Fear Of The Apple People

Part Deux (The original Fear of the Apple People was one of my first blogs on this site about five and a half years ago–maybe I should call this a “reprise” instead).

The fear is not as bad as it used to be, once upon a time, but the fear is still there.

God forbid I look stupid.

I can’t call a help desk.

What if they find out I am an idiot?

What are they going to do, Martines, take away your laptop?

REALLY?

Fear of not knowing what I am doing will stop me in my tracks all the time.

Every time.

But, what I have learned, and I have learned so much since I first became a proud owner of my first, slightly used, refurbished MacBook, is that I may be stopped momentarily with fear, it does not get the best of me.

“Men of faith have courage.”

Courage is walking through fear.

It is not the lack of fear, I’m always going to have fear.

Fear is a part of the human experience, it just is.

However, I have a disease of perception and of over blown fears.

My fears are irrational and unconstituted in fact.

They are baseless, groundless, little mindless animals, voles, shrews, grommets.

I know, a grommet is not an animal.

However, doesn’t that sound like what a little fear animal is–small brown tatty fur, sharp little teeth, scrappy claws, yellowish beady eyes, nocturnal–a grommet.

“Sorry honey, I didn’t mean to snap at you, too many grommets attacking my brain today.”

I have had my new laptop for about a week and I am thrilled.

Thrilled.

The battery last like forever and the receptivity from the key board really does make it feel like I am thinking the words and they are just popping up on the screen.

Lovely.

It’s light, easily a quarter of the weight my old laptop is, that old brick.

But, for what ever reason.

Well, I suspect the not so hot internet connection I have in my little studio by the sea has something to do with it.

The migration of my files on the old laptop to the new MacBook Air took over 24 hours and when it finally happened, something glitchy happened.

The MacBook Air and the old laptop both tell me the same thing–that the files have transferred, but I can’t seem to locate them.

I would like to locate them.

All my music files.

10,000 plus photographs.

Who knew I was so prolific?

Well, you might.

Considering I have been writing this blog on a fair daily basis for the last five years and each blog is on average 1,000 words.

Prolific is not an issue for me.

It has taken me a week, however, to acknowledge that I can’t figure it out.

“Figure it out is not a slogan,” he would say to me brusquely on the phone, and depending on where I was I would burst into tears.

But I want to figure it out!

Damn it man.

God forbid, I repeat, that you find out that I don’t know what I am doing.

I have no clue what I am doing, in case you had any thoughts to the contrary.

I’m following the fault line down the mountain, the path of least resistance, to my heart, to my knees, to my soul.

“If you’re falling down the hill, you’re in God’s will,” she told me at a cafe in Paris, it might have been the Lizard Lounge in the Marais when she first imparted this wisdom upon me.

She then told me about how a snow ball rolling down the mountain takes the path of least resistance, equating it to, if it’s simple it’s the choice, if it’s convoluted and means double back tracking and going around that tree and uprooting that other one, and moving the snow fences, then maybe it’s not meant to be.

I try to figure it out all the time.

Then I remember.

I can’t.

I don’t need to.

And.

Yes.

I can ask for help.

So, I finally got my butt on the Apple site and booked a phone call help session for tomorrow a half hour before my first lady bug of the day flits her way to my doorstep for tea and singleness of purpose.

I can’t imagine it will take more than a half hour to resolve the situation.

If not fifteen minutes.

Probably only five.

That’s the thing.

I often will be given the solution in a nice tidy compact package, but I have to fret for a while.

It’s not as bad as it used to be and I count that as progress.

And bravery.

I am a brave person.

I showed up for a blind date today and I have another tomorrow.

I’m not thrilled to be doing this.

“Geez you sound so excited,” she giggled at me last night when I described going on a date in Golden Gate Park for a picnic on the lawn somewhere.

Yeah.

Not excited.

Not because I didn’t have some rapport with the man, I obviously wouldn’t have accepted the date if there was nothing to talk about.

Which there was nothing to talk about with another guy that tried to contact me today.

Dude.

Did you even read the profile?

And please, I can’t promise I won’t break your heart, no one is responsible for breaking your heart, you break your own heart, so don’t even bother to ask me that.

There are no victims, only volunteers.

I did not volunteer myself to go on a date with said man.

Let some other woman break his heart, I’m too busy breaking my own.

“I’m so over internet dating I told my friend,” my date was running late and I was hungry and boohoo’ing in my coffee.

“Honey, have a snack, I’m sure there’s good reason and he’s making an effort and a MUNI is MUNI, and don’t delete your profile until after you have eaten,” she admonished me.

Yup.

So I’ll be off to try another tomorrow.

Coffee at Java Beach and a walk on said beach, Ocean Beach, with his dog.

I can be afraid of not being enough.

Pretty enough.

Young enough.

Smart enough.

Blah, blah, blah.

Or I can walk through these silly fears too and keep on going.

Every time I take a little leap forward the fear is dispelled a tiny bit and the faith grows larger and larger.

One day this will all be laughable and I won’t worry about calling the help desk and asking them to fax me over a ream of paper and I’ll be ok with looking silly and I’ll keep wearing flowers in my hair and glitter on my face, turning it toward the sun, the blue skies, and the birds flying over head in the park.

“Look, there,” I stopped him, the picnic in the park date, and the story he was telling, “red tail hawk.”

I watched it silently as it circled lazy on the wind and sun, the music of a guitar drifting from the bandshell by the DeYoung, a little boy on roller skates tumble bumbling by, the grass green under my bare feet, I breathed in and closed my eyes to the sun, soaking it up and relishing being exactly who I am in the exact place I am supposed to be.

I think that’s called acceptance.

Face it.

I live in San Francisco.

By the beach.

With a MacBook Air under my fingers, Cat Stevens on my stereo, and nice food in my fridge.

I have nothing to fear.

But yes.

Fear itself.

And even I know that there really is nothing behind that too.

Just another opportunity to grow.

Graceful.

Beautiful.

Loved.

Tags: acceptance, Apple, AppleCare, asking for help, blind dates, courage, fear, girlfriends, golden gate park, growth, HALT, helpdesk, Java Beach Cafe, MacBook, MacBook Air, men, men of faith, Ocean Beach, online dating, perspective, picnic, recovery, red tail hawk, San Francisco, singleness of purpose, suggestions, support