Other Things – Page 5 – Looking to God

The Shed

Posted on May 22, 2015May 9, 2017 by Jack Flacco

The other weekend I was tearing down the shed in our backyard and realized along with the sweat, sore muscles and tender hands gained, I was also learning a few lessons along the way. As part of my Freedom Friday series, this is what I’ve learned.

Tearing down a shed sounds like an easy task to accomplish. The instructions couldn’t be simpler:

1) Take hammer
2) Pull hammer back
3) Apply great force to hammer
4) Hit surface of shed where applicable
5) Repeat 1-5 until shed fully broken into pieces.

Simple. Right? Not so much.

First, the shed’s composition consisted entirely of wood, reinforced with four-inch planks, fastened together by two-inch nails that in case of a meteor assault the roof would not cave in. Second, I needed more than a hammer to take the beast down. I needed a Bobcat utility vehicle. Since I didn’t have one of those I settle on a three-foot crowbar complete with a hook that would withstand a massive beating from my hands. Last, this was not a weekend activity. I ended up taking half of it down on the weekend, leaving the rest for the week ahead.

As I was working, my brain wandered on silly things. The shed I once admired for many years had fallen apart. It deserved a final resting place before replacing it with a newer and shinier version. Similarly, there are things in my life I’ve had to remove in order to push forward. That meant replacing the bad with the good. Habits are like that. I wrote about toxic perfectionism a year ago. I had to tear apart my inner being as a means to throw away that which was causing me the greatest stress. Eventually, that old part is now gone, tossed in the dumpster. And like the shed, where I can still see bits and pieces of it littering the spot where it once stood majestically, the old self, the one wanting things in a perfect, organized box, appears every so often to remind me of the way I had once viewed life—through the doors of a rotting shed.

I also learned that with much banging of a crowbar on an immovable object, the energy I had expended needed replenishing. Drinking water. Sitting in the shade. Wiping the sweat from my brow. They all contributed to that replenishment. Again, as it is in life, I’ve had to take time away from the day-to-day grind in order to replenish my soul. Every Saturday, I disappear from Social Media and spend time with the family doing real things such as enjoying a special meal together or visiting with family and friends. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, this web site can all wait until I return online on Sunday. Saturday is mine to rest and do what I want. If I didn’t do that, then like tearing apart the shed, not taking a water break or rest in the shade, I’d collapse with a guaranteed stroke. I don’t know about anyone else, but I’d like to think I have a lot more to accomplish than make my final resting place six feet under way before my time.

My final lesson I had learned that weekend is to be patient and never give up. No matter what. Slugging the crap out of a shed wall took every ounce of energy I could muster. At times, I wanted to toss the crowbar and forget about the whole thing. I stuck to it. Every hit was one hit closer to success. Every drop of sweat was one more fraction of determination spent. I would not let failure overcome my ambition to slay the beast and win the battle.

The shed died a slow death, but I learned so much from the experience. I’m sure once I raise the new shed I will also have learned something interesting about life I never knew before.

Isn’t life an amazing thing?

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Have you had something you were doing from which you learned a lesson? What is it about life you find the most fascinating of all?

The Human Brain

Posted on April 24, 2015May 9, 2017 by Jack Flacco

My wife recently introduced me to a series of CDs by Dr. Caroline Leaf, a cognitive neuroscientist with a PhD in Communication Pathology specializing in Neuropsychology. In the series, she talks about the development of the human brain. My wife and I had an hour to kill in the car on our way for a weekend jaunt, so she thought I might enjoy listening to it. Boy, was she right.

I’m taking a moment for my Freedom Friday series to talk a bit about the human brain. By no means will I pretend to know everything about the human brain—but I’ll mention what I’ve learned.

What interested me was the idea of learning. How does the brain learn? Is there a physical change in the brain when someone decides they want to learn a subject? Or does that knowledge somehow get there because some people are smarter than others?

The brain has two hemispheres, right and left. Both hemispheres work together. Past science once suggested the two hemispheres worked independently—the left dedicated to logic (eg. science, mathematics, etc.) and the right dedicated to creativity (eg. music, art, literature, etc.) . Science has now discovered the brain works as a complete unit with both hemispheres working together. They’ve also discovered an interesting interaction that takes place between the two hemispheres they didn’t understand before.

The right hemisphere processes information from detail to big picture. The left hemisphere processes information from big picture to detail. The brain works best when the information it needs to process has a logic to it. If the information lacks organization, the brain goes into a default mode and shuts down not accepting new information. The only way I can describe this default mode is a person becomes unresponsive to the knowledge and would rather be out surfing with Beach Boys music playing in the background.

