@ VIRGINIA BEACH
I can't believe that I once lived this close to the Atlantic Ocean, and had never gone in. Lying on the beach, sitting with Son #1 and his sweetie on one blanket, me and the SFC on the other, the desire to walk into the ocean came and lifted me to my feet. Soon, I will be going home and to not have a story like the one I would create, was for me, stupifying. Being able to say that I went and stood in the Alantic Ocean, and had I a mind, could have tried to swim to England ...
Well, that is what the story in my mind read, even though it is a well established fact, that I can't swim! I didn't wait for anyone to get up and go with me, I had made up my mind, jean shorts and all, that I was going to walk into the ocean.
Moving pass people lying on the beach getting sun, and the children running along in the wash where the shore meets the water, the feeling of standing against the waves pulled on me, as each wave went back out to sea. You could say that it also eroded my good sense, because from 'getting my feet wet', it became, 'walk to your neck' out into the Ocean.
____________________
It is only now, with the benefit of hindsight AND experience, i.e. TIME that I look back and see that I take risks. Though they never seem that way at the time, and they come from an inspiration that makes me think they are well concocted, I understand how it may seem reckless to others.
'Working without a net', is how I feel about how it is that I live my life. Part of it is that I never really thought I had anyone whose advice I could value. That is what it is, and that is that with that. That is also why anyone that really knows me, knows that by the time they have 'heard' of something I am considering, that the next time they see or hear of me, it will be after whatever has been 'done'.
For the things that I want to do, once I really want to do them, I don't need no stinkin' badges!! I go on and get to doing it. And that is why I was walking into the ocean alone. My SFC was lounging, and I wanted to go at that moment. Had I waited, I may have reconsidered going out. So without a moments hesitation, I strode out into the Atlantic.
And I still hadn't learned how to swim.
____________________
The water was relatively warm as it lapped at my feet. People were laughing, some were body surfing as the surf petered out. I could see 'tweens and teens' getting tossed by the waves, and that only made me walk out more intently. Seeing people getting strewn, made me think of nature trying to knock me down. It was with defiance and that the Ocean was calm that I kept walking into her. Had it clipped me at knee level, or even waist level, I would have stopped. Laughing, I'd return to shore, 'mission accomplished'. But she didn't. And I kept walking intently.
It wasn't until I reached the outer ring of bathers, two teenage girls, that I thought about where I was at. I first thought, 'Gee, these are some TALL girls', then I realized that they weren't 'tall', but that they were 'swimmers'. They were out treading water. Wave came and topped my head, and my toes 'hung', they didn't have anything beneath them. Another step, maybe two ..?
Turning as the wave passed, staring directly at the girl nearest to me, I said with a smile but matter of fact, "Hey, but I can't swim. FOR REAL. Could you take my hand?' I don't think she got how serious that I was, so just as calm but no less serious, I repeated myself ...
... and I saw my SFC right behind her. I knew then that I wouldn't be taken out into the water. Certainly that is where I was heading (silly a$$ me!) as the girl took my limply extended arm. I didn't want to 'pull' on her, but make contact so that I would have traction and start my way back to shore.
Looking into your clear blue eyes filled with worry, my smile grew even wider. It feels as I have been ,walking into the ocean' all my life, and never had anyone ever came to bring me back to shore.
Until today.
Monday, June 29, 2009
Saturday, June 27, 2009
TRANQUILITY BASE HERE ...
THE EAGLE HAS LANDED..!
And day one was as good as anyone could have anticiapted! I felt the same feelings that I felt for the SFC that I did the first time I saw her! We will be busy going down to run errands, hang out at Virginia Beach, and getting to know one another all over again.
Thought I would let y'all know!! See you when I see you!!
And day one was as good as anyone could have anticiapted! I felt the same feelings that I felt for the SFC that I did the first time I saw her! We will be busy going down to run errands, hang out at Virginia Beach, and getting to know one another all over again.
Thought I would let y'all know!! See you when I see you!!
Friday, June 26, 2009
FROM ASTROPIXIE
QUOTE FOR TODAY
“the art of living does not consist in preserving and clinging to a particular mood of happiness, but in allowing happiness to change its form without being disappointed by the change, for happiness, like a child, must be allowed to grow up.”- charles morgan
See everyone real soon ...
Love and Rockets!
Mark
“the art of living does not consist in preserving and clinging to a particular mood of happiness, but in allowing happiness to change its form without being disappointed by the change, for happiness, like a child, must be allowed to grow up.”- charles morgan
See everyone real soon ...
Love and Rockets!
Mark
Thursday, June 25, 2009
THE BIRTH AND DEATH OF THE DAY
Of all the fan videos of this song, several of them very good pieces of film making, this is my personal favourite. It takes me back to a place and a time that I have never had, but knew was going to happen.
It is just as I thought it would be ... back in my angsty teen age years when kids from my high school were getting caught up at Northland Mall by hard cases from Cooley High. "That stuff happens to other people, but it doesn't happen to me!!" And like the crew of the Enterprise, I would go off, boldly!
Right now, I don't know what to think. Told the SFC (that sounds more appropriate, so there you go!!) that I am going to be so nervous. But I will fake it until I can make it!!
All of this happened so fast. In the beginning of May, I made my trip to go to Nebraska, to get started on what I had to get started on. I was sure that I was going to set my mark to get there. Then near the end of the month, when I was running yet another 'check', to make sure that this was being done in the order I needed to do it, I got chewed out.
I had been asking my friend, of whom I was putting blind faith in, if how I was sequencing my trip was fine to her. It was going to be a short trip, because I was going to go there, to ostensibly build a new life. Yet again. Alone.
This has taken a lot out of me. There is a Far Side panel, with a dog on a riding a unicycle on the high wire as he juggled ... the caption read, "Rex was an old dog, but this was a new trick!" I thought it spoke to the problem of being an 'old dog' isn't of being 'old', but the other issues of experience that comes with being old. You don't think that I haven't asked myself many, many, times if I wasn't too old for this kind of stuff? Even when I would break down, and say 'yes, challenged boy, you are too old for this kind of stuff', I could still see a flicker of light ... hope, is that you?
So I asked for yet another turn.
_________________________
I can't really say what has had ME worried about going west. I mean, I was determined to do it anyway. It was a four day trip, and that seemed like it would be enough time, especially since I was going to come back in a few short months to live out there. You know what I thought was one of the issues? That I was REALLY going to do this! I mean, I am experiencing a version of what Nebraska may have been feeling ...impatience at FINALLY being able to have this person around, who once had been a dot on the horizon. That someone who wanted to be something to her, had made the big move, taken the plunge off the cliff, to essentially be with her.
That is what I think. But 'privacy laws' prevents me from saying much more. I will say that when someone puts so much in your hands, you have to be careful how you handle it. That is why Beth didn't know if I was antsy, because you NEVER show panic. NEVER. That is something that I know I have in me. I would tell people that I was 'pressure proof'. A fictional character, Andy Dufrense symbolizes how I go about being put in situations.
What ever it would have taken for me to settle out somewhere, ANYWHERE, I know how to 'behave like a fighter', and accomplish what I am setting out to get done. The one thing I could have asked her, Nebraska, is has she ever been cliff diving?
My answer for her? No, she hasn't. Don't matter why she hasn't, it only matters that I think that SHE HASN'T. To me, that is what kept showing in her.
______________________
In catching up with the SFC, we have found so many similiarites that we have between us, things that you would have thought we knew, but never did. Our bond was instant, so some of the things that act as the spackle to keep things together, we never discussed. That we both were kids fresh out of high school who came to the conclusion that a career in the military would be the best thing for us, of course, is a big sign. But there are millions of cats in OD green who thought that.
What made us unique, is that we found each other.
She is even MORE of a 'yes you can', ultra positive person than I am. I love how she rationalizes things, and the way that she thinks. Of course, I love that she is going to give us this chance as well.
I rememeber the order of the conversation that led to her sending for me. There was the 'yadda, yadda' talk, then came the 'what are you doing?'. This is the first week of June, June 8th in fact. I know because that is when we did our 'pinky promise' and changed our Facebook status. I call it a 'pinky promise', because prior to being asked, I had thought of that as something that was non binding, yet meant a heck of a lot to the people who were involved.
Now, my 'status' actually meant something to me. And to her.
_____________________
The sun rises in the east ... and it sets in the west. Everything that happens in between is like the dash between the dates, and all that really matters.
It has been a long and winding road to get here ... and yes Patricia, we still have a longer road to go. The important thing is, I am going to take my destiny in my hands, and find out what I am going to make of the wonderful opportunity I have been given.
It is just as I thought it would be ... back in my angsty teen age years when kids from my high school were getting caught up at Northland Mall by hard cases from Cooley High. "That stuff happens to other people, but it doesn't happen to me!!" And like the crew of the Enterprise, I would go off, boldly!
Right now, I don't know what to think. Told the SFC (that sounds more appropriate, so there you go!!) that I am going to be so nervous. But I will fake it until I can make it!!
All of this happened so fast. In the beginning of May, I made my trip to go to Nebraska, to get started on what I had to get started on. I was sure that I was going to set my mark to get there. Then near the end of the month, when I was running yet another 'check', to make sure that this was being done in the order I needed to do it, I got chewed out.
I had been asking my friend, of whom I was putting blind faith in, if how I was sequencing my trip was fine to her. It was going to be a short trip, because I was going to go there, to ostensibly build a new life. Yet again. Alone.
This has taken a lot out of me. There is a Far Side panel, with a dog on a riding a unicycle on the high wire as he juggled ... the caption read, "Rex was an old dog, but this was a new trick!" I thought it spoke to the problem of being an 'old dog' isn't of being 'old', but the other issues of experience that comes with being old. You don't think that I haven't asked myself many, many, times if I wasn't too old for this kind of stuff? Even when I would break down, and say 'yes, challenged boy, you are too old for this kind of stuff', I could still see a flicker of light ... hope, is that you?
So I asked for yet another turn.
_________________________
I can't really say what has had ME worried about going west. I mean, I was determined to do it anyway. It was a four day trip, and that seemed like it would be enough time, especially since I was going to come back in a few short months to live out there. You know what I thought was one of the issues? That I was REALLY going to do this! I mean, I am experiencing a version of what Nebraska may have been feeling ...impatience at FINALLY being able to have this person around, who once had been a dot on the horizon. That someone who wanted to be something to her, had made the big move, taken the plunge off the cliff, to essentially be with her.
That is what I think. But 'privacy laws' prevents me from saying much more. I will say that when someone puts so much in your hands, you have to be careful how you handle it. That is why Beth didn't know if I was antsy, because you NEVER show panic. NEVER. That is something that I know I have in me. I would tell people that I was 'pressure proof'. A fictional character, Andy Dufrense symbolizes how I go about being put in situations.
What ever it would have taken for me to settle out somewhere, ANYWHERE, I know how to 'behave like a fighter', and accomplish what I am setting out to get done. The one thing I could have asked her, Nebraska, is has she ever been cliff diving?
My answer for her? No, she hasn't. Don't matter why she hasn't, it only matters that I think that SHE HASN'T. To me, that is what kept showing in her.
______________________
In catching up with the SFC, we have found so many similiarites that we have between us, things that you would have thought we knew, but never did. Our bond was instant, so some of the things that act as the spackle to keep things together, we never discussed. That we both were kids fresh out of high school who came to the conclusion that a career in the military would be the best thing for us, of course, is a big sign. But there are millions of cats in OD green who thought that.
What made us unique, is that we found each other.
She is even MORE of a 'yes you can', ultra positive person than I am. I love how she rationalizes things, and the way that she thinks. Of course, I love that she is going to give us this chance as well.
I rememeber the order of the conversation that led to her sending for me. There was the 'yadda, yadda' talk, then came the 'what are you doing?'. This is the first week of June, June 8th in fact. I know because that is when we did our 'pinky promise' and changed our Facebook status. I call it a 'pinky promise', because prior to being asked, I had thought of that as something that was non binding, yet meant a heck of a lot to the people who were involved.
Now, my 'status' actually meant something to me. And to her.
_____________________
The sun rises in the east ... and it sets in the west. Everything that happens in between is like the dash between the dates, and all that really matters.
It has been a long and winding road to get here ... and yes Patricia, we still have a longer road to go. The important thing is, I am going to take my destiny in my hands, and find out what I am going to make of the wonderful opportunity I have been given.
NOT THAT 'RANDOM' OF THOUGHTS
FIRST ... FROM READERS!
ps i am glad you didnt go all the way out there, my worry was that you would of left and gotten taken advantage of somehow in the guise of something that wasnt all it was cracked up to be.
Oh my ... this made me smile sooo broadly. It was something like this that was one of, if not the first reaction from my Jersey Girl, near the top of them!!
Like most people who really know me, I say that I am going to go and skin a bear, bare handed, then you better hide all the bears in the neighborhood! You know, though to be sure my Mom fretted about me, I am a little uncomfortable with people being concerned about me.
Not going to bore you with that stuff, but I have started to come around to accepting concerns for my well being. So from, "There's no crying in boxing", to saying, "if you really think it is a bad idea, I guess I won't ride from here to Gratiot & 14 mile Road (instead, I went from here to Garden City!) on the first blazing hot and humid day of the year.
I was not worried about what would happen to me, though. Had I not weighed out my concerns prior to making my decision, I wouldn't have been telling myself I was going to go out there anyway.
UNDER THE LIGHT OF DIRECT COMPARISON
Don't know what else I could say ... I mean the SFC has already laid out for me and I have done the same thing for her. We have had to keep each other from cracking up, in some tense situations.
I don't know if I am sharing this part because for continuity sake or not, but here goes. I can tell you that I am anal, and the important stuff that is on my mind will recycle, until whatever is recycling it, is satisfied. For instance, though I know that I have packed everything I need, I struggle not to unpack and re-pack everything, checking off a hard copy checklist, that I checked off when I packed.
Even though we were admin soldiers, you are first and always a soldier. And unless Terry Tate is looking for you because you didn't use the correct cover sheet, it is different kind of atmosphere in the military ... PARTICULARLY during an action.
Anywho, I dealt with me getting on Nebraska's nerves ... again, I know that I can do that to some people. But because dontcha know, I actually keep my plans to myself, and this relying on someone to help me out was TOTALLY new, it made me squirrely.
Not so much at something like the above happening, but that something that involves the personal choreography as a big intra state move to unknown country...
But I have spoken enough about that. What is that phrase I have plopped into comments ... oh yeah, GET OVER IT.
I would much rather look ahead to whatever it is that awaits!
GOING ON HIATUS
I am due back in the Motor on the 5th of July ... IF I come back. Virginia IS for lovers, and that is what we plan to be to each other. When I think about the some of the rationale for going over people I knew ... that they would be able to tell that my true self is true to them, it doesn't get any better than this.
