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About "Us"



March 27, 2023. I am such an idiot. CORRECTION to February 26, 2023 just below: ALL the New York City stories, which are at 10. 600 Short Stories from New York City, see https://eslyes.com/ homepage and https://eslyes.com/nyc/contents.htm, are 100% Copyright Mike Carlson. I do not share the copyright with anyone. Likewise my two e‐books, E‐Books "English Learner 500 Short Stories for Beginner‐Intermediate" Vols. 1 and 2 only 99¢ each! (iPhone or Android) at Amazon‐Kindle, both of which I own 100% Copyright, sharing with no one. All Rights Reserved. Please forgive my February 26, 2023 misstatement, as I myself try to forgive it, and myself.
February 26, 2023. eslyes.com is my FREE site containing 1,600+ original stories, plus exercises and audio, for English learners and English lovers worldwide. It also has links to both of my e‐books (only 99 cents!) containing 500 short stories each (see homepage for the various links to purchase these e‐books). All material (EXCEPT: SEE March 27, 2023 CORRECTION JUST ABOVE) on eslyes.com is Copyright 50% Mike Carlson and 50% Ron Lee (my ex‐partner), All Rights Reserved. I wrote all the content; Ron created the three websites, including mine. No commercial use of contents is permitted. If you come across websites or internal sites other than this one and Ron Lee's that contain any of this content, please send me an email to michaeleslATgmail.com. Nonprofit use of this content by teachers and parents, among others, IS permitted (copying and downloading text and audio, for example). Any unauthorized duplication, distribution, or use of any or all material on eslyes.com is an infringement of copyright and might subject infringer to civil and/or criminal penalties.
I was an ESL instructor (BA English, MA Education) for 22 years in Pasadena, CA and 2 years in Brooklyn, NY. I currently work part‐time as a proofreader. A Brooklyn resident, I ride the B and Q regularly and walk on each NYC sidewalk and cross each NYC street warily.   —Mike Carlson, October 2017


A FEW THOUGHTS ABOUT...
      You know, we're all the same, and we're all different. We all have our pride, probably too much of it. We're all bullied at one time or another, yet bullies at other times. We all dislike liars and hypocrites, yet we all ARE liars and hypocrites. We've all done and said stupid or mean things, but also really nice things. We've all asked for forgiveness, but refused to forgive. We all have problems, especially regarding money, health, love, and happiness.
      So, I'm like you, and I'm not like you. I was born in Brooklyn, grew up in the South, and moved back here to Brooklyn after 30 years in Los Angeles. I was a low‐handicap golfer for years, and I'm twice divorced. I'm surviving in the big city. I play Mega regularly (or: stupidly), but when Mega went up to $2, as Powerball did, I "wised up"—and now play HALF as regularly. I love watching baseball and golf, and I enjoy reading different news apps and listening to various podcasts on my iPhone. When the weather is nice, I enjoy taking walks on Emmons Avenue, people‐watching as I pass the busy restaurants and the fishing boats.
      Every day, I'm thankful for three things: electricity, indoor plumbing, and soap.
      During a brief chat a while back, an elderly neighbor observed, "It's not easy being old." I said, "It wasn't easy being young, either." He nodded. Like many of us, he and I live day to day, enjoying the wonderful things that come with being alive, dealing with the usual small and unusual big problems, doing our best, and hoping for the best.
—Mike Carlson, December 2019

