Lamentations of a middleman

"Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right, here I am....." with all due reference to Gerry Rafferty and Stealers Wheel: I feel like I am stuck in the middle........again. Maybe it is because I was born a middle child. Well, I wasn't really born a middle child. I was born a baby; the baby in my family......the youngest. I hated being "the baby of the family". This lasted until I was thankfully given a younger brother when I was 8. So at first, I loved being in the middle. I most certainly wasn't the "baby" anymore (at 8 years old this is important for a boy). I soon learned however, that being in the middle wasn't all it's cracked up to be.

I worshiped my older brother. He is only two years older (and wiser) than me, but he has always been a larger than life, monster of a guy in my eyes. He knew everything I didn't and he knew how to manipulate the world around him to exist. He was god and I was his minion, shadow and best friend. Then one of his peer group would come around and my status instantly dropped to "tagalong" & "little butthole". Mom was always a great solace during these times of utter rejection. I didn't understand what horrible thing made me lose my older brother's love, but Mom could always distract me by saying something like "let's bake a bunch of brownies" or "come help me plant some these flowers". Thus I learned to love cooking, digging in the dirt and the wonderful power of the smile. You never get over rejection, you just learn to deal with it as part of life (humans' ability to choose,,,,,,,,another subject for another day) and go on until it rears it's ugly head again.

So Mom was always there to prop me up when life dealt me a blow. Then the new baby came along and I became the middle child. Seemingly this was great. Now I had someone to look up to me. It soon became apparent that because my younger brother was so much younger then me he needed and got the majority of Mom and Dad's attention. I understood. I had to learn self-reliance. I learned how to see and understand things from both sides and decide which way was the path of least resistance. This is both a blessing and a curse.

Where is the worse place to be in any conflict? The guy getting pummeled? No,,,,,the guy who has to step in and stop the guy whose animal instincts smell a kill. When you are in the middle you become the defacto peace maker who tends to fight for survival of the underdog. This puts you at risk for being pummeled too. To survive in the middle you understand that discretion is the better part of valor because that is all you believe you have, and it very often works.

Being in the middle means you come across as being non-committal. I do commit: just after much analysis. So am I a Democrat? Oh heck no! Idealist ideas I might have but I do keep an eye on what is,,,,,I call it reality. And unlike Will Rogers I really need organization in my life. So a Republican? I am too kindhearted and trusting. Also, I believe in looking real hard at this thing reality: shit flows downhill and the those with money have the power and the golden toilet seats at the top. There must be reason a gold toilet seat is cold. So I get pegged as being "moderate". Not really true. I have strong feelings about many things. I am not a fence sitter. Whatever the subject I stand on one side or the other. I just can usually understand why the other side feels the way they do. I like to claim that I am either the most liberal conservative in the world or the most conservative liberal in the world. I just very much hope that I am open minded.

I'm not sure whether I like being in the middle or not. It has served me pretty well. I have survived this way for a number of years. It is somewhat safe as long as you listen to both sides. I liken it to a scene in the movie "Shenandoah": the Confederate and Union armies are facing each other across a field taking a break from an obviously bloody stalemate. Just before the fight begins again, a skinny cow marches out into the field between them, oblivious to the fact that it looks like a good meal to both starving armies. All the men on both sides have a good laugh before a brave sole with a white flag rides out and chases the poor animal away. Then the reality resumes. Like the cow: the middleman has little hope of changing anyone's mind. But the middleman is almost always good for a laugh, and laughing is a good thing.