July 4th -- Independence Day

Happy 4th of July.

Independence Day.

A day in which the United States celebrates breaking off from England to become our own country. At the time we were pissed off that we were being taxed but not getting a say in the way things were done. King George made the decisions and we paid taxes but had no voice.

This year there have been lots of voices raised as people feel like they're not being heard. They feel like they have legitimate complaints about the government of our country that they feel isn't fairly representing them or speaking for them.

From the second paragraph of our Declaration of Independence, a declaration of war against our then legitimate rulers:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

Our country wasn't founded by perfect men. Some signers of the constitution didn't recognize black people as actual people, but as chattel, property. And it wasn't until the 13th Amendment that slavery itself was outlawed. They weren't perfect. The country they built wasn't perfect and still isn't.

But it has, built into it, a system by which we the people, are able to make it better; not just better for us, but better for all of us. We are at our best when we are doing great things in the world. We went to the moon in under ten years. We fought a war on two fronts, and won with help from allies, chief among them, the country we had broken away from 200 years before! We are a country that builds things that are testaments to the human spirit. The Hoover Dam, The Twin Towers. Cape Canaveral.

We are at our best when we try and make things better for ourselves and for the world at large.

Sometimes we lose our way. Sometimes we hear that we aren't the best and we lash out at the person who says it. We get defensive of our country because we genuinely love her, for all her flaws. She's ours and we love her. And we can talk shit about her if we want to, but if someone else does... well... the gloves come off.

Sometimes though, sometimes, maybe we should listen. Sometimes it's okay to admit that while we're a great country full of great people who do amazing things every day... there are those among us who could do better. And we, as Americans, are at our best when we help people become better versions of themselves.

Independence day. It's about freedom. It's a celebration OF that freedom and why we have it. Think though, between now and next year's 4th... are we doing our best to help others be their best? I'm not saying we can't defend our country from legitimate attacks. I'm not saying Al Qaida has a point. I'm saying when enough American voices cry out that there is a problem... perhaps... as good Americans who love this country... we should do what we as Americans do best... perhaps we should try to make it better.. for everyone.

It's not unpatriotic to wish to do better. It's unpatriotic to tell those who are brave enough to tell us when we're falling short of our aim at being the best we can be to shut up and sit down. When we quit looking for ways to get better, when we quit trying to improve, we're done.

It's not about making America great again. It's about every day trying to be better people and a better nation than we were before. That's our job as Americans. If you don't leave your country BETTER than you found it you're doing it wrong.

She's given you a lot of opportunities here. We're a country of great wealth, great resources, and the freedom to exploit them in a way that can improve things for now, and for the future for me, for you, for everyone... but only if we make a point of doing it. Only if we value what our founding fathers valued... what they outlined in the Declaration of Independence when King George wouldn't listen to their concerns the founding fathers had this to say on July 4th, 1776...

"when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."

We need to listen to these people who are unhappy. We need to pay attention to how we can get better and work to get better. It's what we, as a country, have done for generations. We don't do it quickly sometimes, and we don't do it painlessly sometimes. But we have been a nation of people who strive to be moral, honest, and to help ensure the freedom, liberty, and opportunity for ourselves, and for people all over the world.

We didn't do that by shutting down those within the country who expressed a dissenting opinion. Those times in history were not us at our best. McCarthyism wasn't our best day.

Don't take a criticism as an attack. Take it as an American duty to constantly be better than we were before. Take it as love for the country we all live in. It's okay to love something so much you want to help it be better when you think you can.

I know a lot of people won't like this post. It'll appear political and we, sadly, have reached a point in US Politics where disagreement is seen as unpatriotic, as treasonous, as "if you don't like it get out." That makes me sad. Women didn't get to vote. Black people were originally property, like a suitcase or a walking stick. But we saw that and we tried to be better. It's not unpatriotic to want to be better. It's American.

This picture was taken at my parent's house. I typically go there this time of year to sweat my ass off in Tennessee, see the flowers Mom has blooming everywhere, and eat delicious fried Southern food. I couldn't this year because of the Corona Virus. I wish I could be there. I wish I could have seen my nephew graduate from Navy Bootcamp in Chicago this spring. But, that's not where we are at right now as a world.

These opinions are just mine, they're long-winded as usual, and I doubt anyone will read them if you made it this far Happy Independence Day. Try and do better tomorrow and the next day at making our country better, more free for everyone, and a place the world looks to again for leadership and guidance, and inspiration. That's the America I fell in love with. That's the America I joined the Navy to defend.

Left anti-social media

What I'd thought was a fairly innocuous post on Facebook prompted me to finally leave the platform. Sadly, I don't have a copy of the post. I forgot to grab a screen-grab of it and, well, I've left so I can't go get it. It was along the lines of, "I can't believe saying you wish the police would kill fewer people in their custody has become a controversial political statement."

I had several likes, loves, and cares reacts which was fine, but then I got...

• MaYBE peOplE shOuLDN't ReSISt ArrESt So Much.
• Can'T THey DeFEnD theMSelVeS?

My reaction on the day was very different than how this post reads. I was sad, depressed, and in an almost mourning state. People at work, several people commented that I looked like someone had died and asked if I was okay. I lied... I said I was. I wasn't. That hurt, not the words, but what I felt lay behind the words.

So, yeah. My comment that something as basic as wishing people weren't being killed turned into political talking points. Something I'd precisely said I found unbelievable. And there it was. I wasn't a person anymore, even to other people I liked. I was a sounding board for them to spew their agenda. I wasn't their friend or their family member. I was an audience for them to regurgitate their doctrine onto.

If that's what's social media is going to be during a double-whammy national crisis it can do it without me. If they see me only as someone to talk at and not someone to engage with, and by 'they' I mean more than the two I got replies from. It happens a lot. If they see me not as someone to listen to as well as engage with then I haven't got any real reason to spend my energy engaging with them.

