My Dog Going

Personal Reflections & Memories No Comments

 

Been a few days.

Another Easter come and gone. Our rare church service (I’m not big on organized religion but I do think it is good for my kids and wish that we could find a church that we liked that didn’t require 10% of your earnings as a price to save our souls); an absolutely beautiful day; some baseball practice; a nice, simple Easter supper out on the screened porch (first time we have ever done that since building this house); the boys out for a walk with mom; a Bulls opening playoff game on TV (they lost); an episode of Duck Dynasty with the boys; a gorgeous evening faded into a nice night and the end of a long 3-day weekend.

Other things this weekend. Four tournament baseball games. The team won one and lost three. My sons sat the final two and I won’t comment on that. Sometimes in life it is extreme adversity that draws out the very best we have to give. I hope that is the case for my sons. I am here to try to guide and hope to help- in any way that I can. But, in the end, it is what they find inside that will be the ultimate driver to where they wish to go in life.

I wish we had had more time to have the dogs out in the yard. Or taken them for a walk. We have two- they are Goldens as I think I might have mentioned before. Wonderful dogs for us, for the kids, Two females; one 9, one 2.

The younger one is Misty and she is quite the character. So filled, still, with youthful exuberance and playfulness. Everything to her still seems fun and enjoyable. There is no stuffed animal she will not try to unstuff; there is no part of her own tail that she has not molested; there is no ball or Frisbee she will not chase (and usually return); there is no snowball she will not dig to find; every day is a new and exciting adventure for her and we love her dearly, even if she is one of the oddest dogs I have ever known at times. Guess that’s a big part of what makes her so special to us.

The older one is Maizey. We got her when the boys were quite young. The pictures of that little fluffball- one of the best Golden coats I have ever seen or felt. And she still keeps it for the most part except in her face.

She too was quite playful and rambunctious when a pup- not quite like Misty is but still a great dog to play with and take for walks. My sons learned to read while resting their heads on her. She was always such a patient dog; not quite so much anymore.

I always tell my sons that she is “the best dog in the whole wide world”. Sorry Misty.

We still take her up to their rooms each night to say good-night. That and riding in the car in the morning to school are her special things these days. Reserved almost exclusively for her. Misty will have her day and gets to go other places and do other things.

Maizey shakes a lot now and seems to be losing her vision. She seems scared of things and has a harder time moving, especially going up and down the stairs. We have to be careful on the few times she is into fetch as she will sometimes be moving too fast for her own good and hurts herself if she stops too suddenly.

I don’t pet or pat her as vigorously as I once did.

Her face has whitened almost completely and she has gotten old. It seems almost at once.

When I look back at her puppy pictures it is amazing and sad what time can do; what time has always done. Now in her eyes I see age that I have never seen before. Oh, she still has spark but it flickers more as of late.

In her eyes I see the future and it saddens me to see that inevitable day growing closer.

In her eyes I see much of what she was once now going. I see what she once was and I miss my puppy. I see the years of my kids growing up and I see the years of my wife and me growing older too. So much of what we are as a family has been shared with Maizey and a lot of our fun was because of her.

I see the day of my dog going and it brings tears to my eyes. In her eyes I see that inevitable day growing closer. I see so much of what was and what is coming in my dog’s eyes.

I wonder if she has seen the same in mine.

 

 

Learning Things

Personal No Comments

 

It is now no longer Tuesday.  And something must have happened to Wednesday because from the looks of the calendar on the wall today the day is Thursday.

But how do I know that?

If I knew what day it was then I wouldn’t need to look at the calendar and even if I didn’t know then how would I know what day to look for when looking at the calendar if I didn’t know what day it was in the first place?; or what day yesterday was?; or what day tomorrow will be?

It is so frustratingly confusing and I am so frustratingly confused.  That’s normal I guess.

I see from the computer though that it is the 17th of April and if that is true then I may just have the information I need to be able to use the calendar to determine the day of the week.  Give me a moment please.

Ok, ok.  It is indeed Thursday.  It is the 17th of April.  Tomorrow is Friday.  Yesterday was Wednesday but something still must have happened to it because I sure as hell don’t remember it much if at all.

So now that it is Thursday and I know that what will I do with it?

It is Easter weekend this coming weekend.  I know that from my recent visit to the calendar.  My sons have several baseball games coming up and the weather is improving.

