Oh god, I’ve lost my edge. I’m becoming dotty. Taking that panicked worry to its logical conclusion, I knew that if I died right then, I’d leave no profound last words, not like Voltaire or even like Joan Crawford, who is said to have screamed, Damn it, don’t you dare ask God to help me!  (Can’t you just hear her saying that? So wire hanger-ish.)

No, instead of something profound or memorable, I’d be thinking about a restaurant down the road — The Girl & The Goat — and their unappetizing menu of wood-roasted pig face and parsnip puree. (That’s for real, ya’ll. Click the link).

I remember that at the end of her life, my mother saw a blonde woman in a green dress beckoning to her from a silver train. The only part of MJ’s DNA I share is the tendency to dream of odd things in vivid color. On Friday, on some corner of Randolph Street, I just knew that if I keeled over at that very moment, there’d be no friendly guide to see me into heaven. It would just be me, alone, pulling into a white tunneled Starbucks drive-thru in a red, button-sized Smart car while trying to clear my mind of menu memories like confit goat belly and tongue-olive vinaigrette.

Obviously, I thought, today would be a terrible day to die. I should probably hang on a little while longer.

Comforted by new, meaningful mission, I dug my hands into warm coat pockets and jangled the spare coins that weighted down both. In Chicago, far away from the kids who hang out in front of 7-11 or the homeless guy who sits outside of Starbucks, I’ve amassed a ton of change. I try to remember the last time I bought anything that cost less than a dollar, but that makes me recall the days of powdery white candy cigarettes with pink sugar tips, which not even the novelty candy makers dare sell anymore. Almost everyone smoked when I was growing up, though, including grocery store clerks and teachers. I remember sitting in a classroom, shaking my wrists out after a painful hour spent learning to write in cursive with a #2 Ticonderoga pencil while Mrs. McCollum gathered up her Virginia Slims and headed outside for a break.

Who reminisces like this?

Dotty people.

Old people.

Fuck. Really?

Put off by my mental turn into an era of beehives and bubble gum rock, I scanned the street looking for redemption. For that one person who needed about $8.32 worth of quarters, dimes, nickels and pennies. I figured if I died during an act of generosity, maybe God would see fit to send me a blonde angel instead of a roasted goat. But at that moment, in all of Chicago, as far as my eyes could see, there wasn’t one person who looked ragged except me.

It’s occurred to me more than once that I just don’t look good in clothes. I’m sure I look worse out of them, but that’s not the point. The point is nothing fits. Pants are too long, shirts are too short and unless I’m in love, I hate to shop. Only love makes me want to lengthen my legs, shorten my torso, and style my hair — which right now has a skunk-like gray stripe growing down its crooked part. And gray hair isn’t like normal hair at all. It’s like the little steel threads of a Brillo pad.

Oh my god, I thought somewhere near Morgan Street, I’m going to die with Don King hair.

I continued walking until I found a Starbucks. The girl behind the counter seemed oblivious to my existential crisis, so I put on my best game face and ordered a non-fat Venti latte with an extra shot but then — along with feeling dotty, misshapen and gray — I felt pretentious. I wondered if my world would right itself — if I might find some check and balance or even a bit of redemption — in paying for my $4.76 order with coins. Of course I didn’t, because that’s something only very old, very young, or very poor people do.

Heading back to The Rosie Show, it hit me: there has been a lot of talk around the office about the number 50. (Rosie turns 50 nine days before I do.)

50, I realize, is the reason for all this angst. 50 is trying to be my late-blooming midlife crisis. 50 is the reason my legs are too short and my hair is Don King funky. 50 is why babies make my ovaries hurt, young people frustrate me, and love stories make me cry. 50 is why I won’t even try something like hedgehog mushroom gribiche, knowing that I’d prefer a cheeseburger.

My 50 wants to drive a sensible, mid-sized car — a nice, solid GMC or Chevy — and it doesn’t care that it’s still using a flip phone from 1993, but it can’t abide thin towels, cheap coffee, rude people, or disposable razors. My 50 likes to think ahead, divert disaster, and fix what needs fixing before moving onto the next thing. It’s afraid to go to funerals, weddings, or other serious events because it doesn’t trust its hormones not to laugh at inappropriate times.

Yet for all its dichotomous stodginess and hormonal unpredictability, my 50 is wild. Not 20 or 30 wild, but urgent-wild. Life experience-wild. Smart-wild. We-don’t-have-all-the-time-in-the-world-left wild. My 50 has become a colorful precautious sage. Unlike previous ages, it doesn’t fly by the seat of its pants, fueled by nothing more than big ideas and all-encompassing feelings — it’s got documentation, research, personal anecdotes, informed and fierce opinions, and a strong backbone.