That's normally a reason to remove someone from my stream, just block them and move on, not leave the place entirely. I'm aware of how the Internet works. You don't pick up your toys and go home every time someone says something you don't like. But this time it sort of hit harder because one of the people was my Mom.

I remember saying at one point that I felt like we'd be friends even if we weren't related. We have a lot in common. We like the same books, and enjoy the same things that we find relaxing. Our ideas of a good vacation line up pretty well. I genuinely enjoy visiting my parents and spent my vacations, of which I didn't get many because of the new job, visiting them. Well, did until the whole pandemic thing. I love them and I miss them.

But people change over time. Dad's been addicted to Fox News for years. I genuinely believe if they made a way to just get that on his TV he'd subscribe to that option instead of the other ones because I don't know if he watches anything but that, Survivor, and college football. And honestly, I feel like he's not the same person he was when I was growing up. I don't mean because I'm older or because he's older. I mean because anybody, ANYBODY, subjected to as much of a single viewpoint as that is going to change what they believe and they're going to believe it because it's all there is out there. No other viewpoints matter except the one the person is brainwashing themselves with. Mom lives in the same house. It's the same thing. There's only one viewpoint, period, ever.

Dad's not the only person who does it. Fox News came to exist because a lot of people felt other choices didn't represent their beliefs, their opinions. Particularly conservatives. So, Fox News filled that niche. Talk Radio filled that niche. And now there's a conservative echo chamber that reinforces itself so no other noise or opinion can get in and anyone who doesn't believe it is naive, stupid, and ill-informed.

The left isn't immune to that. Ever watched MSNBC? It's painfully left-leaning. But this isn't about the media. It's about Facebook. If you're curious how biased your news media source is go look here, like actually look and pay attention to what you're looking at. Try and think for yourself without just believing anything but your media choice is wrong. Get differing opinions from a variety of media sources even. But, at the least, look at the chart and read the axes. If you're going to subscribe to a particular propaganda at least do it with your eyes open.

Our current president has no interest in being president of the United States. He's president of his followers as long as they do what he tells them to. If they disagree with him they're fired. He's had the highest cabinet turn-over I can ever remember. Nobody lasts under him. They dissent and they're fired. He brooks no other voices but his own. And his followers, those who subscribe to his media of choice, have decided to emulate him. And so, Facebook has become Us vs Them.

We're one country. We're one nation. We're one family in some specific cases. So, if I say something I think is relatively simple to agree with, "The police should kill fewer people in their custody," and it turns out to disagree with the party line and I get reasons why it's okay to kill people if you're a cop. That's... that's disturbing. That's not listening anymore. It's not seeing me as a person you know and care about. Now I'm just a dissenting opinion and that sucks.

Yes, obviously police can defend themselves. Yes, sometimes a policeman can have someone resist arrest and that person ends up dead, but the punishment for resisting arrest isn't death... but that's not what I was talking about and they know it. But they couldn't ignore the chance for their talking point.

So, since FB had become what it feels like now. Just political sides with no chance for reconciliation, for real relationships... I said before I left, I was losing more than I was gaining by staying. I resisted the urge to leave for a long time because I thought I was a reasonable person. I thought I could see both sides. I hoped to meet people where they were, and engage them in conversation. Not necessarily to change their mind, but to explain mine so they knew I wasn't being willfully stupid that people did in fact sometimes have differing opinions. But I was kidding myself. That wasn't what was happening. Rhetoric matters more now.

So, I left. I was, and am, tired of engaging in that sort of stuff. I'm tired of losing people I care about. Yesterday was a hard one for me. You know how you always feel like you've got certain people in your corner who will at least listen to you? It's sort of like walking down stairs holding a box and you can't tell but you think there's another step and there isn't and your leg jams up into your hip and shakes your whole body? Yeah. That, but in my heart.

So, the only thing I'm keeping is Instagram. It's pictures. Oh, I should be upfront about this. If I express an opinion on my Instagram and you disagree there I'll block you. I'm not on Instagram for debate or conversation. I'm not interested in winning hearts and minds. I'm sharing things I like and that I enjoy. If you don't enjoy them or like them then don't follow me. If you disagree go make your own post. If you think I'm being naive or stupid go say so one your own space but stay off mine.

Comments are turned off for this post. I don't normally do that but in this case, like in the one that caused me to leave Facebook. I'm giving my opinion and, frankly, I don't need yours to inform mine. Yes, that sounds adversarial. I don't mean it that way I simply mean to say I'm allowed to have an opinion. This is what it is. I love the people involved. I feel like a part of me that I could always depend on and rely on to be there is built on sand now. Maybe that's a normal part of growing up. Maybe as we become adults, and at fifty plus I've been adult-aged for a while, maybe we find that we have to rely on new things as we get older. That doesn't mean I can't mourn the loss of what I'd felt was a bedrocklike foundation I'd built my life on... It never occurred to me that I would say "I wish fewer people died at the hands of the police" and my mom would say, "some of them are asking for it."

Blaming the victim hits me hard. Maybe harder than it should. But here we are.

Race in 2020 - RIP George Floyd

The country is on fire right now and...

We need to be part of something that happens, something that changes... there's something sick out there. There's something broken. There's something WRONG.

It's... I'm trying to figure out how to say it while I'm writing it instead of planning this out like I usually do. I'm sorry. (Also: Warning... will contain adult language and a link to a video that is definitely difficult to watch)

I grew up in the South. For my first few years of school, I was a minority, little toe-headed white boy. My best friend was Irna. She was black (I imagine she still is actually... it's not something that goes away). We moved to Germany and I went to High School on an army base there. The army is more racially diverse than a lot of America is, and less important than your color is your rank. Yeah, I know, it's elitist. But, hey, the Officer's Club had better video games. My best friend through high school was biracial, in Germany that definitely counted as black. It was pretty white over there then. I haven't been back for a while so I don't know what it's like now. Back in the thirties and forties they sort of got rid of the ones who didn't fit their interior decorating palette...

