Biased Behavior

August 5, 2026 — Pat Bertram

What happened to justice being blind? What happened to impartiality? When did bias become the main criteria in judging cases or reporting news? And isn’t “activist judge” an oxymoron?

Biased behavior, and the acceptance of it, seems blatantly . . . well, biased. There was a time when news people strived for at least the appearance of impartiality, when judges supposedly heard cases based solely on the law and the facts, not wealth, race, power, their own political aspiration, or any other prejudice a judge might have. Nowadays, it seems, things have been turned upside down. For example, a judge released a repeat offender who was here illegally because she claimed she couldn’t know his motivation. Who cares? A courtroom is not a whydunit. The guy assaulted people and had been arrested multiple times. That was proven. End of story. But the judge let him go, anyway, and he assaulted another woman. Other judges have let people go, even conspired in their release, simply because they were here illegally. Apparently, too many judges feel bad for people here illegally, and so they forgive even the most unforgivable crimes. For every criminal who’s on the deportation list, it seems there’s a judge who wants to keep him here.

But what about the victims? Shouldn’t the victims count, too?

Apparently not.

Yep. Justice.

And then there are the all the judges supposedly arguing on the constitutionality of various edicts, but instead, “activist judges” use their rulings to promote their own agendas. Appointed judges have way too much power, even over those who have been elected to positions of power.

You don’t hear a lot about obstructionist District Attorneys or how they wield their immense power, but too many refuse to prosecute minor and not-so minor cases. It used to be that shoplifting was a punishable crime, but then the cap was raised to $1,000 — anything less wasn’t worth the court’s time. And now the cap is nonexistent. People are allowed to loot stores without any consequences except that the store goes out of business. (And suits are brought against the store owner for daring to leave the area.) This disinclination to charge criminals extends way beyond shoplifting and into major cases such as assault, which is why so many people with huge numbers of arrests are never brought to trial let alone convicted.

When the offender is seen as the victim, when legal citizens have less rights than those here illegally, when “justice” is really injustice, when a judge’s ruling is obstruction for the sake of obstruction, when “news” so biased that it becomes propaganda, where do we go from here?

I don’t normally feel old. I’m just . . . whatever I am. But writing this, wondering all this, makes me realize that perhaps my time has passed. Growing numbers of people seem satisfied with overthrowing the truth, the law — and not incidentally, the constitution — and letting chaos rule.

Is that really the world they want to live in? Or are they so biased that they’ve become blinded to the truth?

***

Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One

Posted in culture, history/myth, life. Tags: , , , , , , . 3 Comments »

An Interesting Quote

August 4, 2026 — Pat Bertram
Daily writing prompt
What is your favorite quote?
View all responses

This isn’t my favorite quote since I don’t actually have one, but it’s something I read recently that hit a chord.

In the 1960s, psychologist Frank X. Barron set out to discover what made someone a creative thinker. He discovered that creative people seemed to have certain traits in common: independence; unconventionality; a vast inner life; a preference for complexity and ambiguity; a tolerance for disorder; the ability to extract order from chaos; and a willingness to take risks. He concluded:

“Thus the creative genius may be at once naive and knowledgeable, being at home equally to primitive symbolism and to rigorous logic. He is both more primitive and more cultured, more destructive and more constructive, occasionally crazier and yet adamantly saner, than the average person.”

What hit a chord with that quote is that I have many of those attributes while at the same time, I consider myself a rather average person, and certainly no creative genius or any kind of genius, for that matter. (In fact, a teacher once said to me: “I bet you think you have a high IQ, but you don’t. It’s average.” But she did admit I was creative, so there’s that.) I’m pretty much middle of the road in just about everything, and that’s because I can often see both ends to any spectrum, can often even feel both ends.

I consider myself to be logical, but then, there is that other part of me that is more mystical than logical. Both tend to keep me centered in the middle.

I’m not sure about primitive and cultured. I don’t consider myself either, so perhaps that’s another middle of the road thing?