While it will get said, it will be quite refreshing to say to someone, "You know, I would do anything for you", and know that THEY KNOW you mean exactly that. To hear and have someone claim you as theirs and KNOW that is exactly what they mean.
The long walk down the gangway into the terminal at Reagan Airport (someone mentioned somewhere how ironic that the nat'l airport is named for the cat who broke up that ATC's union!)...
Not going to be trying to keep up out here ... will try to take good notes and DEFINITELY will be in love!!
ps i am glad you didnt go all the way out there, my worry was that you would of left and gotten taken advantage of somehow in the guise of something that wasnt all it was cracked up to be.
Oh my ... this made me smile sooo broadly. It was something like this that was one of, if not the first reaction from my Jersey Girl, near the top of them!!
Like most people who really know me, I say that I am going to go and skin a bear, bare handed, then you better hide all the bears in the neighborhood! You know, though to be sure my Mom fretted about me, I am a little uncomfortable with people being concerned about me.
Not going to bore you with that stuff, but I have started to come around to accepting concerns for my well being. So from, "There's no crying in boxing", to saying, "if you really think it is a bad idea, I guess I won't ride from here to Gratiot & 14 mile Road (instead, I went from here to Garden City!) on the first blazing hot and humid day of the year.
I was not worried about what would happen to me, though. Had I not weighed out my concerns prior to making my decision, I wouldn't have been telling myself I was going to go out there anyway.
UNDER THE LIGHT OF DIRECT COMPARISON
Don't know what else I could say ... I mean the SFC has already laid out for me and I have done the same thing for her. We have had to keep each other from cracking up, in some tense situations.
I don't know if I am sharing this part because for continuity sake or not, but here goes. I can tell you that I am anal, and the important stuff that is on my mind will recycle, until whatever is recycling it, is satisfied. For instance, though I know that I have packed everything I need, I struggle not to unpack and re-pack everything, checking off a hard copy checklist, that I checked off when I packed.
Even though we were admin soldiers, you are first and always a soldier. And unless Terry Tate is looking for you because you didn't use the correct cover sheet, it is different kind of atmosphere in the military ... PARTICULARLY during an action.
Anywho, I dealt with me getting on Nebraska's nerves ... again, I know that I can do that to some people. But because dontcha know, I actually keep my plans to myself, and this relying on someone to help me out was TOTALLY new, it made me squirrely.
Not so much at something like the above happening, but that something that involves the personal choreography as a big intra state move to unknown country...
But I have spoken enough about that. What is that phrase I have plopped into comments ... oh yeah, GET OVER IT.
I would much rather look ahead to whatever it is that awaits!
GOING ON HIATUS
I am due back in the Motor on the 5th of July ... IF I come back. Virginia IS for lovers, and that is what we plan to be to each other. When I think about the some of the rationale for going over people I knew ... that they would be able to tell that my true self is true to them, it doesn't get any better than this.
While it will get said, it will be quite refreshing to say to someone, "You know, I would do anything for you", and know that THEY KNOW you mean exactly that. To hear and have someone claim you as theirs and KNOW that is exactly what they mean.
The long walk down the gangway into the terminal at Reagan Airport (someone mentioned somewhere how ironic that the nat'l airport is named for the cat who broke up that ATC's union!)...
Not going to be trying to keep up out here ... will try to take good notes and DEFINITELY will be in love!!
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
I HAVE NEVER BEEN MORE READY IN MY ENTIRE LIFE TO DO THIS RIGHT NOW
NEVER
There is no obsequiousness in my words when I talk about my attachment with my SFC. It isn't that she is the only one that could have called me and pull me into her life at the last second, I am the only person she could have thought to call to invite in to her life from out of the blue.
Y'all do know I don't even know what she looks like now, don't you? We are both about the same regarding photos, so she doesn't have any up of herself on line. But if Alaina could find herself around to take and post a unobscured photo, then we will have to work around our picture phobia.
And I can't wait for y'all to see her. Now, the rest of the story that the prelude was attached to from the other day.
PICKING THROUGH THE 'TRASH'
One thing I've learned, being single at 50, is that you can forget the idea that someone is going to fall from the sky unencumbered by any complications. If I was straight, I'd almost assuredly be dating someone separated or divorced, perhaps with kids. It's almost suspicious to meet someone without some sort of baggage. If they're attractive, smart and funny, other men will have noticed before me; and if they are emotional healthy, they will have had involvements, sometimes recently. You can sit at home and lament the dearth of white knights without a past galloping by to take you to their castle, or you can get to know people and let things develop or not just by being yourself and having an open heart.
I hope he doesn't mind, but I snagged this from Marc's journal the other day. I think that it covers why what I consider my 'frustrations' with the partnership rituals may sound harsh, bitter even. I have no bitterness, and if I did, I would be directed at me. I am the one who couldn't do what I needed to do, to be who and what I wanted to be.
'Arrested Development' wasn't just one of the funniest shows on the telly during its run, but it is also a mental state, too. Talking with women, and their unrealistic expectations in love, their misguided approach to it, and their own inflated (or as damaging, insecure) sense of self that makes them worthless in a real relationship ...
... and a 'real relationship' is described in Marc's words for anyone who have lived life. Maybe that is it ... I wonder how much of life have these women lead? Do they ever leave the confines of their own mind, the ideas that scramble in their head? The blinged out fantasies of videos and tabloid magazines?
Instead of making the necessary adjustments to get to know someone, these women cling beyond the 'fail safe' point to their immature notions of a dashing prince, sweeping them off in a fairytale fashion ... them and their assorted children, their Mom and her crap sibs and then THEIR ADD children ...
... you get my point. Though I don't think I had unrealistic hopes with either Mookie or Tee Jay, it sort of was disappointing to discover that they stopped growing ... and gee, I really did dream that Tee Jay's Mom told me that she was 'somewhere else', mentally.
Though I write regularly, I have been on here writing nearly every day this month. Honestly, I am looking forward to the day where I am NOT writing ... coming out to comment, and an entry maybe two or three times a week. I want to spend as much time with my Jersey Girl as I can.
For me, that would include being lost in thought of her. I happen to think that some men & women don't quite know 'how' to be IN LOVE. Somehow, it is as if it's a bad thing to be IN with someone. To hang on their words, to be willing to do whatever it is, in their interest. When did being compliant to your partner get such a bad name?
Family shows of my time ... 'The Cosby Show', 'The Waltons', 'Little House On The Prairie' ... they have been replaced by cartoonish dysfunction in the form of 'The Simpsons', and 'Family Guy' ... even the show I referenced, 'Arrested Development'.
When did being part of stable, safe, household get to be such a great punchline?
I guess this entry is one of contrasts, because whenever I want to make a case for 'dealing', sometimes 'dreaming' gets in the way. They are at extremes, and somewhere between the two is the life that we are all living in.
What can I say about my girl? That she is nothing I would have expected at the same time she is everything I could have wanted? I do know that I have never looked at anyone with the eyes that I had for her, and held such a unsullied picture of in my mind.
Saying that we are going to do 'fine' is being modest. We are going to be wonderful together. I told her that we are going to be the couple that people look at, and wish that they had the love and the affection that we will exude when we are together. That they'd wish to have someone in their life that when one is asked about the other, the far away, lost in love look comes over them, and the person asking can only shake their head in envy.
That is what I am looking forward to sharing with my dear friend. And no, there is no air in that, big boy!
THE END!
There is no obsequiousness in my words when I talk about my attachment with my SFC. It isn't that she is the only one that could have called me and pull me into her life at the last second, I am the only person she could have thought to call to invite in to her life from out of the blue.
Y'all do know I don't even know what she looks like now, don't you? We are both about the same regarding photos, so she doesn't have any up of herself on line. But if Alaina could find herself around to take and post a unobscured photo, then we will have to work around our picture phobia.
And I can't wait for y'all to see her. Now, the rest of the story that the prelude was attached to from the other day.
PICKING THROUGH THE 'TRASH'
One thing I've learned, being single at 50, is that you can forget the idea that someone is going to fall from the sky unencumbered by any complications. If I was straight, I'd almost assuredly be dating someone separated or divorced, perhaps with kids. It's almost suspicious to meet someone without some sort of baggage. If they're attractive, smart and funny, other men will have noticed before me; and if they are emotional healthy, they will have had involvements, sometimes recently. You can sit at home and lament the dearth of white knights without a past galloping by to take you to their castle, or you can get to know people and let things develop or not just by being yourself and having an open heart.
I hope he doesn't mind, but I snagged this from Marc's journal the other day. I think that it covers why what I consider my 'frustrations' with the partnership rituals may sound harsh, bitter even. I have no bitterness, and if I did, I would be directed at me. I am the one who couldn't do what I needed to do, to be who and what I wanted to be.
'Arrested Development' wasn't just one of the funniest shows on the telly during its run, but it is also a mental state, too. Talking with women, and their unrealistic expectations in love, their misguided approach to it, and their own inflated (or as damaging, insecure) sense of self that makes them worthless in a real relationship ...
... and a 'real relationship' is described in Marc's words for anyone who have lived life. Maybe that is it ... I wonder how much of life have these women lead? Do they ever leave the confines of their own mind, the ideas that scramble in their head? The blinged out fantasies of videos and tabloid magazines?
Instead of making the necessary adjustments to get to know someone, these women cling beyond the 'fail safe' point to their immature notions of a dashing prince, sweeping them off in a fairytale fashion ... them and their assorted children, their Mom and her crap sibs and then THEIR ADD children ...
... you get my point. Though I don't think I had unrealistic hopes with either Mookie or Tee Jay, it sort of was disappointing to discover that they stopped growing ... and gee, I really did dream that Tee Jay's Mom told me that she was 'somewhere else', mentally.
Though I write regularly, I have been on here writing nearly every day this month. Honestly, I am looking forward to the day where I am NOT writing ... coming out to comment, and an entry maybe two or three times a week. I want to spend as much time with my Jersey Girl as I can.
For me, that would include being lost in thought of her. I happen to think that some men & women don't quite know 'how' to be IN LOVE. Somehow, it is as if it's a bad thing to be IN with someone. To hang on their words, to be willing to do whatever it is, in their interest. When did being compliant to your partner get such a bad name?
Family shows of my time ... 'The Cosby Show', 'The Waltons', 'Little House On The Prairie' ... they have been replaced by cartoonish dysfunction in the form of 'The Simpsons', and 'Family Guy' ... even the show I referenced, 'Arrested Development'.
When did being part of stable, safe, household get to be such a great punchline?
I guess this entry is one of contrasts, because whenever I want to make a case for 'dealing', sometimes 'dreaming' gets in the way. They are at extremes, and somewhere between the two is the life that we are all living in.
What can I say about my girl? That she is nothing I would have expected at the same time she is everything I could have wanted? I do know that I have never looked at anyone with the eyes that I had for her, and held such a unsullied picture of in my mind.
Saying that we are going to do 'fine' is being modest. We are going to be wonderful together. I told her that we are going to be the couple that people look at, and wish that they had the love and the affection that we will exude when we are together. That they'd wish to have someone in their life that when one is asked about the other, the far away, lost in love look comes over them, and the person asking can only shake their head in envy.
That is what I am looking forward to sharing with my dear friend. And no, there is no air in that, big boy!
THE END!
MY LOVE IS AS SHARP AS A NEEDLE IN YOUR EYE
HAVE YOU EVER WONDERED, 'WHAT'S IT LIKE?'
*sigh* But it is a good, soft, summer sigh on the first 90 degree day of the year (or so the Germans would have you believe). No more running for the rest of the week ... the SFC said I can do all that stuff with her. And I agree, because I do indeed plan on 'doing stuff' with her!
Marc made a post about some potential 'new what's happenin' in his life, and he spoke of the different issues facing people in relationships as they mature. I won't excerpt it here ... saving it for a more in depth entry.
What is on my mind today, is that one of the things that I am looking forward to discovering, is the question that many people ask, but I wonder how many of them understand what they are asking when they wonder ... what they would do, if someone did for them, what they did for whoever left them. Answering the egotistical notion that their brand of love is so superior that what they gave to 'whoever' is so supercalifragilistic, that whoever must be 'a fool to pass them by'.
Many people who are hoping to be in love, seeking it, recovering from its loss, or chasing it into hopelessness, ask themselves "What's it like, to be loved by someone the way that I am capable of loving?"
A lot of times, we are so caught up in the wash of what we are doing, that we have tend to have a grander sense of what 'our love' is. I have sort of 'thought' that I left some positive things behind me ... I mean, I have had some folks lay themselves bare in my day. Getting dx'd by Mookie and re-shelved by Tee Jay is the LEAST of what they themselves experienced when I told them that 'I don't'.
I think that they were understood then, even as they know now, that I 'could have been' that person for them. But like most remakes, they fall short of the original, no matter how good the latest version is. 'Cape Fear' and 'The Manchurian Candidate' are two examples of what I mean. De Niro as great as he is, is no Mitchum ... no matter how good Glenn Close is, Angela Landsbury makes you wonder how did she ever get to be the crime solver in 'Murder, She Wrote'.
When I was with Mookie, and things became inevitable, I decided to focus on being the person that I wanted to be. Let me tell you, it wasn't easy. Still, I figured that I was supposed to be learning something for down the line, so I stuck it out.
You get what you ask for and you also tend to get what you deserve. I think that means that you do what you have to, so that you can recieve what you are wanting. And however you have been preparing, will you be able to determine what you have earned.
I get all shuddery, when I remember what I felt about the SFC (note; she did say I could call her 'Jersey Girl') when we served together ... of course it wasn't what everyone else thought. And those images allow for realistic expectations, that the actualization is greater than I thought.
She really loves me. People, you just don't know how much she loves me.
I guess, I wonder what people think when they are face with what they wanted from 'that absolutely wonderful person' that you had no idea wanted you too. And their desire for you, is leaving you in the dust.
All I can do is run after her. Just like I always have.
*sigh* But it is a good, soft, summer sigh on the first 90 degree day of the year (or so the Germans would have you believe). No more running for the rest of the week ... the SFC said I can do all that stuff with her. And I agree, because I do indeed plan on 'doing stuff' with her!
Marc made a post about some potential 'new what's happenin' in his life, and he spoke of the different issues facing people in relationships as they mature. I won't excerpt it here ... saving it for a more in depth entry.
What is on my mind today, is that one of the things that I am looking forward to discovering, is the question that many people ask, but I wonder how many of them understand what they are asking when they wonder ... what they would do, if someone did for them, what they did for whoever left them. Answering the egotistical notion that their brand of love is so superior that what they gave to 'whoever' is so supercalifragilistic, that whoever must be 'a fool to pass them by'.
Many people who are hoping to be in love, seeking it, recovering from its loss, or chasing it into hopelessness, ask themselves "What's it like, to be loved by someone the way that I am capable of loving?"