My 50 still has a 10 year old girl on the inside, ready to drop everything and play at a moment’s notice — or burst into tears when things hurt or don’t go her way — but it’s learned to self-parent, discipline and nurture.

My 50 has realized that impulse and intuition is not the same thing. One should be checked and the other heeded.

My 50 has realized that it’s not about how many new stones can be dug up — it’s about taking the time to polish the ones you’ve already collected before searching for more.

Somewhere along the way, the sharp edges of my younger years grew into curves of memory, mind, and consciousness. I’ve lost edges, but gained a horizon.

I still wish I could rock a pair of jeans or keep a hairstyle for longer than five minutes, though. Maybe that will happen when I’m 51.

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Before we start throwing the confetti around and pouring the margaritas, I should mention that this is, for now, a very temporary assignment. Two weeks to start with — time to evaluate whether my content ideas will be a good fit for the future of the show. I can hardly wait to get started. In the meantime, my mind is already running in high gear and there are bags to pack, plans to make, and a hundred little things to do before I leave the sunshine of Arizona. I’m going to have to forage for winter clothes and figure out if Annie is joining me or going to visit friends for a couple of weeks.

I’ll keep you all updated on Facebook and Twitter as often as I can. Thank you to all of those who have followed my journey through the years and who wish me well in this new endeavor. Your support means the world to me!

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2. My pride tends to come in through the back door and stems more from a self-defense mechanism than a feeling of achievement. Any variation of someone telling me “you’re a no-good, terrible, rotten person” hurts of course, but it also calls up the reasons I have to not hate myself. I wish I could say this kind of pride feels good, but it doesn’t. It feels, instead, kind of desperate and unhappy.

3. I hold hipsters responsible for the internet popularity of bacon, Justin Bieber, ADD, and jeggings. The power of hipsters scares me. I wish I had a hipster friend.

4. There’s a contingent of people on the interwebz who just make stuff up or grow their own conspiracy theories and then spread their stories around until at least a few other people believe them — even if Snopes, common sense, or even a tiny bit of exploration would prove them wrong. I think Rupert Murdoch would approve.

5. This guy, Danny Miller, is like a movie savant. Seriously. Check out his personal website, Jew Eat Yet, where he also shares his love of film and his quirky penchant for writing celebrity obituaries. I think he’d make a great edition to entertainment television.

6. Just because thousands of people believe something doesn’t make it true, ethical, good, or right. Michael and Debi Pearl are hardline Christian fundies who are best known for promoting the corporal punishment of children, including infants. Their most infamous tome, How to Train Up a Child, has sold thousands of copies and ranks consistently high in Amazon’s ratings for child development books. The Pearl’s believe that children should be trained to obey authority instantaneously, without question and on command, and that any hesitation to do so should be met with swift and immediate physical punishment. They also believe that children should not be allowed to express any emotion outside of happiness or gratitude. This sentiment falls in line with the corruption of the “Be Sweet” element of Mormonism by its fundamentalists. Can parents brainwash their children from birth? You decide. This article on potty training infants was written by Shalom Pearl, Michael and Debi’s grown daughter. Personally, I found it disturbing.

To have a five-month-old wait to be put on the potty and then obey Mama’s voice when you say that special word to him and see him go potty for you, then you are not only beginning to train your baby in self-control, but obedience — almost from the womb. How cool is that?!

7. Through a Kindle forum, I learned that this author makes five figures a month from books like “Daddy’s Dirty Little Angel” and “Sex With the Sitter”.  I think if I tried to write porn, all my characters would end up falling in love, being monogamous, and getting comfortable enough with each other to wear their favorite sweatpants and go without makeup. The older I get, the sexier I find things like being at ease and unpretentious. A partner who helps change the sheets? Who sees your vulnerabilities and flaws, but loves you anyway? That’s pure erotica to me.

8. This makes me feel very humble.

It’s the by-product of a recent Kindle promotion, with word spread by readers on Twitter and Facebook, and may not last, but while it does I am profoundly grateful and touched by the support of those who believed in this story.

9. To pay the rent, I’ve been working in the warehouse of a used book store. I am reminded everyday of just how never-ending and pervasive the search is for answers to human problems and frailties.

The shelves are stocked with bibles, tarot cards, runes, ancient Chinese secrets, affirmation journals and books that promise healing through self-reflection, religion, crystals, meditation, mysticism, diet, prayer, magic singing bowls, gaining or losing ego . . . It’s sobering to realize that so much of this stems not just from curiosity, but from pain and the desire to heal something that feels broken, or to fill up a space that feels empty.