And I am knowledgeable about many things, but unfortunately, I am also aware of huge blanks in my knowledge base where I know there are things to know but don’t know them.

Then there’s the “destructive” part of the quote — though I am constructive when it comes to gardening, for example, pampering my plants for the most part, I can also be extraordinarily destructive. Yesterday, I needed to prune an overgrown bush, but by the time I finished pruning it, there wasn’t much left but the bare trunks and branches that had been hidden in the middle of the foliage, so I destroyed the whole thing. Well, not completely, just chopped it way back so that it would be years before it grew unwieldy again. It certainly helped me get rid of my frustrations with all that’s going on in the world today.

I do think I’m sane, though during most of my younger years, I thought I was crazy. I can’t remember why, now — maybe because I was so different from people I knew, maybe because certain noises made me frantic, or maybe because my mental processes took me places I wasn’t comfortable with. I remember once being terrified of meeting a psychologist who was new to the family because I didn’t want her to be able to see my craziness. Luckily, I never met her, and now it wouldn’t be an issue. Age does wonders for an uncertain mind!

I’m just as glad not to be a creative genius, because being simply me is hard enough.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One

Posted in being me, culture, writing. Tags: , , , , , . 1 Comment »

Useful Folk

August 3, 2026 — Pat Bertram

I saw a video clip the other day that made me think, which I’m sure was not the fellow’s intention since he seems to hate old people and think they should all be done away with. Still, this fellow, with more hardware poked into his face than I have in my toolbox, said that some old guy came up to him, gave him twenty dollars, and suggested he remove the hardware. Rude? Probably? Uncalled for? Well, perhaps. But the question is, why would someone make himself into such a spectacle if he didn’t want to be noticed? Anyway, he ranted on and on about how useless “the boomers” are, without any real knowledge of what the boomer generation is. He said they just sat around and did nothing, which some older folks do, especially those older than the boomers. For the most part, the boomers I know are still working, taking care of grandchildren, volunteering, writing, gardening . . . any number of activities.

It seemed to me that he was not the sort of person to get involved with older folks who are strangers, such as those he’d meet if he were volunteering at a retirement home, so the only way he would know if “the boomers” did nothing but sit around all day was if he knew someone personally, someone perhaps who wouldn’t give him money when he asked. Which made his rant more personal than a sweeping generality, especially since he said he needed gas and the twenty dollars the old boomer gave him was necessary. Which completely negates his rant, because obviously, that old boomer had a particular use and wasn’t worthless to the ranter after all.

Apparently, a lot of the younger generations share his viewpoint about “the boomers” being useless and that they should all be put out of their misery (the misery the young people are feeling, that is, not the misery the old folks probably aren’t feeling). Some people see this attitude as the first step toward generational warfare, which is entirely possible. (Supposedly one of the reasons they hate older folks is they are supporting those “useless” people with their social security taxes, but that there are too few of them to support all of the old people and have money left for themselves. It would seem, then, as if the end — based solely on numbers — would favor the oldsters.) Even some of the self-proclaimed “elder millennial” commentators I used to listen to (emphasis on “used to”) turn out to have that same anti-boomer prejudice, which is funny because they hate being classified as part of the black monolith that’s supposed to be voting democratic, but they see “boomers” as just another faceless monolith.

All of that is preamble to what the hardware guy made me think: Who, actually, deserves to live? Who among us is so worthy of life that everyone else should be eliminated to make room for them? What makes a person worthy of living? What makes one person more useful than another? Is anyone useful, really?

Is a baby contributing to society? Is a kid going to school? What about a person who doesn’t work but manages to get enough handouts to live a life of leisure while pleading poverty? What about the rich folks who are funding the subversive movements in this country? What about the fraudsters? What about the teachers who propagandize rather than teach kids to think? What about the university bigwigs who take money from enemies of the United States to further propagandize the students? What about the scientists who develop drugs and other substances to keep people on a medical treadmill? What about the “experts” who make up the news — or slant it — rather than simply reporting it? What about the editors who decide what we are too stupid to understand? What about the commentators who spew innuendo with straight faces?