AND…
      Well, here it is December 2020, and many of us have survived a tiny little bug that has brought the whole world to its knees. And many of us are mourning those who didn’t survive. And many of us are worrying about those, including ourselves, who didn’t lose their lives, but instead lost, or are losing, their livelihoods. Will 2021 be the light at the end of this tunnel, or maybe even be the end of the tunnel itself?
      And if we do conquer Covid‑19, it’s the inventors, STEMers, researchers, medical people, first responders, etc. that we will owe lifelong gratitude to. But will we erect statues to any of them? Will we see them on the front page of newspapers and magazines week after week? Will talk shows have such persons as guests year after year? Will they receive corner offices and C‑suite perks? Will the publishing world be flooded with their best‐selling biographies? Will TV shows and movies about them abound? Will we survivors pester them for their autographs and selfies? While we enjoy the tranquil period between ‑19 and ‑20, will we pay one‐hundredth the attention to them that we pay to entertainers and athletes and internet celebrities, or even (especially!) to our own mirrors?
      Of course not. Because that is our nature. We beg for a cure or an invention or an improvement to that invention, and then when we get it, we carry on as before. No good deed goes unpunished, or long remembered. Human nature is always, What have you done for me lately?
      For us humans, convenience and comfort are king. We blame the energy companies, among others, for ravaging the earth and causing global climate change, but who among us has forsaken the power sources that operate, warm, cool, and light our homes, workplaces, transportation, and entertainment centers? Who among us has refused to buy anything and everything that is made of or from plastic? Many of us will not quit such convenience and comfort until forced to do so. We have no problem with going down with, let alone causing, the sinking ship as long as we can eat well and drink well and be entertained well on the way down. Better to live comfortably now and into a short future than to live into a long future that involves sleeping in caves and trying to keep warm by standing around a small open fire. Supposedly, the Polynesians lived on Easter Island for several hundred years before they destroyed its livability, and moved on to another island. We are several hundred years into destroying Earth’s livability; there is no other island to move on to. Technology brought us to this point. Can it save us in the nick of time? Are cold fusion and unlimited fresh water but a quantum computer’s calculation away? Can technology deliver a global UNDO button?
      Last year I dropped (but now am undropping) the FOURTH item that I’m thankful for every day: capitalism. Where would we be without the incentive to create and/or improve things that enrich our lives AND our wallets? How often do we thank the inventors, the thinkers, the curious ones, for developing, for example, the modest paper clip in the first place, and then improving it with various sizes, materials, and even, like potato chips, ridges? Without capitalism, where would love, money, and power, the three things that drive our universe, be?
—Mike Carlson, December 2020

AND…
      Well, it's the end of about two years of COVID. How much longer before things return to normal, or near normal, or, quite likely, a new normal? Time will tell. . . . But while I'm here, let me add a FIFTH 'thing' that I marvel at and am grateful for every day—evaporation. That's right, you heard me—evaporation! What's more satisfying than washing a T‐shirt, for example, and hanging it up to dry, all the while knowing that hours later, that damp T‐shirt will be bone dry? It always works. It never fails. It's more magic from Mother Nature. I love it!
—Mike Carlson, December 2021

AND…
      Well, January 2023 arrives in about three weeks. I'm still here, enjoying life in NYC, and hoping my body and mind stay healthy for at least another 10 years. I have finally realized that Mother Earth is a beautiful paradise, and I hope we don't destroy it with all our pollution, plastic, consumption, and waste. I also realize that humans are awesome and, unfortunately, awful. Yin and yang. But I still marvel at simple things, like evaporation (hang up that wet T‐shirt and a while later, it's all dry!), soap, electricity, and indoor plumbing. ... On another note, although I wrote all the content that is on my site, I share the copyright equally (50% each) with Ron Lee, my ex-partner. The content that is 100% my sole copyright is the 600 Short Stories from New York City (actually, 1,057 stories) at NYC Stories, including the two e-books (500 Short Stories) at Amazon - English Learner. I am currently writing a third volume of 500 Short Stories and hope to publish it in 2023. Thank you all for visiting my site, and I wish you all happy holidays and a safe and healthy new year.
—Mike, December 7, 2022

AND...
     It's Christmas Eve. I made it through another year without any major health problems (don't jinx myself, and knock on wood). As a young person, I never gave health a second thought. Times change, and so do people. I think I've mentioned before that, if I met my young self nowadays, I wouldn't have anything to do with that person. What a jerk I was. I have changed, mostly because of a wonderful woman who enlightened me as to what a jerk I was. And keeps reminding (because, as she rightly says, I need constant reminding). Anyway, I'm still enthralled by (besides her) electricity, soap, indoor plumbing, and evaporation. Of course, now there's AI that I might add to that list, if its promise holds true. I might also add magnetism and solar fusion, if those two blossom. Regardless, I'm more than halfway through Volume 3 (500 Short Stories). Shooting for July at the latest. As usual, thank you all for visiting this site and reading volumes 1 and 2.
—Mike, December 24, 2023

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