A lot of times, we are so caught up in the wash of what we are doing, that we have tend to have a grander sense of what 'our love' is. I have sort of 'thought' that I left some positive things behind me ... I mean, I have had some folks lay themselves bare in my day. Getting dx'd by Mookie and re-shelved by Tee Jay is the LEAST of what they themselves experienced when I told them that 'I don't'.
I think that they were understood then, even as they know now, that I 'could have been' that person for them. But like most remakes, they fall short of the original, no matter how good the latest version is. 'Cape Fear' and 'The Manchurian Candidate' are two examples of what I mean. De Niro as great as he is, is no Mitchum ... no matter how good Glenn Close is, Angela Landsbury makes you wonder how did she ever get to be the crime solver in 'Murder, She Wrote'.
When I was with Mookie, and things became inevitable, I decided to focus on being the person that I wanted to be. Let me tell you, it wasn't easy. Still, I figured that I was supposed to be learning something for down the line, so I stuck it out.
You get what you ask for and you also tend to get what you deserve. I think that means that you do what you have to, so that you can recieve what you are wanting. And however you have been preparing, will you be able to determine what you have earned.
I get all shuddery, when I remember what I felt about the SFC (note; she did say I could call her 'Jersey Girl') when we served together ... of course it wasn't what everyone else thought. And those images allow for realistic expectations, that the actualization is greater than I thought.
She really loves me. People, you just don't know how much she loves me.
I guess, I wonder what people think when they are face with what they wanted from 'that absolutely wonderful person' that you had no idea wanted you too. And their desire for you, is leaving you in the dust.
All I can do is run after her. Just like I always have.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
...IT ALL COMES DOWN TO THIS MOMENT ...
PRELUDE:
The week before I would fight was invariably the longest one. I called it 'zero week', counting backwards from the beginning. There would be a 'grind week' somewhere near the middle, as the body finally begins to come on line from laying up and eating donuts and drinking yoo hoo's as you go thru regular training.
That would be tough, but that is physically. Mentally you are still fresh and the body is but a slave to the mind. But by zero week, you are worn from drilling on strategy, dealing with what you can and can't do in the ring, and being concerned about maybe even being exposed by your weakness.
As Mills Lane would say, 'Let's Get It On!' Enough talking about it! That is how I am feeling about this week. Friday can't come soon enough.
One of the reasons that football players have empty rhetoric, is that they don't exactly face each other. They play positions, and very rarely is it that someone who lines up directly from you, is the one talking trash.
I used to show up at fights, dressed with a blazer and tie, trying to look the part of someone who was above the level of 'common pugilist', and trying to affect the mildly disinterested sportsman. I would talk about whatever was in the news, always switching the topic from my opponent. There be the gratuitous acknowledgement, but I wouldn't degrade nor compensate for whatever he did well.
Pressed on strategy, I would be prone to say, "Watch the fight, and you tell me what happens. THAT is when we'll know what the strategy is."
As a pro, the only time I tried to agitate someone, was a fight in Vegas. This cat was HUGE. But I kept talking about his feet, and he was foreign, with a heavy accent. His english couldn't keep pace, so I kept telling him that his feet was too big for him to get out of the way. I was going to put a hurt on him, and he wouldn't be able to get away from what I was giving him ... and he didn't!
I haven't seen 'The Right Stuff' in such a long time, that I confused it with the fine show with Craig T. Nelson and Cindy Pickett. Astronauts have such a low margin of error, that only someone who was involved in science, you know like molecular biology or nuclear physics or something like that could really appreciate the low, low tolerances they deal with.
That is what makes them so amazing. They live in a world where that .00001 actually makes a SIGNIFICANT difference. When they have one time to get something done, ONE TIME is what they mean.
In real life, that doesn't happen. We are more tolerant of one another, be it because of our spiritual philosophy, or because in accepting that we all are imperfect, we learn to adjust our expectations. And that is okay, in a way that so many of us accept that it is okay.
Walt Kowalski wasn't as compromising. For him, 'irascible' would have been a compliment. He was a tough SOB, and he wasn't backing down from anyone for any reason.
But I think that there is a reason that we aren't perfect, that we all don't talk the same, or enjoy the same things. A reason for why what appeals to one, can offend the other, and leaves yet someone else indifferent. There is a reason that 'this' is not related to 'that'.
I think that it is that way so that we get to know one another and find something in every one of us. That is what happened to Walt, and he grew as a person. For sure, I have found in reading journals that there is a little bit of each one of us in each other. If we but realized the insignificance of our differences, what kind of world would ...
In speaking about Nebraska, and what I perceived as her lack of 'available space' for me, it made me keep asking myself what was I doing with my life. I mean, this woman had stated her plans ... which had to be neither here nor there to me, because I was being drawn towards something beyond her. She may have been part of my getting there, carried along with me, but what I did know was that I was getting ready to live my life once again.
Remembering when I got my first diagnosis ... and then the hearing ... I simply sucked it up and said what would NOT happen to me. This was not going to be a sentence for me and my dreams. I was not going to allow this to diminish my goals, set upon clouds, aloft in the hazy glow of the sun. The only reason that I could not make any distinction between things was that I was not close enough to see. Things were too far away for me to make out.
I remember my childhood as one of my being annoying. Annoying because I wasn't going to lay down 'just because', annoying because I wasn't going to accept anything but what I considered someone else's best. Yeah, there are a bunch of second place and 'participant' trophies in my life, but hey, I never stopped trying.
Today I lost my cell phone. I had it in the doctor's office, because I had to turn it off. It is missing because ... it's missing. I won't allow myself to get worked up over things. Speaking about 'practice', it is something that apparently isn't going to be different in me, that I am going to want things in a certain order, have a level of security that allows me to feel that I am secure, and not only in a relative way.
I tell myself, and I believe that if I was in a place of my choosing rather than being in of place of 'resort', then things would be different. I would be able to establish my arc, and know that conditions would be as they should, and as expected.
It isn't simply about me not being able to deal with anxiety. It is that anxieties are my enemy. It isn't about dealing with them, it is about avoiding them entirely.
Getting Ken and Beth up from Mexican Town ... I am sure that there were more expedient ways to get 'there, from here', but I couldn't worry myself about all that. I knew what I knew, and that was that. Not that there was anything 'clear and present' about the ride, but I am only saying ...
That is what 'chaotic home life' does for me ... adds to my already anxiety filled life. And why I was again sure that if I had to be to myself, I would be that. Not going to invite an unnecessary risk in my life. Period.
Getting back to the astronaut (man or astro man?) part of this entry, I see two things - one, there is nothing wrong in taking risk. That is a part of life as anything else. People who don't take risk, rarely gain anything out of the gift of living (oh and to be sure, life is a gift ... it is heavy, but I have no doubt that mine is a gift) that they have in their hands. Eventually it turns to dust and crumbs falling between their fingers.
And two, be prepared. There is no air in that (pun not intended ... I wonder if anyone caught it?), because once you get a small thing wrong, the error grows and grows. At some point, you become lost in the error and lost in your mistake. Whatever possibility you can foresee, if you are ready for them, then you will find that you will be able to overcome the ones you DON'T see.
Oh, and to be prepared for the opportunity you didn't expect.
The week before I would fight was invariably the longest one. I called it 'zero week', counting backwards from the beginning. There would be a 'grind week' somewhere near the middle, as the body finally begins to come on line from laying up and eating donuts and drinking yoo hoo's as you go thru regular training.
That would be tough, but that is physically. Mentally you are still fresh and the body is but a slave to the mind. But by zero week, you are worn from drilling on strategy, dealing with what you can and can't do in the ring, and being concerned about maybe even being exposed by your weakness.
As Mills Lane would say, 'Let's Get It On!' Enough talking about it! That is how I am feeling about this week. Friday can't come soon enough.
One of the reasons that football players have empty rhetoric, is that they don't exactly face each other. They play positions, and very rarely is it that someone who lines up directly from you, is the one talking trash.
I used to show up at fights, dressed with a blazer and tie, trying to look the part of someone who was above the level of 'common pugilist', and trying to affect the mildly disinterested sportsman. I would talk about whatever was in the news, always switching the topic from my opponent. There be the gratuitous acknowledgement, but I wouldn't degrade nor compensate for whatever he did well.
Pressed on strategy, I would be prone to say, "Watch the fight, and you tell me what happens. THAT is when we'll know what the strategy is."
As a pro, the only time I tried to agitate someone, was a fight in Vegas. This cat was HUGE. But I kept talking about his feet, and he was foreign, with a heavy accent. His english couldn't keep pace, so I kept telling him that his feet was too big for him to get out of the way. I was going to put a hurt on him, and he wouldn't be able to get away from what I was giving him ... and he didn't!
I haven't seen 'The Right Stuff' in such a long time, that I confused it with the fine show with Craig T. Nelson and Cindy Pickett. Astronauts have such a low margin of error, that only someone who was involved in science, you know like molecular biology or nuclear physics or something like that could really appreciate the low, low tolerances they deal with.
That is what makes them so amazing. They live in a world where that .00001 actually makes a SIGNIFICANT difference. When they have one time to get something done, ONE TIME is what they mean.
In real life, that doesn't happen. We are more tolerant of one another, be it because of our spiritual philosophy, or because in accepting that we all are imperfect, we learn to adjust our expectations. And that is okay, in a way that so many of us accept that it is okay.
Walt Kowalski wasn't as compromising. For him, 'irascible' would have been a compliment. He was a tough SOB, and he wasn't backing down from anyone for any reason.
But I think that there is a reason that we aren't perfect, that we all don't talk the same, or enjoy the same things. A reason for why what appeals to one, can offend the other, and leaves yet someone else indifferent. There is a reason that 'this' is not related to 'that'.
I think that it is that way so that we get to know one another and find something in every one of us. That is what happened to Walt, and he grew as a person. For sure, I have found in reading journals that there is a little bit of each one of us in each other. If we but realized the insignificance of our differences, what kind of world would ...
In speaking about Nebraska, and what I perceived as her lack of 'available space' for me, it made me keep asking myself what was I doing with my life. I mean, this woman had stated her plans ... which had to be neither here nor there to me, because I was being drawn towards something beyond her. She may have been part of my getting there, carried along with me, but what I did know was that I was getting ready to live my life once again.
Remembering when I got my first diagnosis ... and then the hearing ... I simply sucked it up and said what would NOT happen to me. This was not going to be a sentence for me and my dreams. I was not going to allow this to diminish my goals, set upon clouds, aloft in the hazy glow of the sun. The only reason that I could not make any distinction between things was that I was not close enough to see. Things were too far away for me to make out.
I remember my childhood as one of my being annoying. Annoying because I wasn't going to lay down 'just because', annoying because I wasn't going to accept anything but what I considered someone else's best. Yeah, there are a bunch of second place and 'participant' trophies in my life, but hey, I never stopped trying.
Today I lost my cell phone. I had it in the doctor's office, because I had to turn it off. It is missing because ... it's missing. I won't allow myself to get worked up over things. Speaking about 'practice', it is something that apparently isn't going to be different in me, that I am going to want things in a certain order, have a level of security that allows me to feel that I am secure, and not only in a relative way.
I tell myself, and I believe that if I was in a place of my choosing rather than being in of place of 'resort', then things would be different. I would be able to establish my arc, and know that conditions would be as they should, and as expected.
It isn't simply about me not being able to deal with anxiety. It is that anxieties are my enemy. It isn't about dealing with them, it is about avoiding them entirely.
Getting Ken and Beth up from Mexican Town ... I am sure that there were more expedient ways to get 'there, from here', but I couldn't worry myself about all that. I knew what I knew, and that was that. Not that there was anything 'clear and present' about the ride, but I am only saying ...
That is what 'chaotic home life' does for me ... adds to my already anxiety filled life. And why I was again sure that if I had to be to myself, I would be that. Not going to invite an unnecessary risk in my life. Period.
Getting back to the astronaut (man or astro man?) part of this entry, I see two things - one, there is nothing wrong in taking risk. That is a part of life as anything else. People who don't take risk, rarely gain anything out of the gift of living (oh and to be sure, life is a gift ... it is heavy, but I have no doubt that mine is a gift) that they have in their hands. Eventually it turns to dust and crumbs falling between their fingers.
And two, be prepared. There is no air in that (pun not intended ... I wonder if anyone caught it?), because once you get a small thing wrong, the error grows and grows. At some point, you become lost in the error and lost in your mistake. Whatever possibility you can foresee, if you are ready for them, then you will find that you will be able to overcome the ones you DON'T see.
Oh, and to be prepared for the opportunity you didn't expect.
TODAY MY HEART SWINGS
THE SUMMER OF '07
One of the things that I would like to think is happening, is that someone reading this, who NEEDS to read this, realizes that life IS a journey and nothing happens overnight. Often, things change and morph into something else, even when you have stayed on the path that you have sought out and think is best one for you.
I had been feeling tremors in my life in the summer of that year. Steve Harvey's book (which is actually a very good read and I will buy it ... can add to a good relationship IMO, and guide a person male or female, to being a better partner and potential partner, if so desired) he mentions what would happen if the woman holds back on 'the cookie'. That is going to cause the man to 'seek some out'.
*BIG SIGH* Since I already knew that from experience, I figured I would try to see if I could ride this out, like so many women have to in order to maintain their relationships. Not wondering if the relationship was bad or good, but this was something that I had to find out for myself.
KT had an okay visit ... and of course in August my darling brother went on to better things. I happened on to 'Our Love To Admire' at a book store in Okemos. I wasn't even aware that the lads had a new release out. I picked it up straight away and bought it.
I was so out of sorts, that I couldn't sleep comfortably with Mookie. She sleeps with a fan on, acting as a white noise machine. I mainly sleep uncovered, with a sheet over my feet, if anything. The breeze created by the fan kept me up, among other things.
The fact that we weren't having sex was up in the 'top half' of the reasons as well.
So often, I would be in the basement of the town home, playing PS 2, NCAA Football '06. Oh, I do have the updates, but I still play '06. So I would be doing that and listening to the BBC on WUOM until the Mook's were up and it was time for breakfast.
One morning, shortly after I purchased it, I played my new Interpol cd.
HOW ARE THINGS ON THE WEST COAST?
As the United States expanded across the North American continent, the definition of 'west' changed and expanded with it.
The University of Michigan fight song, 'the Victors', which Alaina could second, would indicate how 'the west' was an idea that changed as the country grew. The state of Nebraska was once considered 'the west' as well. Though I may have imagined it, I recall movies and shows referring to the territories out that way as 'west'. And if I made it all up, then that is what I did!!
And in my mind, was born 'The Nebraska Concept'. Mookie had quit on the relationship, and intel on her previous relationships indicated fail in the manner that ours was sinking in. I would get into my 'gotta get back into this thing' scramble, because you just don't know, if it could turn ... but I wasn't going to become part of the problem. She was going to have to own all of that.
