Some years ago, in Chicago, lived a petty hoodlum named Benny, a miserable fellow, who never had a girlfriend, was always coughing with a cold, and was always broke.

So it was that, pawing through a trashcan, he was surprised to find a small and ornate urn, because he seldom had good fortune. He took it home to his hovel, and was rubbing the dust off, when — poof! — in a puff of smoke appeared a genii!

“You have three wishes,” the genii said, “but there’s a condition.”

As you can imagine, Benny was very surprised, and naturally suspicious. “What kind of condition?” he demanded.

“Nothing much,” said the genii with a smile. “You can have anything you wish, but you must agree never to get a shave or a haircut.”

“What happens if I do?” asked Benny. The genii looked somber.

“Then you will spend the rest of your very long life trapped inside the urn,” said the genii, “Just as I have done.”

“It’s a deal!” said Benny.

“What are your wishes?” asked the genii.

“I’d like health, and happiness, and more money than I can ever spend,” said Benny.

“Done!” said the genii, and vanished in a puff of smoke. There was a knock on the door. When Benny answered, he found Ed McMahon from Publishers Clearing House, with a very large check.

Benny didn’t know what to think, but, oddly, he felt happy and healthy. And that’s the way it went. He spent money madly, but more kept showing up. He started dressing better and going out more, and women began to pay attention.

Some years later, his hair fell down his back below his knees, and his beard almost as long in front. But he had a great life, and a good woman. Everything was wonderful.

Well, there was one little thing. The woman. The woman was very, very happy, except that she kept bugging him to get a shave and a haircut. Relentless, she was, and it was making him crazy. While on a world cruise, in the tiny cabin, after a few too many margaritas, she was chiding him to get a haircut and he blew up.

“All right!” Benny yelled, and stomped to the barber, and ordered a shave and a haircut. The barber rolled his eyes, and began. Some time later, the barber handed him a mirror to see how it looked, but a genii appeared in a puff of smoke, and then Benny and the genii vanished, and the mirror clattered to the floor.

There is a moral to this story:

A Benny shaved is a Benny urned.

Henrietta, Texas, February, 1963: I’d been to classes in Midwestern University, but instead of coming home I’d visited with Bill and Dennis, so I’d missed supper. In some families, I suppose that would mean I didn’t get to eat, but my mother had kept food to make me a plate. Though she was a great cook, roast beef usually came out a bit dry. However, I was crazy about the rice and gravy that always rode along.

The gravy still sat in an odd-shaped heavy aluminum pot on the rear of the stove. She dished up roast beef, green beans, and rice, and started to pour gravy on top, as is proper. I held up my hand.

“That gravy’s not hot,” I said. She looked at me.

“Yes, it is,” she said.

“No,” I said, shaking my head, “it’s not.”

“The gravy,” she said, “is hot.”

“No,” I insisted, “I can tell.” She paused, then pointed to the stainless steel sink beside the stove.

“Hold your finger out,” she said, “just over the sink.”

Calling her bluff, I held my finger out over the sink. She grabbed the heavy pot and moved toward my hand, then paused. I held my hand steady, looking at her.

She glanced at me, and then poured some gravy over my finger.

Ow! It was hot! It burned like crazy!

Near Hurnville, Texas, 1949: My mother’s birthday came in the summertime, and we drove to my Grandparents’ farm, eight miles north of town, for cake and a visit. I was playing on the piano in the parlor, when I heard the sound of cars arriving out front.

Peeking through the window, I saw Uncle Dick and Uncle Eugene unfolding from their cars, and my mother greeting them with a kiss. But then Uncle Eugene called out, “Say! You know that today is Maggie’s birthday?”

Uncle Dick said, “That’s right!” and grabbed my mother.

And then they spanked her!

Jittering from one foot to the other, crying in pain and fear, I ran to the porch, to see her laughing and trying to escape. They saw me and stopped. My mother told me it was just a joke, but I was inconsolable that somebody could spank my mother!

The terrible moment passed, and yet the day was not done. Was it later that day? Perhaps it was another day soon after, for I’d been at Rex and Mike’s that summer, and had my first brush with fashion.