I went back to Alabama to go to college and Mom remembers me saying early in going back an observation about the cafeteria at the university. I was disappointed to note that there were clusters of colors. There wasn't a lot of mixing going on. That was in 1986. Everybody was self-segregating into black and white tables.

I got to be Supervisor down in Memphis years later, and I had no white employees for years. None, every employee I had was black. For about four hours I had a white lady working for me, but she went to lunch and never came back.

Something I've learned in all that time is that there are two worlds out there. There are two Americas. There's the one I live in where I and another white male middle-aged friend of mine can trespass, park a truck on someone's business property at night and watch fireworks and not get the cops called on us... and then there's the one where I could be on the news being killed because of what I look like.

That's not political. It's not hippie leftist thinking. It's a fact. And it's hard to watch. It's hard to see over and over again. And it doesn't have to be that way. It's a choice. It's a choice for those people who are doing the killing.

I see people saying, "BLUE LIVES MATTER!" during the conversation and I close my eyes and I close my mouth because there are no blue lives. Blue is a job. If you take off your blue shirt and go to the mall you're not blue anymore. You can live your life without being blue if you want to. You can't take off black. It's there. And it is such a different experience from being white.

Yes. It's better than it was. But that doesn't mean it's good. Better doesn't mean right. If you haven't eaten in 20 days and someone gives you a teaspoon of oatmeal a day, that's better... but it's not good. It's not enough.

Just because things are better doesn't mean it's good enough.

I KNOW you would never do something like this. If you would, you wouldn't be reading my blog. But there's more to it than that. I'm not telling myself "Well, I'd never do that so let's talk about the riots."

Fuck the riots. I could give two shits about the riots in this conversation. That's exactly what keeps happening. The trigger gets drowned out by the noise of what follows and we don't address the trigger. We address the noise.

What else can I do? What else can WE do, to help things continue to get better? Just waiting for the old racists who were raised to think "negro" was the good word so let's all just use that one and they can't complain to die isn't working. Our health care is getting too good. They're living too long. We can't wait for all the racists to die for things to get better. Because they're like gay people. Nobody knows why they keep happening but dammit! Every time I turn around there's another homo or racist sitting on the corner with some cause or another. What the hell man? Gimme a break. I just want to go to work, go to a restaurant once in a while, and go home and watch Survivor with my gay husband. Is that too much to ask? (He's the gay one, not me! Straight as hell! LoL)

The thing is, that's all the people who keep getting killed want. Maybe they want Skittles. Maybe they want help when their car breaks down. Maybe they want to go for a walk. Maybe they want to go for a jog. What they don't want is to live in fear of the police. They don't want to teach their kids to be afraid of the police. They don't want to be afraid they're going to be shot if they have a tail light out that they haven't fixed yet.

They don't want to lay on the ground while a police dog chews on them, LITERALLY CHEWS on them so afraid if they move at all WHILE THE DOG CHEWS THEM that they'll be shot. What world is it that we, you and I, have allowed to exist that they overcome literally every instinct to NOT BE EATEN because their fear of the police is worse than their fear of the dog that is literally chewing on them right then? How have you allowed that to happen? How have I? How have we? Because that's the reality for a black person in today's America.

So, what can we do to fix it? Literally, anybody who isn't trying to help in this situation, anybody who says, "Well, they just need to learn patience. Change takes time..." they're part of the problem.

If two poufs can get married when that was UNIMAGINABLE 30 years ago, then a black man should be able to interact with a law enforcement officer without being afraid he's going to die.

That's all I want. I want our police officers to be the good guys for ALL of us. Not just for my Aryan ass. ALL of us. Including my friends who have more melanin and less skin cancer than me and my family.

If you disagree with anything I've said, please unfollow me. I'm really distressed by all of this, more than I should be for as often as it happens. I should be numb to it by now but I'm not getting desensitized to it for some reason. I guess it's because I think it's important. I think it matters and I can't stop thinking about it.

Ugly -- it isn't a bad thing...

I wrote someone a letter in which I referred to myself as ugly and they called tonight to assure me that I wasn't and I shouldn't feel bad about myself.

I don't know if I ever got my feelings about it across because I was taken aback by the call. I hadn't meant it in a bad way.

Beauty is frequently something people talk about, a symmetrical face, slightly larger than average eyes, smooth features, nothing TOO big or TOO small, proportional to itself and each other, a lack of blemishes or wrinkles, but that last one's not an absolute. We, as a society have an opinion on what beauty is.

Beauty is often talked about and studied, and I'll say I appreciate beauty in a person and beautiful things as well, but often things and people that are considered beautiful lack what I would call character. They're a bit bland. It's not that they're TOO pretty... although, some people are... it's that they're simply beautiful and there's nothing that memorable about beauty.

My nose is too big, too long, too broad. It doesn't go straight, it's a bit off-center. I have thought wrinkles, permanently over my nose that give me something of a scowling appearance. My lips are to thin. My chin too wide. My eyes, when I smile practically vanish. My forehead doesn't know when to stop and I have spots. I'm NOT beautiful. Enough is wrong that I'd say it's ugly. I'm no Quasimodo, but I don't have any delusions about how I look objectively.

That being said I don't think that's an insult. I don't think it's a bad thing. People say, "Oh, you can't say someone is gay because it's an insult..." Well, only if you think being gay is bad which says something, doesn't it? Calling someone who is fat, fat isn't insulting. Calling someone who is ugly, ugly isn't an insult. (I wouldn't do any of those things. It's rude.)

I don't think how ugly a person is exactly related to how attractive they are. That's the confusion. The assumption that an ugly person can't be attractive is common and wrong. I know people find me attractive. I know I find people who aren't by any definition of the word "beautiful" very attractive.
There's a lot involved in how someone looks. Me? I look different in a photograph than I do in real life when I'm talking to someone. The photo shows all the ugly fixed on paper, or on a screen, and that's fine. It's objectively true and it's definitely there.