What have I learned in my life and how much have I forgotten?  I don’t know.

I do know that I still like to read and I still like to learn.  My memory fails me from time to time but then I just do something simple like look at the calendar, somehow figure out what day, and perhaps date, it is and it is all then okay.  At least it is better.

I try to instill the desire to learn in my kids and, you know, it seems to work.  They are bright and inquisitive and are doing pretty darn well.  I am proud of them and will continue to help in any and every way I can to make them successful in life.  Still, it is challenging…

But there I learn also.   By the time I finally learn to be the parent I want to be I’m sure my kids will be much, much older.  Probably way too old to listen to me anymore.

Unless I keep on trying and unless I keep on learning.  Maybe that’s the ticket.

You see boys, I have a huge head start on you and I plan to maintain that lead for as long as I can.  I know that you may catch me someday but by making that as challenging as I possibly can I have accomplished two things.

I will have made myself a smarter and better person, I trust.  And I will have done the same for each of you.

Doesn’t that make me a pretty good parent even right now?

Go ahead, you can say it.  The answer is yes and, yes, you are welcome…indeed.

😆

Leaving Things

Reflections & Memories No Comments

It is Tuesday. 

What do you do with your days on Tuesday?  Too often I just let them fritter away without much thought.  Left to join Monday and, soon, Wednesday as well.

Too often we look and see the time has changed and then have no idea at all what became of what we now know has become lost.  That time is lost you see and with it perhaps so are we.

Like most I have lived and I have loved.  I have even been loved in return though often I don’t really think that I deserved it.  Still, it happened and it went by before I could even see that it had gone.  A sight to see that is not brought forth to the eyes is just a sight never seen and nothing more.

So am I happy now?  You ask about happy to a man who knows more than that.  It has ebbed and it has flowed, has this life, and so with it went I.  If I had recorded it on some medium I am not sure that I would want to watch it in review.  Perhaps the highlights but even then it might only extract sadness out and away from what were called happy times.

So if that is true then happiness will eventually just wind up clothed in sadness and perhaps even sorrow.  If that is the path then once the moment is gone it has changed and likely never for the better.  Once it leaves it is no longer really ours anymore.  Whether it ever really is, or was, I will leave up to you and those far wiser than me.

Perhaps the best moments of most lives have occurred when we were so very much wrapped within that moment and somehow not allowed to exit until it was done.  So immersed as we were then in the moment if it took a particular hue then so too did we with it.  Happy, somber, sad, ecstatic, joyful, painful, poignant, wonderful but then, when gone, leaving an impression but never again being that moment and never again bringing the same stakes to the table.

So live in the moment once it has found you.   Construct a meaningful and worthwhile life from a long string of such moments.  Be aware and be happy when it pleases but don’t let it get by you without taking hold as best you can. 

You will blink and it will be no more.  Time and age will see to that.

I look and you ponder.
You smirk, smile at which time then I wander,
Not slowing, not caring or hoping even to wonder
At what happened, at what became of this, of us.
 
Before there was a then there was a now,
Only that then now came before what would now be then;
And all that mattered mattered because it was true then,
But could then no longer be true again now.
Not now.  Not then.
 
You smile- to which I wonder what and when
But never where or how.  Those were then
And this, and what and when,
Are all that is left now. 
All that is now left is not then left forever.
And certainly not left for today or tomorrow.
 
Yes we did and yes we didn’t.
It was all wrapped up in the moment of then.
It was then unwrapped and too soon became now.
 
And we both now know that now is not then.
Not today, not tomorrow; just yesterday and before.
No now for us; no, never again.
 

Tomorrow Does it Change?

Jibberish No Comments

 

Whatever you have going on in your life, in your world, do you ever wonder how it can stay the same?

Or is everything destined to change sooner or later?

You don’t know; I don’t know.  I don’t know is anyone knows.

Yes I do. No one does.

So if things stay the same is that a good thing for you or a bad thing?  Why do I keep asking questions to people I know are not reading any of this, ever.  Why don’t you ever read this?  Why do I write it?  Probably just for you to not read it; not ever.

I suppose there are many things that I would change if I could.  These things would change whether or not I wanted them to but I suppose I could somehow claim that it was in my plan to change them.  Take claim for something I had no hand in- that would actually be a bit of an odd twist for me.  I’m usually an honest person.  At least I try to be.