In the summer, no youngster wore shirt and shoes. It was just too hot. In the first few days, the feet were tender from a winter of hiding in socks and shoes, but soon they grew hard and impervious to most stickers. Only the dreaded goathead stickers would penetrate our thick skin, hobbling our running into limping.

From Rex I had learned that it was very fashionable to wear blue jeans, cut off into shorts, and with no belt. I don’t recall hearing the word ‘style’ or ‘fashion’, and the word ‘cool’ hadn’t been invented yet. So how I learned I cannot fathom. But somehow I knew: the way to dress was no shoes, no shirt, in cut-off jeans with no belt.

On this later day, once again I’d come from the parlor. But on this day, for some reason, my grandmother’s yard was filled with children. I didn’t know any of them. Most were older than myself. I remember only that it was summer, I was very proud of my fashionable attire, and that I walked out onto the porch, and was standing above a yard full of others.

That is when my pants fell off.

San Anselmo, California, July 24 2003: Today I have a great big truck. It is mighty and it is bright yellow. Tomorrow I’m packing Megatars, shop tools, voicemail equipment, many computers, and a ton or two of books into the great big truck.

On Saturday, I am driving the great big truck, up to the great big mountains, where Adrienne and I will be living in our new house on the side of Mount Shasta. Hanging out with a volcano always seemed like a good idea to me, where the pines are thick, and the air is clean.

In about a month, I will take the rest of our belongings, beds and sofas, remaining shop tools, and the files and working office for the voicemail companies.

Our new house is gray with white trim, a corner lot, with a board fence in the back for Tulip our border collie. There is a nice office and workshop for me, and at 3500 feet altitude, it’s cooler in the summer, and snow to shovel in the winter. Adrienns says she’s going cross-country skiing.

I heard about a woman who did this for a mile a day during the winter, and she then walked for a mile a day in the summer. After a few months, her family had no idea where she was. Hopefully this will not be a problem with Adrienne.

Why are we moving? For several reasons.

First, we want to buy a home, and houses there are affordable compared to here. Next, we’d like a little quieter life, as it’s grown hectic around us where we now live. Third, the place is really, really pretty.

I’m going to be bustling from dawn to dusk through the weekend. I’ll return to posting next week. If you want to help unload the truck then meet me in Mount Shasta.

This is a simple law of nature, but one which is very handy:

It is surprisingly easy to overlook what is important for what seems urgent.

That’s it.

What is urgent usually comes to our attention in the context of other people, work in progress, deadlines, and conflicting time demands.

What is important usually comes to our attention either when we are relaxed and thinking clearly about our lives, without interruption. Or, sadly, sometimes what is important comes shockingly to mind when we’ve just lost something important, probably because we failed to think about it.

If you spend your days stamping out forest fires, because they are urgent, and neglect what is important, then life can tend to be filled with urgencies, and little of importance. Reward urgent and you get more of it. Take time for important, and you’ll have more of what you really want. And the lovely thing is that you get to choose.

Knowing this important secret of the universe, go forth and prosper.

This is a simple law of nature, but one which is very handy:

How much you have actually “earned” is how much you have still got.

That’s it.

Nearly all humans today are confused on this simple fact, partly because other folks wanting to sell things have confused us with bogus concepts such as “investing” in a new gadget which of course is not an investment in any sense of the word, bur rather just a way for us to lose our money to them.

If you worked for five years mowing lawns and hauling garbage to the dump, and you earned a whole bunch of money and gave every dollar to other people, what have you actually “earned” from your five years of labor?

That’s right … nothing.

By giving away those dollars, you have effectively earned nothing for five years of work.

But what if you spent all the money on cantelopes and watermelons which you stacked in the back yard? Do you have something to show for your labor?

No, because they have rotted away and are now worth nothing. You’ve still effectively earned nothing because nothing is what remains of the dollars which once visited you briefly.