10. I wonder what we would go in search of if we all truly felt well, good, and whole.

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I finished the first draft of EG in April, 2011. Since then:

*I’ve moved four times (and am now living in a mostly unfurnished apartment).
*Had a publishing deal fall through in the 11^th hour.
*Went through the process of editing and self-publishing.
*Gone hungry. A lot.
*Re-edited book and then went on a marketing campaign.
*Had my hopes raised and then crushed. A few times.
*Nursed a sick dog back into health only to discover that she’s the best dog in the whole world.
*Found a day job similar to one I had in 1984. It’s exhausting and makes me feel my age, but it pays the rent. I’m grateful.

It’s been a year of happy accomplishments, bruising defeats, immense gratitude and total insecurity. There’ve been more near misses and almost-there’s than I can count, and not nearly enough right on the mark’s. I’ve met up with a dizzying number of people and circumstances, 97% positive, but the 3% who weren’t hit me hard and caused me to reexamine (for the thousandth time) the way I handle hurtful events. I’ve retreated, gotten enormously sad, and then tried to grow some more backbone. I still wonder why it is that pain tends to last longer than joy. I’m working on that and several other things . . . like being more practical and organized, neither of which comes naturally to me. I envy those people with Costco memberships, who never run out of essentials like toilet paper, coffee filters or Luna bars.

After a year of being on the road and then a year of writing a book, all the possessions I own can fit into the trunk of a Honda Civic. Sometimes I think my god, I’m almost 50 — I should probably have some decent clothes, a couch and some matching dinnerware — but then I remember the days I had all of that and realize I wouldn’t trade these past two years for a return to my pre-road trip life in Minnesota.

It’s just that in some ways, I feel like I have stepped back in time and it makes me feel panicky in the sense of oh no, please tell me that something I’ve done has actually made a difference and that I’m not going to end up right back to where I started. Sometimes, I am my own worst Poltergeist. I scare myself with visions of canned soup, orthopedic booties, and a worn out La-Z-Boy recliner no one else is allowed to sit in. Then, because I’m me, I obliterate that unfortunate scene with the magic of imagination. Ah, there it is — a small house by the beach, a mahogany desk, a roaring fireplace and two dogs napping on a Persian carpet.

Then, because I’m me again, I think get your head out of the clouds and for god’s sake, don’t forget to put gas in the car (again) or pick up toilet paper on the way home.

So what I’m basically saying is that I’m scared. But hopeful. Or, as Alanis sang, I’m tired but I’m working, I care but I’m restless, I’m brave but I’m chicken shit and what it all really boils down to is that no one’s got it quite all figured out just yet.

I don’t have it figured out, but it’s 7:02 a.m. and I’ve been up for a few hours after falling asleep at 6:30 last night. Warehouse work is exhausting, and now I have to go get ready for work again. I’d rather be writing — my mind is in better shape than my legs — but that’s not where it’s at right now. Maybe tomorrow it will be, but today’s all about Dr. Scholl’s shoe inserts and energy by way of caffeine.

For those of you who’ve asked about my online absence, I’m okay. I’m just in the process of trying to find my land legs after two years of floating.

I’ve got one hand in my pocket and the other is looking for an anchor.

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After he was featured in “The Secret“– another sham book and movie that titillates those in the market of quick fix salvation with a most basic understanding of the Law of Attraction. The idea that you can just visualize the job, spouse, house or career of your dreams and poof it will appear, became a bestseller that has ( big surprise) been debunked big time. But along the way, the featured shamsters, including Ray, made various media appearances, including the hallowed “Oprah” show.

I often wonder if wealth and fame is like an acid that eventually rubs off the real and replaces it with a strange kind of magical realism. That type of acid, though, isn’t purely self-injected. It spreads through a populace that sees being well-known as some kind of stamp of credibility, even if for the sake of amusement. There is no other reason that outrageous figures like Donald Trump, Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter . . . Snooki, Tila Tequila, Paris Hilton, Kim Kardashian  . . . Louise Hay, Jimmy Swaggart, Rhonda Byrne, Byron Katie, Pat Robertson, Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker   . . . and hundreds of other questionable but charismatic people become famous and rich (or richer) at the public’s expense.

Walk through any bookstore that’s still standing and you’ll see the tangible effect of a fame-driven, reality-television culture that’s become steeped in “platform” over substance. It’s unlikely that JD Salinger, John Irving or hundreds of other more private, iconic authors would be published today. The cult of personality is more favorable to peacocks than to doves. An F-List celebrity has a better chance of being published than a talented but unknown author. With ghostwriters at the ready, reality TV “stars” like Snooki can become published authors . . . of books they didn’t even write.

