play the same version of the song, with no variations.”

But in live performance, there will be variations. There have to be. Every time a piece of music is played, sung, or performed in any way, it’s going to be a little different in one way or another. That’s because it has life. Purpose. A sort of drive that infuses the music, makes it far more than simply numbers on a page represented as notes (and put to lyrics, in the case of Daughtry’s “Artificial”).

In short, music has soul. The best music, made by thoughtful musicians throughout our recorded history, has touched something in us, something profound. (Even something as silly as “Purple People-Eater,” with the lyrics of “one-eyed, one-horned flying purple people eater,” will make us laugh. Laughter, itself, can be profound in its way. So sayeth I, at any rate.)

Chris Daughtry and the rest of his band, Daughtry, are excellent musicians. They put together songs that tell stories. They have multiple levels in at least some of their songs (as seen with the recent song “Artificial”), which shows a remarkably fluent and in-depth understanding of what they’re trying to do. There’s life to their songs. And just a bit of edginess (which I appreciate), along with outstanding performance values, brings about the best of results.

So, “Artificial” is a departure for Daughtry due to being dystopic. But it’s a welcome one, especially under the circumstances. I hope they write a whole lot more songs about whatever they feel like, as there’s no way an AI could ever reproduce their passion, drive, wit, and ability.

Do not accept substitutes, people. (Further the writer sayeth not.)

Written by Barb Caffrey

February 8, 2024 at 6:04 am

Posted in Criticism/critique, Informational Stuff, Music, Prescient observations, Public figures, Writing

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Discussing Other, Alternate Timelines

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Folks, the last several weeks have been extremely challenging. I am unable to say why, as what’s going on mostly does not pertain to me…let’s just say it’s a family health crisis and be done with it.

Anyway, I knew I should write a blog, but about what?

I could write about sports — the Milwaukee Bucks made a coaching change, mid-season, which is quite unusual — but that didn’t seem right.

I could write about politics — some of what I’m seeing from people like Rep. Elise Stefanik of NY (R) is extremely disquieting. (Rep. Stefanik seems to have the attitude of “Vice President or Bust” and is doing her best to ingratiate herself with former POTUS Donald Trump despite her past voting record, which shows at one point she was a moderate.) But again, that didn’t seem right…though I do admire Nikki Haley’s pluck in refusing to get out of the Republican primary, mind you. (She’s right that only two states have spoken. There are 48 states and a number of US territories, plus the US emigres abroad, that have yet to vote and thus indicate a preference.) While Haley is almost certainly not going to win the Republican nomination, any more than Bernie Sanders was going to win the Democratic nomination in 2016, Haley can highlight important issues to voters and ultimately make a positive policy difference (if nothing else).

And while that was a long digression about politics, that’s not what I want to talk about today. I am a SF&F writer, no matter how little-known, and thus I think about a lot of stuff most other folks don’t. I’ve done this for a long time, mind you; my Elfy books, which feature alternate universes (where the Elfs lived — don’t call ’em “Elves” as that’s a swear word to them– and the Elfys were created, among other races), were not the first time I’ve ever thought about alternate universes. I may have thought about them even sooner than age fourteen, which is when I read Philip K. Dick’s classic MAN IN THE HIGH CASTLE, which features an alternate universe where the Nazis and the Japanese won World War II.

I’m not the only one to think about this, of course. There are other writers who’ve discussed this in various ways, such as Doris Lessing and the more recent book THE FUTURE OF ANOTHER TIMELINE by Annalee Newitz. But my own ruminations lead me to how my own, personal timeline could’ve been changed by the following events:

2004: Instead of dying after four heart attacks, Michael has one heart attack and survives with brain and body intact. He does cardiac rehab, which I fully support him doing, and we get another ten-twenty years together rather than two. More books of different types result, and at least some of Michael’s artwork survives. (In this timeline, I have one piece of Michael’s artwork. That’s it. It was a brief drawing of what the uniforms looked like in his Atlantean Union universe.)

But even if Michael had still died in 2004, I had another possible better timeline with which to work, as follows:

2011: Instead of dying of a massive stroke, my good friend Jeff Wilson lives despite the heart virus that nearly killed him. He does cardiac rehab and anything else they suggest; after six or eight months of treatment, he’s allowed to leave the rehab hospital (really a nursing home). During this time, we start to date, long-distance…maybe I even manage to visit him in Fort Collins while he’s in the hospital, as it’s under the threshold of altitude that I can tolerate. (Jeff knew I get high-altitude sickness at about 7000 feet and it gets worse the higher up I go.) Books and stories follow, and whether we ever progressed beyond a very solid friendship or not, things would’ve been much better all the way around for both of us.

And even if Jeff had still died in 2011, I had yet another possible, better timeline to work with, as follows:

2014: A good friend, someone I had no idea that was interested in me, makes a play and I respond. (This happened in real life, though not in 2014.) Things progress. Books and stories follow. The relationship is serious enough to perhaps lead to marriage, and despite some major difficulties, we manage to overcome them and forge a life together.

Of course, that timeline didn’t happen either. So how about this one?