What a photo doesn't show is me leaning forward to hear something someone is saying when I'm interested in them or what they're saying. It doesn't show me laughing. It doesn't show how my whole body moves when I laugh. It doesn't show any of the stuff that is actually me. My personality is animated. It's broad gestures and lots of laughing. That's who I am. That's what people find attractive. My face? Not so much. A dating app where all I had to show someone before they decided to swipe left or right? I'd be doomed. But, put me in a room of people and generally, I'll do okay. They don't notice how I look, and later, when they saw a picture of me at the event, they'll inevitably say, "Oh, that's not a very good picture of you is it?"

Well, sadly, it is... that's how I look, but it's not what people tend to remember about me. And, honestly, I'm okay with it.

I joined the US Navy (well, thirty years ago)

January 4, 1988 I boarded a bus to the Naval Training Center in Orlando Florida. It's gone now, a park.
While there, towards the end of the first week I began to pray for someone in my company to die. He sounded like he was going to. He had a dry, hacking cough that was so loud and... abrupt, that the fire bell over the door would resonate and continue to ring after he had a coughing fit. It served to bridge the slight pauses between his coughing fits that lasted all night long. I'm sure he was miserable because I was. He didn't die. Finally I got to sleep. I'm not sure if his cough stopped or if I just finally collapsed after nights of not sleeping because of his noise. I know it happened multiple nights, many, many, many nights and I hated him for it well after it stopped because I didn't trust it to stay gone.

After completing basic training I stayed there in Orlando but moved over to the Naval Training Center, just across the base, where I attended Nuclear Field "A" School as a Machinist Mate. When I finished that I changed buildings to go to Nuclear Power School and did really well in that. That I loved.

FINALLY the reason I'd joined. Science. Nuke stuff. I loved it. I didn't ace it, but I was in the top of the class. As our class dwindled, the attrition rate was huge on the "dark side." It was called the "dark side" because the classes were hard enough that you never saw the light of day because you were studying so much you never got outside. Well, sort of.

Remember the cougher from the first paragraph? He was also in school, but he was still in "A" School for "Electronics Tech" which went longer, and then he was in Power School, but I was still ahead of him. He had plenty of free time and I was doing well enough, even on the dark side, that we hung out a lot. Went to a lot of movies.

I listened to Def Lepard's Hysteria and Guns 'n Roses' Appetite for Destruction on repeat just about non-stop for most of that time. Those are still two of my favorite albums ever. Not just because they're great albums, but because of where I was geographically, and in my life at the time. It was fun and warm, and we were in Orlando, Florida. You know what there is to do in Central Florida when you're young and have no bills? Everything. That's what there is to do.

I bought a car, a white Renault Encore that was, when I looked at the owner's manual, originally owned by a lady from a place called Ogden, Iowa. When I bought it I didn't know I'd soon be moving to a town about 45 miles from there.

So, long story short, too late. That guy with the cough? We wound up getting married last year so we don't introduce each other as "old Navy buddies" quite as often as we did for decades.

So, happy anniversary of joining the world's greatest navy, and I'm glad he didn't die from pneumonia... I guess.

I said yes

I've been roommates, best friends, Navy buddies, and long-distance besties with someone for almost thirty years now. On April 2, 1988 I knew it was a thing when he agreed to go see Beetlejuice with me a second time even though my loud laugh embarrassed him.

We talked about it, I nagged him into talking about it about ten years ago and he wasn't up for it then. There were familial concerns on both our parts. His family is important to me and I wouldn't want to alienate them and the whole idea was still sort of new at the time so we waited.

I'd left it at that. Unbeknownst to me, he hadn't. He'd talked to several of them without me knowing about it both then, in the intervening years, and again recently.

I was completely surprised when he asked me if I still wanted to marry him and I found myself holding an already mostly filled out marriage application. I grinned like an idiot and said "yes." It turns out there's a three-day wait between getting the license and being able to get married in Iowa. I wasn't willing to risk him changing his mind so I found a district judge willing to waive the waiting period and thirty hours after he asked me if I still wanted to we were standing in front of the magistrate. His Mom who wasn't a fan of it for religious reasons and who I did NOT think would show up, did. I was glad she did. Otherwise, it was just two friends of ours to serve as witnesses.

Through the legal hoops and getting signatures, I was constantly surprised at how happy for us the people seemed. There wasn't any shocked recoiling or clutching at pearls and swooning at the idea of two guys getting married. Nobody was anything but excited in any of the various offices I visited. Even the judge who had hurt his hand when the guard fell off a leaf blower he was using was in the spirit of it all.

What I found most surprising though was how, in spite of us being so close for so long, and not believing this would change much, we both got nervous trembling excited voice and big stupid grins when saying the vows to each other. I hadn't expected that from me, and certainly not from super-stoic him. It made me smile.

Shortly after the ceremony in front of the judge I ran to the coffee shop, because I do that whenever there is any sort of opening in my schedule and I said to the barista, a long time friend, that since I was hitched now I could finally let myself go. He laughed. Half an hour later my phone rang, "You know what I just realized? I can let myself go now!" I laughed and told him what I'd said to Kaleb and he laughed too. "I guess we do think alike."

So, yeah. We're married now, and I'm pretty happy about it.

Father's Day

It's Father's Day, or close enough so as to count. If I were closer I'd be taking him out to eat today because I work tomorrow. (No, the picture on the right is neither me, nor my dad. It's a father/son I've known since the dad was the age of the son and it makes me smile whenever I see it. It's one of my favorite pictures in the world.)


I was talking to someone recently about something we'd been talking about doing, the mechanic's test at work. Evidently it's in three parts and takes from 6-8 hours to complete and MANY people don't pass it the first time.  The other person said they didn't want to fail it and have everyone know they'd failed. I said they'd do fine and the real question is how long do we have to wait after passing to become a mechanic and what kind of training is involved, and what if we hate it do we really have two months to say we didn't want it?

