Sometimes life sucks

So I had this friend, right, he was one of the smart guys. He could reason things through like almost no one I've ever known. His biggest problem, as I saw it, was he was too smart for faith. Too smart to know it's OK not to know all the answers. Unable to believe that people need to believe in something. Faith, belief, reliance sometimes they are the only thing that keeps you going. This life can be a very hard and ugly place sometimes and if you have no one to turn to...where do you turn. I really liked this guy, man, he could talk about the heavy stuff and that, to me, is the easiest way to judge intelligence. I respected him for it because although I couldn't get him to see things my way he never shrunk from the conversation.

This guy, though, he was having a bad time of it (life). A lot of anxiety, feelings of hopelessness and despair. He was hurting and didn't know how to make the pain go away. For a long time he has been calling another friend of mine when he was at the lowest points and telling him that he wanted the pain to go away and was thinking of taking the only way out he could see. He would say what he wanted to do and then say the only thing really stopping him was that he was too weak to do it or maybe too scared. Well I guess when things don't get better and you see no other options it has a very sad way of working up your courage and resolve. See, today, he killed himself. He called my other friend last night just like so many other times. But the part that isn't like other times is at some point today he actually went through with taking his own life.

It is such a waste. If he could only have known how to believe in something...I think that is the key to making it through this life. Nobody is happy all the time, nobody has a smooth road, nobody can manage all by themselves. There has to be something bigger, someone to turn to when you can't make it on your own. Someone to show you the path when you are to blinded by your tears to see the way. Someone to pick you up out of whatever hole you have dug for yourself and let you know you have options. It's the people that can't (or don't) believe that see that as the only way to end there pain. I've had dark times in my life when I didn't know what was going to happen and I didn't want to be me anymore. Thank God, that I can rely on him. I don't even want to think about a reality in which I would be in this world without my Lord, my protector, my shield against the crap that our human minds come up with.

...sometimes the world sucks.


Please, Lord God, be with the friends and family of this poor unfortunate soul. Suicide is not a victimless crime father, this brings about so much more pain and despair please bolster spirits Lord, we need you more than ever. I'm sorry father that I wasn't able to guide him to you Lord, you could have made all the difference. Please help us all get through this terrible tragedy, and please Lord be with everyone tonight that can't see a way out. Send an emissary to them tonight Lord and soften there hearts they need you Father, please protect them. Amen

Law never made men a whit more just. ~Henry David Thoreau

So the way I see it is if police officers cannot see past their own biases and ignorance they need to be stripped of their badges. How is it possible that the chump that arrested Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr., for the audacious crime of being successful AND black, can still walk around with a badge and gun when he obviously has no moral fiber or even a modicum of good judgment. For those that don't know this loser reported to a burglary in progress at Dr. Gates' house. Dr. Gates showed him 2 forms of ID and explained who he was and that it was his house that the university, in which he works as a professor(Harvard), manages the property. AFTER THAT, after he knows who it is and who's house it is, he proceeds to put Dr. Gates in handcuffs, take him to the station, fully process him, make him post bail and make him wait 5 days for the charges to be dropped. All because he's a black man who had the nerve to live in a neighborhood full of rich white people. Because he's made a great living using his mind and this hillbilly cop thinks he needs to knock him down a few rungs. It is obvious he knew what he was doing was wrong because he refused to give Dr. Gates his name or badge number.

There can be no justice when unjust men are enforcing our laws. I have great respect, in general, for the law enforcement officers of our country but they can not be given free reign to enforce there own biases, their job is to know and enforce the laws of our country. This is supposed to be a country where anyone can make a better life for themselves. It is the American way to pull yourself up by your bootstraps and improve your situation. A country that is supposed to be the place where you can be free as long as you live within our laws. It is not supposed to be only available to one race, religion, gender, political ideology or only to those with enough in the bank to keep the wolves at bay. This is the place in the world that is supposed to stand for hope, the place people aspire to come and grow as good people. Who knew that it's only the good things for white people who are already here, and for everyone else it's still the place were the police can come into your house in the middle of the day and haul you to jail just because they don't like what or who you are. It is a very rare thing that I am ashamed to be American, I do get guilty from time to time because of the embarrassment of luxuries we take for granted and the things we waste that people in other countries are dying because they don't have enough of. Today I am truly ashamed that this can happen in the country I love.


http://www.nydailynews.com/news/2009/07/20/2009-07-20_esteemed_harvard_professor_henry_louis_gates_jr_arrested_while_getting_into_his_.html?page=0


http://www.theroot.com/views/skip-gates-speaks

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."