If we were to do away with all the worthless folk, the only ones left would be you and me, and I sometimes wonder about you.

[Sorry, I couldn’t resist. That’s something my dad would say to me when I was young: “All the world’s crazy but you and me, and I sometimes wonder about you.” He sure did think that was funny!]

Despite that last facetious remark, there is a tinge of truth to it. In my case, I might not still be working at a paying job, but I am working in my garden, which gives a lot of people pleasure —my neighbors, people walking by, people driving past on purpose to see what I am doing. When I do see people, I always have a smile or a kind word or a hug to give away. I might not be contributing much to the economy, but I leave behind barely perceptible footprints: I live on a miniscule income, drive as little as possible, don’t waste food or much of anything. I just try to live a quiet life of peace, which adds to the entire mantle of peace that perhaps protects us.

Who’s to say that’s not as important as . . . well, as anything that’s important, if there is anything that’s important.

So, to turn the tables on the ranter, perhaps by giving me something to think about, he actually turned out to be one of the useful folk.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One

Posted in being me, culture, dealing with old age, gardening, life, relationships. Tags: , , , . Leave a Comment »

A Brief History of Election Fraud

August 2, 2026 — Pat Bertram

The claim of no election fraud in the USA would be laughable if it weren’t so . . . fraudulent. I don’t know if people who say the elections are secure are truly ignorant, naïve, being ingenuous, or flat out lying, but election theft has been part of our heritage from the very beginning. Remember Tammany Hall? Probably not, if you’re one of those generations who were never taught history, but Tammany Hall was a Democratic political machine in New York in the 1800s that kept one hand in the till and the other hand on the voting lever. They bribed and intimidated their way into power, controlled city contracts, embezzled millions from the taxpayers, traded favors and jobs to immigrants for votes, turned in ballots for dead people, and “miscounted” votes.

In 1946, in what is known as the Battle of Athens in Tennessee, returning veterans fought an actual gun battle to prevent Democrat candidates from committing voter fraud.

Lyndon Johnson apparently stole his Texas Senate seat in 1948 with a late ballot drop of over 200 votes. The theft was so egregious that it was pursued all the way to the supreme court, but the court, for some unknown reason, declined to hear the case.

The Kennedys stole the 1960 election. Well, Joe Kennedy did, anyway, by manipulating (buying?) the Illinois vote. (He wasn’t exactly a sterling character; he made a fortune by aggressively exploiting weaknesses in the stock market. Because he knew the system so well, FDR appointed him to clean up the stock market and to get rid of all the practices that made him so rich.) Nixon wanted to challenge the vote and fight for the presidency, but his handler, the Bush patriarch — yes, those Bushes — told him to back off and that he’d get his turn. (Remember at the end when Nixon said that they wouldn’t have him to push around anymore? He didn’t mean the electorate. He meant the Bushes.)

In 1982, a grand jury found that in Chicago alone, there had been 100,000 fraudulent ballots. Some people were even convicted.

Voter fraud has been widespread in Colorado for a couple of decades at least, though these fraudsters are more discreet about it — no late-night drops of exactly 35,000 votes. No major changes to the big cities that might have more oversight. Instead, as they have bragged to researchers, they tweak the ballots in the smaller areas where a few votes here and a few there make a huge difference. In fact, one guy bragged that he knew the names of thousands of dead people in Colorado, and he could get them to vote when necessary. (If you ever wonder how Colorado, one of the most middle-of-the-road states, became rampantly leftist with only 25% of the electorate registered as Democrat, that’s how it happened. If you’re also wondering why they went after Tina Peters so hard, this is it — they needed to make an example of her so they could keep their scam going.)

