The Luna Park Gazette

“What you resist, persists.”—Carl Jung I was just one stop away from my destination when it hit me. This the last leg of my trip to Wallingford, PA and I should’ve been happy. I had made all my connections, my train was about to pull into the station, and I hadn’t gotten lost, mugged, abducted by aliens or impressed into the British Navy. No, everything had worked out for me and, apparently, that was the problem. My shadow self didn’t have anything to get upset about, so he set about creating misery out of nothing. I suddenly started thinking about how I had wasted so much time in my life, how I caused my parents such anguish by my inability—(refusal?)—to find a career path. It was the usual stuff that often runs through my mind, only this was magnified several thousand times. It seemed to come from absolutely nowhere, but, of course, that isn’t true. Anxiety is a constant companion, only it rarely gets this aggressive—unless I’m an airplane and then I’ve got Xanax. ...

I emerged from the depths of Penn Station and the sounds of the city smacked me square in the mug. I was returning home from a night in the Philadelphia suburbs where I had gone to attend a friend and former co-worker’s birthday party. In addition to having a great time with fabulous people, I also achieved a personal milestone by breaking out of the Netflix comfort zone conundrum. In short, I got up off my ass and did something different. Now I was back in town, weary from the train ride and struck by the contrast with the environment I had left just hours earlier. I had rented a place through Airbnb in this beautiful woodsy area. The apartment was massive—I could move in there tomorrow—and the morning was so lovely and peaceful. So, obviously, the city with all its people, traffic and especially noise, gave me quite a jolt as I stepped out onto Seventh Avenue. But amid the honking horns, blaring music, and the voices of people roaring into the phones like they're co...

“There is a crack, a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.” ---Leonard Cohen, Anthem Kintsugi is a Japanese art for repairing damaged pottery where powdered gold, silver or platinum is applied to the broken areas. The 400-year-old technique, also known kintsukuroi, or “golden repair,” treats breakage and repair as part an object's history, rather than something to disguise. Psychologists have applied the concept of kintsugi as a way of viewing emotional injuries so we that accept and embrace our problems and imperfections rather than try to hide them. I’d heard about kintsugi years ago, but I googled it yesterday following a weird and ultimately wonderful dream I had that kicked off with me brawling with a total stranger and ended up with me meeting the love of my life. This mental midnight double feature occurred earlier in the week, and it started with a bang. For reasons that I don’t begin to understand, I’m in a small office somewhere kung-fu fightin...

I know this looks weird but hear me out. If you were to walk into my house early on most mornings, you might be a little surprised to see me reclining on the living room floor. And you might be tempted to ask yourself, “hey, what is this stupid bald bastard stretched out in front of the TV like the town drunk when he’s got a perfectly good bed to sleep in?” A fair question, no doubt, and you deserve an answer. While I may look like I’m on an indoor camping trip, I’m actually working doing myself a world of good. I recently discovered a meditation technique called yoga nidra, or yogic sleep, a guided meditation practice aimed at creating a deep state of relaxation between sleep and wakefulness. Unlike most yoga routines, this one doesn’t involve twisting yourself up into a pretzel and getting all bent out of shape. Yoga nidra is typically performed in the corpse pose, or Shavasana, which, on the surface, could easily be mistaken for lying on your ass. But there’s so much mor...

James Lenihan was true to his unhappy country. That expression-- Fidelis patriae infelici —is the Lenihan family motto, one of many facts I learned from my late father, James Lenihan. A veteran of World War II, my dad fought in Europe with a division known as The Timberwolves, and I’ve been doing some research to find out more about his experiences in the army. Last week, I Googled the words “James Lenihan + NYC + World War II” and was delighted when I got a hit from a military history website. I clicked on the link and found James Lenihan, all right, but not the one I was expecting. This was a James Lenihan who was born in County Kerry, Ireland, in 1846 and who had served with the 5th U.S. Cavalry during the “Indian campaigns.” Private James Lenihan had been awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest military decoration, “for gallantry in action on 2 January 1873, while serving with Company K, 5th U.S. Cavalry, in action at Clear Creek, Arizona Territor...

Every high civilization decays by forgetting obvious things. – G.K. Chesteron I saw the American flag on the ground the moment I stepped outside my house on Friday morning. It had apparently fallen from the front door grating where my landlady had put it. Any other day I would’ve immediately picked the flag up and returned to its place on the door. But on this day, I just kept walking. After a majority of American voters gave Donald Trump—a convicted felon--a return ticket to the White House, I’m starting to wonder if people really appreciate the importance of the Stars & Stripes. My father fought for that flag in a little shindig called World War II, which was started by a guy named Adolph Hitler, whom Trump deemed worthy of praise. When I look at the words “E pluribis unum” now all I see now is a meaningless phrase in a dead language. Maybe we should think of changing our national motto to “Hooray for me and fuck you” because that’s the direction we’re heading...