I would pop out, and occasionally catch Nebraska out there. I vented to her ... didn't really try to do any 'charm thing', that guys who are 'alledgedly' in a piss poor romance did. Because that wasn't going to be this movie.
I was moving out there to find my life. I also understood that she was getting it together to go find hers. With me still in Nebraska. If I wasn't cool with moving there and making it my home, for me, I would have been foolish. The song kept me thinking that I would have to keep on with my life, without her in it at some point. That she wouldn't be the 'be all, end all' in the romance novels I would write in my head about us.
So I had been getting ready to 'do this' all on my own anyway. Always had been. The struggle, the challenges I would face, I was ready and down for all that, all on my lonely.
Little did I know, that was when 'everything changed'.
On Deck: One more song ..!
One of the things that I would like to think is happening, is that someone reading this, who NEEDS to read this, realizes that life IS a journey and nothing happens overnight. Often, things change and morph into something else, even when you have stayed on the path that you have sought out and think is best one for you.
I had been feeling tremors in my life in the summer of that year. Steve Harvey's book (which is actually a very good read and I will buy it ... can add to a good relationship IMO, and guide a person male or female, to being a better partner and potential partner, if so desired) he mentions what would happen if the woman holds back on 'the cookie'. That is going to cause the man to 'seek some out'.
*BIG SIGH* Since I already knew that from experience, I figured I would try to see if I could ride this out, like so many women have to in order to maintain their relationships. Not wondering if the relationship was bad or good, but this was something that I had to find out for myself.
KT had an okay visit ... and of course in August my darling brother went on to better things. I happened on to 'Our Love To Admire' at a book store in Okemos. I wasn't even aware that the lads had a new release out. I picked it up straight away and bought it.
I was so out of sorts, that I couldn't sleep comfortably with Mookie. She sleeps with a fan on, acting as a white noise machine. I mainly sleep uncovered, with a sheet over my feet, if anything. The breeze created by the fan kept me up, among other things.
The fact that we weren't having sex was up in the 'top half' of the reasons as well.
So often, I would be in the basement of the town home, playing PS 2, NCAA Football '06. Oh, I do have the updates, but I still play '06. So I would be doing that and listening to the BBC on WUOM until the Mook's were up and it was time for breakfast.
One morning, shortly after I purchased it, I played my new Interpol cd.
HOW ARE THINGS ON THE WEST COAST?
As the United States expanded across the North American continent, the definition of 'west' changed and expanded with it.
The University of Michigan fight song, 'the Victors', which Alaina could second, would indicate how 'the west' was an idea that changed as the country grew. The state of Nebraska was once considered 'the west' as well. Though I may have imagined it, I recall movies and shows referring to the territories out that way as 'west'. And if I made it all up, then that is what I did!!
And in my mind, was born 'The Nebraska Concept'. Mookie had quit on the relationship, and intel on her previous relationships indicated fail in the manner that ours was sinking in. I would get into my 'gotta get back into this thing' scramble, because you just don't know, if it could turn ... but I wasn't going to become part of the problem. She was going to have to own all of that.
I would pop out, and occasionally catch Nebraska out there. I vented to her ... didn't really try to do any 'charm thing', that guys who are 'alledgedly' in a piss poor romance did. Because that wasn't going to be this movie.
Wasn't trying to fool her, Mookie, or most importantly, myself. I had to do things based on what I thought was best. It did not make dollars, so it didn't make sense for me to leave Mookie, who stopped loving me, for someone who had indicated clearly that she wouldn't.
Because I thought the ironic notion of asking 'How are things on the West Coast?', when speaking to Nebraska was yet another subversive way of letting her know that 'I got it'.
I never forgot that I was the one who was so into her, so into the chance to go out there and take a shot at her. And I also understood that as totally wonderful as I thought she was, that she could like, have cared less about me. And if it wasn't that bad, it certainly did not match what I felt for her.
In the way that only I could have, the song helped me figure out where I was going to go. As much as I liked Vegas, I didn't want to try to go there. AZ was still a possibility ... but I had met someone on line who reminded me of something that held my interest as a little boy ... and what is past is often prolouge.
So I would occasionally ask her, 'How are things on the West Coast?', much in the same fashion Keyser Souze tested out the dectective in 'The Usual Suspects'. Had she picked up on that ...
Well I've got a chance for a sweet safe life
said I've gotta dance; it moves into the night
Well I've got a plan with forward in my eyes
But today my heart swings
So as long as I knew what I was getting into, what I was going out there for, I was so totally fine with whatever she could have thought concerning me. This song is about some cat whose girl has left him to chase her dream life out west. Which is why, when after all that has gone into getting my mind and conscious around the notion, and with her emotional reaction to my unintendedly harmful comment, we fell out.
I was moving out there to find my life. I also understood that she was getting it together to go find hers. With me still in Nebraska. If I wasn't cool with moving there and making it my home, for me, I would have been foolish. The song kept me thinking that I would have to keep on with my life, without her in it at some point. That she wouldn't be the 'be all, end all' in the romance novels I would write in my head about us.
So I had been getting ready to 'do this' all on my own anyway. Always had been. The struggle, the challenges I would face, I was ready and down for all that, all on my lonely.
Little did I know, that was when 'everything changed'.
On Deck: One more song ..!
Monday, June 22, 2009
THIS COULD BE DESTINY, OH SWEETHEART ...
I'D GO THROUGH LENGTHS AND LENGTHS OF LOVE...
I was asked if it was the words that I say and write that she was in love with ... and I know what she meant.
As the best looking girl I had ever been with, I would have made sure that you felt good about yourself. There wouldn't have been any doubt about who put the light in my eyes, because they'd shine for only you.
No, I told the SFC. It isn't that the words only sound sweet to your ears and look wonderful to your eyes. It is that you KNOW in a way that goes down all the way to the bottom of your soul and back again, that from me those words mean what you want them to mean.
I would not be saying them to you, if they didn't.
People try to become who they imagine themselves, fashioned like an avatar in an interactive game. Who knows what is behind the image that they create? The message boards were like that ... but I have led a 'semi-larger than life' life already. I didn't see the harm of me simply being who I am. Who'd believe me anyway? Besides, if I found someone on line, it wasn't a need to appeal to the masses.
I only wanted to appeal to some ONE.
I really liked her 'cake' analogy. It goes something like this: You see a picture of a beautiful cake on the box, and you want to make that cake. You have to go get and put together all the ingredients, measure them just right and blend them together.
You know that you have done everything right ... you even have the right frosting to ice the cake and everything. Pour the batter in the pans and when you take them to oven, the batter SCREAMS, "Noooo!! It is too hot in there!!"
Looking at the pan, you say, "But don't you want to look like that beautiful cake on the box?" The cake says, "Yes I do, but it is too hot in there!"
"Well," you go, "if you want to look like that, you must go through the fire before you become like that beautiful picture."
In goes the cake. After its time in the heat of the oven, it comes out and you begin to frost it. After all the fetching of the ingredients, the mixing and the fire, you can ice the cake and it is beautiful.
The moral: Sometimes you have to go through the fire to get to become all that you can be.
The reason that I kept throwing out the KC-Omaha Kings, and Nebraska football, is that I had hoped to get you to understand that I wasn't some desperate cat, trolling for someone to open their heart so I could take advantage of them. It [sic] was that I was willing to make the big leap, to put it all on the line for the chance to be in love.
With my SFC being as enthusiastic as she is, and me having an understanding of how deeply she feels, it make me soo thrilled that she wants me!! I mean of all the cats she could prolly be wanting to have been with, she looked and found me!!
That is the only way I can see this ... it was purposeful that we come together at this time. Have I said that already? I told her that she will have to get used to the idea of being 'Louise', because that is how I see us! She laughed, and said she is going to try to wrap her head around it.
As much as I care about you ... I want to be in love, and you weren't interested in falling in love with me. Too many reasons to get into, but I wasn't going to bother you about any of them. We could be friends and you made that clear. I only want for someone what they want for themselves, and in our case, your want did not include me.
I can be a pretty enthusiastic cat, when it comes to being in love. Senorita could prolly vouch for this, but Patti on 'Millionaire Matchmaker' often moans about the West Coast laid back attitude. On the East Coast men are much more aggressive. West Coast guys won't press a lady after a good date, won't call right away. They are too mellow.
East Coast cats are pure 'hunters'. When they see something they like, they pounch. Had a good first date? Within two days, they are calling to see when you can do it again. They are straight up and forward.
Have I mentioned that the SFC is from New Jersey?
Because I have tried to reinvent myself, alone and wanting for someone, I feel like I know how lonely it is out here. It is even more lonelier when you are told that you are a great person and that there is someone out there for you. I know how that feels for me ... don't know what it is for anyone else. I know that I would '... move heaven behind those eyes'.
I didn't think that would have been enough, not from me it would have been. And for me to be that selfish, to want to make you 'see' that it was here in me, just isn't my style. I can handle the ache of unrequited love far better than I can handle the doomed pursuit of someone who doesn't want me.
Not only is this the right thing, but this is the right time. No one is trying to fool the other. This is right when 'we' were supposed to happen. We weren't ready for each other when we first met, but we are now. With what we have been through together, you know when I say that I would do anything I can for you, that means just that.
You aren't 'in love' with words. You are in love with the person SAYING the words.
NEXT: MORE INTERPOL SONGS!!
I was asked if it was the words that I say and write that she was in love with ... and I know what she meant.
As the best looking girl I had ever been with, I would have made sure that you felt good about yourself. There wouldn't have been any doubt about who put the light in my eyes, because they'd shine for only you.
No, I told the SFC. It isn't that the words only sound sweet to your ears and look wonderful to your eyes. It is that you KNOW in a way that goes down all the way to the bottom of your soul and back again, that from me those words mean what you want them to mean.
I would not be saying them to you, if they didn't.
People try to become who they imagine themselves, fashioned like an avatar in an interactive game. Who knows what is behind the image that they create? The message boards were like that ... but I have led a 'semi-larger than life' life already. I didn't see the harm of me simply being who I am. Who'd believe me anyway? Besides, if I found someone on line, it wasn't a need to appeal to the masses.
I only wanted to appeal to some ONE.
I really liked her 'cake' analogy. It goes something like this: You see a picture of a beautiful cake on the box, and you want to make that cake. You have to go get and put together all the ingredients, measure them just right and blend them together.
You know that you have done everything right ... you even have the right frosting to ice the cake and everything. Pour the batter in the pans and when you take them to oven, the batter SCREAMS, "Noooo!! It is too hot in there!!"
Looking at the pan, you say, "But don't you want to look like that beautiful cake on the box?" The cake says, "Yes I do, but it is too hot in there!"
"Well," you go, "if you want to look like that, you must go through the fire before you become like that beautiful picture."
In goes the cake. After its time in the heat of the oven, it comes out and you begin to frost it. After all the fetching of the ingredients, the mixing and the fire, you can ice the cake and it is beautiful.
The moral: Sometimes you have to go through the fire to get to become all that you can be.
The reason that I kept throwing out the KC-Omaha Kings, and Nebraska football, is that I had hoped to get you to understand that I wasn't some desperate cat, trolling for someone to open their heart so I could take advantage of them. It [sic] was that I was willing to make the big leap, to put it all on the line for the chance to be in love.
With my SFC being as enthusiastic as she is, and me having an understanding of how deeply she feels, it make me soo thrilled that she wants me!! I mean of all the cats she could prolly be wanting to have been with, she looked and found me!!
That is the only way I can see this ... it was purposeful that we come together at this time. Have I said that already? I told her that she will have to get used to the idea of being 'Louise', because that is how I see us! She laughed, and said she is going to try to wrap her head around it.
As much as I care about you ... I want to be in love, and you weren't interested in falling in love with me. Too many reasons to get into, but I wasn't going to bother you about any of them. We could be friends and you made that clear. I only want for someone what they want for themselves, and in our case, your want did not include me.
I can be a pretty enthusiastic cat, when it comes to being in love. Senorita could prolly vouch for this, but Patti on 'Millionaire Matchmaker' often moans about the West Coast laid back attitude. On the East Coast men are much more aggressive. West Coast guys won't press a lady after a good date, won't call right away. They are too mellow.
East Coast cats are pure 'hunters'. When they see something they like, they pounch. Had a good first date? Within two days, they are calling to see when you can do it again. They are straight up and forward.
Have I mentioned that the SFC is from New Jersey?
Because I have tried to reinvent myself, alone and wanting for someone, I feel like I know how lonely it is out here. It is even more lonelier when you are told that you are a great person and that there is someone out there for you. I know how that feels for me ... don't know what it is for anyone else. I know that I would '... move heaven behind those eyes'.
I didn't think that would have been enough, not from me it would have been. And for me to be that selfish, to want to make you 'see' that it was here in me, just isn't my style. I can handle the ache of unrequited love far better than I can handle the doomed pursuit of someone who doesn't want me.
Not only is this the right thing, but this is the right time. No one is trying to fool the other. This is right when 'we' were supposed to happen. We weren't ready for each other when we first met, but we are now. With what we have been through together, you know when I say that I would do anything I can for you, that means just that.
You aren't 'in love' with words. You are in love with the person SAYING the words.
NEXT: MORE INTERPOL SONGS!!
Monday Moanin'
THE WOODCUTTER'S LESSON
If I don't seem suitably euphoric, it is because this isn't over yet. I have to still do what I have to do, and this is but another step in getting there.
This is a time not to celebrate, but for letting all the preparation I have been doing, shine. It has been a long time since someone has been THIS enthused with the idea of being with me. And it is a dream for me.
One of the things that I don't think I have ever managed to get across is that it take a lot of work to be in love. I have never imagined it to be easy to always find a smile when exerting oneself, but I do. It is my job to be this way, and I love my job!!
If I don't seem suitably euphoric, it is because this isn't over yet. I have to still do what I have to do, and this is but another step in getting there.
This is a time not to celebrate, but for letting all the preparation I have been doing, shine. It has been a long time since someone has been THIS enthused with the idea of being with me. And it is a dream for me.
One of the things that I don't think I have ever managed to get across is that it take a lot of work to be in love. I have never imagined it to be easy to always find a smile when exerting oneself, but I do. It is my job to be this way, and I love my job!!
For me to say that I am going to work at loving you, it means that whatever it takes to make you feel loved, I want to do for you, and do it with relish. If that is my 'job', then that is what I want to do!
When I am out running and I am hurting, I keep on thinking of how cool it is going to be when I glance at my stop watch and see a faster time. It means I can imagine myself getting faster, maybe even one day being the fastest old cat around wherever I am at!
Same thing with anything I have ever done. One of the best compliments I got as a boxer is that I was an accurate puncher. Of all the things that I could and could not control, that someone noticed that about me, made me feel good. I worked at punch placement, and that is why it has stood out.