Even worse, what voters vote for don’t always stay the course. Many years ago, Colorado tried to pass a bill that gave gays preferential treatment, sort of a DEI before DEI. Colorado voters voted it down, but Barbara Streisand and her ilk decided it was anti-gay, though it wasn’t. She made a huge national stink, and suddenly, the whole thing disappeared. I never did understand that — the government of Colorado overriding the votes of its citizens to pacify an aged celebrity who didn’t even live in the state. But they did it.

So, safe and secure elections. Right. If you believe that I have a bridge to sell you.

Until the elections of the past decade, it didn’t matter who won anyway, because Democrats and Republicans have almost always been two sides of the same coin, both betting that coin against the taxpayer. If you doubt my word, ask yourself why so many of the politicians supposedly representing us refuse to pass legislation that the majority of citizens in both parties want and need. You probably won’t like the answer.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One

Posted in history/myth, life. Tags: , , , , , , . 15 Comments »

No Feeling of Vindication

August 1, 2026 — Pat Bertram

I’ve been sitting here mechanically playing a game of solitaire and letting my mind make sense of what is going on with the Covid hearings without any input from my emotions or a mental push from my conscious mind.

It’s odd — I don’t feel any vindication at having known exactly what was going on back then. Hints of the “conspiracy” were running through threads of pandemic panic, and since those same conspiracies (not theories, real conspiracies) have always been in the background of any biological or chemical weapon development (especially since such research has been banned for decades), it was apparent to me what was happening. I also had the advantage of the years of research that formed the back story of my novel A Spark of Heavenly Fire, in addition to a well-developed sense of pattern recognition. (I originally wrote “over-developed,” which leads to a tendency to draw connections among events that might not have anything to do with one another, but in this case, I was right on target.)

More importantly, for me, I didn’t have anyone telling me I couldn’t see a grandbaby unless I got the shots, or any other such personal coercion, so I was able to deal with that whole horror on my own terms. As to why I never wrote about my suspicions back then — it was due to a rather feebly developed sense of self-preservation. (I say “feebly” because it’s obvious from some of my more recent politically leaning posts that the thin veneer of self-preservation is wearing off.) They scared me with all that talk of arresting people who didn’t have a certificate of vaccination, and apps to track people or to turn in people you knew who didn’t comply. Too much like the “big brother” in 1984, who turned out to be one’s fellow citizens. And they were silencing anyone — even doctors and nurses — who told a different story, and some of those people are still paying the price for telling the truth. So I kept my mouth shut, both online and off. Not that it would have mattered — no one cared what I thought.

I mostly feel sad for all the people who got caught up in the megalomania of this man and who were forever damaged by his policies. But despite what we are hearing about his diary, a betrayal of such enormity never comes from a single bureaucrat. He needed backers, protectors, accomplices, media people to keep the fear escalating, lawmakers to force into law edicts that people would otherwise not have gone along with, governments to coerce people into compliance, gatekeepers to cover up the truth, governors to create unnecessary mandates, and everyone to tout “the science” and ridicule the non-believers. If you’re wondering why he’s taking the fifth despite being pardoned for his crimes (and even though “taking the fifth doesn’t hold in such a case like this because he’s already protected), it’s that if he lists names, he’s a dead man. Literally. I have no doubt names of consequence are hiding behind his silence, but although I can guess at some, other names are lost in the utterly secret roster of the global elite that has always wanted to destroy this country (and now, apparently, most of the world, too). He was the face of the pandemic, and now he’s the sacrificial goat. Everyone else who was complicit will simply go on with their lives as if they don’t have blood on their hands.

I doubt I would have paid much attention to what is coming out in the hearings, even with his thunderous silence, but there’s so much else coming out now, things that have been kept secret for generations, things I’ve known from my research without knowing a lot of the specific details. And the details are appalling. And appallingly sad. The huge amounts of money — trainloads — that are moved out of the treasury with no accountability. The utterly corrupt career politicians. The creeping communism. The activist groups that keep free speech for themselves but gag everyone else for disagreeing. Proof that outside operators have almost always interfered with our government, paying off those who are supposed to be on our side.