Martin Luther King

Timing, it can't always be bad...right?

It's interesting that for quite a while I've been kind of in neutral, idling as it were, and while I was, pretty much everything else (exterior forces acting on my life; God, fate, bosses, possibly a muse) seemed to be doing the same thing, namely...nothing. Now here is the ironic part. I fancy that I'm starting to come out of my malaise and these forces seem to be trying to make up for lost time. All sort of fighting against each other, presumably figuring to make sure they get there chance first in case I give in again before they get there turn. My issue isn't that these things are happening but in the fact that they are contradictory things most of them trying keep me from the path that I have deemed appropriate for my future. You see, I've recently started making decisions that impact the way my life will go from the point that I am able to enact them (sorry I'm not going into details here but I like to play close to the vest, you'll find out in due time). The things that are going on at any other point would have been a blessing and I would have welcomed them, but now they seem a trap that only look to drag me down. I'll give you the latest example (the one that actually prompted this post). I have worked my current job for a long time and while I have made some advances in seniority and rank, it has never been a fiscally beneficial time for me. I have decided that while I like my job and would not have met any of my best friends without it, I do not want to work retail for the rest of my life. Shocker. I know it's a job that's supposed to be a means to an end and not a career. But now that I've come to this realization a very interesting thing has happened. I was talking to the owners of the store and it was intimated to me that they had me pegged for a pretty significant promotion and raise (although not hard dates or plans were made). The thing is, I know me. I've got this very strong sense of honor, if I was to take that promotion that's it for me. That's my job for ever. So it seems that has put an expiration date on my current job. When the time comes I can do 1 of 2 things. 1) I can take it, bank some money, buy a house, settle down in Cheney and work that job...forever. or 2) I quit and start my plans at that point whether I'm ready or not. I don't see a 3 I can't see myself working there after turning down a promotion. If this would have happened already I'm pretty sure I know what I would do and it would have been the wrong choice. It would possibly be my one chance to make a descent living at any point in the foreseeable future and I would have to turn it down in order to stick with my convictions.

...I guess what it boils down to is God didn't let this come into my life earlier because he know I would have made the wrong choices and screwed up the amazing world changing things he has planned for me!


P.S. for those of you that know them PLEASE don't mention any of this to my employers (or anyone who would tell them) although I am willing to stick to my convictions I'm not quite ready to act on them just yet.

We cannot banish dangers, but we can banish fears. We must not demean life by standing in awe of death. ~David Sarnoff

So today I got an interesting glimpse into the face of death. No...I'm not talking about Farrah Fawcett and I am most definitely not talking about Michael Jackson. The death of a celebrity can in no way be put on the same plane as the death of a normal person. Celebrities aren't real, they're just something you see on a screen or in a tabloid. Sure they are real enough to their family but that's not the same thing, is it? But I digress. Today I had a 15 minute conversation that made me think about death more than I ever have before. But before I delve into specifics, a little background of my views on the subject. I have never been afraid of death. That is to say, that as long as I can remember, since I have been aware of the concept (and reality) of death I've never been afraid of it. I've known a lot of death in my life. I've been in hospital rooms when people die on a couple of occasions. I've lost multiple grand parents and found myself less than affected by the majority of the loss. As bad as it may seem, when my father's mom died I left work in the morning and was back on the clock by noon. It really is something that looses it's ferocity the more you experience it. When I was in 5th grade one of my best friends was killed in a tragic accident. I think the year(or so) after that the father of another of my best friends died on Christmas Eve. Don't misunderstand me it's not that I don't miss the departed or regret the fact that I can't be around them any more. No...that's not it at all. It's hard to explain because the more I try, the worse it makes me look. I'd like to think it's because I'm secure in what's going to happen to my soul after I die that allows me to accept it like this. But although I am secure in my fate I'm not sure that's it. You see, I think I've just been around it so much it has become, sort of...mundane. Join me again in present day. Standing in the back stockroom at work today I had a discussion with a 23 year old kid who only earlier this morning found out he has a brain tumor the size of a rather large walnut. He has a 50-50 shot of it continuing to grow and there is no one in the immediate area that can preform this type of surgery. Oh wait, that's not the part that got to me, not entirely. We stood there talking, going over hypotheticals in both directions of his fate. What happens if he has surgery, what if he chooses not to. Being typically male we tried to poke a little fun at the situation. I told him if things progressed poorly he could get to sign up for a make-a-wish. So we talked about what he would want in that instance. He started talking about how if he got to the point where his days were numbered he would want to move west and spend a lot of time at the ocean. (Nope that wasn't what got me either). Do you want to hear what it was, what broke through my typically stoic mien? He stood there with red rimmed eyes, all manned-up, he told me the thing he is going to regret the most is having to shave his head. That's it, that's what did it. Not, if I die there is so much I haven't done. Not, I'm going to fight it's not going to get me. Not, I hate the world for allowing this to happen to me. I don't want to shave my head...and that's had me thinking all day long. To me it brings death a whole lot more into focus. It shows me that his mind can not handle everything it's receiving so it broke all that information down into one tiny little thing that it could handle. It can't handle do I risk surgery but my hair is so thick I don't want to loose it, is right in it's wheelhouse. This scared the hell out of me. I'm so used to being able to think through most any situation and look at it logically but now there is something that has the power to make my brain say, No I won't think about that try this instead. That is the part I don't think I could take. This poor kid has no real family, they are there but not the kind of people you can count on. He is being forced to face his own mortality. But what keeps going through my mind is, what happens when he isn't worried about his hair anymore? What is the next thing his mind can cling to? I'm not seeing a whole lot of other innocuous things it can find in the situation.