2020: Covid-19 does not happen. Millions of people do not die. (If this was lab-grown in China or anywhere else, it does not escape the lab.) People are not shut in for weeks, months, or years; there is no such thing as public-shaming over mask-wearing (I believe masks can help, especially if you, yourself, are ill and don’t know it; you won’t give it to someone else that way. But shaming people is wrong.) There’s no such thing as kicking people off public trails because of fears that they might get Covid…one of the dumbest things I ever heard, yet it happened to a good friend of mine in 2020. (I wish that hadn’t happened to him, too. As we found out later, Covid is not likely to spread outside with the same frequency as it’s going to spread inside with the greater density of people to work with.)

And as we all know, unfortunately that timeline didn’t happen either.

I’ve avoided some of the obvious ones, mind you. (Some folks may be asking, “Why not go back to 2000 and have Gore win instead of W.? Why not go back to 2016 and have your choice, Hillary Clinton, win instead of Trump?” Or even this: “Why didn’t you eliminate the war in Ukraine?”) I think many others have gone over those possibilities, and I wanted to make you think more about smaller, more personal decisions rather than stuff like that. (Well, with the exception of Covid, of course, though Covid caused more small-scale upheaval than just about anything in the past fifty years in my own not-so-humble opinion.)

So, what other timelines could you have had? What other timelines do you wish you would’ve had? (I know I wish Michael would’ve lived. Everyone who’s ever read this blog or known me in any way whatsoever should know that’s been my most fervent wish.) And is it still possible to create a better timeline in the future than the one we fear may happen? (I hope so, otherwise I’d not do anything, much less write this blog.)

Written by Barb Caffrey

February 1, 2024 at 5:37 pm

Posted in Books, Elfy, Elfyverse, fantasy, Framing Narrative, friendship, in general, Michael B. Caffrey, Persistence, Prescient observations, Remembrance, Writing

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Looking for Optimism in 2024

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Folks, 2023 was a difficult, frustrating, and disempowering year for me. A whole lot I wanted to get done didn’t happen. A whole lot that I never wanted to occur did.

So, how can I look for optimism in 2024?

It seems like every time I turn on the news, something else awful has happened. There’s a tornado in Alabama. There’s a documentary about a young woman, Gypsy Rose Blanchard (now happily married, married name Anderson), who was mistreated horribly by her mother and who served several years in prison for conspiring to kill her mother. (If you saw what her mother did to Gypsy Rose Blanchard, you might be like me and say, “Small loss.” Especially after Ms. Blanchard tried hard to get away from her mother, and how no one understood the horrific stuff her mother had put her through.) Blanchard’s story sent ice straight down my spine, as her late and (to my mind) unlamented mother kept her looking ill and much frailer than she ever should’ve been due to Blanchard’s mother’s significant mental illness. (The diagnosis for Blanchard’s mother, who I’m not naming as I feel she was among the world’s worst villains of the last thirty years, was Munchausen’s Syndrome by proxy, meaning Blanchard’s mother put Gypsy Rose through all sorts of crap by making her appear sick — as a cancer patient, as needing various surgeries Gypsy Rose never required, etc.)

Then, of course, there are the usual problems. Snow. Ice. Wind. Man against nature.

So, it’s a dark and rather depressing opening to 2024 for me. It’s cold, there’s not a lot of light at the end of the tunnel, and I’m frustrated overall because I’ve tried very hard for the last nineteen years-plus since my late husband Michael died (yes, I know to the hour, but I won’t be that anal-retentive today) to live the best life I can. Maybe I’ve done that, but my creativity has not been where I wish it to be; I didn’t achieve my goals in 2023 of getting some new stories out under my own name due to my father’s passing in October (partly, anyway; I was already behind that expectation due to the earlier cellulitis of the face I suffered in February and March before he died); work lagged, and I was having to play catch-up even before I caught Covid-19 in early December.

When looked at all as a piece, it seems much worse than what it was when I lived through it. And it’s of course not a patch on what Gypsy Rose Blanchard lived through for years until her mother was killed by Gypsy Rose’s then-boyfriend. (Don’t judge that young woman until you’ve seen what her mother put her through.) But pain is pain, and Michael always told me that it’s invalidating to try to compare your pain to others’ pain.

I think that’s good advice.

In my case, stuff builds up inside. I have no way to express it safely, or at least it seems like there isn’t one. This feeds depression, this feeds illness, this feeds lack of creativity and this also feeds despair, hopelessness, and as my friend Karl Ernst put it in his book Rocking Change, stuckness.

That doesn’t mean I’d not have been ill with Covid-19 if my problems magically went away. (Plus, life seems to be all about how to navigate problems. We always have some, somewhere.) That doesn’t mean everything would be lightness, creativity, brightness, and happiness, either.

What it does mean is that the real issues I’ve got: grief, again, this time due to the loss of my father; iffy health (that I continue to work on to get at least slightly better); loneliness; frustration; anger; hopelessness; well, they all get stuffed together in a maelstrom of despair.

That said, I think there are some reasons for optimism here.

First, I am aware of these problems. They aren’t just sitting there, unremarked and misunderstood.

Second, I have managed to write over 36K words in the last year into a new story I can’t tell you much about yet (it’s in a friend of mine’s universe and will eventually go out co-branded with his name), which is the highest word count I’ve managed in the last three years. This means the prospective novel is about one-third completed. (Yay!)