The brain also contains what’s called dendrites. Dendrites makes it possible for the brain to remember. Healthy dendrites have an actual physical appearance in the brain that is stalky, thick and branch-like. If you’ve ever seen a head of broccoli, that is what the human brain looks like underneath. Obviously the color of the brain wouldn’t be green, otherwise it would be a) weird, b) make us zombies. The thicker the dendrite, the more powerful a memory.

Short dendrites are known as floppy cells. Floppy cells occur when the brain absorbs a piece of information but then discards it. We all know the condition as short term memory. When the brain needs to remember five minutes’s worth of info, it creates floppy cells.

You must be wondering, what happens to the floppy cells when we don’t need them anymore? Good question. This is where sleep becomes comes to the rescue. When a person sleeps, the brain cleans away the floppy cells and stores them in an inaccessible part of the brain. The storage capacity of the brain is about 300 million years. I’d place a winning bet that we have enough capacity in that noggin of ours to store five minutes worth of garbage in there, don’t you think?

All right, having said that, what is the result of this brief discourse regarding the human brain?

When a student is in the process of learning a new subject, there’s an actual physical change in the brain that takes place in order to retain the new knowledge. As the student learns, dendrites grow thick. Anything not needed, the brain cleans away during sleep. As the student continues to learn, the student becomes smarter. The physical changes in the brain allow that to happen. Barring disease, the brain is the only organ that continues to grow in spite of getting older.

In other words, don’t let anyone say to you that you’re too old to learn. You’re never too old to learn.

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Have you ever studied into the human brain? If so, what do you like about it?

Freedom Friday, Other Things

My Mentor

Posted on April 17, 2015May 9, 2017 by Jack Flacco

Well over thirty years ago, I sat in my high school music class pondering the meaning of why I was there. I had my whole life ahead of me and didn’t know better. I didn’t know better because prior to that, I’d gotten into heaps of trouble with the schools I had attended but not enough to constitute a criminal record. Thank goodness. Had I not smartened up, I’m sure I would have ended up on the street somewhere doing who knows what.

I had help. My high school music teacher was one of my mentors throughout the length of my stay there at the insane asylum. He was a bulk of a man, tree stumps for arms and a thick neck. He also was Romanian. Not that it mattered to other students, but it mattered to me, considering I had a huge crush on gymnast Nadia Comaneci at the time, and he came from the same area of Romania she did. So naturally, I gravitated toward his instruction and put him on a pedestal.

His name doesn’t matter either. Suffice it to know he influenced me in ways that even today bewilders me. “Hey, so-and-so used to say that,” I would say to myself whenever I’d do something he would have approved.

His approach to life was a simple one—be the best you can be without being a goof about it. His words. If you expected something dramatic, that’s as dramatic as it got. His intention was to instill courage into every student, and never to be afraid of making a difference in the world.

Before becoming a teacher, he escaped communism from which he experienced firsthand the persecution of his family by those less intelligent than he. When he immigrated to Canada, his goal was to live a peaceable life. Eventually, his reputation as a perfectionist in the field of music preceded him and my future high school offered him a position as a teacher.

Students like me flocked to his classes simply from word of mouth. They were not easy classes to get into, and they were not what anyone expected. His philosophy of marrying music with life lessons made him the most popular teacher in the school. The courses were worth an extra half credit for those lucky enough to have him accept their entrance application.

From the onset of taking one of his classes, he made it plain that students who did not give one hundred percent of their attitude toward the class would not pass. To him, skill wasn’t what mattered. It was attitude. He used to say

“You can teach an ape to do anything, but it is very difficult to teach attitude to a human.”

Many kids came and went through his doors. Those with problems, he personally helped with encouraging words. I landed on the student council believing I was capable of more than what I had shown him.

After graduating high school, I visited my music teacher several times to see how he was doing. He was his cranky old self, teasing his students to sit up straight, and pay attention while I distracted him with simple stories of my effort with living a peaceable life.

Eventually though, we lost touch. However, by that time, I didn’t consider him a mentor anymore but a friend.

I miss my friend.

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RANGER MARTIN AND THE ALIEN INVASION, on sale now.

Have you had a mentor in life? What ever became of them? What do you think of the mentoring others for their betterment?

Freedom Friday, Other Things

The Library

Posted on April 10, 2015May 9, 2017 by Jack Flacco

To me, the library has always been a special place to visit. In grade school, every teacher I’ve known would bring me, along with the rest of my friends, into the magical world of books where I would lose myself for hours at a time. While the rest of my class enjoyed recess outside, I took to the books, drowning my imagination in their stories.

