Simply Irresistible
I don’t think I’ve ever heard of Robert Palmer, the British singer/songwriter who wrote and sang the top late 80’s hit records Addicted to Love and Simply Irresistible, but both catch-phrases that title and end these two songs stick out clearly in my mind, so I’m sure I’ve heard him sing many times despite not knowing who he was. The man was a true 80’s phenom with his elegant attire and his blend or rock, blues, pop, soul and jazz and his MTV music videos featuring slicked-hair, red-lipped, tightly-dressed women who all look like they could hurt you just with a glance. I would argue that both phrases “addicted to love” and “simply irresistible” have become part of the mainstream euphemisms that are part of our vocabulary. Technically, a euphemism is supposed to be something used to dull the harsh edge of something unpleasant or embarrassing, but Robert Palmer certainly doesn’t sing either song with any sense of regret or embarrassment. One might even say he is brazen about it all and accepts that he can do nothing about his attraction to this tough-as-nails sort of woman. He reminds me of Gary Puckett with his full array of hit songs that are all soulful ballads of some poor schmuck getting his heart battered to here and back from either a cheating or jail-bait or sexually-teasing woman who likes to toy with his emotions and libido. As much as I like Gary Pickett’s songs, when I saw him live on stage recently, I have to admit that he looks every inch the lothario that he sings about. Robert Palmer is apparently all of what he sings about too since the poor sod died at age 54 of an unexpected heart attack and his girlfriend of the moment wasn’t with him and he died alone. I know nothing about her, but if she was true to his music, I bet she just kept on partying while he was laid to rest.
That’s the thing about being simply irresistible, you tend to know it and become simply insufferable along with it. I spend a good deal of time these days thinking about simplicity. I’m not quite where Katsumotosan was with his contemplation of the simplicity of the cherry blossom, but that reminds me that I seem to spend more and more time simply staring out at my garden and whatever work I have most recently done to it. Today I pulled alyssum from amongst the cacti and succulents along the driveway. I only got halfway done with the task before I had to stop for having almost filled one of my four green waste buckets, and mostly on account of a sore and cramping right forearm. I like the mindlessness of repetitive tasks, but they often do not like me and remind me by either waking me in the middle of the night needing Extra-Strength Excedrin, or just turning my hand into a Dr.Strangelove instrument beyond my logical control. I am in the hot tub right now typing away in hopes that the warm water will soothe the cramps in time for my second assault on the remaining alyssum tomorrow morning.
Today, while I was laboring away along the driveway, the UPS man came to deliver a package. By this time, we know each other to say hello. He looked at me in my work-clothes and gloves with a quizzical look as he paused in the driveway. He said, “Why are you doing that, you don’t have to do that.” He has that Southern California state of mind where gardening work (especially the menial stuff like pulling alyssum weeds) is the stuff of Mexican day-laborers. In fact, Joventino is coming on Wednesday, so I could easily have put it on the list for him to do and it would have gotten done painlessly and much faster than I can do it, given my need for breaks and letting my muscles cool off. But I am determined to keep doing this tomorrow for some reason. When the UPS guy came back down the driveway, he paused again and this time I said, “it’s good exercise and I don’t like gyms.” He nodded and said, “it is good exercise for sure….have a good one.” I’m sure he thought I am crazy and that when he retires he will have none of this.
What I should have said to him is that he needed to wait and hold his opinion on menial work until he is 6 months into his retirement. There is nothing wrong with menial work, especially of the garden maintenance variety. It doesn’t mean that I don’t like Joventino doing some of the things that I don’t have the tolerance for, but doing some simple physical work every day is good for my soul even more than its good for my body. And the key to not overextending oneself and thus overexerting, is to keep it simple.
I just had an interesting exchange with someone about the broader issue of keeping it simple, and it played right into a theme about the geopolitical landscape that I have been mulling over for some time. I am not sure what exactly seeded this idea, but I know what I have done has brought it to the fore in my mind. You see, I have these two friends who I know through motorcycling. We are actually quite close and have an active text string with one another. We are unabashed about feeding each other memes, quips, articles and such about our respective views, which are many and varied. Strangely enough, on any given topic the sides can also vary such as with two of us believing in vaccines and one an avid anti-Vaxer while the other two voted for Trump twice each and I voted against him both times…with a passion. One now thinks like me that Trump is a waste of space and doing more harm than good while the other goes to Mar-a-Lago regularly to patronize the great man.
In economic terms, my two friends are both staunchly conservative and as a forty-five year banker it is hard for me NOT to call myself fiscally conservative, but I feel that my liberal tendencies have caused me to take a much longer-term view of economics and what is most financially healthy for the world. All three of us stay well-informed and do lots of homework, but I have concluded that my two friends have a thought process that restricts their economic thinking to the here and now rather than farther than their nose into the future. When a recent article I sent them explained a solid cause and effect for the current inflationary situation (like the massive profits being inflicted on consumer from both shipping and energy companies taking advantage of the supply chain and Ukraine problems), their response was that inflation was caused by too much fiscal stimulation and by the COVID lockdown (whether medically warranted or not). No mention was made by them of Governor Abbot’s politicization of the Mexican border supply chain or that Elaine Chow as Transportation Secretary deregulated shipping to benefit her family business and shipping pals. When I pointed this out to them they stuck to their simple approach of what causes inflation and put it all on Biden’s back. I called them out as being too simplistic.
Strangely enough, the redder of the two was prepared to agree that his thinking was simple and that he liked it that way. I have long suspected that Republicans are people who keep it simple and simple is generally very profitable in business. It doesn’t do much to improve the world or prepare for the future, but it sure works well for the here and now. And that, my friends, is my theory. Red equals keep it simple and blue prefers to think of others and the future and is therefore far more complex. I see the value in simple, but my complex mind insists that there is more to the equation and that keeping it simple will end badly for the world. I find it simply irresistible to be complex.