Third, I have good friends I trust, along with family, that have known me for many years. That has to help.

Fourth, while 2024 is already shaping up to be a year of change for me in many senses, I believe there is room for me to take a new role upon the stage somehow. (As life is but a stage, and we are merely players according to both Shakespeare and the rock group Rush, this needed to be said.)

Or as my father used to put it, “There’s always another season.” He was talking about sports, but I think that’s applicable to life as well.

So, what I’m going to do is this. Write. Edit. Compose music. Talk to other people as best I can. Continue on my path, as I know exactly what it is, and do whatever I can and whatever it takes to make my life happier, more stable, and far more satisfying.

See, I can’t control the future. I can’t control what other people think about me. I can’t control all the vicissitudes of life.

But I can control how I react to it.

That’s my overarching reason for optimism in 2024. (What’s yours? Tell me in the comments!)

Written by Barb Caffrey

January 9, 2024 at 8:54 pm

Posted in Framing Narrative, heartbreaking stories, in general, Michael B. Caffrey, Persistence, Prescient observations, Writing

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A Nonmaterialist’s Approach to the Holidays

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Folks, as I write this it’s five days until Christmas Day. The holidays are likely to be a subdued affair at Chez Caffrey due to my father’s recent passing, and as I’ve said many times before at this blog, they’ve been less than stellar for quite a few years now.

That said, I try to keep the holiday spirit in mind. I can’t ever promise to be “happy happy, joy joy” because that’s just not me. But I can try to help people as I’m able, and I also can do my best to pay attention. Sometimes just being able to do these things, or give a kind word to someone who needs one, is enough to make someone else’s day.

Supposedly, there are different types of ways to say “I love you” besides just saying the words. I’m more of a “do stuff for others” type than saying the words, and I think my whole family (which includes my good friends) knows this. That’s how I try to give presents, as I don’t have a lot of cash and again, everyone in my life knows this.

I’m guessing there are a lot of people in my boat this year, in that finances are tight, lots of stuff has gone wrong, and perhaps the holiday spirit is in short supply. So for those of you who need it, remember that the best present you can give anyone else is your presence and your time. Try not to worry if you can’t give someone a monetary gift even though you would if you could…just keep doing your best for as long as you are able, and try to let those in your life know that you appreciate them.

Also, I am a firm believer in miracles, in that I’ve seen two genuine miracles happen in my life thus far. (No, I won’t tell you what they are. But most of you will probably guess one of them correctly. Just sayin’.) I think there’s nothing wrong with asking the Deity for something, anything to go right, and I have to admit that I have indeed asked this before and will probably ask it again.

Finally, remember that we all have disagreements with people. We don’t have to be disagreeable about it, mind, which of course is a tough thing when emotions are high and tempers are already frayed (as holidays can bring out the worst in people). But we can remember that most of the time when other people act badly, it’s not personal. It’s just that they have nothing else left to give, and are basically saying, “I can’t handle any more!”

So, happy holidays to you all, and may your 2024 be filled with blessings.

Written by Barb Caffrey

December 20, 2023 at 3:24 pm

Posted in friendship, holiday stuff, in general, Informational Stuff, Prescient observations

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Saying Goodbye to Dad

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Folks, I know I didn’t blog last week at all. Mostly I was trying to save up my energy for what proved to be a two-part effort: Dad’s funeral/memorial service on Saturday, and Dad’s burial on Monday. I figured I’d talk about that, along with the difficulties of saying goodbye when you weren’t ready at all to do so, today.

My father was almost 87 when he passed away. (Had he made it through another month, that is.) As he told everyone (including grocery store cashiers), Dad lived a good life. He was satisfied because he had three good kids, he’d been a successful letter carrier, he’d bought a house (and died in his house, something he’d told me and my sibs often was his wish), he’d enjoyed outings with his own sibs (when they were healthy enough), he’d done some traveling (mostly to and from other family members’ homes), and he’d enjoyed watching and listening to the Milwaukee Brewers, Green Bay Packers, and Milwaukee Bucks games over the course of his lifetime. He’d also played in what was then the Racine Municipal Band for twenty years in the percussion section. (Dad did not consider himself to be a percussionist, because he didn’t read notes; he only read rhythms. That said, he played the snare drum, the field drum, the bass drum, the castanets, the cymbals, the maracas, and anything else that didn’t require note-reading.) Dad also enjoyed watching old movies, as I said before, and played lots of cards (mostly cribbage and smear — smear is kind of like sheepshead, I guess; I don’t know how to explain it any better).

In short, Dad had the life he’d hoped to have.

The thing is, even though I know all that, it’s still hard to say goodbye. My relationship with my father wasn’t always an easy one. I wasn’t what he’d expected, at all. I’d been expected to make a big noise as a classically trained musician, but my hands failed; then, after I finally found the love of my life in my mid-30s, I lost him due to four heart attacks (as I’ve discussed multitudinously at this blog) and ended up back with my family again.

See, I’d hoped my entire life to make it as a musician. My whole life was oriented toward that. I used to practice up to eight hours a day, then wrote music for another hour or two (I can still do that, at least, when motivated and my mind isn’t all over the place as it is now), often while working a part-time or full-time job on the side.