All this might be shocking to people who are hearing about it for the first time (if, in fact, they are hearing about it since the alphabet media are generally silent on anything that doesn’t fit their leftist narrative), but it’s not shocking to me.

I do feel sad for myself, though in a more general way. A lifetime of trying to peek behind the scenes to get glimpses of the truth has led to . . . nothing, really. Well, it did lead me safely through the pandemic where, despite my fears (and, oh they were so good at playing on our fears!), I was able to stick to my convictions. But other than that?

Just sadness.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One

Posted in being me, history/myth, life. Tags: , , , , , . 3 Comments »

The Joke’s on Us

July 31, 2026 — Pat Bertram

Sometimes I wonder if we are the victims of some sort of practical joke, as if those who are running things are giggling up their sleeves at how gullible we are. At the last minute, they will yell, “surprise!” And then they will triumphantly tell us that the Democratic frontrunners for the 2028 presidential election are all a joke and that someone really great is hiding behind the scenes.

Or they will tell us that the billions upon billions of dollars that have been stolen by fraudsters was all a minor misunderstanding, and that there’s nothing going on. It’s all in fun, you see.

Or they will tell us that they knew all along that those thousands of criminals with multiple charges let out on a cash-free bond (or simply not charged) would commit another crime, but so what? Apparently, we’re all spoilsports who can’t take a joke.

Or they will tell us that the push for Americans to cheer the Islamists as they spread terror throughout the world was simply their way of gigging us, and that of course no one supports them, especially not all the woke folk who would be immediately beheaded or thrown off a building if they brought their pride parade to that murderous regime.

Or they would tell us that the push for Communism in the United States isn’t really happening. That they just want everyone to be kind and to “share,” as if that forced sharing isn’t merely theft from the workers (who they profess to support) and given to those who don’t contribute anything.

Or maybe they would admit that just for fun, they turned everything around, that the so-called aggressors they wanted everyone to hate were really the victims merely trying to defend themselves.

Or maybe they are laughing themselves silly at the tragic irony of all those American-hating Muslims living in the vicinity of the greatest terrorist attack on the United States. And laughing themselves even sillier at all the mayors and other petty politicians who think they are world leaders.

Yeah, right. We might all be being duped, but unfortunately, it isn’t some sort of practical joke. Though maybe it is — I had to laugh at a video of people protesting the mayor of New York, and the speech-to-text program translated their yells as “Remove my dummy.” Unfortunately, he might be a lot of things, though I doubt he’s a dummy.

I’m lucky — none of that is visible from my yard, so if I turn off my computer, and go outside, those “jokes” becomes less real. What is real in my yard is no joke — plants struggling to survive in the heat, but so far, so good.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One

Posted in culture, history/myth, life, writing. Tags: , , , . 2 Comments »

Blowing a Fuse

July 30, 2026 — Pat Bertram

Does anyone say “blew a fuse” anymore, either referring to an electric control box or losing one’s temper? Probably not. Well, except for me, and even my use isn’t strictly accurate.

Last night, I flipped a light switch. The bulb went out in a flash and blew a fuse. Or tripped a switch. Or broke the circuit. Or did whatever things do nowadays to make the electricity not work.

I checked the erstwhile fuse box that’s on the wall going down to the basement, but those switches still were in their proper position. It was raining heavily (yay for the rain!!), and dark, besides, so I couldn’t access the main breaker box. For some reason unknown to me (code requirement, maybe?), when the electricity in this 98-year-old house was modernized, the new main control box was set outside. The first insurance inspector I had said to put a lock on the box to prevent anyone messing with it, which I did. It only prevents casual passersby from accessing the box since a lock is so easily cut, but at least it makes me feel as if I am doing the right thing.

Since there was nothing I could do about the situation, and since I was too tired to worry, I went to sleep.

