two hearts that beat as one...rip

Richard and Elizabeth

It's true that the life of one can best be deciphered with the dark days of another.  A man truly dreams to find a place in the corner of a room to find a reason why?  While a woman finds the center of the room to be the universe of the man who quietly watches her serenade his heart.  In Richard we found Shakesperean tragedy while in Elizabeth we found comedy.  The great truth to this love was what was lost.  This hurt will hurt no more never more apparent in two people.  A spirit that builds and grows like ivy on the chapel walls of a heart.
If this is my sonnet to life then let it be deciphered for the absence of drink.  For his drunkard life can unly grow in the womb of his soul.  Such a thing called dreaming and hope in that clouds full of rain will wash away the dirt from these scars.  When Richard pledged his love it was indeed eternal and yet mortal.  Therefore when Elizabeth pledged her eternal love it was mortal.  Two souls...one great love.  A story to remain untold and never to truly be understood unless one could survive such a comedy of tragic proportions.
Shakespear only wished he could have written this act in the everlasting life of love.

Dear old age look what you have done to us...

Today I looked in the mirror and became acutely aware of the shadows that overwhelm the passing of time.  It is now official, I have become one of them!  It was only yesterday that I would sit and point at the 27 year olds and think to myself, “wow they are so ancient.”   Arguments with Mom and Dad about them not understanding kids now a days.  The music that would blister my ear drums in disgust has now become my swan song for meditation.

What a travesty that for the rest of my life kids will look at me with a disdain and they will either appreciate the authentic nature of my existence or offer me a Senior Citizen Discount.  Okay, I can lie and tell everyone that since my life exist because of wine then surely that is my being.  It only gets better with time.  Of course, that’s it, I only get better with time.  Mirror, mirror on that magical wall what have you done with all of these years?  What are these white follicles coming out of my head?

Walking through my son’s school it was interesting to see those children looking and staring at me as some sort of prized possession.  “I bet you he was born 100 years ago.”  “What gives with the hair?”  The sick sense of being disrobed with eyes that only a vulture could snatch from the sky.  My time had arrived, I am now my father.  Someone please buy me a drink!

I look at my wardrobe and smile at the antiquated nature of it and please understand that I use this word because there is no shame to hide the fact that I still own a 1991 Van Halen T-Shirt.  Michael J Fox will always be Michael Keaton and the Facts of Life girls will never be hot.  However Heather Thomas will never be confused with Heather Locklear, and we all know Who shot JR!

So what does one contemplate now?  Walking into a bar the girls don’t look at me with a sense of awe, instead they ask me for the name of my daughter so they can go get her from the bathroom.  There was a time where the ‘witching hour’ was king, and the come on line was simple and sweet.  Now the simple appreciation of a beautiful women, can get me arrested for indecency.

Yes, Father time is here and instead of contemplating down town, I wonder, quietly albeit, if the Bingo Parlor is happening.  At least the jokes of this generation will be something along the line, “Who is Bruce Springsteen?  Or who would name a band Ratt?  What is a Motley Crue?”  These the songs that guided my path to rebellion are now being played sans vocals as the dreaded elevator music.  

Life does have a sense of humor though, each generation trying in vain to leave a mark on the next one.  In this lifetime, Nickelback will be Van Halen and its excess, Jett will attempt to be school boys in shorts thinking its all about a power source.  While there will never be another U2, who will replace Depeche Mode?  Rather who will aspire to be great?  

Maybe we will look at Little Wayne and think he is Lionel Ritche?  Nah!  As I get older, please offer me the Senior Citizen Discount but the youth that we will so depend on remember one thing, been there and done that.  The knowledge and wisdom I leave behind for you to learn, is Jose Cuervo does not apologize to anyone!  

In closing, to you my friends that find yourself looking at the miles of time that accentuate your beauty.  Our time is now, we can relish the fact that tomorrow our children will have to learn the valuable lesson of life.  We can give them wisdom and we can steer them but they will never know what it was like to Party like its 1999.

All things being equal. Can I have a do over?

Let the journey to the center of my mind begin.  Wait?  Over before its begun.  There was something wrong with any attempt at finding a solution to this drinking issues of the soul.  Okay, seriously is life fair or do we adjust the rules to accommodate the failures with in us?  Answer that one for yourselves.  Here is my answer, “if you need to back up 15 yards and punt, why not?”  

Do overs are essential.  If we don’t give ourselves a moment of understanding then you have answered the question as to why we drink?  Who judges us most?  God?  Lets leave that one alone.  He and I have an understanding.  If there is one drink left in the bottle and there are two of you, do you split it or do you pour the other person a drink?  Life isn’t fair sometimes, however we have an ability to make things, just a bit more complicated than we should.

 Was thinking the other day, does the Rio Grande River flow into the Ocean or does the Ocean bleed into the river?  Its a simple question but a complex one that can be deciphered by a handful of geniuses with a handful of different opinions.  Is Jack Daniel’s better than Jim Beam?  The beholder of the glass will tell you that the one that comes from the country of Freelandia is probably the better drink.

