Brian Mayer

You ever wake up one morning and just feel like you have nothing to do?

You may feel completely drained. Maybe there’s a lot you could be doing but it’s boring stuff you don’t need to be doing. Or maybe there’s stuff that you should be doing but you don’t feel like it.

This can often happen on a weekend, but sometimes it happens smack in the middle of a work week. And you drag yourself out of bed anyway, and go to work, and the malaise stays with you all day. Even when you check your email and there are 10,000 things to address: you just can’t bring yourself to do anything.

It is on days like this that you may feel like what’s the point. And it is on days like this that you have to get out of this mindset. Because if you’re not accomplishing something each day, even if it’s small, you will feel even worse. And that can lead to a viscous cycle. This is why Admiral William H. McRaven tells people how important it is to make your bed each day.

Get up. Snap out of it. Make your bed. And then do the smallest thing on your list. You’ll be grateful for yourself that you did.

I remember the first time I saw Notre Dame. I was only 13 visiting Paris for the first time with my dad. I remember looking at this famous building and thinking how small it looked. It’s no taller than your standard East Side tenement. And you forget that because of how large it looms in the collective imagination.

There are few symbols of Western culture that are as universally understood as Notre Dame. The gothic jewel of Paris, one of the most important cities in the world and one of its historical and cultural and gastronomical centers of gravity, as a building that has withstood centuries of religious reformation and revolution and world wars and terrorist threats, Notre Dame is a steadfast reminder of the things we too often forget about today’s world: how far we’ve come. It stands as a tribute to those who have suffered before us and now, after it continues to smolder in embers, it stands as a symbol to our resilience.

Cultural symbols mean something because they are bigger than all of us. We individual humans will grow old and die, and we’ll change our hair styles, and our religions, and shockingly, I know, even our politics. But culture incorporates all of us, and though it changes too as we change, it remains steadfast and rooted in longer standing meaning that we can share. As our culture evolves, especially as the world becomes more interconnected as ever before, it’s important that we are reminded of these common threads of heritage.

Though today’s conflagration was tragic, the rebirth of Notre Dame will reaffirm our global commitment to these timeless cultural values.

The return of Game of Thrones after a two-year absence got off to a slow start, with a procession by Jon Snow and Daenerys Targaryen back to Winterfell reminiscent of when we met Robert Baratheon back in Season 1. By the end, we were on the edge of our seats as Brandon Stark stares down Jaime Lannister in the square.

I, for one, was just happy that the show was finally back on the air. It’s one of the few things in life that gives me great joy.

I wish these characters good fortune in the wars to come.

I’m finishing taxes this weekend. Allow me to go on one of my fun rants.

I get the need for taxes. I do. But what in the hell is the use of capital gains tax?

This is my money. I already got taxed on it when I earned it. Now, I’m investing it. That’s something my government should want me to do. But when I sell the investment, if I’ve made money, I have to pay a tax on it.

Why? It’s hard enough to invest and be profitable doing it. It’s basically gambling anyway. If I’m lucky enough to have beaten the market on something, why am I being penalized for it?

This has to hurt investment because it increases the cost of investing. It also disincentives selling assets which means capital isn’t being allocated to where it would get the most efficient return: it’s being stored inefficiently for longer than it should be.

So, not only does it make me personally angry to be paying a tax on investment profits, it would seem to be bad for the economy as well.

So is it a policy? I’m listening.

I’ve never had a morning routine. I always considered them boring and, well, routine.

I also always was too lazy to have one. That sounds harsh but it’s true. Getting up at the same time every morning means discipline and self control. Making breakfast, going to the gym, reading the news—these are things that lame suburbanites with 2.5 kids do. I was cooler than that. I had the luxury of being able to do what I wanted when I wanted.

In the past couple weeks I’ve been getting up early and going to the gym almost every day. At first it was a huge chore. Now it’s almost routine.

It’s not that it isn’t hard…it is. But by making a routine out of it, including a breakfast, a shower and (on occasion) a blog post, I can force myself to do the things I never liked doing.

