Steve Guttenberg - Philosopher of Positivity For Our End Times?

A voice reaches my ear from across the room.

Some guy is doing positive-speak or something.

Affirmations? A guided meditation? I can’t tell.

“Sometimes you have to take the good with the good. I know it sounds kind of funny, but sometimes, everything is going to be okay… sometimes it is a great day, so savor it — savor those great days.”

I follow the sound and find my partner staring at his phone, lost in maybe some YouTube video?

He almost has tears in his eyes. This is not like him. This is not the kind of stuff he usually allows himself to fall into.

It starts up again:

"Something good is going on… I’m strong, I’m resilient, I’m also sensitive, I’m calm yet I’m excitable. I love the people in my life, I love myself. I just think something’s going on. I can’t explain it to you… I hope something’s going on for you, and I hope it’s good."

The voice is pleasant, familiar, genuine. Not some Tony Robbins focus-group-tested spiel on autopilot designed to cajole you into their five-year 10-step workshop package.

It’s just a guy, talking — a guy who sounds happy and authentic. You can hear the smile on his face, the thought in his words.

“What is it?” I ask Eddie. “Some author?”

He looks up a little embarrassed, caught.

“Oh… now don’t laugh, but I’m really getting a lot out of these. He’s just… so likable, so genuine.”

“Who?”

“Steve Guttenberg.”

Time slows. I sprain my neck doing a quadruple-take. Brainwaves sort of short circuit and I wonder if I’m suffering from a mini-stroke. Perhaps I misheard. But I glare at the screen and there he is, speaking through the clutter… and into my soul.

What the eff is happening?!?, my brain pleads.

Speaking of short-circuiting, I’m referring to actor Steve Guttenberg from the movie Short Circuit. You know, he played one of the dads in Three Men and a Baby, and the lead character Mahoney in four, yes four Police Academy movies in the mid to late ‘80s.

I was introduced to the first and second Police Academy movies on VHS by some older pre-teens who wanted to corrupt me, I suppose, as these were raunchy fun films that presented a world of sexual innuendo I knew nothing about.

Innocent, sheltered me: “Mom, what’s a blow job?”

I wanted to hate his character, Mahoney. He reminded me of all those “bad kids” I went to grade school with — the cute ones that didn’t follow the rules, ignored the adults and did it all their own way and then somehow got away with it all with a dimpled grin while we nerds weren’t rewarded for following the rules.

But I couldn’t hate him, because Steve is just so damn likable.

A few years later I spotted him on TV in a rerun of Cocoon as the leading man, and again my brain sorta short-circuited — wait, it’s that comedy guy from Police Academy playing the romantic lead in a drama? (And he was really good). And wait, whoa, he’s got a killer body too? What’s with those worked-out pecs on a comedy guy?

I now realize it may’ve been my closeted gay little boy noticing that part, but seriously, it was kind of an anomaly. What other comedy leading man of the ’80s was really ripped and noticeably in shape besides maybe Eddie Murphy?

Steve Martin wasn’t presented to us that way. Dan Ackroyd wasn’t. John Candy and Rick Moranis certainly weren’t.

All this to say, Steve Guttenberg was a very unique and unusual leading man for the times.

And now, some 35 years later, he’s looking me in the eye, talking directly to the camera, to me not at me, apparently on his Instagram feed with 241,000 followers — a giant, smiling, authentic teddybear of a man, of course older, but really reaching through the screen and connecting.

Posts about his recently deceased father tear through me and I genuinely — where is this coming from? — get a lump in my throat.

• (In a cemetery) This is my first Father’s Day without my dad. And I got a cup of coffee, a cup of coffee to share with my dad. He liked black coffee, so I thought I’d share a cup of coffee with my dad. So if your dad’s still around, go have a cup of coffee with him or do something that he wants to do, and I wish you a happy Father’s Day.

Wallop, right in the solar plexus.

Then this one:

• Today is one year since my dad’s passing. So you can imagine how it is, or maybe you know how it is. I wonder what he’d say to me. I think he’d say, Steven, be your best everyday. Be your best. Think your best. Be your best for other people. Be the best you can be at all times — thinking, playing, doing, working, caring, loving. Be that best that you can be. — I think that’s what he’d say to me. So I’m going to take that with me, and maybe that’s something I can give to you today — be your best, smile, even when your heart is breaking, smile, and be your best.

I have to smile, but again, I’m scratching my head.

What has happened in the course of human events and the space time continuum that Steve Guttenberg has firmly ascended to and claimed the role as our modern-day Mister Rogers, telling us adults to keep going, to just put one foot in front of the other?

• So you know, I was thinking about it, what am I going to do today? And I’m just thinking about showing up. I’m gonna show up and do my best and I’m going to be everything I can be at that moment. And sometimes my best won’t be so great. And sometimes my best will be unbelievable. But today, what I’m thinking about is just show up. Show up and then do my best… and we’ll see what happens.

He’s not on a stage, he’s not speaking into a microphone, he’s not doing a TED Talk. We’re catching Steve as he’s walking through the mall, on the beach, just finishing a marathon, taking us along on his daily walk as he mulls over what he’s struggling with or what he’d like to share.

My cynical sarcastic brain wants to fault him, to be all snide, but my goddess!, he is just so freaking cuddly, like a fun uncle or young grandpa who’s telling you how you’re just overthinking it, that you’re just making it too hard on yourself, to just cut yourself a freakin’ break already.

Go ahead, check it out — I defy you to not love this current iteration of Steve. Even when a day has completely shit the bed and you want to hurl your phone against the wall, you can’t, because Uncle Steve is just talking you through to the next day, urging you on, touching your heart, making you hold back tears, all with a smile on his face — the philosopher of our modern times.

This is the guy from the movie Can’t Stop The Music with The Village People, y’all!

After ripping through the unflinching grinder of the trying-to-stay-relevant Hollywood machine, many celebs get crushed under the hindsight and what-ifs. But if they’re smart, they realize there are second acts for all of us. We all have something more to give.

Man, these are challenging times.

But, I’ve accepted it. It’s a thing.

And my brain is no longer revolting.

But I’m telling you, if Bill Murray of Ghostbusters and Caddyshack arrives on my phone talking to me about life goals and fulfillment, I’m outta here.

Thanks for reading something written by an actual human! This story was originally published here on Medium.com.