...AND IF YOU DID NOT RISK ENOUGH IT IS BECAUSE YOU DID NOT PUT ENOUGH OF YOURSELF OUT THERE TO GAIN ANYTHING

TACTICAL

First, the straight dope.  I have secured the 2nd weekend in July to visit Ken and his lovely wife Beth at Nutwood.  Then, the first week of August will be KT’s visit to Omaha to see her old man and his NEW partner (I prefer that to any other reference term), as I am going to be moving from Omaha to the nearby town of La Vista! The end of my daughter’s visit will likely leave me just enough time to get ready for school!

I am excited about returning to classes and seeing where the possibilities take me.  A good portion of my free time has been spent watching You Tube videos about space, time, and philosophy… and it harkens back to my childhood of wondering what it would be like to be a man of letters (failing that, like my man Howie on the TV show, “The Fall Guy”), and seemingly becoming knowledgeable about the entirety of existence!

The recent news has just been crazy!  The attack on the Florida nightclub was just beyond my comprehension.  I don’t know what kind of take I have on the situation… there are several angles that one could take on this… still, needless of that, ANY take that GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump has on ANYTHING is likely to be the WRONG one!

THEY WERE WHO WE THOUGHT THEY WERE..!

“You need not wonder whether you should have an unreliable person as a friend.  An unreliable person is nobody’s friend.”  -Idries Shah

I don’t talk about my depression because I trace its source directly to my disabling brain injury.  There isn’t any emotional situation that I need to “work through”, nor is there a family crisis that lies as a source of all things angst in my life.  Not to mention the freedom from spiritual contradiction that my agnosticism provides me.  Finally, since most of my life has been spent alone and with my thoughts, I don’t think my social aversions does not constitute a sign of my mental state.  If anything, I would have thought my entries from when I first began journaling were a clearer sign that I just might be losing my sanity.  Anywho, I have been depressed for a little while and I have not quite been able to figure out what it is that’s bothering me.

Another reason that I don’t broach the subject of my mental health is that I don’t want anyone to have the “feels” for me.  It is simply supposed to happen per diagnosis of my injury.  What I experience when I am going through an episode is the feeling that I am being draped by cloak or tarp that obscures my sight, and that casts everything in shadow.  There is no reason for me to mention my depression because it is  NOT what makes me sad.  And the things that makes me feel sadness is another kettle of fish.

I picked this fave video of mine because it encompasses my thinking in my moving to Omaha.  The key statement, “We played them in pre-season, who the h*ll takes the third game of the pre-season like it’s bullsh*t?  We played them the third game… the Bears were who we thought they were...”, which should have illuminated the “why” to then-coach Dennis Green’s anger.  By mentioning “the third game of the pre-season”, which NFL teams usually use as a barometer for their starters.  It is in this context that I listened to Coach Green’s rant and how it became a tool of my own philosophical measurement.  Essentially, what likely upset Coach Green was the way his team played… as though they were completely unfamiliar with their opponent when they had only just played them a few weeks before.

My decision to move to Omaha was far from the random bolt it may have seemed when I began blogging than the opportunity that someone in my then-domestic situation turns to as an answer.  That was one of a number of negative presumptions that could have been made about me and my intentions in moving west.  Also, the idea that I was moving to Omaha primarily to be with a particular someone was a point of contention between Nebraska and myself prior to my deciding to move here.  When we first met online, there was a lot of “why Omaha?” in our conversations.  I never thought that with my flailing away with Mookie Dee had changed how she saw me… nor did I think that our rendezvous in Chicago improved my standing in her eyes.  In fact, I had lost ground with her after Chicago, though as for that, she was still pretty okay as far as I was concerned.  Besides, her gains made from our Chicago interlude were merely balancing out other considerations that I held of her from a different time in our relationship.  So you see, if I had came here primarily to be with Nebraska, I could have angered Coach Green!  After all… they are who we thought they were!

IN MY HEAD

Working out my issues and unraveling my thoughts is something that I have always done through my own inner monologues (and yes, I answer myself..!).  It wasn’t until the end of my boxing career and showing the symptoms of Traumatic Brain Injury, struggling to keep my thoughts clear and focused, did I think that I need to begin keeping a journal.  Never, not in my disaffected “era of my discontent”, did I think that I needed to keep a diary of my days… possibly because I took for granted the gift of being a child of the First World.  Though I always tried to appreciate being born and raised in the Motor, having a Mom who worked for the Pentastar and earning good Union money, I also acknowledge the inner “ugly American” in me.  The kind of snobbery that would go across the bridge and wonder why didn’t they have a Dunkin’ Donuts and what the big deal was with the language fight in Quebec province (actually, I knew all about that even back then… just taking a poetic liberty point..!).

With the designation of introversion taking on a kind of cool status in society, my self-understanding of being an introvert gets lost in popular conversation.  Throw in my sociability, and I have always got how unlikely it may have seemed to people… in spite of all the teasing and insults I absorbed as a kid.  Despite all the incongruities about my perceived character, I have never really found myself “liking” people.  At an early age, I stopped having birthday parties, and Christmas time never really held any romance for me.  I could go on and on, but hanging about in groups never appealed to me, even as a nerdling among my fellow nerds.

Maybe some clarification is needed here, as I did have a group of five kids who I played “Dungeons and Dragons” with in junior high.  Of this group, two others (and about 8 of our fellow classmates) were smart enough to get in one of the three elite high schools in the city.  Here is one of my most major “what ifs” in my life, one where the road clearly diverged.  I did not make the first cut, but to keep from losing teachers, the westernmost of these schools took in more students from their list, and I made it.  My Mom had enrolled me at a parochial school, where I was one of seven or eight black kids, all male, on the east side of town.  I was doing quite well when the second chance came to go to my “dream school”, and I took it.  My decision was made, not impulsively, but with the full (or as full of one as a I could have had at the time) understanding of what my choice entailed.  It was a choice where I would disagree with Frost, and say that the road that I left for another day, if taken, would have made all the difference.  But what you must understand is, there are no regrets.  The most disappointment that I have had in my life has been in one epic choice...

EPILOGUE

The most epic theme to my sense of consequence in life a section from the song “London Calling” by the “only band that matters”.

Because I am inside myself SO MUCH, I have second thoughts about my second thoughts! It feels like a burden most of the time… being able to make assumptions made on social mores or presume customs based on superficial observances.  “Do you like this song?”  “Are you going to see that movie?”  “Is that singer pretty to you?”  “I bet you eat a mess of chicken, don’t you?”

I have enjoyed the consequence of the choices I have made during “my so-called life”.  The ups and downs of one’s existence is not measured in degrees.  Was life a well-lived one or was it not?  You are not going have time to equivocate when you reach the event horizon of being.

KT is looking forward to visiting in August; me and my new partner are thrilled about going to South Bend.  The way into the light is hard and long.  It has always been that way.  So you might as well smile as you go!