For Freedom Friday, allow me a few minutes of your time to tell you what I love about the library and why I think everyone should take the time to enjoy this great resource of knowledge and wonder.

As a teen, I had my first job working at the city library. They hired me as a page. I never really knew what the title meant, but it wasn’t until I got older that someone told me a page is a gofer. Go for the books. Go for the librarian. Well, you get the picture. I spent most of my time putting books away. I wouldn’t trade the experience for anything.

Late one fall evening, as I sat in my usual spot near the window sorting my books, the rain began. I stopped my sorting and just sat there watching. The traffic lights made a reflection on the street as they changed from green to yellow to red. People scattered to the nearest store searching for shelter. I sat on the ledge of a carpeted bay window. I remember how peaceful it was to look at the water coming down in the middle of the street.

When my wife and I had our first child, it was an incredible period. All of a sudden, we were parents, but at the same time, we became kids again. We filled our home with toys, books and baby clothes. We’d take family trips to the zoo, the movies and our nearest park. What I remember the most though, is the trips to the library. I don’t know who enjoyed it more, my child or me.

The biggest kick I got from the experience was watching my child’s face as it lit up with joy after having found the most perfect book. It brought me back to when I first graced the aisles of my school library to discover the book Where the Wild Things Are.

Now that my kids are older, I visit the library on occasion. I still get that wonderful feeling in the pit of my stomach knowing it’s an extended home to me. My interests may have changed, but I’m ever willing to explore the catacombs where fantasy and reality meet.

The library is my refuge. It’s where I belong.

RANGER MARTIN AND THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE, on sale now.
RANGER MARTIN AND THE ALIEN INVASION, on sale now.

Have you been to your local library recently? What do you like about it?

Freedom Friday, Other Things

Life Is…

Posted on April 3, 2015May 9, 2017 by Jack Flacco

There are days when things don’t make sense. Like when you walk across the street and a cop stops you for jaywalking—not that it’s happened to me. Or when you step outside and it begins to rain. Or when you’ve just missed your bus by a fraction of a second and all you can see are the vehicle’s taillights trailing into the distance. Or when the movie you’ve wanted to see all spring is sold out. Or when the waiter brings you a dish you thought you hadn’t ordered and realize it is the dish you ordered. It was the wrong choice after all. Yeah, some days things don’t make sense.

This is my Freedom Friday article about—well, you’ll just have to find out.

But then there are those days you want to hold on to until the end of time. Like when you order a Greek salad and the waitress adds extra olives to the dish. Or when you’re driving and every intersection you pass there’s a green light. Or when you buy that item you’ve always wanted, and find at checkout that you’ll be saving an extra twenty percent because you came into the store at the most perfect time. Or when you find the last sale item on the shelf and wonder if life could be any more amazing. Or when someone holds the door for you, and you know it has made all the difference in the world that morning when you’d lost total faith in humanity.

Yes, we all have those days. Bad or good, they are our days. No one can take them away from us and no one can say they can relate either. Your days are your own, even if it’s happened countless times to others.

Isn’t that the purpose of life, though? To hold on to the things that no one else has experienced in order for one day to show others we can provide some wisdom worthy of learning? Of course, it’s never that simple. Every moment of every day sets the bar higher and we’re still holding our breath trying to stay ahead of it all.

Yet, regardless of how the day goes, there’s always that single instance when you feel the world and all the forces of the universe have collapsed within themselves as a means to connect with you to show there is something as perfect as hope. And it’s that hope that carries everyone forward to a better life filled with wonder.

Now, it may sound strange and in some respect seem all random. But there is a logic to this illogical existence we call life.

It’s just a matter of finding out what that logic is.

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RANGER MARTIN AND THE ALIEN INVASION, on sale now.

Have you had anything good happen to you lately? What makes it so special?

Freedom Friday, Other Things

My Childhood

Posted on March 27, 2015May 9, 2017 by Jack Flacco

When I was twelve, I looked forward to Friday nights. I lived in Toronto’s Little Italy where our neighborhood featured markets, shops and cafés specializing in Italian goods and cuisine. Our neighborhood also had a theater featuring movies shipped directly from the old country. It was there my dad would take me every Friday night to enjoy some one on one time away from the family. I believe it is also there my fondness for films emerged.

For today’s Freedom Friday, allow me the liberty to tell you about this part of my life.

Before the age of ten, I grew up in some of the roughest neighborhoods in the city. The school I went to was once voted the worst school in all of Toronto by a group of concerned citizens. My family eventually moved out of there and took up residence in Little Italy. It was a great place to live, school nearby, lots of places to play, and I had plenty of friends.