They asked, "You're already thinking of what you'll do if you pass?"

I said, "Um. It could happen. I've passed things by accident before."

The thing is, the idea of NOT passing it hadn't really crossed my mind as a serious thought. The same of the Pharmacy Tech Certification Test thing I had to take. A lot of people take it more than once. I toyed with the idea of what if I didn't pass it, but it never really felt real that I might not. I'm not a super genius. I really am not. But I am confident I can do what I set my mind to do.

I saw that growing up. Both my parents, from my point of view, seemed to make up their mind they were going to do something and they just did it. I'd never seen my dad roof a house before but then he did it. Chop down/up trees after a hurricane? Did it. Build just about anything? Yup. This was even before YouTube so he wasn't learning it on the sly by watching videos online. It was just a thing. Once you decided to do something you found out how to do it and then you did it.

If I had one thing to kvetch about growing up it would be that I was inadequately prepared for failure. It just wasn't something that came up an awful lot. It wasn't an option that was on the table. My parents, to my eyes, didn't fail and they did impossible things all the time. What's that? Want to go to Germany and be teachers? Okay. So, they did and we went to another country, half way around the world.

I'm sure there were times when they weren't as fabulously successful as they appeared and I probably never knew about the times that things didn't go the way they were supposed to, but the lesson I learned from watching him just DO stuff was that the expectation was, once you make up your mind to do something you'd better, by God, do it. Learn it, do it. In that order. There's not a lot of room in there for Mess up and start over or do it again. All that won't fit between the comma after "Learn it," and the words "do it."

So, this Father's Day I'm celebrating the confidence and expectation of success I got from both my parents. Not in a "You will be the best or you're a failure!" way, but in an "Of course you can do it if you want to. You just have to figure out how first and then do it," way. The expectation that we kids were capable of whatever we wanted to learn how to do and then DO, has turned out to be valuable to me in life.

The confidence in my abilities is good, but that first step is the important part so many people don't have. TONS of people believe they can do anything but not as many realize, "learn how" is the first part. Maybe it's because my parents were both teachers. They valued learning and reading and competence. Today I still have those values and I know where they came from. My parents. They believed in me before I did.

Thanks Dad. Thanks Mom.

Happy Father's Day, and eat something good for you! :P

And, since I know he'll see this because Mom will share it with him...

Love,
Rich

Different managers/Different types

In the many years I've worked for other people:

• I've had managers I respected so I did what they asked because I knew it was the right thing to do. I trusted them and knew if I did what they asked something positive would come out of it that would help us all. 
• I've had managers I liked and I did what they asked because I hoped they'd like me back. That whole weird striving for approval through hard work thing. Yeah, I grew out of that. I mean I still work hard. I just mean I don't do it hoping they'll like me for it. I could give two figs if they like me, just appreciate that I work hard and am a good worker. Like me? Don't care.

and finally

• I've had managers I did what they asked to get them to STOP TALKING TO ME. I'll do it. Please, just shut up. I can't stand hearing your voice. Every word you say is like a nail through my ears. FOR THE LOVE OF GOD SHUT UP! I'm doing it. See, working. Now, go away, bother someone else! Oh God, my ears are bleeding. Make them stop talking to me!!! 

Some management styles are more effective than others, and some I think are more sought after than others. But I still think the respect one is the best one. Sure, they all get the job done, but the respect one gets it done more consistently.

So, now people I've worked with and for are all going to try and figure out where they are on the list. Obviously I didn't include every type of manager on here, and not everybody is purely one of the three here, and some of them aren't at my longest job so don't think they're all you. They probably aren't. Well, unless you're the one that prompted me to kick the bathroom door. You,  I just wanted to STOP TALKING!!! 

It's been a year...

A year ago I lost my job of almost 20 years.

I'm at a new job now and while the pay is substantially less it's a good job and I like the people I work with. But the income change was a really big deal. A really big deal.

I had/have bills I got and debts I took on when I made quite a bit more than I make now and while I took care of a lot of them it wasn't all of them and the stress of trying to keep them all current has really gotten to me. I don't handle money stress well. And, sadly, while I was good at not wasting money I need help. I've got to prioritize bills, something I never had to do before. It wasn't between which bills to pay it was when I'd pay them. The ability to pay was always there before. Now, now it's not like that. Sometimes they get late and the phone rings and it's some collector who always wants all of it up front. I don't have it all and they seem unwilling to take anything less than all of it. So, I quit answering the phone. I quit thinking about it. I just waited for it to go away. Obviously that's not a good answer.

Now, if my plumbing breaks I can tell pretty quickly if it's something I can fix or not. If my car breaks I can fix some things and not fix others. In those situations I was smart enough to find someone who did it for a living who could help, and I would. Financial help, credit counselling, whatever you call it. That felt like an admission of weakness to me, like I was failing at being an adult. Like I was just a loser who lacked discipline or something. So, I  kept trying, and failing and feeling shitty about myself.

Enough was enough last night and I went to a website for a credit helper type and gave them my information. This morning they called and we set up an appointment. I nee to gather a bunch of information between now and next week but I have taken a step in the right direction. I have called someone who is better at this than I am. The BBB says good things about them. I've talked to someone who has used their services and was happy with them. I feel like I've taken a step in the right direction instead of just hoping I win the lottery. That's not working out so well so far as a solution.

So, even though I'm financially no better off than I was before the call I feel like I've done something, taken some sort of control of a situation that feels overwhelming to me, and that helps. After the appointment I hope to feel even better. As it stands now though, I've swallowed my pride, I think that's what it is/was, and asked for help. That's hard for me. Hopefully it all works out. It feels less impossible now so that's something.

I'm an introvert...

I'm not unhappy. This is my "neutral" face. :)

"Why do you go sit in your car to eat lunch?" The person who asked it often ate lunch in the office instead of the break room & it was a legitimate question. It's been really cold this winter and most days when I got a lunch I'd go out of the building to eat it.