But as I said, my hands failed. I have something akin to carpal tunnel syndrome, though it isn’t that; it’s bilateral tendinitis in both hands and wrists. I can have spasms in my wrists or hands at any time, and there’s no apparent reason for this. (The tendinitis could happen to anyone; I could’ve worked around that. The spasms were much harder to work around, and it’s why I’d stopped playing except in the Racine Concert Band and the UW-Parkside Community Band.)

When I met Michael, I was only reluctantly ready to concede that I would not be a professional musician. But I’d discovered I was good at writing; really good. With Michael’s help — as he was an excellent editor and a good writer, too — I finished up my novel, Elfy (later split into two parts as An Elfy on the Loose and A Little Elfy in Big Trouble), and was working on a prequel called Keisha’s Vow (I’ve mentioned this before, here at my blog) when the unthinkable happened: Michael died.

So, I was bereft, incredibly upset, grieving, very unhappy, and though I didn’t know it at the time, also very depressed when I came back to live with my father. (I did spend a good amount of time with my mother, too, and still do.) I wasn’t at all what I’d been. I didn’t recognize myself in the mirror, I was so very upset.

At first, my parents (neither one) knew what to say to me. As I’d been previously married, their thoughts were probably along the lines of, “Well, she won’t be here long. She’ll find someone else.”

Um, no.

Anyway, Dad is the subject of this blog, so I’d better explain what he did. Mostly, he pointed out there are seasons to life, just as there are to baseball, basketball, etc. There may still be another season in my life that could be good, even though I couldn’t see it…I had to have hope, and faith, that someday I’d understand why Michael had died young and why my hands had given me so much trouble.

Over time, I slowly got better. I went through physical and occupational therapy for my hands in 2010 and again in early 2011; this brought back quite a bit of movement and flexibility to my hands and wrists, so I was able to play my saxophone and clarinet again. (If I had someone to make reeds for me, I could’ve played my oboe as well. But my hands will never be good enough for me to make reeds ever again. That’s just a fact.) I rejoined the Parkside Community Band not long before my friend Jeff Wilson died in 2011, and if I recall correctly, most of my family was there for the first concert I’d played in over ten years. (Dad wasn’t. But my sister was, my Mom was, I think my niece was…and my Aunt Laurice, who lived in Racine also, was there, too.) I played a solo in a piece called “Roma,” and thought about Michael and Jeff as if they were in the front row, just invisible to everyone else except me.

Note that my Mom also believed I would play again. I don’t mean to slight her in this. But fortunately for me, she is still here now, and I can continue to do whatever I can to help her whenever I am able to do it…while Dad, who never wanted anyone to do anything for him except talk to him now and again, is on the Other Side.

So, Dad and I continued to talk about sports. We sometimes talked about politics; he was disgusted by many of the goings-on, and one of his final thoughts was that it was disgraceful that there was no Speaker in the U.S. House of Representatives. (I agreed with him, too. That was a big mess.) He often pointed out that if the able refused to serve, or were unable to serve, we only ended up with idiots. (He didn’t use that term. He was far kinder in some ways than I am.) He pointed out that Samuel Gompers had said, in essence, that it’s better to be party to a principle than a principal to a party, and that anyone who let dogma rule them when there were practical problems that needed solutions and compromise wasn’t worthy of his or her seat in Washington, DC.

At any rate, Dad was a person who believed talk was cheap and results were what mattered. He also believed that kindness was essential — though harder to do than to say — and if you remember the blog I wrote years ago about how people treat cashiers says a lot about them? Well, Dad was almost unfailingly kind to cashiers, even if they made mistakes in his order. (He’d just go up to the service desk and straighten it out, that’s all.)

Was Dad a saint? No. Not at all. But he meant to be a good man, and in his way, I think he was. But he wasn’t always easy to live with (neither am I); some days he could be downright ornery, and he also took pride in being cantankerous. (He figured once you got over eighty, they’d call you that anyway, so why not live up to it?)

Anyway, on Saturday I gave some sort of eulogy, as did my siblings and my niece, Jenni. (I think they did better jobs than I did. I don’t really remember much of what I said, to be honest.) Then my Mom and I and everyone else went to a local restaurant, and we did our best to celebrate life and remember my father.

This past Monday, Dad was buried out in Union Grove at the vets’ cemetery. My sibs, my niece, and one of my cousins was there. (A good friend of mine tried to come, too, but she got lost. It’s OK. I got lost, too, and only barely made it to the cemetery in time even though I started out almost an hour beforehand. It’s only a fifteen-minute drive, if that, to Union Grove from where I started…ah, well.) They gave Dad the military honors he deserved, as he’d been a member of the U.S. Navy in his youth (he loved to say “I was a member of the man’s navy”), and that was that.

Except it’s not.

I wish I could explain it better than that, but I can’t. I do know I’m glad Dad didn’t suffer. (I found him, so I know he didn’t.) I also hope that he’s with his mother (who died when he was only eleven), father, stepmother Gertie, my Aunt Laurice and Uncle Carl, and everyone else who predeceased him. (Maybe Michael’s up there and is talking sports with Dad right now. I like to think so.)