What has been the result? It’s probably too early to tell, but I can say that although I get more tired than I used to in the late afternoons, the extra freedom that evenings now afford me is worth it. These morning routines free up a lot of extra time to go out, meet up with friends, watch TV, write music, or whatever floats my boat, without the anxiety and pressure of all the things I’m supposed to do hanging over my head.

So, I think it’s working, and as long as I can stick with it, maybe I’ll get healthier too. Stranger things have happened.

I was thinking about George Washington today and all of a sudden I realized that the image I had in my head of our first president was not of this guy…

…but of this guy:

I was astounded. Obviously, Hamilton‘s Christopher Jackson is an unmatched performer and his portrayal of Washington is a masterpiece. But the fact that his representation of this historical character had replaced the true original in my own head is a testament to the power of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s storytelling, and the brilliant way that Hamilton tells history through contemporary voices.

For, it’s not just the character that comes through in the show–the honesty, the integrity, the inner strength, and the other leadership qualities that made Washington such an extraordinary man in real life. By creating such a moving and accurate portrayal of our first president in living flesh, in modern vernacular, Miranda forces us to see ourselves in our history, and see Washington as more than an engraving on a dollar bill, but as a complicated and real man tortured by self doubt and fear.

It’s also through this portrayal that Miranda’s choice to cast non-white actors in all the main roles, especially Washington, holds true force. For not only is Washington the quintessential American in character and historical relevance, he also, at the time, represented the quintessential American in race and class (and, unfortunately, slave ownership). By casting a black man as George Washington, Hamilton is not doing what some have claimed and disrespecting American history. It’s doing the opposite: it’s embracing and respecting American history and mythos so much that it seeks to claim this heritage for all Americans, not just white Americans. It’s a testament to the power of storytelling to reshape our own perceptions–to force all Americans to recognize themselves in our founding fathers, even if in actual historical reality they were, well, much less representative.

100 Days. 100 Blog Posts.

I’ll admit, I haven’t been very good about keeping up. I spend some nights where I write 4, 5 posts in a row just to keep on pace.

But, as I discovered at 90, the writing is getting easier. The hard part is carving out 15-30 minutes every day to do it.

I’ve never done it before. Intentionally, that is.

One time, last year, a friend and I got up and started to walk out without paying. It was an honest mistake; we were having a great time and simply forgot we hadn’t paid. And the waiter chased us down and we paid, no problem.

Went to that same restaurant tonight, for the first time since the incident. The same waiter was working there, staring, tracking me the entire time. It was uncomfortable.

I left a monster tip.

Boy, I got my ass handed to me.

It was supposed to be a casual game, and it was. It has been a couple years since I’ve seriously played poker, and I’d have to admit, part of me just wanted some action.

Instead, I walked into a den of snakes.

Some advice for you that I keep having to remind myself over and over again: if you can’t spot the bad player at the poker table, you’re the bad player at the poker table.

It was a strong table through and through–except for me–and I busted out twice. The only consolation is that I know I played badly and I know I can play better. But knowing and delivering are two very different things. As poker is a game of skill, I have to hunker down and re-educate myself before I’ll let myself go back to the table.

At least I was somewhat humbled in what has been an already pretty triumphant week.

There are two types of lies: lies of commission and lies of omission. It stands to reason that there are two types of honesty: expressed honesty and repressed honesty.

My writing has almost always fallen in the former camp. I’m not proud of it. Here we are, my 97th blog post since January 1, and only a handful of times have I let slip what I actually, honestly, believe that I’m too afraid to say out loud.

I haven’t lied once, that I know of. But real truth comes from the darkness: The truths that are too painful or embarrassing or risky to say out loud.

I assume most writing is repressed like this. But I also believe that the best writing isn’t. The best writing is intuitively vulnerable and forces the audience to empathize, if not always agree. And the best writing comes from the hardest thoughts. Best writing comes from the darkness.

I wish I could promise to write more honestly and less repressively; and, maybe, that’s the goal I secretly had in mind when I set out on this one-post-per-day project. But knowing what it would cost me in terms of vulnerability–the kind of scandalous, embarrassing admissions I would have to put on the page–makes me somewhat afraid. OK, very afraid.

It is that fear, more than anything else, that keeps me from becoming the best writer I can be.