"I'm an introvert. I need time away from people to charge my batteries. I love customer service. I love helping people but if I don't get away from them after a while I start to get anxious."

"Really? You are so outgoing and happy and... bubbly with everybody, all the time. I'd have never guessed."

"I know, and it's exhausting. I'm beat at the end of the day. I suck at groups. A concert would be hell for me. A crowded bar to go hang out? A nightmare. I fake it when I'm at work. I'm acting. I put on my work costume and it's like an actor dressing for a part. I play the part of someone who is extroverted, charming, and funny who loves large groups of people but it's all acting."

"You're really good at it. I'd have never guessed. You really do seem happy."

"I am happy. Introverted doesn't mean sad. It doesn't mean lonely either. It just means I need some down time to recharge. Extroverts get energy from being around other people and introverts get it when we're by ourselves. It's not a bad thing."

"I didn't mean it like that it's just... I can't see it at all."

"That's because I'm a very good actor. I do it all the time, and mostly people don't know it or notice because if I'm around a lot of people, or at work, then I'm acting. I really like people one on one or even in small groups. But at work... it's a lot. Sometimes I just need to get away for a minute. So, I go eat lunch in my car or go straighten the stock room or take the trash out and patrol the parking lot for litter. Just little breaks is all."

"That's so weird. I'd have never guessed. I've heard you call your work clothes a costume before and wondered why you said that."

"And now you know," I said as I grabbed my lunch bag and clocked out for lunch in my car.

"Huh. Weird," she said as the door closed behind me. I smiled and waved. She smiled and waved back.

So, yeah. That happened.

Winter can stop now

It's been a long winter here in Central Iowa. We haven't gotten much snow where I am and that's a mixed thing. I hate the stuff, but it's water and we need a snow pack to melt and raise the water levels in the soil here. We came into Winter with a water debt and we're going to leave it that way too.

The cold this year is really mind numbing as well as extremity numbing. I've said cabin fever isn't a problem in my small house because I can always go outside but this year going outside isn't something anybody does on purpose for any length of time. It's noon right now and is 4°F before wind is factored in. With the wind it's -12°F. It hurts to be in it.

It's definitely not helping my state of mind. I could really use some better weather. It doesn't even have to be Florida or Texas warm, just not polar cold.

Spring means beginnings

Spring is here in Iowa late this year and while the temperatures say spring the summer storms we, and the country are getting say that summer isn't far behind.

I'm still on my vacation and enjoying it still. I got a kayak and have enjoyed kayaking on local lakes, creeks, and soon, rivers. (Not super soon, rain = flooding & rivers are deeper than creeks. I'm enjoying myself but I'm not foolhardy!)

But, my vacation needs to wind up soon. I'd told myself I'd take a week of camping before I ended the vacation but the weather hasn't cooperated in giving me a week of warm without days and days of rain. Last week was warmish but this week is raining, storming. Soon, though I need to get back to the working world. I haven't missed it yet. I'd wondered if I'd be bored after almost a quarter of vacation. I haven't been bored. I've travelled. I've read. I've written. I've taken up a new hobby and quit a bad habit (smoking, as of right now it's been over 15 days since I shoved a cigarette in my face.) I've been hiking, walking, and exercising in an attempt to minimize the weight gain during my quit and while I've gained 5lbs I don't see it getting to be much more than that. I've gotten closer to friends I've made recently and re-kindled friendships & familial relationships that had fallen to the wayside over the years as work kept me out of town and away from friends & family. What I haven't done is become bored.

Someone said that boring people are the ones who get bored. My lack of boredom so far seem a good indication that I am, perhaps, not a boring people. That's encouraging to me. I've wondered.

One of the things about taking all this time off is a little bit meta in that I've been that guy that works at that store for almost 20 years. Finding how who I am without the job has been fun and honestly, I was a little worried I'd have an identity crisis. Perhaps I did a bit and that's why I haven't been blogging as much as I sorted out who I am if I'm not my work. Because the job's gone and I'm still here.

What's the future hold? I'm not sure. I am sure that if I took a job tomorrow I'd like it to be one in which I am a cog in a much bigger machine. I want to be a little spinning gear and not one of the driving gears. I did my time as the motive force behind something giant and it was good and I was good at it. I want to go somewhere though where I can start at the bottom, or at least lower down, and work my way up. I'm pretty frugal as exhibited by my being able to afford to take this long off work without stressing over money, so I don't need a lot of money. I learned a long time ago from something I read that there are two ways to be rich either make a lot more than you spend or spend a lot less than you make. I've done both and fortunately I learned how to do the second before I had to. There's a lot of freedom in that.

So, I'm still here. I'm happy. I'm getting ready to start looking at doors to see which ones I want to step through and I'll keep you posted. I'll post more frequently now. I took some time away to be me for a while and now that I've settled that, as existential as it sounds, I think I'm ready to be me here too. I was worried if I were coming back here too often I'd relapse into old-me. He was a good guy, but he's gone now. The new me isn't necessarily new & improved, just new & different. I'll let you decide if you think he's improved or not. For myself? I'm happy with me now and I'm happy with the years I put in at the old job. They were good years and I did a good job at it. I don't regret it.

Tat-2'd

In 1993 I didn't have a job and a friend of mine also didn't have a job. We'd both left a job at the same, or almost the same, time and were on unemployment and angry with our prior employers so we applied at lots of places we knew wouldn't hire us... lady's shoe stores for example.  He was an artist, an amazing drawer, and he bought a tattoo gun. He tattooed an orange. He tattooed his big toe. Then, he tattooed my right arm, above the sleeve. I was still employable when I finally decided to quit milking that company's unemployment insurance. (New needles for each tattoo, don't panic.)