We trivialize life and yet expect perfection in a bottle.  Hmm that is food for thought.  Where do my flaws accentuate the seconds of the day, or do I just move the hands of time back to accommodate the failures?  Are we all just that evasive that we refuse to put our hands on a simple truth of fact?

Here is a truth, I drink!  Why?  Not sure just yet trying hard to find a reason but then in the quiet moments of my sanity do I really want to know why I drink?  Who wants to know why they drink?  By a show of hands raise them up to the sky in a V and just to tell the man upstairs that you will gladly toast his life.  However if you don’t get a double realize that the man downstairs screams a little bit more than usual.

I always laugh when people drink themselves to oblivion.  What is the point?  Instead why not enjoy yourselves and the company of life?  Its easier said than done.  My jokes about toasting to the rituals of someone’s anguish are far better served in the desolate thoughts of time.  The funniest toast I ever made went something like this, “Here is to the guy down the street who thought it was a great idea to scream at the sky alone.”  No one got it!

If the marquee reads like a novel then why are we dissatisfied with the ticket price?  I would gladly sit in a park in this sweltering heat and listen to the sweet sound of birds singing intimately to each other.  Like a deer caught in headlights these sounds scream to my heart.  They don’t make me wallow in pain, instead they make me realize that in life we have do overs.  What we do with them determines the moments of time that we will cherish.

Okay every time I write a soliloquy most of you sit there reading this asking a simple question, “what are you drinking Rick?”  Tonight, San Pellegrino Limonata.  No alcohol.  A simple lemon flavored San Pellegrino or flavored water.  We don’t always need the sauce. 

So I raise my glass of S. Pellegrino Limonata and toast the simplicity of life that we forget about.  The river does run through our hearts.  Absolutely we buy the novel and expect to only pay half the price.  Its why we always leave the theater saying, “the book was much better.”  

Read this and write your master piece of time and thought.  Be fair and all things being equal you will wake up in the morning a little hungover with life.  Salut!

Who are you and what do you stand for?

Its so easy to confuse what we see in the mirror.  We wake up, take a shower, and stare at the mirror and wonder what happened to yesterday?  Of course these thoughts are from a man in serious denial of his lost youth.  Take for instance this morning, after several cups of coffee and a good cigar it came to me that my morning had still not begun to take shape.  

Some friends joke about trying to get a hold of me, “Tried calling you.  Do you know that your voice mail is full?”  Heck, I called myself and sent myself to voicemail.  My jaded sense of thought tells me quietly that if after a year my voice mail is full, don’t you think you should try texting, or email, or even swinging by to see me.  Yes, we all feel that OUR day is much more important than yours.  Always ME before you.

Who opens a door for a lady?  Do people even wait to eat until everyone is served anymore?  What happened to being polite or having manners?  I call it accessories.  We have all accesorized our lives with all of these neat little things, cell phones have become our own personal secretaries.  With my I-phone I can rule the world.  Hey, if Obama as President of the United States can rule from his personal Blackberry what is there to prevent me from using mine as my PA.

Times have changed, when was the last time you wrote a letter to someone that was not an email?  Here is my letter to life.

Dear Life,

In times like these I begin to wonder where it has all gone to?  Do I exist

purely to satisfy the humor in all of us?  Today the wind blows and the air

outside whispers that tomorrow will be a new day.  The slight chill that reeks 

is of an impending cold front where the temperature will drop from a comfortable

90 degrees to 80 degrees, or as I like to refer to it, ‘here come the lettermen jackets.”

I hide in my cage as my staff loves to call my office and I stare at the volumes of 

alcohol that surround it and ask myself, why?  What is this quest that we are 

after?  What truly makes us happy?  Why do we have to drink to be free to express

what is in our soul?  

A man once said that all he wants is a supermodel looking wife with the brains of Einstein and the nurturing side of his mother.  What he got was two ex-wives, child support payments, and he is still looking for that perfection.  As a man i wonder what women think?  Maybe they really want the tall, dark, and handsome lad.  For the record, I’m out!

I think in a nut shell we all search for the unknown.  We laugh at misery yet we scream when it is ours.  However, let me have a Goose and tonic and lets see where this journey goes.  You know, life, make that a Double Goose and tonic!

In closing, life, if you can wear a matching burgundy lacy bra and lacy panty set, I’m good.  That will do it for me.  If you can scratch my back when it itches.  That’s also a good thing.  And by all means if you can make us a single barrel jack on the rocks with a twist of lemon...its all good.

Always one drink a way from insanity

rick ramos

As always guys and girls, these are thoughts meant to offend everyone.  They serve no purpose other than for us to laugh at everything that is right and wrong with us.  If you feel above this quiet antidote to life, then you my friend are much better off than I am.  

Salut! 

Simple but elegant...

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