Here, though, on Earth, I struggle. And I think it’s going to be like this for a while…that said, I will keep doing whatever I can to be of use and service to others, and hope that, creativity, and whatever shreds of faith I have left will be enough to sustain me.

Written by Barb Caffrey

November 15, 2023 at 11:52 pm

Posted in Elfy, Faith, heartbreaking stories, in general, Informational Stuff, love stories, Michael B. Caffrey, Music, Persistence, Prescient observations, Spirituality

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Dad Died Yesterday, Aged 86

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Folks, this is a very tough blog to write. But I think I should. So here we are.

My father Roger was 86 and a bit — he would’ve been 87 in November on his next birthday — and was a huge sports fan his entire life. He loved the Milwaukee Brewers, the Milwaukee Bucks, and the Green Bay Packers, and going to the 1982 World Series with us kids between the Brewers and the St. Louis Cardinals at old Milwaukee County Stadium was a highlight he’d talked about for years. (One kid would go with one parent for each home game, so all three of us got to see a World Series game in person when we were young. I think Mom went to two home games and Dad one; it was a long time ago, but Dad insisted he’d gone and he usually was right about such things.)

I had to start off with that, because unless you understood at least some of my father’s passions, you didn’t know him at all.

Dad also played the drums. He did not consider himself a percussionist because he didn’t read music so much as read rhythms. He did play cymbals, bass drum, snare drum, field drum, castanets, maracas, and anything that was needed when he was a member of the Racine Concert Band. (Yes, my family has had a strong interest in the RCB for a very long time, and Dad was a member for over ten years in the percussion section.) He loved music of all sorts, but was most partial to musicals, Doris Day, Kristen Chenoweth, big band jazz from the 1930s, 1940s, and a bit into the 1950s (bebop was taking over from the older big band style; think the difference between Benny Goodman and his orchestra and/or Duke Ellington and his orchestra versus Charlie Parker and/or Dizzy Gillespie.)

Another of Dad’s passions was old movies. His favorite movie of all time was “Mr. Deeds Goes to Town,” a story about an unlikely man who inherits a fortune, the newspaperwoman who writes about him (incognito), and about the efforts to strip his fortune by unscrupulous members of his family. Why did they try? Well, Mr. Deeds was an eccentric. He played the tuba, he liked to dance down the street and sing a bit (Mr. Deeds didn’t have much of a voice, I’m afraid; his tuba, however, did), and he was a nonconformist for the times. That was enough to get a hearing before a judge, to prove competency or the lack of it.

Anyway, Dad loved that movie, and I know I watched with him several times over the last few years because it’s a highly entertaining movie (what with the tuba playing and all). Jean Arthur was the female lead, and Dad admired her for Arthur’s beauty and brains and grace under pressure, as he saw Arthur in several other movies (including one of Dad’s other favorite movies, “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington”). He loved comedies like “Easter Parade” and “Calamity Jane” and “State Fair,” and of course he knew all the words to favorite musicals such as “The Music Man” and “The Sound of Music.”

Dad also was a man of principle. One of his favorite sayings was that government doesn’t work if the able don’t serve. He also pointed out what Samuel Gompers said, about how it’s better to be party to a principle rather than a principal to a party, though the actual quote is more like this according to a quick Google search: “It is not the party for whom we vote that counts, but our loyalty to the principles for which that party stands.”

Anyway, my father lived a good long life. He believed in family and cared about others, but couldn’t always show it as he was a guy from a time where men were admired if they were the strong, silent type. (Dad would admit he wasn’t that type, sometimes, but the Stoic nature of it all certainly was something he admired.) Dad was a member of the Lutheran Church, believed firmly in Heaven and in God (to him, God was most definitely male, though he’d not had a problem with me seeing the Deity in other ways as far as I could tell), and was mentally alert pretty much until the hour of his death.

In our last conversation, which was mostly about sports, Dad told me he didn’t think Jordan Love is the answer for the Green Bay Packers and that he wished Aaron Rodgers had stayed in Green Bay as Rodgers probably wouldn’t have been injured here (as the Achilles’ tear Rodgers suffered was worse due to happening on artificial turf). He was looking forward to the Milwaukee Bucks basketball season (starting tonight), though he didn’t like the trade of Jrue Holliday for Damian Lillard; he liked Lillard, but he’d rather have had Holliday and Lillard, and if he could only have one, he’d have kept Holliday. (That this apparently caused Giannis Antetokounmpo to sign a maximum-amount three-year extension didn’t really please my father. He liked to say that the Bucks needed five people on the team, not just one guy, and that compared to Wilt Chamberlain or even Michael Jordan, two guys who could and did win games practically single-handedly, Giannis wasn’t in that league. Of course, he also admitted that Giannis had come a long way and would certainly make the basketball hall of fame some day, too.) And he worried that the Milwaukee Brewers would trade their ace, Corbin Burnes, over the winter; while he didn’t think Burnes was as good this year as last (or the Cy Young year before that), he still felt Burnes was an ace-level pitcher and was needed, desperately, for the Brewers to be a competitive team next year.

So, on Sunday night, we had that good conversation. I didn’t see him Monday except once; he was not well, and I asked him if he wanted to be taken to the ER or if he wanted me to call the rescue squad. He said he didn’t want that. I abided by his wishes, went to bed, got up on Tuesday to go to a doctor appointment, and when I got back home, Dad had passed away.