Fast Forward to now, 2012 and he's had his own shop for a while now and the color on my almost 20 year old tattoo was well & truly faded. I stopped in to see him and chat and he asked to see it. When I showed it to him he said, "Let me fix that and I'll fix it for free as long as you don't tell anybody who did it until I DO fix it." I said, "Deal."

I thought he meant he'd recolor it. So, today I sat in the chair expecting a quick recolor only to have him start drawing on my arm... a lot. When I asked him what he was doing he said, "I'm going to fix it. Trust me. If you don't like it you can have your money back." We laughed. He told me to be still.

Two and a half hours later he was done with the black part of the tattoo. "OK. Come back in three or four weeks and I'll do the color." I looked at it and was very impressed. I'm still impressed. He really does do good work. He's the only person I'll let tattoo me. It'll be a while though. MAN I'd forgotten how sensitive the inside of my arms is. (My sleeves still cover it so I'm still employable.)

Sad fact about this picture. I had my hand on the inside of my arm to push out my muscle so more of the tat would show and you can't tell. He burst out laughing and said, "It's not working. Put your guns away before somebody gets hurt... from laughing at your chicken wings."

Dangit!

PS: I'm now a contributing member of society and have worked for the same company for almost 18 years uninterrupted.

C'mon - I'm not THAT gay.

“Look,” I told Ruthie now, “I don’t want to be that guy, okay? The gay guy. The token homosexual..."

Sprout by David Peck

So, I'm gay. I don't know if I've said that on the blog before or not but it's out there on the Internets somewhere. People in real life know too and oddly enough THEY'RE the ones that are bugging me. It's not that I'm being discriminated against or hassled or bullied. That doesn't happen. It certainly doesn't happen twice. *grin*
So, I meet someone for the first time and we know each other for a while and that's fine. Then a friend of mine comes up and says, within an hour, something about my being gay. It doesn't even really fit into the conversation so much as it's a comment. Maybe to show how hip they are that they know "a gay" or how OK with it they are or what. I've got no idea. But I know in at least two cases I've had the new person I met say to me later, "I didn't know you were gay, hadn't thought you were gay, and while it's OK(1) and all... it was just a little awkward to have that thrown out there like that so soon on meeting you." OK. That's not verbatim but it's the gist of what was said twice.
I'm not ashamed of who I am at all. It's not that I'm necessarily closeted, I'm not. But I don't think my sexuality is appropriate conversation when I'm just meeting someone, unless I'm trying to hook up with them (and I'm off the market so that's not really an issue either.) I think it's just rude. I'm not offended by it so much as I would rather that the new people I meet form an opinion of me that isn't based on who I love. I'm a little over being the token gay.
Among friends I'll make comments or jokes or observations that I wouldn't make among new people. But it's like that with a lot of things, not just my sexuality. I wouldn't talk about other people's private lives in the first hour I meet someone they've only just met. Private issues, like sexuality, politics, religion, prior criminal background, stance on drugs, etc... Those aren't really great topics for conversation when first meeting someone in my opinion.
So, if you know a gay, let them decide who and when to talk about it. It's their decision. Or rather, it's OUR decision.

"When I started writing about myself, I waited as long as I could before I told you I was gay, because once you reveal that, it seems like it’s all anyone can think about."

Sprout by David Peck

(1) I love how often ppl say "It's OK" or "It's your choice and that's OK" and they're really not meaning it in a bad way at all but it sounds hinky to my ears. a) I know it's OK and b) I'm pretty sure I didn't choose it.

The upside to getting older

I've got to say out front. I'm not a fan of getting older. Yes. There are advantages: cheaper insurance, much better self-confidence, and a little more patience than I had when I was younger. Those are all great, and go a long way towards peace of mind and general well-being. That said, I'm not a fan of getting older.

An advantage to getting older though that IS worth it is getting to be friends with my parents. Not just friendly, but the mental-age discrepancy and power imbalance of parent/child isn't there any more. I'm old enough now to remember my parents at my age. (If that makes sense to you, cool. If not, just move along. It's not a key thought, just an observation.) It's cool I think to be able to be friends with my parents. It doesn't mean they're perfect or did everything right or that we had a Brady life. It was pretty good and they did really good in my opinion. If I had kids I'd let 'em raise them and that's a compliment... the part where they would say "Hell no! We did our time! You having one just like you is one of our prayers answered!" is beside the point.

I'm just really glad to have both of them still there, and still together, and that they're the kind of people I would want to be friends with. Everybody's not that lucky and I lucked out and drew a good card when they were handing out parents. For that, I'm pretty thankful.

Today I was 17 again for a little while.

Once upon a time I went to High School in Germany and when I graduated and left I didn't think I'd ever see those people again. Not because I didn't want to, just because we were from all over the place and meeting back at our high school in a different country from where we were going to go to colleges or get jobs seemed like a really big challenge to me.

Today I got to go have lunch with a friend of mine from back then and it was awesome. Sometimes I miss the feeling of growing up in a town where you went to school with everyone around you. I wonder what that's like for you to know everyone and all the people they've dated on and on... it seems like a romantic small-town idea to me. I know people like that. I'm not like that. Seeing +Eric Coffman was full of awesome sauce. It was more special, the meeting, as he was going somewhere else we met up for lunch and a walk of the Iowa State Capitol grounds while we talked and that made it special, rare, and poignant... a fleeting connection to a past I wouldn't trade for anything.

Ordinary people who inspire me...

Scott Johnson is a lot of things but I know him as a pocaster. He does several podcasts I listen to and enjoy.

He's silly, funny, and sounds like he'd be a lot of fun to know.

He recently did a podcast where he talked about religion and what it means to him in his podcast he does with Mark "Turpster" Turpin. I'll do a whole blog post on that one soon. It's been rolling around in my head for a while. It's not ripe yet.

This is something he recorded one day and released into the wild to share with us and it's so poignant and cool to hear a dad talk like this. I really do look admire him.

http://www.myextralife.com/diary-of-a-cartoonist/diary-152-the-boy/

Give it a listen.