But what if you spent the money not on cantelopes but on a sportscar? Well, is the sportscar still worth the number of dollars you paid for it? Could you sell it today for the same amount? No? Then the sportscar is just rotting more slowly than cantelopes, but its days are numbered, and you can count on it being worth nothing soon enough.

It is surprisingly easy to overlook this basic fact: If you obtain some dollars, and then give them away, you’ve got nothing. It is surprisingly easy to overlook what is important for what seems urgent. The urgency of our desire for glittering gadgets, fancy food, and shiny automobiles can easily outweigh something important.

What is important? Well, survival is important, and loved ones are important, and pleasure in living is important.

Survival means you’ve set aside money enough to take care of your true needs, including healthcare when age slows you down, and if you ever want to have love in your life, setting aside enough to take care of your sweetheart and your children. True pleasure in living does not mean the shiniest car now, but rather the leisure to leave labor behind you as your investment income grows enough to support you and your loved ones.

True luxury is having time to live, people to love, and wisdom enough to live in a way that promotes the survival and pleasure of you and your loved ones.

True luxury is obtained by living below your means, keeping some part of what you earn — this is your true “earnings” — and putting that money to work, so that in time the “earnings” from your invested money will free you from ever having to labor again.

Does this mean you will do nothing? Not at all. It means that, over time, you will have more and more choices about what you do, and how you care for your loved ones.

When you spend all the money that comes to you, you’re earning nothing. You’re not spending just the money; you’re spending your life.

Speaking plainly, it’s better to save your life!

Knowing this important secret of the universe, go forth and prosper.

Grant and Green, San Francisco, 1974: While I was living in the apartment from hell in North Beach, I called my cousin Bruce again.

He said that he knew that apartment building, because he’d once been abducted there.

Bruce was several years younger than I, and was mostly seen during family get-togethers at the farm. He’d been a young active boy with red hair and a mischevious nature, alternating between brashness and uncertainty, with just a dash of yearning.

He told me years later that, at the end of a visit, when his family was ready to leave, he would slide a red rubber band around the knob on the bannister of the pine staircase in the hall, so that he was leaving something of himself in that place. And when they returned in a year or so, he’d run to the house, to see if the rubber band was still there.

Sometimes it was; sometimes it wasn’t.

In college, he’d become fascinated by video, and seeking his video fortune, he arrived in San Francisco, and spent the first night at a cheesy hotel on the corner of Columbus and Grant. Perhaps you’ll recognize the spot as a strip joint called the Condor Club, where the famous Carol Doda put on floor shows. It was in this club that her piano killed a man.

Here’s what happened: A waitress had picked up a boyfriend for the evening, and they stayed late, after the bar closed. Carol Doda had a white piano which descended from the ceiling, as part of her act The drunken pair wondered what it would be like to make it on the famous piano, and while engaged in exercises there, triggered the lever which sent the piano returning to the ceiling.

The two were pinned in missionary position when it reached the ceiling; the fellow had a heart attack and died. The waitress, trapped beneath the dead man, was quite sober by the time janitors arrived in the morning light.

At the corner of the building was a two-story sign with a huge plastic Carol Doda posing, in black plastic panties and bra. On the upper floors we find the cheesy hotel, and Bruce’s window was five feet from this gargantuan bra. Being drunk enough, he leaned out to pull that bra off Carol Doda. It wouldn’t come free, though he broke off the strap, and for years after I felt a certain surge of pride whenever visiting North Beach. Our family had left its mark.

Bruce was looking for an apartment the next day, when suddenly an older guy, grizzly with a dirty grey beard, grabbed Bruce’s arm, and shoved Brude through the doorway of my apartment building. The fellow was much larger and stronger than Bruce. Grim-faced, the man said nothing, and dragged Bruce up the stairs. Bruce figured he was about to be killed. So he stumbled to pull the guy’s arm, then straightened, then launched himself straight backwards into the air. The fellow had to let go or fall down the stairs.

Bruce dropped six or seven feet to the landing, ran out, ran away up the street, moved to Berkeley, and never learned what it was about.

But of course, like the curious couple in the bar, there are some things a person just doesn’t need to know.