I remember a professor complimenting me for being a top flight student in an American History class ... I can't catch the course title. That took me back to being in jr. high and helping Hutch grade tests. He taught all of those Social Science courses, and I was already into that stuff.
Life keeps sending the same lessons back at you, because it is a course requirement. If you want to pass, you have to learn the lesson. In a most real way, I feel like that I have finally met my standard. Time to go on to the next level ... from 200 to 300 class, and from there we will be in 'graduate school'.
And then we will be living a 'happily ever after' life.
DID YOU KNOW THAT..?
Ken is a 'big' guy? I mean by any measure he is a fit, strong looking cat. And it isn't 'popcorn size', the kind of size you get from working out the 'candy store' muscle groups and leave the other groups to fend for themselves.
One of the ways you can tell if a cat is 'big' as opposed to 'muscular' (for women, I guess it is the difference between 'voluptuous' and 'full figured'... I know that I like them both!). You can tell by the development in their calves. Skinny legs mean that they are only concerned with 'eye candy', the chest and arms. Legs muscles, take work and you may not notice the gains yourself. So you sort of ignore them as your work. Also, the stuff that helps your legs develop like walking/running, and real cycling doesn't impress the girls.
Leg work is a solitary activity. Having good legs is sign of someone who can focus on their bigger picture. They don't mind doing the things that will lead to a greater success down the line.
Guys his size would give me the most trouble, because they had enough heft to push me around, and tended to be mobile enough to get our of their own way. Kind of like Evander Holyfield to a Mike Tyson.
NFL MATCHUP
Perhaps now I know why I have that 'always love you' in me, despite what someone else may feel about me. When I think back to our time together(me & my SFC), I can remember doing whatever she wanted me to, making sure that what she needed she had.
Do we complete each other? One way to find out, and I expect that we will discover that we do. I think one of our biggest strengths is that we are aware of our weaknesses, and we are willing to do what we have to do in order to overcome them.
Oh, and that we understand the commitment that we are making to one another. Though it is not so always, having something as big as the Army in common means you 'get' the commitment part of being in a relationship. Her asking me if I was still up to my old tricks, meant that ...
... lets not over think things. We get enough about each other to confident enough to 'know' we are going to be together for the rest of our lives.
And as she would say, "The end!"
Sunday, June 21, 2009
JARGON V. PATOIS
I may have mentioned to Beth during her visit, that I had been mulling over the idea of doing an entry about 'jargon and patois'. I tend to use jargon from a wide variety of environments, and mashed them together to create my own patois.
'Jargon' is like the geek speak for a certain genre or philosophy. There is so much technical and discipline specific language, that often as a casual observer, I have to wonder if those using the 'dialect' really understood what was being said themselves!!
Scott Adams and Ken's 'Sunday Silliness' make light of the 'buzzword culture' out on the cube prairies of offices or wherever it seems that paperwork backlogs. Because jargon actually is a description of something functional or an operation, it is in my mind to be taken more seriously than a 'buzzword'. 'Buzzwords' are more closer related to slang in my mind. The serve a similar function, as they are terms used to create an environment that has less to do with the real value or use of something and more to do with egoism and making someone feel something.
'Patois' is a functional slang, created to be a subversive, secret language spoken in front of everyone. Only a select group has full understanding of the speech, and it is an open secret. Not everyone can fully understand or appreciate the lingo, and it is rare for someone on the outside to understand and comprehend it. Rare indeed.
For me, words have always been interesting. There are certain terms that because of my early interest in the etymology of words, that I read differently or hear differently. Knowing a words past can be as useful as knowing a persons past, which is why how someone talks on line can be as revealing as a face to face encounter.
My patois is a snappy blend that reflect a variety of experiences in my life. I used to think that I spoke the way that I did, so that I could talk about someone while I was talking around them, only I would stand in their face! Often, they'd stand there like Moe would to Calvin, confused before deciding to pound him!!
Phrases, lyrics, they all carry a piece of something or someone with them. When you take them in the scene you first encountered them, and place that scene in new surroundings, you create something of your very own. That is part of why I get agitated by common slang and its (mis)use. Try to be a little original, do a little 'goat thinkin' (which is a line from Adam Sandler from his first or second comedy tape) and come up with something that you have created yourself, and can really identify with. Otherwise, you are simply being a sheep, led to where sheep get led to.
Jargon can become patois, but patois is never jargon. A jargon is meant to be understood by a larger group whereas patois is something that is only understood by those who are immeresed in a specific environment. I can imagine that Ken and Beth have witnessed scenes like today's video, if not participated in a discussion like that themselves.
I am wondering if it is like a 'chocolate in my peanut butter' kind of conundrum, where the texture of my life has me 'speak' the way that I do. My internal dialogue is clear as a bell ... I never sound confused in my head! When I look at what my fingers produce, I sometimes wonder what IS on my mind!
'Speaking straight away', is pretty simple to understand. And if I can't get my feelings across in any other manner, I can do that. For instance, telling Ken how to get back to the hotel from the Science Center was a bigger adventure than I let on. Every now and again, places look 'different, but familiar', like I am transposing a scene from another place unto what I am looking at.
That is what a lot of the Military jargon does for me ... reinforces my confidence. You begin things with the end in mind, and that is always with success as the objective.
Getting to the restaurant, and from the restaurant to the hotel was an example of that internal thinking. Because of it, I think that I am nothing if not cool under pressure, and I knew that if we weren't going to get lost, I had to remain calm ... and I think I did a good job of that! I didn't want to be wandering Detroit lost any more than they did!! In a situation like that, being clear and sharp is the most important thing. Ken is a pretty good driver, so I only needed to talk like I knew where I was going and he'd get us there!
"We knew the environment", which I got from Bob Davie as he led an overmatched Notre Dame into a football game, is a line that signifies that a person has a complete and deep understanding of what they are engaged in and the consequence involved. The side of the major artery I live on is 'chippy' to say the least (that is a term I associate with hockey ). To someone from out of town, it is risky ... and in a super sharp Mustang, it could be the longest three minutes spent anywhere outside of fighting a prime Mike Tyson (and there is more to him in this entry!!)
When Ken offered to drop me home, I told him that would be all right (or is that alright??), not necessarily because it is simply a risk, but it was an totally unnecessary one. Why take it? The best way not to become a cautionary tale is to use caution! Doesn't mean that risk is absent in my life, but I like to think that I 'know the environment' before I get started!!
The urban slang that heats me up, does so because it is missing the point. Rather than 'reinvent' a thought, it confirms one's ignorance or lack of imagination to me. Where does it come from and really, what does it mean? Context can tell you what it is supposed to mean, but what is the picture you are trying to create, the idea you are conveying with being 'jiggy wit it?' And yes, brother and sister, if you aren't either Michael Eric Dyson or Connie Rice, I do think you stop trying to be 'down' when you reach 30.
Someone who is seriously trying to hold a discussion with me 'speaking jive' is hard to take seriously. The irony of that is that they can't grasp my patois because they won't expand their imagination to accept the ideas I am expressing and I won't let mine shrink to accept and acknowledge their lack of that ability.
With a common background in science, there is a level of communication between Ben & Keth that allows them a closeness that is enviable. There is a shared experience separate from each other that allows them to understand in a more profound way than someone who doesn't have that experience, even in though they are different in their field, science is still science ...
... just like the Army is still the Army.
THE ECLECTIC METHOD
Before I entered the service, I beat a cat who beat Mike Tyson. And the clear victory that he had over Mike, I had over him. So with one degree of separation, I fully expected to be able to fight and beat Mike Tyson ... yes, THAT Mike Tyson. You can imagine what it sounded like to people in the service when some cat was saying that he felt he could beat up 'the baddest man on the planet'.
There was plenty of snickering ... you wouldn't DARE laugh out loud at me, but no belief ... well, almost no one did belief.
My SFC had my back.
We already have a 'couple language', where we instantly 'get' what the other is saying. That was something that I caught from our intrepid Hoosiers, that there is a communication that they have between each other that allows them to say whatever right in front of you, and you have no idea of what they expressing to one another. I mean, you can find the definition of the words in the dictionary, but that wouldn't tell you what they MEAN to them.
And again, that back ground ... different branches of science but still, the methodology is generally the same. That only deepens their understanding of one another.
Me and my girl are like that NOW. We can talk in a way that is intimate and feels exclusive to us alone. Usually having major common interests lead to other shared interests that are important to one another. Right now, I am thinking about how different she would have viewed my professional career ...
But I don't think long nor hard about it. She is here in my life at the right time, and if I can sell her on being 'Louise', we will kill at Halloween parties!!
'Jargon' is like the geek speak for a certain genre or philosophy. There is so much technical and discipline specific language, that often as a casual observer, I have to wonder if those using the 'dialect' really understood what was being said themselves!!
Scott Adams and Ken's 'Sunday Silliness' make light of the 'buzzword culture' out on the cube prairies of offices or wherever it seems that paperwork backlogs. Because jargon actually is a description of something functional or an operation, it is in my mind to be taken more seriously than a 'buzzword'. 'Buzzwords' are more closer related to slang in my mind. The serve a similar function, as they are terms used to create an environment that has less to do with the real value or use of something and more to do with egoism and making someone feel something.
'Patois' is a functional slang, created to be a subversive, secret language spoken in front of everyone. Only a select group has full understanding of the speech, and it is an open secret. Not everyone can fully understand or appreciate the lingo, and it is rare for someone on the outside to understand and comprehend it. Rare indeed.
For me, words have always been interesting. There are certain terms that because of my early interest in the etymology of words, that I read differently or hear differently. Knowing a words past can be as useful as knowing a persons past, which is why how someone talks on line can be as revealing as a face to face encounter.
My patois is a snappy blend that reflect a variety of experiences in my life. I used to think that I spoke the way that I did, so that I could talk about someone while I was talking around them, only I would stand in their face! Often, they'd stand there like Moe would to Calvin, confused before deciding to pound him!!
Phrases, lyrics, they all carry a piece of something or someone with them. When you take them in the scene you first encountered them, and place that scene in new surroundings, you create something of your very own. That is part of why I get agitated by common slang and its (mis)use. Try to be a little original, do a little 'goat thinkin' (which is a line from Adam Sandler from his first or second comedy tape) and come up with something that you have created yourself, and can really identify with. Otherwise, you are simply being a sheep, led to where sheep get led to.
Jargon can become patois, but patois is never jargon. A jargon is meant to be understood by a larger group whereas patois is something that is only understood by those who are immeresed in a specific environment. I can imagine that Ken and Beth have witnessed scenes like today's video, if not participated in a discussion like that themselves.
I am wondering if it is like a 'chocolate in my peanut butter' kind of conundrum, where the texture of my life has me 'speak' the way that I do. My internal dialogue is clear as a bell ... I never sound confused in my head! When I look at what my fingers produce, I sometimes wonder what IS on my mind!
'Speaking straight away', is pretty simple to understand. And if I can't get my feelings across in any other manner, I can do that. For instance, telling Ken how to get back to the hotel from the Science Center was a bigger adventure than I let on. Every now and again, places look 'different, but familiar', like I am transposing a scene from another place unto what I am looking at.
That is what a lot of the Military jargon does for me ... reinforces my confidence. You begin things with the end in mind, and that is always with success as the objective.
Getting to the restaurant, and from the restaurant to the hotel was an example of that internal thinking. Because of it, I think that I am nothing if not cool under pressure, and I knew that if we weren't going to get lost, I had to remain calm ... and I think I did a good job of that! I didn't want to be wandering Detroit lost any more than they did!! In a situation like that, being clear and sharp is the most important thing. Ken is a pretty good driver, so I only needed to talk like I knew where I was going and he'd get us there!
"We knew the environment", which I got from Bob Davie as he led an overmatched Notre Dame into a football game, is a line that signifies that a person has a complete and deep understanding of what they are engaged in and the consequence involved. The side of the major artery I live on is 'chippy' to say the least (that is a term I associate with hockey ). To someone from out of town, it is risky ... and in a super sharp Mustang, it could be the longest three minutes spent anywhere outside of fighting a prime Mike Tyson (and there is more to him in this entry!!)
When Ken offered to drop me home, I told him that would be all right (or is that alright??), not necessarily because it is simply a risk, but it was an totally unnecessary one. Why take it? The best way not to become a cautionary tale is to use caution! Doesn't mean that risk is absent in my life, but I like to think that I 'know the environment' before I get started!!
The urban slang that heats me up, does so because it is missing the point. Rather than 'reinvent' a thought, it confirms one's ignorance or lack of imagination to me. Where does it come from and really, what does it mean? Context can tell you what it is supposed to mean, but what is the picture you are trying to create, the idea you are conveying with being 'jiggy wit it?' And yes, brother and sister, if you aren't either Michael Eric Dyson or Connie Rice, I do think you stop trying to be 'down' when you reach 30.
Someone who is seriously trying to hold a discussion with me 'speaking jive' is hard to take seriously. The irony of that is that they can't grasp my patois because they won't expand their imagination to accept the ideas I am expressing and I won't let mine shrink to accept and acknowledge their lack of that ability.
With a common background in science, there is a level of communication between Ben & Keth that allows them a closeness that is enviable. There is a shared experience separate from each other that allows them to understand in a more profound way than someone who doesn't have that experience, even in though they are different in their field, science is still science ...
... just like the Army is still the Army.
THE ECLECTIC METHOD
Before I entered the service, I beat a cat who beat Mike Tyson. And the clear victory that he had over Mike, I had over him. So with one degree of separation, I fully expected to be able to fight and beat Mike Tyson ... yes, THAT Mike Tyson. You can imagine what it sounded like to people in the service when some cat was saying that he felt he could beat up 'the baddest man on the planet'.
There was plenty of snickering ... you wouldn't DARE laugh out loud at me, but no belief ... well, almost no one did belief.
My SFC had my back.
We already have a 'couple language', where we instantly 'get' what the other is saying. That was something that I caught from our intrepid Hoosiers, that there is a communication that they have between each other that allows them to say whatever right in front of you, and you have no idea of what they expressing to one another. I mean, you can find the definition of the words in the dictionary, but that wouldn't tell you what they MEAN to them.
And again, that back ground ... different branches of science but still, the methodology is generally the same. That only deepens their understanding of one another.
Me and my girl are like that NOW. We can talk in a way that is intimate and feels exclusive to us alone. Usually having major common interests lead to other shared interests that are important to one another. Right now, I am thinking about how different she would have viewed my professional career ...
But I don't think long nor hard about it. She is here in my life at the right time, and if I can sell her on being 'Louise', we will kill at Halloween parties!!
Saturday, June 20, 2009
IT IS WHAT HE DOES WHEN WE PLAN
AND I BET HE IS LAUGHING HARD AT ME AND MY PLANS, NOW!