I wonder how much honesty is valued.  I wonder how much it ever was.  I mean if things turn out okay for all concerned then it probably doesn’t matter how honest anyone was in the process.  All is indeed well that ends well regardless of how that end was achieved.

Yep, that’s the ticket.

I try to teach my kids that honesty is a good thing, the way to go, the thing to do.  They say they get it but then they look at me and I wonder what exactly they might be thinking.  Do they already know that it unfortunately only matters who is left standing, who has scored the most points or runs, in the end, that really matters?

Where do you go when you need to find an honest person?  Do you go to your church?  Maybe talk to your local representative?  Nah.  How about a family member or close friend?  Boss?  Co-worker?  Teammate?  Union steward?  Teacher?  Where do you go?

Maybe you go nowhere because the need for an honest person does not exist and maybe never has.  Maybe we are all dishonest and maybe it just doesn’t matter.

So why sweat it?  Why worry if there is a bit of dishonesty about; maybe more than a bit.  Maybe that’s the way it has always been, was always meant to be.

And it may change tomorrow.  But I really kind of doubt it.

Some things were never meant to change.

Time Left for Man

Commentary Social No Comments

Utash, Hughes, Jackson & Sharpton

 

I know that the world is changing.  I can feel it and I can see it.  It reveals itself in so many stories from so many sources.  It is inescapable.

I know that the world is changing and I am not smart enough to know into what exactly though it is likely not very good.  I’m not sure that I would want to know even if I could.  Would you?

I see and feel that the world is changing and I know that I am no longer young enough to do much about it.

But is that really true?

I believe that there is a certain amount of goodness and a certain amount of badness in this world.  I call it badness because as a counter to evil the word “good” just doesn’t seem to cut it.  But I believe there are finite amounts of each at any given moment and that while it can be changed it cannot be changed all that much in a short amount of time.  The armies are massed and the battle lines drawn.  The outcome is not necessarily a given though.

Or is it?

I believe that in this day and age the dark forces have been emboldened and are stepping en masse out from the shadows.  And with that stepping out, the forces for good have stepped back in.  The balance has shifted and it has not shifted in our favor my friends.

Doubt this?  Okay.  But rather than attempt to list the reasons why I am right can you simply give me the reasons why I am not?  Please, I’m listening.

Too many good people have just given up.  They have either been worn down or exhausted or just don’t care much anymore.  And with each ounce of good that retreats more than an ounce of bad advances.  I believe that.  Just look at a mob beating as it serves as an easily accessible reminder that you can view more and more often these days.

Just look at what happened to Steve Utash.

Someone who is a better position to provide a comment on what happened has to tell me what that man did to deserve the beating that he received.  In fact, when does anyone deserve such a beating?  And our present and supposed forces for good would, hell, do, openly, loudly, and repeatedly decry such things like the evils of our advanced interrogation techniques and label them disgustedly as torture.  On this other thing though they remain silent.

It is not a black on black crime.

It is not a Latino on Latino crime.

It is not a Latino on black crime.

It is not a black on Latino crime.

It is not a white on black crime.

It is not any of these that receive at least some media coverage, some liberal outrage, or some street marches as led by the spectres portrayed by those long-time players Jackson and Sharpton.

Where, oh where, are those good right reverends in this case?

Silent.  Back in the shadows.  Bad rarely advances to confront bad in cases such as this.

No, this is a simple crime of black on white.  Many blacks on one white.  And no matter what the supposed reason for the reaction it is clear that what happened was an accident and in the process of trying to do the right thing this white man was savagely attacked and is now in a coma.

While there may have been high emotions due to the fact that a young boy was hit by a truck, accidentally, and the group of thugs (can I say that without being considered racist?…okay, so I will call them assailants instead, is that okay?) is it true to say that the man driving the truck was beaten simply because of the color of his skin?

There are different colors of skin in the world are there not?  Or does white skin only count when it is reported as being on the wrong or presently unpopular side of the issue?

If you disagree then that is your right of course.  And you are more than likely a racist in the full and horrible true fashion of the word.  Hate is hate.  Bad is bad.  Wrong is wrong.  Evil is evil.  Don’t matter where; don’t matter who.