The perfume aisle, the clothing store, even the semi-sacred art world have all been inundated by the disingenuous but effective monster of crossover marketing. The problem as I see it isn’t that JLo’s name is on a perfume bottle or Jessica Simpson’s name is on a shirt label, it’s the false premise that celebrities actually contribute anything more to these products than their signatures on lucrative contracts. It’s that American corporations, once heralded for ingenuity and invention, now seem hesitant to invest so much as a nickel on new talent, but will spend millions to borrow a celebrity name. And the public is buying it — by the bottle, by the handbag, by the book.

Maybe it’s true that America likes its loud swaggering egos, train wrecks and false prophets (and there’s certainly sufficient proof of that), but the social effect goes beyond amusement and purchasing decisions. A recent study shows that Fox news television viewers are less informed than those who watch no news at all. Fox has a long history of courting the charismatic to its national pulpit, offering up dogmatic hosts like Bill O’Reilly and Glenn Beck while providing an open platform to colorfully ill-informed spectacles like Sarah Palin (I can see Russia from my porch!) and James Dobson (Tinky Winky is gay!).

Millions of people watch Fox news. Millions.

In 1987, in a soft economy that brought about Black Monday, famed television preacher Oral Roberts took to television to proclaim that God was going to hasten his death if Roberts didn’t raise $8 million dollars immediately. Roberts ultimately charmed his followers out of $9 million. Artfully disguised by the cloak of religion, Roberts denied in interviews that he was a wealthy man. Just a decade earlier, though, his ministry “partners” donated a record-breaking $38 million dollars to his tax-free ministry and they kept donating over the years in amounts that afforded Roberts and his family a lavish lifestyle, replete with private jets and multi-million dollar homes. It’s not as if Americans aren’t aware of televangelical shams and psychic shysters — James Randi has made a career of successfully exposing frauds like Peter Popoff, John Edward, Sylvia Browne and Benny Hinn, and we all watched as the 24K gold world of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker came crumbling down . . . and then there’s Miss Cleo, Jimmy Swaggart, Robert Tilton and many others — yet the disease of charismatic fame is that it seems to learn no lessons. When the attractiveness of one charming fraud wears off, another will take its place.

Joel Osteen, the benefactor of his father’s ministry, lives in a $10M dollar home because he preaches a feel-good gospel of prosperity and positive thinking to a predominately middle-class congregation. All one has to do, according to Osteen, is “Start calling yourself healed, happy, whole, blessed, and prosperous” and it will happen. It’s the old law-of-attraction snake oil that’s been around for generations, but Osteen’s got a smiling, silver tongued delivery that makes the oil gleam anew.

A few years ago, I was excited when I was invited to write for the popular Huffington Post. Sure, the former Republican Ariana Huffington paid writers nothing for their contributions, but it was an opportunity to share my work with thousands of readers. Then Alec Baldwin became a contributor. Then Jaime Lee Curtis. As more and more actors, film producers and sons and daughters of the rich and famous signed on as bloggers, articles by not-famous writers, even the most relevant and carefully researched ones, began getting buried or going straight to the archives. Today’s front page includes stories by Marlo Thomas, Jennifer Aniston, Rhea Perlman and Matthew Modine. All of these celebrities may have something of value to say — I’m not suggesting that everyone get in their primary career box and stay there — but in an entity that calls itself an “internet newspaper”, it should be the newsworthiness of what is being written, rather than the allure of celebrity, that determines the placement of articles. (I don’t write for the Huffington Post anymore.)

I have a sliver of faith that eventually a game-changer will come along. I don’t think it will stem from anything like rising public indignation, though. As a society, we have become so enmeshed in perpetuating unwarranted idolatry and public interest that we’re nearly blind to it, even when the hypocritical divide between our shared values and actions is miles wide. (Hard work pays. Hey, the Real Housewives are on. Talent should be rewarded. Let’s buy Kim Kardashian’s book. If we truly believed that intelligence was more important than beauty; logic was preferable to charismatic charm; and depth should be valued more than shallowness, our actions would fall in line. The fact is they don’t. We’ve kept our beloved aphorisms in the name of sentiment while abandoning the working principles behind them).