Still, proper planning prevents poor performance. This was a well planned and executed process that has brought me to where I am today.
I am where I am supposed to be. Headed to where I am supposed to go. Not where I thought I was going to be setting a course to, but still it is where I am supposed to be going.
But I didn't know it. Or maybe I did?
DARKHORSES
"Most men are stubborn of the path they have taken, rarely the goal."
Soon, I am going to do a post on some of the language that I use to communicate with myself. Until then, readers are going to have to bear with me.
For me, it had always been a simple risk assessment that had kept me from ever asking someone back out again. There were reasons that caused us to part ways, and no matter who was at 'more fault', those issues would need to be addressed. That was something in observing relationships that I felt people would overlook.
Men are dogs ... women are gold diggers. And on and on. Many of the problems in the failed relationship were usually related to one of those problems, and you can add a layer of financial stress that would aggravate things as well.
Even if the 'usual suspects' weren't at the root of the problem, whatever issues that were at the root, the problems weren't only because of fail due to one party in particular. It was something that BOTH contributed to and were responsible for the fail happening. Example, I don't know what Mookie's side of the story is, because she isn't here to tell it. Therefore, her case is unknown, and perhaps she had justification for wanting to be rid of me.
Same thing with Tee Jay. I try to respect that, and not let too much bitterness show and move on from there. Being fair to them isn't necessarily what I am after, but being fair to me is. If I have to change something, be better at whatever, then I need to try to figure it out and work at it.
Makes no sense when someone has acted in the manner that a Mookie has, to wonder why she didn't want me. Why ask why Tee Jay didn't want to give a cat who did her the way that I did, another chance? Accept it and move on, because there is something out there for me, and I kept on going.
Periodically, I would check the validity of purpose of the direction I was headed. The goal was still there, even if I could not clearly make it out in the mists ...
Sitting down with Ken & Beth ... of course I would have liked to have spoken to them more at length, was another sign that I had chosen my course wisely. I spent time in formulating my course, and never lost sight of what I was doing and why. Though there was some twists (Mookie instead of Tee Jay, or Pecan Sandie) and some other assorted bumps, it still held up to inspection.
One of the things that I had known, and Donald Rumesfeld actually explained pretty well, is that there are 'known unknowns' and there are 'unknown unknowns'. There were a lot of things that I didn't know when I considered what I was doing. For instance, when did 'The Ex List' morph into the 'Nebraska Concept'? Did NOT see that coming. But it did do that, didn't it?
And with the change over issues that were cropping up (and they fall under the 'known' part of this), the most difficult thing wasn't dealing with the changes, but remembering that there was a purpose to all of this, indeed a goal.
The goal never changed.
"The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it." - Michelangelo
Value judgements in relationships change when you place the appropriate value on the combined involvement in a relationship. They change because something that you had once thought of as 'no go' items, say smoking or style of music, can be negotiated and dealt with for the insignificance that they really are.
After all, if they compromise the integrity of the relationship, are they worth keeping? And are they the problems so offensive that there can't make an exception made?
One of the things that I hadn't spoken of is how I really envisioned my life out west. I KNOW that I would have been a good friend to Nebraska and that I would have been an asset in her life. I know how to let someone be to themselves and keep busy with my own individual pursuits.
We are all grown folks in here, so I will talk about how I have been 'practicing' with maintaining my profile as far as trying to sleep with people. Because my life spent falling short of my goals have been mainly been due to a lack of discipline at critical times in the area of interpersonal relations with women. Also, no matter what gets said or agreed to by those involved, emotions always get attached to that act. An attachment get made, understandings breeched, and feelings get hurt.
So do not want to be a part of that fandango. So unless Nebraska had said we were going to really give us a go, and since I wasn't here to lead AKA on, I chose to 'get off the merry-go-round' (the word 'celibate' carries baggage and I am far to opportunistic to remain in that mind set indefinitely). There'd be no one thinking that because they did 'this', it meant that I felt 'that' (okay, I will give that a rest for today!!) at any time on this journey. Can't do the things that you know hurts that will hurt your chances to get what you really want. Especially when those things are contrary to the things you should do if you want something.
When you place your emphasis, and let your priorities make 'the list', rather than getting lost in listing of your priorities, things tend to happen and eventually things will work themselves out and the path will become clear. Getting laid was not a priority for me. Finding my happiness is. Chasing panties did not bring me any closer to that goal.
Being disciplined in the pursuit of my goal has.
THEN THERE ARE THE 'UNKNOWN UNKNOWNS'
That is what 'darkhorses' are all about. They are the unknown things that are acting in their own environment, spinning in their own uncharted orbits, crossing and intersecting where they do. They can appear random because they aren't on maps or charts, but they are on a larger chart than the one that I have.
And I have acknowledged that I am trying to play my part, not that I have all the answers. What I was supposed to do was find my path, and that is what I have done.
Believe me when I say to you that me and the SFC never were physically intimate, but other than that, I don't think I have been as close to any person in my life. It has always, always been that way for me, that I don't need someone to necessarily return my love directly. But I always 'knew'. When I mentioned the relationship to one person, she was regarded the SFC as 'sainted', said tongue in cheek. I guess it was to highlight how out of the realm of the Mark that they knew, that kind of relationship was.
What ever the SFC has seen in me, has stayed with her over twenty years. That alone says it all. And as soon as I heard her voice, the same emotions I have for her rushed to the front. They are all there, ready and hers to claim.
And now she has.
ANOTHER NOT SO STIFLED FRIDAY NIGHT
THE FOUR ROUND PRELIM
When you first start fighting as a professional, they walk you up to fighting longer distances, beginning quite often with 4 round fights. Some of the more accomplished amateur cats start off with longer fights, but for the most part this is the distance you begin with. You work yourself up in two round increments, to 6, 8, then the distance of real fighters and real men, 10 rounders.
The extra six minutes make a huge difference when competing. There are all sorts of strategic adjustments to be made on account that you are fighting at a range that you aren't used to fighting, a different distance. Your opponent my combine any variety of skills and experiences that affect how you fight and your approach to him.
I could go on, but it only gets more complex. That is why it is called 'strategy' and people win fights based on 'ring generalship'.
I LIKE TO FEEL LIKE I FEEL ... I LIKE TO DO WHAT I WANNA DO ..!
Now the thing about me and the SFC, is that we have NEVER kissed. I can't stress that enough. So for everyone in our unit to have thought what those outside of our small office thought, is not hard to believe. She was, is and will always be my best friend. Like I tried to told you, if I like you and you don't cross me, I will always like you ... and if I love you and you ever want to claim it, it is here waiting for you.
Glad that there is no added drama to this, for instance, me going to Nebraska (the place, the place) the week after she called, or Nebraska (the person, the person) having said that she is all in with me on this thing ...
... but hey, that ISN'T the kind of stuff that happens to me, being given such confusion. I am the one who makes the confusion by not sticking to what I know, playing to whatever strengths that I have. Don't know if I have hung with this process I am working with a long time ... what is a couple of years against the stretch of time that it took for the universe to age? I mean, what is the splash of a glass of water on your face compared to the crash of the waves in the North Atlantic? I mean, really?
So I mapped out and set a course ... stayed true to it, and in Ken & Beth, saw the theorem proven in a real world application. Last night was the first night we haven't spoken since we have been back in touch with one another. When we talked tonight, she remarked on it and I felt it!
I don't bother with comparisons to any other time I may have thought I was in love ... I KNOW what is burning incandescently in me is true love. We talk about making a lifelong commitment, and we both know enough about that to know what it means to us to say that. And it means even more when you know that the person you are sharing this with, understands and feels like you do about the plans you are making together.
Right now, I feel absolutely wonderful.
When you first start fighting as a professional, they walk you up to fighting longer distances, beginning quite often with 4 round fights. Some of the more accomplished amateur cats start off with longer fights, but for the most part this is the distance you begin with. You work yourself up in two round increments, to 6, 8, then the distance of real fighters and real men, 10 rounders.
The extra six minutes make a huge difference when competing. There are all sorts of strategic adjustments to be made on account that you are fighting at a range that you aren't used to fighting, a different distance. Your opponent my combine any variety of skills and experiences that affect how you fight and your approach to him.
I could go on, but it only gets more complex. That is why it is called 'strategy' and people win fights based on 'ring generalship'.
I LIKE TO FEEL LIKE I FEEL ... I LIKE TO DO WHAT I WANNA DO ..!
Now the thing about me and the SFC, is that we have NEVER kissed. I can't stress that enough. So for everyone in our unit to have thought what those outside of our small office thought, is not hard to believe. She was, is and will always be my best friend. Like I tried to told you, if I like you and you don't cross me, I will always like you ... and if I love you and you ever want to claim it, it is here waiting for you.
Glad that there is no added drama to this, for instance, me going to Nebraska (the place, the place) the week after she called, or Nebraska (the person, the person) having said that she is all in with me on this thing ...
... but hey, that ISN'T the kind of stuff that happens to me, being given such confusion. I am the one who makes the confusion by not sticking to what I know, playing to whatever strengths that I have. Don't know if I have hung with this process I am working with a long time ... what is a couple of years against the stretch of time that it took for the universe to age? I mean, what is the splash of a glass of water on your face compared to the crash of the waves in the North Atlantic? I mean, really?
So I mapped out and set a course ... stayed true to it, and in Ken & Beth, saw the theorem proven in a real world application. Last night was the first night we haven't spoken since we have been back in touch with one another. When we talked tonight, she remarked on it and I felt it!
I don't bother with comparisons to any other time I may have thought I was in love ... I KNOW what is burning incandescently in me is true love. We talk about making a lifelong commitment, and we both know enough about that to know what it means to us to say that. And it means even more when you know that the person you are sharing this with, understands and feels like you do about the plans you are making together.
Right now, I feel absolutely wonderful.
Friday, June 19, 2009
TO WHERE NO MAN HAS GONE BEFORE
AND THEY'RE OFF!
Ken and Beth that is. Tremendous people the both of them. It was neat to take them to my fave restaurant, Xocochimilco's and finally the Astoria bakery today. Maybe if I could take someone to the Whitney for dessert, I would have shown them what is in my head when I think of Detroit.
We split up, they went off in Ken's super cool Mustang, and I made my way over to Capitol Park to catch the bus home. They are great people and it was a fantastic experience to be with them both. Told them about my plans and how I came to them. More than likely, I will get to it in here. Going to have to be a bit patient as I get there.
CAPITOL PARK
That is where the buses get together for their journey out from the city center, at least many of the west side lines do. Detroit is split mainly east-west, with the southwest having its own little thing. It is strange that it wasn't until I was an adult and started being with SD that I ventured over on the east side, save for the odd excursions to a club.
It resembles what is the stereotype of a decaying city center ... guess that doesn't make it a stereotype. There is an odd cluster of shops and eateries ... a pizza place that I have never tried and some off, off, off line dollar store. Pigeons who move with impunity, unafraid of being so close to humans, who themselves look as grizzled and worn as the birds.
I sat there waiting for my bus, looking and observing the 'intention fail' in their eyes. And though there was some foggy eyes, from what ailed them physically, or from their use of various controlled substances, there was something more around them. There was a lack of spirit, as if they were only going thru the motions, without direction.
MEASURING BY THE COMPANY
I wonder when did they let go of their hope for better, when did they finally resign themselves to having lost their way. What made them drag themselves up, shuffle their hands in a pile of clothes strewn about in a drawer, no effort made to fold them, and come out into the day? "This", I thought, "is the 'quiet desperation' of which is spoke of in verse.
Though I was where I was at, physically, I had just came from somewhere else, physically and mentally as well. Being able to share what I did with two great friends that I have made out here, reinforced a lot of things I felt not only about them, but myself as well.
I will say when apropos, "should have done better in high school", because I do think that if you look at the folks you ran with then, by what they become you can find your own level to measure yourself by. A small sample, that I find pretty accurate of what people go on to become as adults.
When I think of where I went to school ... and then the people that I called friends, of what they went on to do with their lives, I know that something else is in store for me, beyond the people here with me at Capitol Park, seated amid the refuse and clutter. Their eyes gauzy from the wear of life, showing in their skin and their poorly matched clothes, that the prolly picked up from where they lay. No thought to whether or not they were even clean.
And should the fashion fail that is their attire managed to be clean, are they themselves? If Toucan Sam followed his nose aboard the #27 to the Redford Plaza, he'd gag from the odor of musty humans in badly made clothes. I sit wondering where did they think they would go when they woke up, much less when they graduated high school ...
... and that is where we come to the fork in the road that we are sharing.
"Freedom is a road seldom traveled by the multitude", said Fredrick Douglas. What that freedom is for the individual now is much different than what it was then, but the impact of the words are no less important. What is it that a person wants to be free from?
I sense a weight on some, the weight of an unfilled hope, unfilled desire, of an unfilled LIFE. Though I say, and I hope to get across, in a self-effacing manner that I have a 'crap life', I DO NOT say or mean it that way when I say 'I will take what I got'. Because I like my life, really and truly. Wins as well as losses, the good as well as the 'less than good'.
The stuff I left high school with, I took with me and the mind to do them. That I ended up 'just a little outside' of my mark, has kept my clothes clean, my skin fresh, and my body smelling like it looks. And honey pie, I look good.
So I am riding the bus ... wasn't always so, and I am a little shy on some cash. Wasn't always like that either. And it WON'T always be like that, either.
Like many things that 'I know' but don't know why I know them, something that I want is meant for me. Period. Like the artillery, I am 'walking in rounds' to my target, and getting closer and closer. As long as I got ammunition, I am going to keep on firing ...
I hope you don't mind me refreshing what I guess you could say is the mission statement of the entire Nebraska Concept. Which is to find my happiness. I set my course, and struggled gladly thru what I have had to in getting here. And we all know that the struggle is what makes the achievement worthwhile.
If there is one thing that I would say that is in common with my friends, is that they have achieved what they have, overcoming what they had to in order to reach their objective. Simple formula, when you get down to it. And while we each have our own measure of what we call happiness and what amounts to success, the essential formula is pretty simple.
And that is where the difficulty lies.
I have never lost heart, nor given up on myself. I have somehow found a way to cope with being something I didn't want to be and kept on the struggle trying to be what it is that I want. There would be times where I would tell myself, "If I ever became successful, then everything I would know", the thinking being that I had enough hard times, so there had to be a bunch of good times that lay ahead for me.
And I really think that is true. For me. See, despite the crap about ME, I am in very good company. You could say that I am their lightning rod for bad judgement and poor decision making, so that they can go on to have the life that they are having. If so, cool beans! That means I DO know I am, Pee Wee!
Still, I think I am so much more than just a 'catcher' of fate. So much more, and it is more than just 'a notion'. I have always accepted it as a FACT.
MISSION STATEMENT
To be happy.