Dad always wanted to die at home. I know that. But I still feel terrible about it anyway.

I also have to say this: Dad wanted everyone to know that he wasn’t a saint, just a man; he hated the idea of everyone being lauded as the most wonderful person who’d ever lived after they died (if you already thought that before the person’s death, that was another story entirely), and would rather that we remember his humanity along with the good times, the bad times, and the in-between times.

At any rate, I thought that I’d be prepared for this day, when it came, and I’m not.

Funeral arrangements are pending.

Written by Barb Caffrey

October 25, 2023 at 2:06 pm

Posted in Faith, heartbreaking stories, in general, Informational Stuff, Milwaukee Brewers baseball club, Prescient observations, Remembrance, Writing

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Life, Prayers, Friends, Frustration, and Futility

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I know I haven’t blogged in a bit, but the last few weeks around Chez Caffrey have been hectic, to say the least. I’ve been hip-deep in one edit, chin-deep in another (don’t ask), have nearly completed a third edit, restarted a fourth edit…and carved out a bit of fiction writing time for myself, too. (Not as much as I wanted. Not as much as I would’ve liked. But some.)

And, of course, I have had all the usual Real Life Issues (TM) to deal with, too.

Sometimes, I feel utterly frustrated. I want to be able to do more. I only have so much energy; it’s a finite amount, and some days it seems like it’s trickling away without my notice. There’s only twenty-four hours in a day, and it seems like I need at least twenty-six to get everything “normal” done (I know; define normal). That’s before writing, of course, so if you add in writing, along with music composition (which has taken a back seat the last few weeks as well), I’d probably need at least thirty-two hours in a day to do everything I feel I must do.

Which, of course, is flat-out impossible.

Because of the recent “sadiversary” observance (which I’ve discussed elsewhere here at my blog), too, I have been reminded of how much faith my late husband Michael had in me. He believed my writing, my music, and my music composition all mattered. He wanted me to succeed, to thrive, to be happy, and to be creative (not necessarily in that order).

I wonder, sometimes, how much I’ve managed to do in this regard. Life gets in the way. There isn’t enough of me, and there are way too many different things that must needs doing, stat…then add in the fact that a couple of my friends are in major distress right now, plus another one is watching his spouse die by inches and can’t do anything except be by her side as she no longer recognizes him…well.

Frankly, I have felt extremely frustrated over it all. I have wondered if life is just a futile thing, because there are so many things I can’t do and so many things I wish I could do (such as restore my friend’s wife to health). I believe we, as human beings, are striving toward something — empathy, creativity, passion, purpose, maybe all of it? — and yet we face so much frustration along the way.

Is it worth it?

I think so, or I wouldn’t be here now, blogging about it. I believe life is not only is worth it, but it matters so much, so intrinsically, that it’s nearly impossible to plumb the depths of just how much it matters.

That said, there are moments where I wish I could do a whole lot more than I am. There are moments where I wish, just for one moment, I could hear my husband Michael tell me that yes, what I’ve done makes sense, and yes, what I’m doing makes sense, too, and yes, what matters is that I’ve given it my best effort.

As I’ve always done. Yes.

He knew that, about me. And he knew that about life, too.

Some say that life is all about the journey. I think that’s only part of it. Yes, we journey along, and yes, we learn things on our own journeys, too. But it’s also about figuring out what’s important to you, and how to go about doing those things while pulled in seemingly a million different directions.

So. I’ve felt frustrated, and wondered if life matters, and thought about futility for the past week-plus. (Yes, some of this would’ve come up because of the “sadiversary” observance. But I think much of the rest has come about due to my friends’ various struggles, and my wishes that I could ease their burdens in some way as it doesn’t seem like I’ve been able to do a lick of good in any regard.)

What do you do when you feel frustrated? What do you do when you think everything is just futile, or pointless, or just not worth it?

I know what I do is go on. I put one foot in front of the other, do my best not to fall, and just keep going. Even if the direction doesn’t seem right, and even if sometimes I need a course correction or two, I just keep on keepin’ on.

But before I go, I would like to ask a favor. Please, if you have energy to spare this week, pray for my friends. Pray because they are good people who need good things to happen rather than the bad things that have accumulated over the past few months (months that have seemed like decades, at least to me). Pray because no one deserves to feel so terrible for so long. Pray because human beings should care about one another.

I’ve never asked this before, and I may never ask it again. But I need to ask it now, as way too many of the people I find meaningful and wonderful in my life are struggling. I can’t do much to help other than listen, which of course I’ve done…and pray, which I have been doing for a while. My prayers, however, do not seem to be anywhere near enough to positively affect the outcome.

That’s why I chose to blog today and to discuss all this difficult stuff. I want to help my friends, dammit; I want, somehow, to give comfort to them, and the feeling that their lives aren’t hopeless or meaningless or worthless.

Does anyone else feel this way? If so, tell me in the comments. Please.