No, I think that if something is going to come along to realign our cultural priorities, it won’t stem from the complacent public. It’s unlikely too, especially in the current climate, that a revolution will spring from the pens of discontented writers. The Age of Reason ushered in by Paine and Jefferson . . . the Age of Realism that Frederick Douglass & Thoreau contributed to . . . the Modern Period of Zora Neale Hurston and John Steinbeck . . . the Post-Modernism of Jack Kerouac, Maya Angelou and Kurt Vonnegut . . . I believe the glory days of writers as true cultural reflections and influences are gone. We are living In an era of well-franchised teen vampires and sorcerers, political jesters, snake oil self-help books and miraculous weight loss solutions. In literature, we are in the Age of Escapism. Socially, we are in an era that’s so devoid of real value, real beauty, real talent, real truth, real compassion — real anything — that on those rare occasions it comes along, we’re shocked. (The Susan Boyle effect.) Sometimes we’re even disgusted. (Who does that Michael Moore fellow think he is anyway?)

It’s going to take charisma to end the unfortunate rein of the charismatic. It’s going to take a strong leader with a considerable platform who inspires others in business and the arts to raise their voices, provoke truthful discussion, publish real books, make meaningful films and potentialize untapped talent. I don’t believe that such a leader will come in my lifetime anymore, but I hope future generations will look back on this one with all the disgust it so rightfully deserves and decide to give ingenuity and originality another era and more opportunities to thrive.

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You can read the same story a thousand times on the internet and it’s always heartwarming: A dog on the edge of death is rescued and brought back to life. It repays its new caregiver with abundant loyalty and unconditional friendship. Birds chirp, bells ring, nuggets of Eukanuba dot the kitchen floor like a Rorschach for canines. Everyone lives happily ever after.

And then there’s Annie.

I love this dog, but it’s complicated. In some ways, she feels familiar. She’s gentle, but obstinate. Affectionate, but wary. Old enough to have developed her own way of doing things which are, to her, the only right way. Other than the ten or twelve pieces of dog food she insists on leaving on the floor after every meal, Annie likes order and habit. She likes her belly rubbed a certain way, her blanket just so, and her water fresh and cold. She gets bent out of shape when I wash her bedding and disturb the bones that she’s so carefully hidden. She has an internal clock that has memorized the schedule for feedings, walks and the dog park and if I’m late or I try to change it up, she’ll express her dissatisfaction with a long sigh and a despairing tail. I understand all of these needs and try to be accommodating.

In other ways, I wonder who this stranger is in my living room. She has no sense of loyalty. When we go to the dog park, I suspect she is scoping out other potential owners, perhaps ones with a swimming pool and a real backyard. When the pretty blonde owner of a bright yellow mini-Cooper opened the doors to let her Australian Shepherd out, Annie jumped in, leash and all. When I pulled her out and we all stepped into the park, Annie was suddenly The Best Dog in The Whole World. She even sat on command, which absolutely shocked me. Annie’s had me convinced that she doesn’t understand English, which is why all my attempts at Sit-Stay-Come-Down have failed. And I’m no slacker — I have mastered patience and the calm-assertiveness Caesar Milan promotes — but Annie is a special case. She has no particular love of rewards. She can take them or leave them and her obedience ethic? Her desire to please? It’s just absent.

Yet, when she rolls over to show me her belly or decides that she’s in the mood for affection — when she gives me the big grin I get in return for taking down the leash — there’s just no dog I want to please more. Someone’s being trained here, but it’s not Annie.

Annie will walk on streets and sidewalks, but won’t walk on the uncarpeted parts of my floor. She won’t eat dry dog food without at least a little warmed, canned food mixed in. She won’t sleep in my bedroom because that would mean leaving her one favorite spot in my tiny apartment. She’s housebroken, doesn’t chew things up, doesn’t bark, walks well on a leash, is friendly to all humans — but she’s the wallflower of the dog park. All that chasing, running, play biting? She doesn’t get it. It’s too unrefined for her. Tennis balls, squeaky toys, stuffed animals? No. If it’s not edible, she doesn’t see the point. And forget about chasing after anything, because that would just take too much effort and besides, she’s not about to leave the fresh pair of human hands she’s found to pet her neck.

So I have this dog, but she’s not really very dog-like at all. She’s 60 pounds of sweet, lazy, disloyal, stubborn, habitual, polyamorous love wrapped up in a beautiful low-energy, high-maintenance package. She is, now that I think about it, a lot like my ex-girlfriend, who jumped the fence for a woman who had a Ford Explorer and a Harley Davidson. Hopefully, Annie isn’t as fickle. In the meanwhile, I add ice to her water bowl, rub her belly the way she likes, and do my best not to rearrange her blankets. I give her the freedom to love whomever catches her eye and hope that in the end, she thinks coming home with me isn’t such a bad deal.

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