Sorry to be so bleak.

Hope is independent of the apparatus of logic. ~Norman Cousins

Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom. ~Marcel Proust

OK, so I've been really wanting to get back to posting on this Blog and I thought the easiest way to find a topic is to take something someone else has said and expound on it (for those that don't know I'm kind of a sucker for quotes and that makes this easier).

I find it interesting how we acquire the people in our lives that make us happy. I say we but, of course, I really mean me. I think it's funny how round about it is. My own personal group of "charming gardeners" thinking back were all basically accidental meetings or met through acquaintances or (most interesting of all) people I had missed meeting earlier in life but was only a degree away. I have a friend that is the cousin of one of my friends when I was in junior high and high school but we had never met back then. I have another friend who is the sister of someone I knew from 3rd grade all the way through graduation. While I can't still count the initial relationships as friends, too many years have gone by for that, it has lead me to some of my favorite people.

But it's not just the initial meeting that has me fascinated it's how your whole perception of people can change through the course of time. For the better or worse. It's interesting you can be really tight with someone and after a little time you just can't be around them anymore. I'm hardly friends with anyone I knew while I was in school anymore, although thanks to the wonder of facebook I've reconnected with some really good people from back in the day. But it can work the other way too. People that you're not close with to start off with can turn out to be some of the most important people in your life, sometimes more so than you would have expected.

I know this post is kind of meandering and doesn't fully complete any thoughts but this was really more to get me back in the swing of writing and less about quality of content ;)

All this to say that at this point in my life my soul is lush and growing greener and more full every day. I am so grateful for those of you who cultivate it. I hope you know who you are (if not ask I'll let you know) I have people in my life that I can't imagine not being there and hopefully they always will be. I love you guys.

DARK WAS THE NIGHT

So there I was going through my nightly internet routine...Check email, Check Facebook, Very quick check on the hardly ever used Myspace (just to check for messages), then on to the blogs. I've got 7 that I check every night and a handful of others that I check a couple times a month. So it should go without saying, if you write it I'm going to read it. So anyways I was making my way through, when I got to my dear sweet eldest sisters' school blog. And very much to my surprise I got a mention. She said she wrote because she saw on my blog that it had been 5 weeks since her last post. Then I got to looking and realized it had been the same amount of time since I had posted. So feeling shamed that my very busy (finishing her Doctorate while teaching classes and chasing after an almost 2 year old) and very tired (did I mention she just had a baby day after Christmas and hasn't slept much since?) found time to post on a blog she's not even sure people are reading (I am), I decided it was time to for me to post also...but what to write?

So I got to thinking about what's going on right now and I came up with something I'm pretty excited about. I love music; the platform for expression, the power to move peoples' souls, whatever it is it stirs up a part of me nothing else can. I really enjoy finding new bands and discovering new sounds. It just so happens that a bunch of bands that I've found in the last couple of years got together and put out a compilation called "Dark Was The Night." Now, every once in a while something happens that can really lighten your heart, something you love can actually make a difference. Now I would have bought this Cd set anyway but it comes with the added bonus that it's a benefit Cd.