This morning, first thing, I changed the burnt-out bulb, which was no easy task. The screws holding up the globe light fixture hadn’t been touched in perhaps ten years, and I was balanced on a three-step stepstool, but I was careful and managed to get the cover off. Then I had to sort through my lightbulbs (another task that needed the stepstool) to find the proper one.

When those tasks were safely concluded, I found the keys to the control panel, went out and finally flipped the switch.

Such a simple and silly thing, and yet I feel as if I accomplished a monumental task, as if I were sorceress magically creating light, especially since I don’t remember ever having to change a lightbulb in an enclosed fixture. I must have at some point or other because it seemed familiar. But, whatever . . . now I have light!

 

***

Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One

Posted in being me, home, house, life. Tags: , , , , . 2 Comments »

Decor . . . Um

July 29, 2026 — Pat Bertram
Daily writing prompt
What’s your home decoration style?
View all responses

I thought I’d be clever and try to find some way to link décor and décor . . . um (decorum, get it?), but I really couldn’t find a fit since décor is about one’s things and decorum is about one’s actions. If my house did have the ability to act in good taste rather that simply being in good taste then, yes, the two are linked.

Still — décor? Um . . . what do I know about décor? Not much. My decorating style is whatever was donated or what I could scrounge, and yet somehow, it all fits together in a pleasant, comfortable, and inviting way.

That’s the extent of my decorating style. If left to myself, I’d probably be living in an empty house with a single furnished room: my office. And that certainly doesn’t have any sort of décor — just tables, and chairs and a day bed that I purchased and put together by myself. (I’d probably need help if I were trying to assemble the bed today. It was heavy and the pieces were awkward, but somehow I did it. Whew!)

It is interesting, though, that even without any planning, my living room ended up being so inviting. It’s impersonal enough (I don’t like pictures on the walls and I have a minimum of gadgets collecting dust) that people feel at home from the minute they walk in the door. Supposedly, too many photos and such screams “my place!” to visitors, keeping them at arm’s length, which is why realtors have sellers remove those personal items.

Or maybe not, I don’t know. All I know is whatever my decorating style, it works for me and whoever happens to stop by. (And yes, I know the mat in front of the door is not centered, but it’s where it needs to be for when I enter the house.)

***

Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One

Posted in blogging, home, house, life. Tags: , , , , , . 2 Comments »

Dreams I Never Dreamed

July 28, 2026 — Pat Bertram
Daily writing prompt
What’s your biggest dream?
View all responses

I don’t have any dreams, biggest or otherwise. Well, I do have the night kind, but I don’t have many of those either, at least not that I remember. Should we have dreams? I don’t know. I tried looking up dreams on Google, but no matter what my search terms, I always ended up with a list of sites pertaining to nighttime dreams. I even asked if we needed a dream, and what I got was a lecture on the importance of REM sleep.

So, I guess I’m on my own for a definition of this topic.

Do we need to have a dream? It seems to be the consensus (except for Google) that yes, we do. As Harper’s Bizarre once sang, “You gotta have a dream. If you don’t have a dream, how you gonna have a dream come true?

As far as I can recall, though, I never really had a dream, something I was passionate about that I wished would happen or that I could work toward happening. When I was young, I wanted to be an author, even quit a job to pursue the craft, and it came as a shock when I discovered I had no talent. Years later, long after any vestige of that ambition had disappeared, I learned how to write, even had some books published but never became a “real” author, one who makes a living by writing. Perhaps the closest I came to having a dream was after Jeff died when I considered walking the Pacific Crest Trail, or walking cross country, or doing some other epic walk. I called it an impossible dream in my many blog posts about pursuing that dream, and as it turned out, it was impossible, but still, it was something that consumed my attention for many years. I researched, tried to get in shape enough to carry a heavy pack, did so many things to try to achieve that “dream,” though was it a dream? I don’t know. Looking back, it seems less a dream and more of a mental escape or a way of coping with a life of uncertainty.