Written by Barb Caffrey

September 28, 2023 at 5:47 am

Posted in Faith, friendship, Informational Stuff, Michael B. Caffrey, Persistence, Prescient observations, Remembrance, Widowhood, Writing

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When Life Does Not Go As Planned…

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Folks, this past week has been a difficult one for me. I’m ramping up to the nineteenth observance of my beloved husband Michael’s day of death, something I call a “sadiversary” (a contraction of sad and anniversary). But I’ve also noticed a few other stories that I wanted to discuss, also about life not going as planned…so, let’s get started.

First off, Aaron Rodgers’ plans to be the New York Jets’ starting quarterback did not go as planned. He played one series and got sacked; he couldn’t get up. It turns out he has a ruptured Achilles tendon. This puts him out for the year.

Now, most of you are probably thinking, “What does this have to do with me? Aaron Rodgers has a ton of money, he could just retire, he goes on all sorts of jaunts all over the world, and even participated in a ‘darkness retreat.'”

What it has to do with you is this: No matter how much money you have, no matter how much status you’ve attained (as Rodgers is a sure-fire first-ballot NFL Hall of Fame pick), your life won’t always go as planned.

I mean, who wants to have to rehab a ruptured Achilles tendon? Whether you’re an athlete or not, that’s just painful. It’s more common in professional sports than in everyday life because of the wear and tear athletes put on their bodies, not to mention the other pro athletes they play beside and across, who also put wear and tear on their bodies in a different way that sometimes interacts with you. (Such as when Rodgers was sacked by the opposing Buffalo Bills’ defensive line.) But it’s painful, and because I’ve known some folks in everyday life who’ve had similar issues, I know it’s life-disrupting, uncomfortable, and unpleasant.

No amount of money makes the healing go any faster, either.

So, here you are if you’re Aaron Rodgers. You’ve made a huge move from Green Bay to New York City. You participated in all of the off-season workouts, as well as the entirety of training camp — not something that most long-time quarterbacks do as it does put more wear and tear on the body, especially as they already have a ton of wear and tear as it is. You did everything you possibly could to get ready for the NFL season with a new team, new-to-you players, and a new attitude.

Then, your season ends after Week One.

What comes to mind for me, with regards to Aaron Rodgers, is this: How much Netflix is he going to be watching? How many rehab appointments will he have? How many stints in the “warming pool” (what the rest of us would probably call a Jacuzzi) that he most likely has at home? (Many players do for obvious reasons.) Will he try to help the Jets as an unofficial coach, or will that not be allowed or wanted?

See, this was not what he wanted at all.

And in case the point hasn’t been made, another thing that came to my attention this week, but actually happened earlier this year, was Disturbed’s lead vocalist David Draiman’s divorce from his wife of ten years, Lena. Draiman has a beautiful, powerful voice, a ton of musical talent — as does the entire band that comprises Disturbed — has traveled the world, has had many interesting experiences and written great music with his band…yet even he, with the money, the status in the music field, and with all the good will in the world, still ended up divorced.

Draiman is known in hard-rock fandom as being one of the nicest guys in rock or metal music. He remembers people’s names, he honestly cares about others, and some of the songs he and his band have come with in the last ten years — including “Hold on to Memories,” “The Light,” and “A Reason to Fight” — are beautiful, powerful anthems about how difficult life is, how frustrating it is when bad things happen, and how awful it can be to mourn people who are gone too soon. (“Hold on to Memories” was written partly because of the loss of his good friends Chester Bennington, lead singer of Linkin Park, and the inestimable vocalist Chris Cornell, he of Soundgarden and Audioslave fame.) Draiman also said in various places that his divorce was not due to infidelity on either side; he views this as his failure alone, mind you, from everything I’ve seen and read, but I think that’s him taking too much responsibility for something that perhaps was going to end no matter what he did.

(I say this as someone who’s been divorced. You can love someone, care about them to the Nth degree, maybe even have a child with ’em as Draiman has with his ex-wife Lena…but sometimes there’s just nothing you can do.)

Draiman, in several videos I’ve seen of live recordings made this year that I’ve viewed on YouTube (not going to link to ’em to save space), said that he feels the call of depression himself. That earlier this year — probably, and possibly elliptically, referring to his divorce — that he almost joined Cornell and Bennington in prematurely ending his life. (Both Cornell and Bennington died by suicide, two months apart. They were also good friends of each other, and Bennington died on what would’ve been Cornell’s 53rd birthday.)

See, depression can hit anyone. Even a rock star with millions in the bank, a massive following, talent to burn, all that.

Depression is just that powerful of a force to fight.

I know this myself. Every year around this time, I have to fight my own depression much harder. I think to myself, “How could I possibly have lived nearly nineteen years without my husband? It just seems like yesterday, he was here…” Then I realize it’s been such a long time, and I know with a shock that no matter how much I want him to be here in the body as well as in spirit (as I don’t think his spirit went too far away), he’ll never be here in that way for me again.

I wake up every day, every single day, and want my husband. I want to kiss him good morning. I want to kiss him good night. I want to hug him, hold his hand, talk to him, listen to his wonderful baritone voice (as he said, he couldn’t sing, but man, his speaking voice was amazing), hear how his mind works, know what he’s thinking with regards to his stories…in short, I want the incredible, amazing, wonderful, best person I’ve ever known to still walk this Earth beside me. Not just to cheer me on, though he was great at that, too. Not just because he understood me the best anyone’s ever done, either. But because he, himself, was worth everything. Absolutely everything.