That is what the 'Nebraska Concept' is about. For me to do fulfill my obligation to find my destiny, around which my happiness is enclosed. And in deciding to do an 'ex List', I was sure that I would find mine. As sure as Monday follows Sunday.
When I go to Virginia, it will be to begin another chapter in my life, one spent with someone of whom it can really be said is my best friend and love of my life. The details will work themselves out, as long as we are determined in the goal we have set before us.
I am never surprised at how doubt and the unknown falls away from the determination of the mind. Move mountains, that is what it does. So why can't it take a cat from Detroit to Virginia?
'Six days and a wake up' until we see each other again. Can't classify nerves ... because I anticipate better than frighten. We got along day one while we served, me and the SFC ... and since that is where we left it, then we should pick it up from right there, only difference being ...
... that we are in love with one another.
Ken and Beth that is. Tremendous people the both of them. It was neat to take them to my fave restaurant, Xocochimilco's and finally the Astoria bakery today. Maybe if I could take someone to the Whitney for dessert, I would have shown them what is in my head when I think of Detroit.
We split up, they went off in Ken's super cool Mustang, and I made my way over to Capitol Park to catch the bus home. They are great people and it was a fantastic experience to be with them both. Told them about my plans and how I came to them. More than likely, I will get to it in here. Going to have to be a bit patient as I get there.
CAPITOL PARK
That is where the buses get together for their journey out from the city center, at least many of the west side lines do. Detroit is split mainly east-west, with the southwest having its own little thing. It is strange that it wasn't until I was an adult and started being with SD that I ventured over on the east side, save for the odd excursions to a club.
It resembles what is the stereotype of a decaying city center ... guess that doesn't make it a stereotype. There is an odd cluster of shops and eateries ... a pizza place that I have never tried and some off, off, off line dollar store. Pigeons who move with impunity, unafraid of being so close to humans, who themselves look as grizzled and worn as the birds.
I sat there waiting for my bus, looking and observing the 'intention fail' in their eyes. And though there was some foggy eyes, from what ailed them physically, or from their use of various controlled substances, there was something more around them. There was a lack of spirit, as if they were only going thru the motions, without direction.
MEASURING BY THE COMPANY
I wonder when did they let go of their hope for better, when did they finally resign themselves to having lost their way. What made them drag themselves up, shuffle their hands in a pile of clothes strewn about in a drawer, no effort made to fold them, and come out into the day? "This", I thought, "is the 'quiet desperation' of which is spoke of in verse.
Though I was where I was at, physically, I had just came from somewhere else, physically and mentally as well. Being able to share what I did with two great friends that I have made out here, reinforced a lot of things I felt not only about them, but myself as well.
I will say when apropos, "should have done better in high school", because I do think that if you look at the folks you ran with then, by what they become you can find your own level to measure yourself by. A small sample, that I find pretty accurate of what people go on to become as adults.
When I think of where I went to school ... and then the people that I called friends, of what they went on to do with their lives, I know that something else is in store for me, beyond the people here with me at Capitol Park, seated amid the refuse and clutter. Their eyes gauzy from the wear of life, showing in their skin and their poorly matched clothes, that the prolly picked up from where they lay. No thought to whether or not they were even clean.
And should the fashion fail that is their attire managed to be clean, are they themselves? If Toucan Sam followed his nose aboard the #27 to the Redford Plaza, he'd gag from the odor of musty humans in badly made clothes. I sit wondering where did they think they would go when they woke up, much less when they graduated high school ...
... and that is where we come to the fork in the road that we are sharing.
"Freedom is a road seldom traveled by the multitude", said Fredrick Douglas. What that freedom is for the individual now is much different than what it was then, but the impact of the words are no less important. What is it that a person wants to be free from?
I sense a weight on some, the weight of an unfilled hope, unfilled desire, of an unfilled LIFE. Though I say, and I hope to get across, in a self-effacing manner that I have a 'crap life', I DO NOT say or mean it that way when I say 'I will take what I got'. Because I like my life, really and truly. Wins as well as losses, the good as well as the 'less than good'.
The stuff I left high school with, I took with me and the mind to do them. That I ended up 'just a little outside' of my mark, has kept my clothes clean, my skin fresh, and my body smelling like it looks. And honey pie, I look good.
So I am riding the bus ... wasn't always so, and I am a little shy on some cash. Wasn't always like that either. And it WON'T always be like that, either.
Like many things that 'I know' but don't know why I know them, something that I want is meant for me. Period. Like the artillery, I am 'walking in rounds' to my target, and getting closer and closer. As long as I got ammunition, I am going to keep on firing ...
I hope you don't mind me refreshing what I guess you could say is the mission statement of the entire Nebraska Concept. Which is to find my happiness. I set my course, and struggled gladly thru what I have had to in getting here. And we all know that the struggle is what makes the achievement worthwhile.
If there is one thing that I would say that is in common with my friends, is that they have achieved what they have, overcoming what they had to in order to reach their objective. Simple formula, when you get down to it. And while we each have our own measure of what we call happiness and what amounts to success, the essential formula is pretty simple.
And that is where the difficulty lies.
I have never lost heart, nor given up on myself. I have somehow found a way to cope with being something I didn't want to be and kept on the struggle trying to be what it is that I want. There would be times where I would tell myself, "If I ever became successful, then everything I would know", the thinking being that I had enough hard times, so there had to be a bunch of good times that lay ahead for me.
And I really think that is true. For me. See, despite the crap about ME, I am in very good company. You could say that I am their lightning rod for bad judgement and poor decision making, so that they can go on to have the life that they are having. If so, cool beans! That means I DO know I am, Pee Wee!
Still, I think I am so much more than just a 'catcher' of fate. So much more, and it is more than just 'a notion'. I have always accepted it as a FACT.
MISSION STATEMENT
To be happy.
That is what the 'Nebraska Concept' is about. For me to do fulfill my obligation to find my destiny, around which my happiness is enclosed. And in deciding to do an 'ex List', I was sure that I would find mine. As sure as Monday follows Sunday.
When I go to Virginia, it will be to begin another chapter in my life, one spent with someone of whom it can really be said is my best friend and love of my life. The details will work themselves out, as long as we are determined in the goal we have set before us.
I am never surprised at how doubt and the unknown falls away from the determination of the mind. Move mountains, that is what it does. So why can't it take a cat from Detroit to Virginia?
'Six days and a wake up' until we see each other again. Can't classify nerves ... because I anticipate better than frighten. We got along day one while we served, me and the SFC ... and since that is where we left it, then we should pick it up from right there, only difference being ...
... that we are in love with one another.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
WELL, KEN & BETH KNOWS IT NOW ...
THE BIRTH AND DEATH OF THE DAY
Whenever someone is talking about their new found love, I imagine us all in a long line, and that I get a chance to 'move up a spot' when they go on off prancing in the meadows with the deer dancing and butterfly in their hair. Apparently, enough people have had their turn.
So I've got 'next'.
Whenever someone is talking about their new found love, I imagine us all in a long line, and that I get a chance to 'move up a spot' when they go on off prancing in the meadows with the deer dancing and butterfly in their hair. Apparently, enough people have had their turn.
So I've got 'next'.
'I got next', is a play on the pick up basketball term. Cats are on the court, and you want a chance to play, a 'run'. So you ask the fellas who are watching if anyone has 'next', and if no one responds, then you can call 'next'. When the game underway ends, it is your 'next'.
And I've got mine.
It is the most amazing story. I have spent this whole month trying to digest it as I go. Sometimes I get dizzy because this is something that is not only happening, but EXACTLY what I asked for.
So now, I have to wonder if I asked for everything I will be getting?
That is important, because along with asking for all that I want, in my life I have found myself wanting. On further analysis, there shouldn't have been any surprise to my career fail, relationship fail, or plain ol' fail fail.
There was something missing in me, and that something would end up being magnified because it didn't mesh well with the what was missing in someone else ... or some of what they may have had.
When I lost out with Tee Jay, I came to the conclusion that I was still short a little, that I needed to go back to find what it was I had. THAT, along with my want for her was the motivation for the Ex-List. That and the FACT that I believed that my love has came thru my life already. And before I launched another search for the 'next Miss What's Happenin', I felt that I owed it to myself to go back and allow for someone to come back.
When I look at my profile, and reflect on what I have shared here, I have wondered myself if I was like 'The Most Interesting Hood Rat' in the world. I mean, I am not top shelf, nor have I led a top shelf life. But when I do sit down and talk with my current peer group, they remind me of Peter Gabriel's 'Big Time', because 'I greet them all with the widest smile and always they're amazed ...' at the stories of where I have been.
But now, since I can only access remnants of my own life, and I did not think as I ran through my youth that I would ever need a momento from anywhere, who is it that knows where I have been and the places I have gone? Who would care?
And that is where the idea came to find out if I could get with someone from my past, and build a new relationship with them. Not that I am afraid of going forward, but because I hadn't done it, as many folks have had, I figured to give it a shot.
NEXT: THE DARKHORSE
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
WEDNESDAY MOANIN'
HERE SPEAKS THE VOICE OF REASON
So telling both Nebraska and AKA where they stood essentially in my life at this current time went as well as it could be expected.
With Nebraska, it had to be done via email, our primary means of communication. In doing so, I decided on trying out a more disciplined style of writing. Speaking 'straight away', without spending time in the heady realm of 'what if', I told her 'how and why' I came to my decision.
She wished me the best, and I thanked her for that. We have, in my mind, gotten all the way past 'whatever' and since that has been entered into our relationship experience, would think that situation can be dealt with more effectively, should there be a next time.
CONCERNED AND CARING, HELP THE HELPLESS ...
...but always remain ultimately selfish.
One of the things that 'hearing' about what happened between someone and their now ex -partner, is that as I read it, the cat was cowardly.
Without more intel, I can't say exactly why anything went the way that it did. But when a cat is talking about 'you' when he wants to pull the plug, he really means 'me'.
I haven't been mentioning that I know how AKA feels, to stroke my ego. It has been so that I can remain respectful of her feelings. I told her about my intentions when I first arrived in Detroit. Then when I got my tire bumped by the crap driver, I told her IN NO UNCERTAIN TERMS how I felt about my residency in the city (even though Alaina took some neat pics of Belle Isle ... have to ride the park this summer).
Telling her about the recent changes in my life, I did so without talking about 'what if'. There is no speculation other than my desire to make a certain kind of life and that is that. It has NOTHING to do with anything about her, no trait, no core philosophy or anything else. But I guess that is where I guess the difference between me and my friend begins and ends. I think she was being misled.
AKA cried, but I did not ask her 'why'. There wasn't any real need, because it wasn't about anything that she could change that would affect my thinking. This was all about me and doing what was best for me. That was what I told her, and while it may hurt her, she had to understand where I was coming from.
Tomorrow will be hangin' on the square and kickin' it with Ken and Beth. That should be big, big fun. I am sooo happy, I am hoping that I don't faint away! It has been years since I have been in the Science Center. So it is going to be a new experience for me as well.
So telling both Nebraska and AKA where they stood essentially in my life at this current time went as well as it could be expected.
With Nebraska, it had to be done via email, our primary means of communication. In doing so, I decided on trying out a more disciplined style of writing. Speaking 'straight away', without spending time in the heady realm of 'what if', I told her 'how and why' I came to my decision.
She wished me the best, and I thanked her for that. We have, in my mind, gotten all the way past 'whatever' and since that has been entered into our relationship experience, would think that situation can be dealt with more effectively, should there be a next time.
CONCERNED AND CARING, HELP THE HELPLESS ...
...but always remain ultimately selfish.
One of the things that 'hearing' about what happened between someone and their now ex -partner, is that as I read it, the cat was cowardly.
Without more intel, I can't say exactly why anything went the way that it did. But when a cat is talking about 'you' when he wants to pull the plug, he really means 'me'.
I haven't been mentioning that I know how AKA feels, to stroke my ego. It has been so that I can remain respectful of her feelings. I told her about my intentions when I first arrived in Detroit. Then when I got my tire bumped by the crap driver, I told her IN NO UNCERTAIN TERMS how I felt about my residency in the city (even though Alaina took some neat pics of Belle Isle ... have to ride the park this summer).
Telling her about the recent changes in my life, I did so without talking about 'what if'. There is no speculation other than my desire to make a certain kind of life and that is that. It has NOTHING to do with anything about her, no trait, no core philosophy or anything else. But I guess that is where I guess the difference between me and my friend begins and ends. I think she was being misled.
AKA cried, but I did not ask her 'why'. There wasn't any real need, because it wasn't about anything that she could change that would affect my thinking. This was all about me and doing what was best for me. That was what I told her, and while it may hurt her, she had to understand where I was coming from.
Tomorrow will be hangin' on the square and kickin' it with Ken and Beth. That should be big, big fun. I am sooo happy, I am hoping that I don't faint away! It has been years since I have been in the Science Center. So it is going to be a new experience for me as well.
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
RANDOM MUSINGS
PRE-VISIT
Went to make sure that I knew where Bee & Kay were going to be at, to make sure that I can get to it and back again. I know where they are going to be, the general vincinity, but that is about it. I couldn't 'see' it, so I made sure I could find it.
I am really excited to meet someone from out here. I follow the 'Phillip DeFranco Show' on You Tube, and he is going around the country hanging out with people. Makes me wonder how much loot he gets from his little thingy, if he does get enough interest to fund stuff like that.
Spoke to the cat I would like to be the subject of a story, and I keep reading stuff that is in the neighborhood of what I would like to write. He keeps putting me off, and I am going to have to step up my game. I am not going to let this story get away!
IT'S CONFIRMED ...
A week ago, I mentioned that I had 'gotten next'. I wondered if anyone caught that, as to what it means coming from me.
I thought about that last night reading someone who had to get back 'in line' recently. I sighed, because it was the kind of thing that is not only too common, but part of what keeps the 'Mars-Venus' stuff such a exploitive fianacial success. Should that be the book I write, I prolly would NEVER seek to do a follow up ... I'd go all J.D. Salinger or Harper Lee on the world. Anywho, my heart slowed a beat, the way it does when you hear not good news about someone you had the best hopes for.
Her enthusiasm and happiness was familiar to anyone who finds themselves in something exciting and as promising as a new relationship. I wish that I could have taken her out, and sat at a bar or a ubiquitous chain restaurant and point out all the cats who are trying to cut their eyes to check her out, and the jealousy in the eyes of the women who wished they were in a couple that looked as good as we were looking!
I would have made her laugh, and feel good about herself. I would even let her eat most of the dessert! I wouldn't let her fall back into a less than good space, and make sure she understood that this was an isolated incident, and that for real, he did you a favor. I would even use my EX WIFE as an example of the kind of harm that can come when you mess in a relationship after you know it isn't the best thing for you.
But when we got back to her place and I got on my bike to go home, I would have been thinking ... as I was last night sitting in Border's about I am really about to take MY TURN.
