"Ooooo...Owww...Ouch... I hate when I do that...." - Willie

I love my blog titles. They are very often loaded with double meanings. Sometimes they are pretty straight-forward. If there is a double-meaning you can still enjoy the humor or the relation to the actual blog. Other times, they require some explanation. Like this blog's title. I am certain that many of you are wondering who the Hell Willie is and why I am quoting him. How is this quote from some strangely named person germane to one of this writer's amazing blogs? I shall reveal in good time. You will see how the title fits with what I am discussing tonight. I will need to explain who Willie is. He is a character that Billy Crystal used to do on Saturday Night Live. Am I dating myself by talking about Billy Crystal on Saturday Night Live? Oh well, screw it. This is not about Willie. It's about Billy. You still with me? I love Billy Crystal. I always have. He is great. The best thing about him in everything he does is his delivery. Certain lines. The way they are said. He has an everyman quality that you can just relate to. In the movie "When Harry Met Sally" he delivered a line that has stuck with me over the years. He was talking about something his ex-wife said. When he was describing what she said he said that it had one of those "cartoon balloons" around the words. Making the words just hang there. Giving them a physical presence. So, my point is, has this ever happened to you? Ever said something that you could almost see the words above you in a "cartoon balloon?" Now, have those words ever been so bad that you wanted nothing more than to take them back? You wanted to just reach up and tear the words up into a million tiny pieces. I have. Very recently. I said something that I wish a cartoon balloon was attached to. Something that I wanted to rip up and act like I never said. No cartoon bubble, though. See where I am going with this? See how the title fits? I knew you would. It was one of those moments that wished that there was a big remote control in the sky that would allow me to hit the rewind button. Well, I am pretty sure there is a remote control like that. Think about it. When someone is born, that means the Big Guy pressed play. When someone dies, He pressed stop. When someone does cocaine, he pressed fast forward. Well, not just then. The FF button is also for when we try to do too much in not enough time. I have essentially seen these three buttons at work. Rewind is a little tougher. We try to rewind all of the time. We recreate scenes. We re-live the past. We try to remember the way things were. This is not the rewind button at work though. I believe, no, I hope the rewind button works in a different way. I hope that if you and the person you said the thing that you wish you didn't to both reach up and hit that button with the Big Guy, that you can actually rewind and redo that very moment. Thereby, removing the words as though they never happened. I truly believe that you both have to do it at the same time though. If you said something to a bunch of people, you all have to do it together. Either way, it has to be those involved and Him in order for it to be done right. I have my hand on the button. I know He does. I just hope and pray that her hand will be there soon and we can push it and we can start over from that moment. So, what did I say that was so terrible? What could I have said that would make me so desperate to take it back? Yeah, right. I'm gonna tell you.... Y'all know me well enough to know that was coming, right? I will tell you what I am comfortable with sharing, though. What I asked this person to do was like asking a fish to live without water. Like asking a child to live without toys. Like asking Sonny to live without Cher......Wait, scratch that one....He's dead and she never liked him anyway......The first two, though, you wouldn't do, right? I suppose you could. You could take all of a kids toys away and say, "No more," save the occasional free toy in the cereal box or Happy Meal. Would the kid die? Probably not. He/she would adjust. Find a new way to entertain themselves. Kids are resourceful. More importantly, they are resilient. They would be okay. You still wouldn't do it, though. Would you? How about the fish and the water thing? That seems a little more extreme and a little more impossible to do, right? Wrong. If evolution has taught us anything, we now know that all living things can find a way. Life finds a way. Heard of a lungfish? It's a fish that lives in Africa, Asia and Australia. It can burrow down into the ground just before the dry season and go into a catatonic state, encased in mud and live. Live long enough to see the next rainy season. It can do this all through it's life cycle. So, yes there is a fish that can live without water. Just one kind, though. Obviously it's not the best way to live. That's why all other fish need water. It makes life easier for them. The point is, yes, people can change. They can evolve. They can adjust. They can deal. We will always be able to. What I did, though, was ask someone to do that when I had no right to. I asked her to adjust. Evolve. Move on. Deal. I did not want that. I do not want that. I cannot live with that. I will not live with that. I should have never asked. I want to rewind. Join me in praying that it will happen. Join me in hoping that she knows that I need to rewind so that I can say what I really meant. Join me in wishing that the button will work. I hope I have tied the title together with the story enough. I know that Willie was saying, "Ooooo, Ow, Ouch," about when he threw his legs up over his head and shaved the backs of them with a cheese grater and then squatted in a bowl of gin but we are both talking about pain. Serious pain. Pain that we hope will go away.