Dark Was the Night is two-disc CD, featuring 31 tracks that have been exclusively recorded for the compilation. That's cool in and of itself, but what's even better is that sales from the album will benefit the Red Hot Organization - an international charity dedicated to raising funds and awareness for HIV and AIDS. Check out Red Hot's link and see that they really are a worthy cause, to date they have donated nearly 7 million dollars to AIDS relief around the world. Everyone wins here you get great music and someone somewhere just might get to live. I bought my copy at Amazon.com but I'm pretty sure it's also available on iTunes


DARK WAS THE NIGHT

THIS DISC

1 Knotty Pine – Dirty Projectors + David Byrne
2 Cello Song (Nick Drake) – The Books featuring Jose Gonzalez
3 Train Song (Vashti Bunyan recorded, written by Alasdair Clayre) – Feist + Ben Gibbard
4 Brackett, WI – Bon Iver
5 Deep Blue Sea – Grizzly Bear
6 So Far Around the Bend – The National (arrangement by Nico Muhly)
7 Tightrope – Yeasayer
8 Feeling Good (popularized by Nina Simone) – My Brightest Diamond
9 Dark Was the Night (Blind Willie Johnson) – Kronos Quartet
10 I Was Young When I Left Home (Bob Dylan) – Antony + Bryce Dessner
11 Big Red Machine – Justin Vernon + Aaron Dessner
12 Sleepless – The Decemberists
13 Stolen Houses (Die) – Iron and Wine
14 Service Bell – Grizzly Bear + Feist
15 You Are The Blood – Sufjan Stevens

THAT DISC

1 Well-Alright – Spoon
2 Lenin – Arcade Fire
3 Mimizan – Beirut
4 El Caporal – My Morning Jacket
5 Inspiration Information (Shuggie Otis) – Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings
6 With A Girl Like You (The Troggs) – Dave Sitek
7 Blood Pt 2 (based on original song “You are the Blood” by the Castanets) – Buck 65 Remix (featuring Sufjan Stevens and Serengeti)
8 Hey, Snow White (Destroyer) – The New Pornographers
9 Gentle Hour (Snapper) – Yo La Tengo
10 Another Saturday (traditional song) – Stuart Murdoch
11 Happiness – Riceboy Sleeps
12 Amazing Grace (traditional song) – Cat Power and Dirty Delta Blues
13 The Giant Of Illinois (Handsome Family) – Andrew Bird
14 Lua – Conor Oberst + Gillian Welch
15 When the Road Runs Out – Blonde Redhead + Devastations
16 Love vs. Porn – Kevin Drew

31 tracks on 2 Cd's cost me something like $12. It's amazing that something so inexpensive can make such a big difference!

How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world. ~Anne Frank

Real difficulties can be overcome, it is only the imaginary ones that are unconquerable. ~Theodore N. Vail

This post is going to be a pretty ambiguous and for that I apologize in advance. If it pans out I'll fill you all in on the details later, I just needed to release a little pent up worry. This isn't meant to frighten anyone, so don't jump to any conclusions. I'm OK.

For quite a while now I've suspected there might be something...wrong. Maybe wrong is too strong, Let's go with; off, askew, amiss, distorted or maybe just strange. I think I've even figured out what it is. I have to do a little more research but what I've found so far seems to fit. I have to talk to somebody and see what they think or have experienced. I know the logical thing is to talk to an expert but that really scares me. It's not really real if the people with the fancy degrees don't tell you about it...you know what I mean? I don't think it's paranoia but at this point I can still tell myself that it is. But the thing is...I don't know how to fix it. The worst part is, the one thing I hate most is surrendering control. Well, that and admitting weakness. Those are pretty much obstacles I'm going to have to overcome if I'm going to move forward with this. The interesting thing is, by trying to chase it down for myself I feel oddly empowered. At this point it kind of feels like a pretty good mystery novel. Hunting down clues, reading between the lines making deductions. If it wasn't about me and wasn't a little scary it could be a fun little exercise.

I want to end this on a happy note. So until next time remember...

Hope is that thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words and never stops... at all. ~Emily Dickinson