Laid Bare: Essays and Observations, Judson, Tom [best self help books to read .TXT] 📗

the oaks and maples around the cabin announced the onset of autumn, I found myself at my wits end.

My friend Debby, always a source of solid practical advice, said without hesitation: “_____ must be in a bad place to be doing this. You have to think about him and do what’s best for him, and, in doing so it will also be what’s best for you. You have to give Dan to _____.” My heart sank. Then I remembered a proverb I once heard: “The things you keep for yourself are lost for good; the things you give away are yours forever.”

The course of action seemed clear. I wrote _____:

“After much soul-searching I have decided I need to do what is best for you. And if that means making a gift to you of Dan then that is what I will do. I hope you will allow me to come and say goodbye to him.”

I never heard from _____, and I never saw Dan again.

I tried to feel good and angry about it all, but couldn’t seem to. Frustrated? Sure. Helpless? You bet. But, one has to be in a deep, dark place to keep someone from saying farewell to his own dog. I might as well have gotten mad at my ex-boyfriend because his eyes are brown and not blue.

The other day I took a load of rubbish to the town dump. Along with a broken lamp and leaky garden hose—other things I don’t need anymore—I left a water bowl with D-O-G stenciled on the side.

The bowl may be gone, but as the proverb says, Dan is mine forever.

HOWARD, WE HARDLY KNEW YE

I read that the Times Square Howard Johnson’s is closing its doors after almost fifty years. When I was 18 and moved to West Forty-Fifth Street in 1979, this last Howard Johnson’s was going strong. The food was mediocre at best, and none of the twenty-eight flavors of ice cream could match the richness of Haägen-Dazs.

Back then, 9th Avenue was something of a wasteland and HoJo’s was the only place to get a late-night snack or a cup of coffee and make “a couple of deals before dawn.” At that time of night, the restaurant was usually empty and I had my pick of seats, which was always the same booth in the window that looked out onto 46th Street and the Helen Hayes Theater. The orange vinyl seat would let out a sigh as I settled in.

Moving at a glacial, graveyard-shift pace, the waiter approached, and ignoring my greeting, he’d wipe the table with a wet rag and then place a glass of ice water on the table--overfilled and dripping—along with a laminated menu.

I marveled at the insouciant style this late-middle-aged African-American man gave to the place. He was a dressed in the regulation uniform of white shirt and black pants, but on any given night, he would be sporting hair from a large collection of toupees. There was the crazy Little Richard style and the Nat “King” Cole (neatly parted and slicked down on the top and sides). My favorite hairpiece, however, was The Nipsey. The Nipsey was a modest yet shapely Afro rising just slightly from the forehead. The waiter didn’t seem to choose a toupee to complement his personality, as he didn’t appear to have a personality, but I still liked The Nipsey best.

After ordering a dish of peppermint-stick ice cream, I took out a pen and started on the puzzle in the early edition of the Times. I rarely got very far before my imagination would begin to conjure up images of my own name gracing the marquees in the neighborhood. My plan was to be a Broadway composer by age 30. Across the street, at the Helen Hayes, there was a musical version of “Flowers for Algernon” (complete with mouse). So how hard could it be? With my chin in the palm of my hand, I sat gazing out the window into my future when the reflection of my waiter darkened the glass. He placed the metal sundae cup in front of me, filled with already melting ice cream. How did it melt between here and the counter? I didn’t care; it contained chips of real peppermint stick and had a fan-shaped wafer cookie stuck into the conical—not spherical—scoop.

I tasted a spoonful, took one last look at the retreating Nipsey, and returned to my 2 A.M. daydream.

I did make it to Broadway, but as an actor, not a composer. That dream is long gone, along with the old Helen Hayes Theater. So, too, is the Broadway that could support a musical version of “Flowers for Algernon." For that matter, so am I, having left Hell’s Kitchen over a decade ago. And soon Howard Johnson’s will be just a memory as well.

That’s New York, I guess.

THE BEAUTY CURSE

My friend Tim and I were browsing the profiles on BigMuscle.com the other day, consigning the especially attractive men to horrible fates: a fatal disease here, a terrible disfiguring accident there. You know what I mean—the kinds of things that guys imagine when confronted with particularly demoralizing beauty. This God-play knew no geographical restrictions; there seem to be stunning specimens of maleness in every region of the U.S. Heck, we even found a few fer’ners destined for the rack (once Tim and I take over the world, that is.)

I’d pull up a profile picture and wait for Tim’s reaction. “Oh, my god, he’s gorgeous. I hate him.” Tim would point out an attractive face or bicep and I’d respond with, “Amazing. Beautiful. His days are numbered.” Then we closed the Powerbook, sunk back on the couch and sighed in tandem as Tim opened another bag of chips and I reached for the remote to flip back and forth between Paula’s Home Cookin’ and