WHAT A MONTH!!
And it is only HALF over!! When I mentioned 'things have changed', it was only in reference to the 'Nebraska' part of the Nebraska Concept. From that, things have changed once again. And like Voltron, 'the changes just don't stop'.
This time when the month is over, so many questions will be answered for me. They don't nag, but linger and hover over me. Even if I am not a lucky cat, I certainly have told myself that I am long enough to believe it!
'Scope Control' hasn't been effectively implemented. But I will see what develops from the new planning to reach the objectives ahead. Both Nebraska and AKA have been fully appraised of the new direction, and that was done as well as can be expected.
And on that note, I will continue down my path ...
Went to make sure that I knew where Bee & Kay were going to be at, to make sure that I can get to it and back again. I know where they are going to be, the general vincinity, but that is about it. I couldn't 'see' it, so I made sure I could find it.
I am really excited to meet someone from out here. I follow the 'Phillip DeFranco Show' on You Tube, and he is going around the country hanging out with people. Makes me wonder how much loot he gets from his little thingy, if he does get enough interest to fund stuff like that.
Spoke to the cat I would like to be the subject of a story, and I keep reading stuff that is in the neighborhood of what I would like to write. He keeps putting me off, and I am going to have to step up my game. I am not going to let this story get away!
IT'S CONFIRMED ...
A week ago, I mentioned that I had 'gotten next'. I wondered if anyone caught that, as to what it means coming from me.
I thought about that last night reading someone who had to get back 'in line' recently. I sighed, because it was the kind of thing that is not only too common, but part of what keeps the 'Mars-Venus' stuff such a exploitive fianacial success. Should that be the book I write, I prolly would NEVER seek to do a follow up ... I'd go all J.D. Salinger or Harper Lee on the world. Anywho, my heart slowed a beat, the way it does when you hear not good news about someone you had the best hopes for.
Her enthusiasm and happiness was familiar to anyone who finds themselves in something exciting and as promising as a new relationship. I wish that I could have taken her out, and sat at a bar or a ubiquitous chain restaurant and point out all the cats who are trying to cut their eyes to check her out, and the jealousy in the eyes of the women who wished they were in a couple that looked as good as we were looking!
I would have made her laugh, and feel good about herself. I would even let her eat most of the dessert! I wouldn't let her fall back into a less than good space, and make sure she understood that this was an isolated incident, and that for real, he did you a favor. I would even use my EX WIFE as an example of the kind of harm that can come when you mess in a relationship after you know it isn't the best thing for you.
But when we got back to her place and I got on my bike to go home, I would have been thinking ... as I was last night sitting in Border's about I am really about to take MY TURN.
WHAT A MONTH!!
And it is only HALF over!! When I mentioned 'things have changed', it was only in reference to the 'Nebraska' part of the Nebraska Concept. From that, things have changed once again. And like Voltron, 'the changes just don't stop'.
This time when the month is over, so many questions will be answered for me. They don't nag, but linger and hover over me. Even if I am not a lucky cat, I certainly have told myself that I am long enough to believe it!
'Scope Control' hasn't been effectively implemented. But I will see what develops from the new planning to reach the objectives ahead. Both Nebraska and AKA have been fully appraised of the new direction, and that was done as well as can be expected.
And on that note, I will continue down my path ...
Monday, June 15, 2009
Justifications, Reasons, Explinations ...
EXCUSES, THAT IS WHAT THEY ALL END UP BEING, EXCUSES
Sometimes I slip and reference my ex-wife as my 'wife'. I could go on and on as to why, but my SFC said that it makes people think that I have 'whatever' FOR her.
I do not.
I could make a case, but why? If it still brings me back to 'doing not', then DON'T.
She is my ex-wife. Period.
Sometimes I slip and reference my ex-wife as my 'wife'. I could go on and on as to why, but my SFC said that it makes people think that I have 'whatever' FOR her.
I do not.
I could make a case, but why? If it still brings me back to 'doing not', then DON'T.
She is my ex-wife. Period.
SPORTS ... AS LIFE!
PROLOGUE:
Ooh, how I hate to be Jameer Nelson! If he had closed out on Derek Fisher's 3 pointer at the end of regulation of game 4, he wouldn't have the haunting feelings he will have the rest of his life. The only way he will be able to live with that, is by not only winning a championship, but winning with the core group of guys that he cost a chance at a title.
Not a guarantee that they'd have won a title, but they would have won the chance to compete for one. That was a playground move, giving up the long open shot, and hope he miss. That Derek Fisher was having a bad shooting night didn't matter as much as the situation did. You don't let the guy shoot the 3 point shot when it can tie or win the game without contesting it.
But he didn't. And it is harder to live with the things you didn't do than what it is you have done.
Along with Kobe Bryant, I am an unabashed Sidney Crosby hater. He is what he is, one of the top skaters in the NHL. I don't like him, because he grates on my nerves. His 'shunning' of handshakes at the end of game 7 bothered me. Had it been anyone else, I would have shrugged it off, chalked it up to youth and excitement. But 'Sid the Kid' has spouted off on stuff that makes me think that he is another in a line of athletes that think it is just about 'them'.
"NUMBER ONE, I APOLOGIZE ..."
I watch the press conference where Mike Singletary explains what happened with Vernon Davis after the game with the Seattle Seahawks (I think I said it was the Saints the last time I referenced it) sorta kind of regularly. The passion he showed ... in his words and his carriage was obvious. I keep watching it because it is a good framework for my life.
Somewhere, I read or heard what I call an typical story of relationship fail. It went something to the effect that the woman collects Winnie-the-Pooh stuff, and for a birthday, her fiancee bought an expensive Mickey Mouse thingy. Now, she said she called the whole thing off in short order, but in 'real life', that is the exception and not the norm.
People often put up with stuff that is meant to be a deal breaker, because the wire it trips, is connected to something that is very important to a person. I think it was like that for me ... I could talk about stuff with my ex wife, but all I really have to do is come back to being her boyfriend and having her spout off about 'Tommy Hearns this, and Tommy Hearns that' (and I hadn't yet discovered myself that 'this and that' weren't related ...) IN FRONT OF MY FAMILY. I won't even go into THAT, as it should speak for itself.
Mike wants you to understand that "It will change," because of what THEY wanted, not because he said so. He did gloss over the ambiguity that uncertainties brings when you figure out 'the formula' for what it is going to take to make something happen.
When I think of my 'ex list' idea, I liked it because there were certain questions that could be asked by both me and that person, and find out if we had a real good chance at a relationship. Because see, "it's not so much the play, it's the mindset". Where ever some one's mind is at, will determine more than anything else. Jameer Nelson's competitive instincts were dulled, because he had been hurt and hadn't been playing. There would be no guarantee if he had ran out, but with the mindset behind him of 'make him miss, win the game', it could have affected the fate of the shot.
One of the reasons I have found myself in relationships with people from 'hither and yon', is because I don't worry about how they go about achieving their happiness in life, in love as they do, but the mindset, the WHY. Having a basic formula is very important to not just me, but to EVERYTHING in life. So how could it not be critical to an individual that they have a fundamental and honest understanding of who they are, why they are going about things and how they are going to make things happen.
When you look at people who 'have the things you want for yourself', it is often through the prism of the 'sparkle' of what it is that you admire, not the effort of what made it happen. It is hard to fathom the committment that someone has made to get to what they earned.
The idea of 'hitting them in the mouth' is also part of a mindset, where for me came from dealing with the strange mix of traits that were in me, and picking out the ones that I liked best, and 'maintain' them. I felt that someone who knew me, would be qualified to help me find and 'polish' the good that is still in me.
If it seems that I dance around things, I am sorry for that. Because I am journaling, you get to 'see' the work and the processes play out. In person, I think that I am able to make decisions with the appropriate decisiveness.
MAKING DECISIONS THAT COST THE TEAM
Folks that do that, are only in the thing for what being involved in 'it' can do for them, make choices that favor them AT ALL TIMES. Even in their moments of selflessness, they are doing it so that later they can come back and make a grab at something for themselves.
That is what having a formula, a mindset should filter out of your life for you. For instance, subsituting for 'Tommy' is Gay/Lesbian rights. I watch and will listen to how that response is framed. I am not necessarily looking for anything, but I do know what I don't want to hear. Because if I hear that 'stuff', then I know that there is going to be other issues that we run into that are going to be just as impossible to over come, leading to relationship fail (the 'fail' thing just popped up today, and I am going to be 'fail'-ing a lot o' stuff from now on!).
Knowing what kind of thinking will inevitably lead to choices that 'cost the team' means a lot. If they are going to make those kind of choices in a relationship, and you are fine with it, then you will get what you pay for. Oh, and there is no pity for the majority (KMFDM, better than the best!) of people who do allow for that to enter their relationship lives.
" THAT MEANS WE EXECUTE...
...from the beginning of the game to the end of the game." That DID happen for me with Mookie, and it was so that I could fully appreciate what it is going to take to not only get to the end of the game, but to win. And that is what I want, winners.
Someone who has withstood the vagaries of their own lives and remained unbroken, spirit and essence still strong. I am hoping to find someone who still seeks to make the most out of the living that they have, and to expect that rain is the signal that there is going to be a beautiful rainbow to come.
'Begin with the end in mind', some wise cat said. And I do. Just the one small detail of remaining on the path that I had a problem with.
But I have stayed on this one. And since I am not at the end of it, I have no reason to look for another. Should the path diverge and become two ...
Ooh, how I hate to be Jameer Nelson! If he had closed out on Derek Fisher's 3 pointer at the end of regulation of game 4, he wouldn't have the haunting feelings he will have the rest of his life. The only way he will be able to live with that, is by not only winning a championship, but winning with the core group of guys that he cost a chance at a title.
Not a guarantee that they'd have won a title, but they would have won the chance to compete for one. That was a playground move, giving up the long open shot, and hope he miss. That Derek Fisher was having a bad shooting night didn't matter as much as the situation did. You don't let the guy shoot the 3 point shot when it can tie or win the game without contesting it.
But he didn't. And it is harder to live with the things you didn't do than what it is you have done.
Along with Kobe Bryant, I am an unabashed Sidney Crosby hater. He is what he is, one of the top skaters in the NHL. I don't like him, because he grates on my nerves. His 'shunning' of handshakes at the end of game 7 bothered me. Had it been anyone else, I would have shrugged it off, chalked it up to youth and excitement. But 'Sid the Kid' has spouted off on stuff that makes me think that he is another in a line of athletes that think it is just about 'them'.
"NUMBER ONE, I APOLOGIZE ..."
I watch the press conference where Mike Singletary explains what happened with Vernon Davis after the game with the Seattle Seahawks (I think I said it was the Saints the last time I referenced it) sorta kind of regularly. The passion he showed ... in his words and his carriage was obvious. I keep watching it because it is a good framework for my life.
Somewhere, I read or heard what I call an typical story of relationship fail. It went something to the effect that the woman collects Winnie-the-Pooh stuff, and for a birthday, her fiancee bought an expensive Mickey Mouse thingy. Now, she said she called the whole thing off in short order, but in 'real life', that is the exception and not the norm.
People often put up with stuff that is meant to be a deal breaker, because the wire it trips, is connected to something that is very important to a person. I think it was like that for me ... I could talk about stuff with my ex wife, but all I really have to do is come back to being her boyfriend and having her spout off about 'Tommy Hearns this, and Tommy Hearns that' (and I hadn't yet discovered myself that 'this and that' weren't related ...) IN FRONT OF MY FAMILY. I won't even go into THAT, as it should speak for itself.
Mike wants you to understand that "It will change," because of what THEY wanted, not because he said so. He did gloss over the ambiguity that uncertainties brings when you figure out 'the formula' for what it is going to take to make something happen.
When I think of my 'ex list' idea, I liked it because there were certain questions that could be asked by both me and that person, and find out if we had a real good chance at a relationship. Because see, "it's not so much the play, it's the mindset". Where ever some one's mind is at, will determine more than anything else. Jameer Nelson's competitive instincts were dulled, because he had been hurt and hadn't been playing. There would be no guarantee if he had ran out, but with the mindset behind him of 'make him miss, win the game', it could have affected the fate of the shot.
One of the reasons I have found myself in relationships with people from 'hither and yon', is because I don't worry about how they go about achieving their happiness in life, in love as they do, but the mindset, the WHY. Having a basic formula is very important to not just me, but to EVERYTHING in life. So how could it not be critical to an individual that they have a fundamental and honest understanding of who they are, why they are going about things and how they are going to make things happen.
When you look at people who 'have the things you want for yourself', it is often through the prism of the 'sparkle' of what it is that you admire, not the effort of what made it happen. It is hard to fathom the committment that someone has made to get to what they earned.
The idea of 'hitting them in the mouth' is also part of a mindset, where for me came from dealing with the strange mix of traits that were in me, and picking out the ones that I liked best, and 'maintain' them. I felt that someone who knew me, would be qualified to help me find and 'polish' the good that is still in me.
If it seems that I dance around things, I am sorry for that. Because I am journaling, you get to 'see' the work and the processes play out. In person, I think that I am able to make decisions with the appropriate decisiveness.
MAKING DECISIONS THAT COST THE TEAM
Folks that do that, are only in the thing for what being involved in 'it' can do for them, make choices that favor them AT ALL TIMES. Even in their moments of selflessness, they are doing it so that later they can come back and make a grab at something for themselves.
That is what having a formula, a mindset should filter out of your life for you. For instance, subsituting for 'Tommy' is Gay/Lesbian rights. I watch and will listen to how that response is framed. I am not necessarily looking for anything, but I do know what I don't want to hear. Because if I hear that 'stuff', then I know that there is going to be other issues that we run into that are going to be just as impossible to over come, leading to relationship fail (the 'fail' thing just popped up today, and I am going to be 'fail'-ing a lot o' stuff from now on!).
Knowing what kind of thinking will inevitably lead to choices that 'cost the team' means a lot. If they are going to make those kind of choices in a relationship, and you are fine with it, then you will get what you pay for. Oh, and there is no pity for the majority (KMFDM, better than the best!) of people who do allow for that to enter their relationship lives.
" THAT MEANS WE EXECUTE...
...from the beginning of the game to the end of the game." That DID happen for me with Mookie, and it was so that I could fully appreciate what it is going to take to not only get to the end of the game, but to win. And that is what I want, winners.
Someone who has withstood the vagaries of their own lives and remained unbroken, spirit and essence still strong. I am hoping to find someone who still seeks to make the most out of the living that they have, and to expect that rain is the signal that there is going to be a beautiful rainbow to come.
'Begin with the end in mind', some wise cat said. And I do. Just the one small detail of remaining on the path that I had a problem with.
But I have stayed on this one. And since I am not at the end of it, I have no reason to look for another. Should the path diverge and become two ...
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