So into the midst of all this madness, hatred, and racism steps an older black woman.  And this brave and courageous woman manages somehow to stop the beating.  There are almost no words that can describe my own personal admiration for this woman.  I don’t know what she thinks of white people but I see what she thinks of human beings.

The armies are massed and the battle lines drawn.  From out of the shadows emerges both good and bad, in constant battle for control of this world.  It is bad, it is indeed evil, that is the bolder and lately much more prevalent of the two forces.  And it is winning, I fear, and the good is in retreat.

I read a good bit of history and realize that battles, and ultimately wars themselves, can turn on a single event, can change with the heroic or simple but timely action of the few; or just the one.

How much time there is left for man may well depend on such courage and actions as exhibited by one solitary woman.  I wonder though just how many more of Deborah Hughes’ make-up and mettle are out there, out of the shadows and into the light.  Woman or man.  Black or white.  Rich or poor.  Tall or short, fat or thin, young or old- Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist…   Human.

I wonder.

Life Left Living

Personal Reflections & Memories No Comments

 

Strained the old arm playing baseball with the kids this weekend.  Not throwing, as you might suspect, but batting.  Guess I turned the power arm over too hard or too often hitting fungos to the outfield and am now paying the price.  Rather pitiful.

My feet are better but still hurt quite a bit when I walk on hard floors without shoes.  I try to not do that very often but, man, what a drag.

I have trouble sleeping still.  In fact it’s not yet 5:00AM and I have been awake for well over an hour.  I will be very tired by lunchtime and will likely have to take a nap.  Just like grandma used to do.

I noticed the sagging of the skin on my inner wrist, my neck, the back of my arm.  Man, I guess I am getting old.

Am I getting old or just getting older?  Are the best years of my life really behind me or are there more perhaps yet to come?  Have I done all of the significant things in life that I was meant to do or able to do?  How much time do I have left?  Will I fade slowly and sadly or quickly and with barely a whisper in doing so?  Or can I go out a bit better than that?

Hell, I don’t know.  Who does?  I would imagine that a good number of folks spend far too much time worrying about such things.  I have fallen into that trap a few times lately.  Please, no more.

I am trying to re-invent myself.  Like that expression?  I really don’t but it’s early and I am too tired to try to find another.  I simply want to do some of the things that I really enjoy and hopefully have them be able to provide a decent living so that I can to continue to support my family for some time to come.

Sometimes it’s all about just getting started and then, once begun, maintaining some sort of forward progress.  Walk, stumble, walk on.  Walk, fall, rise, walk on.  Always keep walking on.  Keep on truckin’ as we used to say.

Sometimes I feel very old.  And sometimes I don’t.  Playing baseball with my kids I felt young- until I hurt my arm for no apparently good reason and then I suddenly felt old…and weak…and rather useless.

Useless, helpless, hopeless.  Are these the words that describe me?  Are these the words that now define me?

God I hope not.  No, actually I think not.  No, they absolutely will not.

I will do the things that I choose to do.  I have attained a position and place in life where that is just possible and I will not watch the opportunity slide by me.  I simply have to do and no longer just wish or think or dream or hope.  Just do.

And, yes, perhaps there are a few things that I will need to back off of doing or perhaps give up doing altogether.  I guess that is life as it heads toward death.  Sorry if that’s depressing but you can never forever hide from the truth.

There’s life left to live and any life left living is life not yet dead.

So, yeah, I’ll continue to have to give up some things I suppose but don’t worry kids, baseball will definitely not be one of those.  Ever.

They’ll have to roll me up into a tight little ball and knock me out of the park to make that happen.

In fact, in thinking about that as a way to go…what a way to go.

Play Ball!

Chopping the Oak

Commentary Political No Comments

Brendan Eich

 

How dare you?  How dare you propose to exercise what some say is a right to free speech.  Where the hell do you think you are, 18th century America for chrissakes?

You gotta get wise friend.  There are many areas where you best not travel.  Well, I guess that you can go there but you best leave your voice and your thoughts, your opinions and viewpoints, behind.  In fact, don’t just leave them; get rid of them if they don’t line up with mine ok?

Things have a way of catching up to you ya know?  So maybe you didn’t figure anyone would ever find out but we did, we did man.  We never stop lookin’ for slugs like you who think they can hide behind that old bullshit Constitutional crap.  The screen is down man don’t you know it?