It’s hard to go on when something traumatic has happened. The loss of your job — even if temporary, in Rodgers’ case, depending on whether he wants to do the extensive rehab (my guess is yes, but who knows right now?) — is a huge stressor. The loss of your marriage through divorce is also brutal.

So is widowhood.

It’s easy to say, “Find someone else.” (Or as in my case, “You’re young. You can remarry,” which I heard not two days after Michael had died. I still want to throttle that person for that insensitive comment.) It’s easy to say, “You have millions in the bank. Count your blessings.”

(Not that I have millions, ’cause I decidedly don’t. But I trust the point has been made.)

It’s really hard to get up every day, do the work of living, try to find something positive when everything inside you feels like it’s crashing to the ground, over and over again. It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, in fact.

Even if, someday, I find someone who understands me well enough to know that Michael being in my life was by far the most formative influence I’ve ever had, I’ll still miss Michael. It might be easier, if that day ever comes. (I think Michael wants it to happen. He wasn’t petty. He’d want me to find any happiness I could. Honestly, that’s how he rolled.) But it’ll never be easy.

Confronting “sadiversaries” is very hard. Dealing with the blows life sends you, all unlooked for (’cause who’d want ’em?), is also very difficult.

The only way I know is forward, though.

So, for Rodgers — not that he’s ever likely to read this — I hope he knows that the work he did with the Jets was valuable and may make the difference for one or more of the players this year. I hope he knows that this was just random, in a weird way, in the same way Kobe Bryant went down with an Achilles injury years ago (injured in an NBA game). What he did mattered, even if it doesn’t feel like it now.

And for Draiman — not that he’s ever likely to read this, either — I hope he knows that the ten years he spent with his wife and son were beautiful, memorable, special things. (Draiman also lost his dog, an Akita, at age fourteen recently. That, too, has not helped…I understand completely, as I still miss my dog Trouble, a Shih Tzu mix who died at age seventeen a few years ago.) The years he spent with his dog and feeling the unconditional love mattered, the love he had for his wife mattered, the love he continues to have for his son matters and always will.

Life, sometimes, is just damned hard. But we get up, we try, we do our best, we create or build or work hard on whatever it is that we feel called to do. Even when we’ve felt like we’ve failed at our deepest levels, what we’ve done matters. Even when our lives have been shattered, what we’ve done and who we’ve loved and how hard we’ve tried matters.

So, for the “sadiversary” that rapidly approaches on September 21, I will keep telling myself that my love for my husband mattered then, still matters now, and always will. As long as I’m alive, at least part of Michael is alive. And he’d want me to “go do the best things in life…make the most of the rest of your life, make a ride of this world while you can,” just as Disturbed’s song “Hold on to Memories” says.

I will keep endeavoring to do just that.

How do you handle “sadiversaries?” Do you have tips on how to get through the day? (I advise dark chocolate as one of ’em, just in case anyone’s wondering.) If so, leave a comment. (Or leave one anyway, even if you don’t have any tips or are fortunate enough not to have any sadiversaries…yet.)

Written by Barb Caffrey

September 13, 2023 at 4:26 am

Posted in Aaron Rodgers, heartbreaking stories, Informational Stuff, Michael B. Caffrey, Persistence, Prescient observations, Remembrance, Sports figures, Widowhood

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Tell Negative Self-Talk to Take a Hike

with 4 comments

Folks, I’ve recently realized something that I think has value. And that is exactly what I said in the title line: tell your negative self-talk–the stuff that hits you in the middle of the night, or maybe at other times, that says nothing you do will ever matter and that no one wants your creativity, thank you anyway–to take a hike.

See, because of my initial training as a musician, I know a lot about failure. Very rarely does a musician get through a performance playing everything the way they wanted. If you get all the notes right, you didn’t get the feeling right. If you got the feeling right, you missed notes. Maybe near the end of the concert, you thought you were finally going to have a perfect one…and then something went wrong at the last minute.

We’re human, so nothing is ever going to be perfect. This means if you want perfection, whether it’s as a writer or as a musician or as anything, you are doomed to disappointment.

Now, as for negative self-talk: it can be insidious. “Well, your sales record shows that no one wants what you write…” is one of the biggest problems I have right now, and I have to throw it out.

Besides, I know better than that. Sometimes you can do everything right, and for whatever reason, it’s not time for your books yet to make any sort of dent at all.

How do I know this? My friend Loren Jones had it happen to him. When his books were picked up by Twilight Times Books several years back, he did far better than he’d done with a previous micro-press. Same books. Same editor (yours truly). Better visibility and covers. Which all led to more sales–far, far more sales.

Yet Loren’s work hadn’t changed. He wrote good novels, then and now.

See, all we can do is our best. We can’t force the world to notice us, or our hard work. We can only continue to do the work, because it matters to us, and because it’s the only thing we want (and need) to do.

It can be difficult to tell those awful words inside you, that tell you that nothing you do matters or ever will, to take a hike. But you must do it.

Don’t let your fears keep you from realizing your dreams. And those fears include, most definitely, negative self-talk.

Written by Barb Caffrey

August 20, 2023 at 3:30 pm

Posted in Prescient observations, Writing

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