Quote: What am I running from?

From the book "Where the Hell is Matt?: Dancing Badly Around the World." by Matt Harding. 

 

I was in transit.

And for as long as I remained that way, I
felt okay. When I stopped moving, that was
when problems caught up with me

But then I thought: airports are soulless,
antiseptic, and generic. Why am I at peace
here? Why am I only happy when I'm on my
way somewhere?

I suppose the next question is fairly obvi-
ous. But it had only just occurred to me:

What am I running from?

Sourced from Google Books.
(I wish there were a satisfactory way to do block quotes in G+)

Where the Hell Is Matt? (Link leads to the page with the quote in Google Books)

Dammit!

You ever watch The New Adventures of Old Christine? I love it. She is funny to me. Julie Louis Dreyfuss or whatever... I love her in that role. I remind me of her sometimes.

So, I'm paranoid of being perceived as racist. I'm a blond, middle-aged, white guy. If anybody fits the stereo-type of a racist or The Man... it's me. I failed to mention I'm in amazing shape, stunningly good looking, and have trophy wives on each arm... the reason I failed to mention is it that none of that is true. Middle aged white guy with blond hair, that's true. Paranoid about being perceived as racist, also true.

I ALWAYS lock my car. I've talked about this before... but I can't find where. Maybe it was on facebook.

I pull up to a friend's house and across the street a non-white couple with 2 kids lives. We've chatted in passing and we know each other well enough to wave and say "Hey." That's about it. The day in question there were about a dozen non-white kids in the yard and their parents on the sidewalk as I pulled up. I got out and looked at them and waved to the two people I knew and they waved back... then I was about to put the key in the door and lock it, AS I ALWAYS DO (so I won't lock my keys in the car)... when I froze... oh crap. They're going to think I'm locking the door because of all those non-blondes over there! So. I didn't lock the car. I was only going to be gone like 3 minutes. It wound up being more like five.  While I was gone half the kids and all the adults left.

I was half way down the block before I realized my ipod, previously in the passenger seat, was gone. SONOFA#*&^@!!!! See! This is what I get for being sensitive to what other ppl think! I get screwed! Now, it's not because of the race of the kids that the ipod is gone. It's because there were a half dozen of them, unattended, and I'd left them a crime of opportunity. Dammit! If I'd locked the door I'd still have my ipod. Now I have a steaming pile of nothing.

So, from now on... locking the door. If they get their feelings hurt they can pitch a fit. But I had my ipod stolen dangit! Those things aren't cheap. I'm still pissed about it.

BAT!!!!

I woke up last night around 2am and thought I heard something in the room. I decided it was the wind against the house. We'd been having pretty dramatic thunderstorms as I went to sleep. At 4am when I woke up again the sound was unmistakably in the room with me. It was the thwp thwp thwp sound of leathery wings. I opened my eyes as adrenaline dumped itself into my bloodstream jerking me from asleep to infrawake... an awake as beyond awake as infrared is beyond red. In the darkness of the room my eyes, the Optometrist said I have light eyes and better than average night vision because of it so I could discern in the 16 million greys of the room the shape of what could only be a bat flying around the room.

I reached over and turned on the lamp, trusting the light to drive it from the room. It did and I left, in a single adrenaline fueled motion from under the covers in bed to the door where I slammed it shut and turned on all the lights in my room. Grabbing a hoodie and my flannel pants I armored up, pulled the racquet ball racquet  out from under the bed and went into the dining room. First I stopped at the thing I have by the door to my bedroom, the little cabinet thing dad made. On top of it was a baseball cap. I snugged it onto my head and as I reached to open the door my eyes were drawn to the bill of the cap, a scant 3 inches in front of my eyes... I call it the bill of the baseball cap... I'm sure to a bat it looked like a landing spot, a roost, a perfect place to land after flying all over some weird geography out of which he could not escape. With a shudder I jerked the cap off my head as I imagined, quite vividly, the little winged rat hanging from the bill of my cap and staring at me, eye to eye across a distance of inches before he opens his mouth in an upside down grin, teeth glistening, wet from rabies filled saliva. *shudder*

The shape of the leathery winged sharp-toothed intruder was dashing back and forth from living to dining room. I darted forward and opened the door to the porch then went around and turned the light on in the kitchen as I went to the bathroom and turned the lights on in there and shut the door. My goal was to use the light to drive him out of the house and onto the porch. When I returned to the dining room he was gone. Unsure if he was hanging from the curtains in the living room or out on the porch I shut the door to the porch. "I can open it again later if I need to." I thought. "But I'll feel like an ass if he comes in off the porch." Now that I've lost him I search all the corners, walls, and where I can see on the curtains for the bat .I don't see him anywhere. I look under the cabinets over the counter and nothing. I don't find him anywhere. I retreat to my room, leaving all the lights on except in the living room... including the lights in my room. I roll a poster tube in front of the crack at the base of the door. I aim a fan at the door and turn it on. I've read somewhere they don't like drafts. There I lay in bed under covers, eyes peeled open waiting to hear him or his mate in the room with me. Finally I came down from my fear induced adrenaline rush and I pulled the covers over my head and went to sleep with all the lights and lamps on in my room.

I should clarify I'm OK with bats outside. Bats are wonderful things outside. They're fascinating creatures, navigating by sonar, eating their weight in bugs every twenty minutes or something like that... amazing animals. BUT. They're outside animals like camels or walrusi, or kangaroo. They don't belong in any house I'm in... and if I have the choice between being inside with 1 our outside with many I'll pick outside every time. Something about having them in the house with me makes me shudder just to think about it. I hate those things.

I often say things like, "I'm really doing better." or "I'm trying to do better." I won't lie. I didn't do better. I was freaked out and ready to go sleep in the car. I hate bats. I'm dreading going to the house tonight and wondering where it is. I keep whirling around to see if it's about to land on my shirt and ride me around like an Indian Mahout rides an elephant.