THE RISK OF GOING BACK

WHERE HAVE THE DOUBLE FEATURES GONE?

I decided to take a break of sorts this weekend.  There are not going to be many moments where I get to consciously and willfully kick back and relax like I have been doing this weekend.  I blew off a couple of appointments on Friday, partly because of the one larger appointment for my neuro-psych results, and the fatigue of having to juggle so many balls in the air, balls that once were mere detritus on my way to other things, gets on my nerves at times.

As I said, Saturday I saw “Dark Shadows” and I enjoyed it.  Sunday, I went to see “The Avengers”, which had the best plotlines of nearly all of the superhero movies, though I qualify that statement because I have not seen any of the Spider-Man movies.  The writing felt “real” and did not skimp too much on the dialogue, nor did the movie seem to be force-feeding the story.  It felt more like a very well-written comic book, with enough nod’s to the fanboys without alienating the broader audience.  The next villain that is hinted at as the credits rolls at the end of the film, Thanos of Titan, is a super-crucial villain in the Marvel Universe, and I will really be looking forward to how they develop him.  He is a cat who is linked to a hero fanboy fave of mine, Adam Warlock, and they had epic battles in the Marvel Universe!

Before my movie began I received a text message from Miss Maybe.  I think that is going to stick as her personification as it fits her appearance in my life at this time.  She asked me if I would like to join her and her two younger boys for a movie.  They were planning to see “Men In Black”, which was a movie that I had thought that I would want to see, and I told her that I would wait for them to arrive after my movie let out.

Since I took my big “walking stick” (which resembles something that Gandalf would have used) I definitely felt conspicuous.  After my movie ended I bought my ticket for “MIB” and met her and her boys near the video game area.  The movie got wishy-washy reviews but I thought that it was good for what it was, a piece of super fluff to spend 2 hours on a warm late spring afternoon.

When she dropped me at my apartment she got out of her truck and walked around the back.  She was there to open her hatch so I could get my walking stick out and she kind of lingered, I think hoping for a kiss good-bye.  But like many a comedian has said, dating a single mother means that her children “blocking” instincts come into play!  Her youngest for no discernible reason got out of the truck and just stood by the door as she handed me the walking stick.  I thought it was “funny, kinda” and it was what it was.

DO YOU FEEL IRIE?

One of the problems of going back to revisit a time and place in your life that was filled with good (or maybe even great), is that when it does not meet the expectations based on your memories, those same fond memories suffer for it.  This explains why I never had tried to get back with an ex-girlfriend or ex-wife before I hooked up with Mookie Dee.  Think of it this way; a class reunion and you want to see if the hot teacher from 10^th grade World History is still hot, or if that girl who was your favorite sweater model still looks as if she was poured like pancake batter into her clothes.  Oh, and let us not forget those suave and cool jocks or stylish and flashy dressers, driving their “it” cars to school, it will be worth coming back to town for the reunion to see what they look like.  Who knows if the crushes from high school still have any spark left to them if one does not let themselves be open to the opportunity?  Maybe this is my singular vision of high school reunions, but I do think that it is a reflection of enough people of their reunions, and that it reflects a not-so-quiet desperation that they have been living their lives with.

Understanding that people who break up are doing so for a reason and that the person they are going back for has already “died” in that unlived moment, I never wanted to date a girl that I had already dated before.  The person that they think they were “into” is gone, never again to exist in any physical form.  Not saying that I would have changed so greatly that I could not be identified by the Butterfinger wrappers in the trash or the cookie crumbs on my shirt, but when I recently posted about “Composite”, it was to show how that an experience makes an impression and leaves its mark even though the experience itself has been long since removed by time. 

DEALING WITH THE MEMORY OF RAIN

The last time I saw my starter wife, it was at a hearing to finally adjust my child support.  As much out of guilt and the adversarial mechanism of the Friend of the Court system, my support to my oldest child had always been based on the income previous to my last pay grade.  So when I finally got a full-time job and stopped listing “professional boxer” on my W-2’s, the support was based on what I was earning as a boxer.  When I was unemployed, it was based on my job in the auto industry.  Finally, when I left Mookie Dee and was at my Father’s, I had the opportunity to finally have everything brought up-to-date, including getting credited for some overages, as well as having the amount was taken from my disability check reduced.

I have been saying for the past 5 (!!!) years that if my search for a partner in my former loves was to have run through her, then I would rather be single for eternity.  And the last hearing confirmed what I know of her, that she is still “that person”, no matter how many other of her “finer qualities” that she possess, she still is a f*cked-up b*tch (and I mean that in the kindest way possible!).  And to a lesser extent, so was Mookie Dee, and while my dear SFC was never anything but the greatest to me, we still could only mesh as a couple so much.

See, I think the saying should not be that “People don’t change”, but that “People don’t change themselves”.  Generally, people are not going to change their behavior until they realize that they are the source of their own disillusionment.  And I am referring specifically to their emotional state as often is reflected by their relationships with people, BOTH general and in intimate their relations as well.

Doing the same things over and over, as well as using the same kind of understanding to arrive at the conclusion in making the choice in one’s life, can only result in whatever they have brought you.  Either you are satisfied with that and have achieved if not full peace and calm in your life, then you MUST be ready to make the changes that you feel will bring you to this state, if not something that you consider to be equitable to that.

In Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol”, prior to Scrooge being visited by the three ghosts, he was cool with life as it was.  Squeezing every penny from everywhere that he could from his business and being a demanding employer brought him to a place that he called, “contentment”.  What I think the ghosts showed him was how much more fulfillment he could gain from life were he to live a little differently, and if he were to be observant of the world that is more than about his singular focus of obtaining wealth.

I think that as a bonnie wee lad and watching the black and white images of the classic interpretation of “…Story”, was prolly the first seed in my mind of making the choice to be the kind of person that I wanted to be.  I could have been 5, maybe 8, but it was before I would be found out to be an un-stereotypical African-American kid, which I had no idea that I was, and I determined that I was not going to be what anyone thought I should be.

Scrooge was made aware of the consequence of his way of being, as his essence rippled through his actions, and he saw their effect on others.  THAT is what made him change.  He would have never made the choice on his own because he was already in a state of contentment.  What he achieved through intervention was a higher state of consciousness.

…AND LIFE IS ALSO TOO SHORT TO DRINK LOUSY COFFEE

One of the reasons that I think there are people like Scrooge amongst the high achievers in life (and don’t quibble with me about what ‘high achiever’ is..!) is that they took risks where few would have and dared to seize the moment when it was availed to them.  I think this is what spawns the “bootstrap” trope that one only needs to do what must be done in order to gain what they want out of their lives.  Regardless, I do think that if you want different results out of life, then you have to approach life differently.

As I said before, my starter wife is full of sh*t.  Not only was she full of sh*t when I met her, she remains full of sh*t now, and what is worse, it is the SAME SH*T she was full of when I met her, only more of it.  I cannot tell you how I arrived at this conclusion, other than going into our last meet up, but I am sure that a reader would accept the word of one who knows.

My journey to Omaha has been the evidence of how much of my philosophy I actually do live by.  Any misunderstanding of how I consider things is not my fault, as I cannot be responsible for any ill-formed constructs that a person has created of me.  Communication is the key, as it is for many things, to gaining understanding and clearing up any misperceptions.  And when it comes to intimate relationships, without communication, there is NO intimacy, only a relationship that has remnants of intimacy on its surface.

All this writing… and nothing to close it up with… c’est la vie… that I what a journal is for, to express oneself and if it reaches a conclusion, fine, and if it does not, that is fine too!!