My dad made it a habit to build traditions in our family as a means to bond us to certain times of the year. Saturday nights were big at our house. It was Hockey Night in Canada night and should there have been a game between the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Montreal Canadiens, God forbid, it would have been the most epic night of the week.

The other big night was Friday night. My favorite. My mom would make something quick for us to eat—typically a soup, a plate of sandwich meats and bread, or simply a bowl of pasta—so that we could leave as soon as we finished eating. The theater was down the street from us and it took about fifteen minutes to walk there.

My mom always made sure I brought a sweater; even if it was during the hot summer months. She always said it would get cold in the theater. She was right. I still remember that to this day where I sometimes bring a sweater with me to the theater—yes, even in the sweltering months of summer.

I loved the walk there with my dad. We talked about silly things a nosey kid like me liked talking about. A thing like where we would sit when we got there was a hot topic. I wanted to sit to the side and he wanted to sit in the middle. So imagine where we sat. Nowadays, I love the middle. It’s the best seat in the theater.

Once we arrived, we’d check the movie posters. If any of them were a spaghetti western, I’d be jumping on the spot with excitement. It wasn’t hard for him to figure out which one we’d see.

From there, the other events are a blur. I remember the popcorn he’d buy me, the seats we sat in and the waiting in anticipation. Sometimes the theater would have a cartoon showing before the movie, which made the evening even more exciting.

After the film, and having found our way outside, the fresh air that hit my face was incredible. I can never forget the sensation of walking back home with gunslingers on my mind. My dad always got a kick from seeing me excited talking about the best parts of the film. How can I forget such a memorable evening?

I suppose I should have given this article a title like, “My Dad,” or “Movie Night,” but in actuality, calling it anything else other than “My Childhood” wouldn’t have made sense to me. Although it’s a snippet in time, I think you get a good idea of what my early life was like reading this.

I was an ordinary kid with my whole life ahead of me. Isn’t that the way childhood should be?

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RANGER MARTIN AND THE ALIEN INVASION, on sale now.

Do you have fond memories of your childhood you’d like to share?

Freedom Friday, Other Things

Zombies and My Beliefs

Posted on March 13, 2015May 9, 2017 by Jack Flacco

My wife recently received an appointment as Children’s Ministry Coordinator for our church. Her enthusiasm for the scriptures has given her an opportunity to serve in a way she didn’t expect. She’s currently aiding with the program’s Sunday curriculum and presentations. I have to say, I’m extremely proud of all that she’s accomplished in the short time she has served in the kid’s ministry.

With that on my mind, I’ll make today’s Freedom Friday post a short one. I’d like to talk about my beliefs and how I reconcile the fact that I write about zombies.

Before I go on, let me get something out of the way first. I’m writing this post with the intention of not offending anyone. I’m sure I will, but I don’t mean to. I suppose, in the grand scheme of things, I shouldn’t say whatever’s on my mind. But because you’re my fans, I’d like to provide an added dimension to who I am–not only as a writer, but as a person.

Right. Moving along.

I get this question a lot. When I say a lot, I mean über-times. The question I receive is this: How can I write about zombies if I believe in a higher power? More specifically–how can I write about horror if I believe in God?

My answer is always the same. I write about sin. Rather, I write about the effects of sin in a godless society. This is where you as the reader either stop reading, or continue reading with the goal of trying to understand what I just said. I’m sure whatever you decide to do, I will know by the response I receive at the end of this post.

I write about zombies as a type of sin that has spread throughout society. Given sin is the breaking of God’s law, lawlessness left unchecked will produce a society where sin corrupts and kills the good. Similarly, zombies as typified sin, spread their corruption, in this case their undead state, to others by means of close contact. Without salvation, all of humanity will die. Hence, the only thing to redeem humanity from sin is the shedding of blood.

My definition of a zombie apocalypse is not about how gory the story can become, but about good versus evil. In other words, how far has sin progressed in the story that the hero–the savior–can appear and redeem the remaining few who have chosen not to allow sin to enter into their lives?

To me, zombies also represent people dead in sin. I’m talking about those folks who roam about shackled to a life of bitter slavery. They have no concept of an existence beyond themselves, and their idea of living is waking up every morning to continue a life better left unchallenged. Eventually, zombies will rot until there’s nothing left and sin will have prevailed over their souls.

Do you see now how I don’t feel guilty writing about zombies?

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RANGER MARTIN AND THE ALIEN INVASION, on sale now.

If you’re a writer, do you allow your belief system to inspire you? If so, how far do you allow it to take you?

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