And my life was uncertain. After Jeff died, I moved a thousand miles from our home to go take care of my aged father, and then after he died . . . well, let’s just say I was untethered.

Still, back then, I did think a lot about trying to find a “dream,” a way of getting through the rest of my life as fully engaged as possible. I did a lot of things in pursuit of a dream, though in fact, I’d never even dreamed any of those dreams. Dancing on stage, for example. I’m not the lightest of folks, not much of one for music or rhythm or bendability or any of a dozen other things one thinks about when you think of a dancer. And yet I did learn to dance, even did several performances on stage before a live audience. Apparently, despite the Harper’s Bizarre song, you can have a dream come true even if you never had the dream.

It’s the same with my house. Until I decided to spend my last bit of savings on a house, I’d certainly never even entertained the idea of owning a piece of property. Once I had the idea, I dreamed the house into existence, and now I seem to be living a dream, one that I never really dreamed.

And my garden. It’s a dream of a garden, that’s for sure, but for sure one that I’d never dreamed. In fact, I distinctly remember thinking (and telling people) that I didn’t want a garden or any landscaping. I wanted a yard that would take care of itself, and yet here I am, with an aftermath of a dream I never had.

Although I still don’t have dreams, I continue to open to whatever comes my way. And who knows, one day I might find myself in another situation where a dream I never dreamed actually came true.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One

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Promises

July 27, 2026 — Pat Bertram
Daily writing prompt
What’s a promise you made to yourself that you’ve actually kept?
View all responses

I don’t really make promises to myself, at least not using those words. I do wake each day with the idea of trying to do better than I did the day before at taking care of myself, such as eating real food or doing stretching exercises if nothing else. I sometimes played around with New Year’s resolutions, though those resemble my daily betterment intentions rather than any resolution or promise to myself. Oddly, my unintentional resolution of daily blogging (I never decided to do it, never promised myself I would, just started doing it) is still in effect. 208 days and counting!

The closest I ever came to promising myself anything was after Jeff died and I became determined to be spontaneous. The only time in my life I was spontaneous was right after I met him. His very presence in the world made the world feel friendly, and I felt comfortable taking chances. Over the years, I settled back into my worrisome self. Our lives became constrained by his health, our finances, and various other matters beyond our control. He told me once it bothered him that our shared life had destroyed my spontaneity — but he never understood that he was the one responsible for whatever spontaneity I had developed to begin with.

I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life mourning, didn’t want to spend my life regretting that my shared life was ended, didn’t want to . . . well, I didn’t want to do a lot of things that I had to do, such as deal with the pain and go from there. Through it all, though, I kept that determination to be spontaneous as a way to honor him. And to honor myself.

I did many new things and took many chances — visiting museums, taking dance classes, hunting for wild poppy preserves, exploring the desert, hiking — though oddly, a lot of my spontaneity came with preparation and planning. For example, I couldn’t just start driving cross-country trip on a whim — I had to get both myself and my car into shape, stock up on the necessary emergency and camping equipment, notify people of my intentions in case they wanted me to stop by, and so many other niggling details. And yet, despite the planning, most of the trip was an exercise in spontaneity — driving how far I wanted each day, taking side trips when the signs beckoned me off the main road, accepting invitations from people I barely knew.

Even buying my house was as spontaneous as such a purchase can be. I got an unsolicited email from a real estate website saying that they had a house I might like. I did like it. And I bought it sight unseen. (Though I did have a realtor and two inspectors look at it for me.) Although my life has settled into a comfortable stay-at-homeness, and although I still have to live more or less according to a gardening schedule, my life is mostly unplanned. I do what I wish when I wish it, which most often means not doing much of anything, which I’m okay with, although oddly, yesterday I suddenly felt like cleaning house, so that was my big spontaneity of the day.

I suppose, in the end, I did make a promise to myself — that plan to be spontaneous — and I did keep it.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One

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