When the bullets start flying it sure as hell pays to be on the right end of the gun.  We’re taking aim and we aim to take no prisoners.  All’s fair y’know.  Think I’m kidding?

Hate speech is just that- speech that I hate.  I hate it when you try to speak so just shut up.  And if anything you do or say is something I don’t agree with then we will chop you down.  Who’s we?  We are all those who are not you.  And we hate you but our speech is simply in defense of what you disagree with and, as such, could never be considered as hateful.

Beautiful ain’t it?  We hate what you say or do, express that hate in defense of something that is protected from any speech or actions that we have worked to define as hateful, and then if you try to defend what you said, or your thoughts, or your position, we are able to just simply rack it up as more hate speech.  Game, set, match.  Pardon me while I chuckle at your total ignorance toward the inherent beauty of this new artform.  Folks like you, you’ll never learn.

You don’t get it?  Who cares.

In the end it’s simply the fact that we win.  And if we win then I guess you lose.

You can’t fight it if you can’t win so just get out of the way.

Yeah, okay, we’ll let you resign.  This time anyhow.

Love ya man

Observations No Comments

No, Really I Do!

 

If you were to read one of my postings (pick one) you might come to the conclusion that I have set feelings about certain groups of folks.  This is true.  I simply love the group of people who are honest, hard-working, positive, responsible, patriotic, happy, and not filled with an excuse for every occasion.

Is that your group?  Great!  I love ya man!

I don’t like groups who label me and classify me without once ever meeting me or talking to me or knowing anything at all about me.  I’m sure you absolutely understand it is a possibility that when you do that to me then I just might, when I’ve had enough, do the same exact thing to you.  That’s fair isn’t it?

I don’t appreciate groups that hide behind some sort of conveniently constructed screen and then hurl all sorts of accusations with absolutely no allowance for a response, much less any actual debate.  Why are they afraid to debate on the facts and not the fiction?

There is always a reason for why people do what they do.  I tell my kids as they grow and learn that to understand some things, unfortunately most things these days, just follow the money.  From politics to education to healthcare to insurance to media to religion to sports- just follow the money to see what’s what.  Money may be evil but it sure as hell is revealing.

I hate groups that try to hold me personally responsible for acts committed at another time or in another place by people that may look like me or even in some extended way be related to me.  Again, are these accusers held to the same judgment?  Even with such high levels of competition they are perhaps the worst possible examples of what is wrong with our society

Can’t we all just get along?

I recently heard a quote on this:

“I simply love the group of people who are honest, hard-working, positive, responsible, patriotic, happy, and not filled with an excuse for every occasion.  Is that your group?  Great!  I love ya man!”

Not Winston-Churchill or A. Lincoln profound but right on nonetheless.  Wish I could meet the author.

So, no, sorry all you hard-luck groups:  I ain’t racist (are you?), I ain’t sexist (are you?), I ain’t homophobic (but I do not agree with gay marriage, or, rather, as blacks believe that they are the sole owners & purveyors of the race issue why shouldn’t heteros be the sole owners & purveyors of the marriage question?- we owned it first).  I am a bit of an Islamophobic though, I have to honestly admit, as it seems far more of them blow themselves and innocents up than any other group- is that incorrect?  That may be unfair but until it stops I find it hard to stop.

I’m sure that I am leaving some groups out and I apologize for that.  Maybe in a future posting.

Leave the excuses, grab some responsibility, join with those of us who don’t rely on color, or sex, or sexual preference, or religion, or nationality, or any other convenience to gain ground where our effort or ability fails to do so.

Come meet me and then look me in the eye and glance over at the mirror and then tell the truth about who the real guilty party is.

I’d like to think you’d be surprised but it is hard to hide from the truth forever.

Just Kidding, Right?

Commentary Observations No Comments

No Kidding America

 

I fixed the creaking floor.  It’s creaking again.

The navigation system in our expensive new vehicle continues to place the location as off-road and, instead of telling us how to get to where we are going, it keeps trying to tell us how to get back on to the road we are already (and still) on.

There has been another shooting, with deaths, at Ft. Hood.

I heard another white liberal who has spent his life in academia talking about racism again.  He had the support of some high-ranking Democratic officials and some black activists who managed to stray out from their mansions in the suburbs.  I managed to miss the precise nature of the accusation but they assure me it must be true.

