Kaleidoscope

Looking at a Human Lifetime, just about any human's really but especially that of a celebrity, gives a complex and multifaceted picture of what it means to be homo sapiens. The picture can be beautiful or repugnant; sublime or abysmal; outrageous or banal. Most likely it will be a little of each.

I'm thinking in terms of Dictionary.com's third entry:

1. A series of changing phases or events: a kaleidoscope of illusions.

Each of us is kaleidoscopic in our appearance, depending upon both the view point of an observer and, of course, the phase of life we, the subject, are experiencing. What one sees through the scope is not necessarily a fair representation of the reality of the view'd's existence. It is dependant upon so many variables that tolerance and understanding of the nearly limitless possibilities of individual experience must be at least subconsciously weighed when doing the observing.

When it is a celebrity at the far end of the scope, the picture is colored even more by everything anyone has ever written or otherwise published about the subject on display. Rafael Palmeiro is a case in point.

Last week all of the Sports Talk shows were debating whether this long-time standout hitter was going to be a first ballot Hall of Famer. He's certainly got the numbers: 3000 Hits - 500 Home Runs It's a no-brainer that he's in the Hall.

Or is it...?

Over the weekend it was announced that Raffie had failed a test for steroids. This makes him a doper. A druggie; A cheater and a liar and, because he testified this winter passed to a Congressional Committee that he had categorically never used steroids, he may actually be facing perjury charges.

But did he do it? Are the tests accurate and reliable? Or is this a matter of one of the great ones gettin' slandered by shoddy testing?

His numbers have never been outstanding in any given category for any given season. His have always been solid and near the top of the performance charts year in, year out. Does this fact offer a suggestion either way as to the likelyhood that he used 'roids? I don't think so.

But I look the small view hole at player's career and see alot of variable colors and shifting patterns of brilliance and mechanical solidity. I see a Viagra user and wonder what on earth a healthy, decent lookin' guy with his astronomical income could possibly need with performance enhancing sexual dysfunction drugs and it makes me think: maybe the 'roid tests tell a true story after all. As a baseball fan though, I'm torn between wanting to believe they erred and being fed up with always more examples of the simple idiocy demonstrated by people who should know better.

I don't know whether or not Raffie used the 'roids. I know he tested positive for doing so.

I don't know if I'll ever be able to make sense of the swirling montage of images that make up this man's baseball life. I wish him well and hope he's not the kind of person who will take this situation too hard. He'll most likely have his plaque in Cooperstonw; eventually. I'd say the first ballot debate is now a null issue.

The swirling mass of shapes and colours that form this one person's life reminds me to pay attention my own though. My values are what I practice and they form the image kaleidoscope that other people see when they look my way. This blog is only part of those shifting images, but I try to make it an honest reflection of who I really am so that I can receive feed back (in lieu of drug testing?) as to how to how I'm really living my life.