At school my kids are learning all about their country.  Correction, all about “their” country.  They learn about how we… screwed the Indians; raped the land; polluted the waterways; shut women out from the workplace and voting booth; exploited the working man; planted the seeds for hatred in so very many countries around the world and are now being served our just dessert; were responsible for just about every war in every corner of the world over the last couple of centuries; immorally treated illegal aliens; unethically pursued the sin of the American Dream; allowed and even aided big business to screw over every single person in the country, again and again and again; obstructed a woman’s right to produce, not produce, or un-produce; denied people of the same gender the right to couple, marry, and assume children; withheld the natural right of healthcare by not allowing everyone to insure regardless the risk or even the need; polluted outer space; allowed far too much free speech in the wrong areas; prevented unions from assuming their natural positions as the only allowed owners of labor; shut minorities out from business and school opportunities; unfairly imprisoned people who have broken the legally and properly enacted laws; and enslaved millions of blacks even 171 years after they were declared emancipated by none other than A. Lincoln.  I love the look in their eyes when they return home after a hard day learning all of this (and maybe just a bit of math and science)- it just bursts out as “God I am so proud to be an American”.  No time for any good stuff even if there was any.

The news media continues to flee from the unfair label of being a “free press”.  Their free use of their freedom of speech to deny the same freedom in others is, what, ironic?

It sure seems to cost a lot of money to win a campaign these days.  But that’s not buying the office, that’s just the way it is.

When I was a kid youth sports coaches managed to teach a little and expect a lot- win, baby, win.  If you weren’t all that good they would cast you off at the end of the season anyway.  Nice to see how much that has changed.

I recently tried to tell a kid that he was responsible for his actions.  I managed to escape hard time but was placed on probation.  One more offense and I’m in deep doo-doo.

The programming on television has never been better.  So much great stuff to choose from nowadays.  Good people with positive messages doing good things 24/7.

People still complain about the money poured into pro sports and yet still go to the games and still buy all of the endorsed products.  And then again complain that the amount of money these guys command is obscene.  Hypocritical of course but still good to know those that complain would never take such an offer themselves if they ever got the chance.

Everywhere I turn I encounter good role models for my kids.  It is comforting to know that there are still so many famous and popular folks who still step up to the plate on this.

Heard that Gwyneth Paltrow (or however the hell you spell her name- ain’t gonna look it up) thinks she has it much worse than the average working mother.  Wonder what her salary is; wonder if she cleans her own house; wonder if she washes her own car(s); wonder if she has a nanny (does she have kids?); wonder if she writes her own checks at the end of the month when the bills come due and it’s time to make meager ends meet.  I’m sure that none of us would want to be her.

White people are the only ones who should ever feel guilty about anything…ever.  Correction, mainly white males.  Correction, mainly white conservative males.  Correction, mainly white conservative males who are married to a woman.  Correction, mainly white conservative males who are married to a woman and dare to have more than one slave-owning, gay-bashing, woman-hating, immigrant-fencing, tree-cutting, job-producing, free-market-promoting, Constitution-supporting, air-polluting, responsibility-bearing, victim-causing, global-warming, fossil-fuel-consuming, income-tax-paying, SUV-driving, nice-house-owning, anti-union, capitalistic, property-tax-paying, personal-freedom-loving, non-socialist, light-skinned, home-grown, home-schooled, fascist, charity-giving, bratty little American kid.  God forbid it is another male and, worse still, possibly a Republican.  Oh the shame.

Do the celebrities who have made a ton of money off of the problems we face think that we don’t see they will lose their allure if ever things got better?  I’m not sure that some of them are not worse than those who cause all the problems.  But rock on.

The government will take care of you always.

The temperature is twenty degrees lower today than yesterday and there is a rumor of more snow in the forecast.

My kids don’t listen like they used to and certainly nothing like I think that they should.  I try to tell them all about life but they keep ignoring me.

I just heard the Dems have another plan to save the country and the Repubs are doing nothing about it.   The Libertarians are plotting how to come in 3rd again.

The price of gas shot up again right after winter ended.

The dogs need to go outside again.

It’s election year again.  Mid-terms.  We can elect more do-nothings and just let them gather in the aisle- no need to cross it and waste all that valuable energy.

This winter was so bad that we now have over 5 major cracks in the driveway.  Never happened before now.  Something else to fix.

Finding it harder and harder to get a good night’s sleep.  Keep waking up and then just end up getting up early.  Every single day.

Will continue to pay property taxes even if the kids go to a private school.  Education in this country has really gotten pitiful.  But we still have the teacher’s unions thank God.

I heard that God is dead.

Have a leak in the wall, likely from the roof, that will need to be fixed when the weather gets better.  Something else to fix.

I’m working out pretty regularly and still can’t drop ten pounds.  And my feet hurt all the time and I have ringing in my ears and I am almost always so tired.

It sometimes seems that the world is closing in around me and my days are now numbered.  These are the bad days and the days when very little seems right.

I believe that our country is dying and there is not much a person like me can do to stop it, to save it for the future, to save it for the kids, for my kids.

It’s dying and no one is doing very much about it are they?

You have to be kidding me.

Are you freaking kidding me?

You gotta be frickin’ kiddin’ me…

No one looks up and no one, for damn sure, ever answers.

What Success?

Observations Personal No Comments

MY SUCCESS, YOUR SUCCESS

 

I’ll be archiving the entries for the first quarter of the year now that the 31st has arrived.  This will be the last posting for the first quarter and tomorrow things begin anew.

Nice to divide the year into quarters and months and weeks and days.  It gives us all a chance to start over or start fresh- with our families, with our friends, with our work, with our chores, with our dreams, our hopes, our lives.  Kind of a nice deal.

It’s still early and in a little while I will be getting the kids up to get them ready to go off to school after a ten day break for Spring.  We didn’t do anything very unique or too exciting from a kid’s point of view but we did spend a good bit of family time together.  I know they are not thrilled about going back, though they do like school, but I know that I will appreciate some of the available time it offers me.  Still I will miss the moments we shared.

They start their day off in band.  After that they will go to their classes.  Later today they will go to the allergist and then practice baseball in preparation for their first game tomorrow.  Opening Day!

Lots going on.  Lots more to come by the grace of God.

What will they do with their lives?  What will interest them?  What do they love now that they will no longer love next year and what new things will draw them in?

When I was a kid I didn’t know much, not nearly as much as I think my kids do at the same age.  Not sure why that is but it is.

When I was a kid I wasn’t aware of all of the opportunities and things to do that are out there in life, even at a young age.  No one really ever told me and I certainly did not know.  My kids are aware of as much of this as I was around the time I entered college.  Maybe more.

When I was a kid we did not have the resources to pursue much of anything if it cost money.  So we did what we could with the little we had.  The situation is much different for my kids.  I think that’s good, that’s better, but sometimes I do wonder.

If my kids have all of this knowledge, an early start, and the resources to pursue the opportunities that interest them and the stuff that makes up their dreams then I would think, I would hope, that success for them is farther reaching and is achieved much sooner and much more fully than it ever was for me.

But then there is the burnout factor and the very real chance that they will pursue something that they think they like before they are mentally or physically mature enough and they will then discard it for something else that is a bit simpler, a bit easier to be good at.  The impulse purchase syndrome.

There is also the achievement factor in that some things too easily achieved do not hold the same deep feeling of accomplishment as do the things that take so much more effort, of you, to achieve.  The level of satisfaction of a challenging goal achieved is just not the same and the level of excitement is just not as high.  So I guess that the impetus to just walk away can come more easily, especially for a kid.

What exactly is success and what price should be paid to reach it?  Is it fair that some seem to reach it so much sooner and more easily than others?  Is it fair that some never seem to get there or, worse perhaps, never seem to feel that they ever arrive no matter what they pursue, no matter how hard they might try?

I guess I don’t really know the answer.  I guess I never did.

I don’t know if I was ever really successful until I began to try to help my own children in their pursuit of success.  But for them it is not seen as success.  It is seen as doing something they enjoy and because they enjoy it then doing it more and maybe doing it better.

And when they have finally succeeded I suspect they may not know it either.  I will and I might then also consider it a success for me but I likely won’t.  Or maybe I will.

Success then, I guess, is merely only our own accomplishments as viewed and judged by others and is, therefore, in the end, really out of our hands.

All that we can do is to do what we like or love or want to do.  And then maybe doing it better.

In a free world and especially in this country this is possible and I would dread to live in a world, in a country, where it is not.