Tag: human condition

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personal

Chad Vazquez BJJ

What are you?

Chad: Can I run something by you?
Me: Sure.
Him: (later) I don’t think I’m ready.
Me: (shaking head) No one’s ever ready for their lives to change. The saying isn’t, “Take your chances when you’re ready.” The saying’s, “Take your chances as they come.” This is your chance to ball. You can be a basic bitch, or you can ball.

Chad and I have a buddy, Brando, that sent Chad information on a space to take over so Chad could have his own gym. The wild thing is that Brando owns a gym himself.

That’s what an amazeballs human being he is – even though he ran his own gym, he still sent Chad information so Chad could open his own. What a class act.

In any case, Chad turned it down. But then, last week, he gave me and alla those handsome devils you see in the pic above, a buzz to meet up to see if we would help if he did eventually open his own space.

Without hesitation, we all agreed and everyone met up at my fave Chinese joint around the way with less than 48 hours notice. And these are some busy and powerful people. Why?

Miller: We all believe in you, Chad.
Me: (interjecting) Well, I’m helping him.
Chung: We all believe in you, Chad.
Me: (grumble)

Over some soup dumplings, Szechuan beef noodle soup, and beer, we banged out a jaw-dropping amount of details in just about 90 minutes.

Then I spent the rest of the weekend building out spreadsheets, writing up legal papers, and dealing with all sorts of random issues.

All of this while juggling stuff with my own building and alla these new people I’ve been meeting in the world, but that’s a story for some other time.

Chad’s helped me with a lotta things and this is my way to pay it forward with him.

Besides, this is what I think he’s meant to do.

Me: When I was kid in Queens, there was a saying I rather liked. It went: Bitch-ass motherfuckers get what they can. Hard-ass motherfuckers get what they want. I know what I am. What are you? Or, rather, what do you *want* to be?
Him: The latter.
Me: (nodding) Then take your chances as they come, brother.

It’s early yet, but you heard it here first: Chad Vazquez is gonna try and open his own gym.

The hardest thing about doing anything, is the deciding. Everything else is just details.

Maybe you’ll come by and watch Chad do his Chad thing?

I might do some stabby-slashy-stabby there whenever he he finds a place and opens but this is gonna be his little slice of the world.

I’ll keep you posted.

Location: around the way, having an Old Fashioned
Mood: so goddamn excited
Music: been working so the both of us can ball (Spotify)
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I should go now

I should always order the steak

It’s been a busy week, least of all because I was always unsure if I had allergies – I never had any as a kid – but now I can definitively say that I do.

Was a coughing mess because of tree allergies and walked around sounding like Don Corleone.

Because it rained the entire holiday weekend, alla my bigger plans got reduced drastically to several one-on-one meetups, including with my boss.

As well as just random friends here and there.

A wealthy guy I know got divorced relatively recently so we went to Koreatown as I’ve been doing lately. He surprised me by asking me a question.

Me: I’ll answer that by asking you a question: We’ve known each other for close to two decades. Would I have ever cheated on Alison?
Him: (sighs) I’m sorry, I…
Me: That’s not the question you shoulda asked.
Him: What is?
Me: Did she ever proposition me? I think you know the answer to that one too. Even if I was capable of cheating on Alison – and I don’t mess with marriage, mine or anyone else’s – I’m always loyal to my friends.
Him: What did you tell her and why didn’t you ever tell me?
Me: I told her, “I should go now,” and left. Didn’t tell you cause I was hoping it was a one-off. But you can go fuck yourself. If I wanted your wife, I woulda taken your wife.

I regret not ordering the bigger steak platter.

Oddly enough, a similar, but different, situation came up in discussion while driving home with some other friends the following night.

Me: They each asked me on separate occasions but I told them, “I think I should go now,” and just left.
Her: [Both women] were unhappy in their relationships. So I believe that.

It’s weird, I’ve gone from being the most important person in the world to one person to being just a shady secret to rando women in NYC.

Perhaps even weirder, I’ve reached a point in life that I have a go-to phrase for MBA women.

On a much more positive note, did manage to end the weekend with the sun and my college friends.

We’d talked for ages about our kids hanging out and it never happened because I was so messed up in my head all these years.

But we all got together in a biergarten in Brooklyn on the only sunny day of the holiday.

Her: Your son’s so cute!
Me: Well, I’m required by law to keep him for the next 11 years but his being cute definitely helps.

The boy had a blast hanging out with all of their kids.

This is him having a slice of pizza sitting under the table to avoid the sun. He’s such my kid.

As is typically the case when I see groups of friends these days, I’m the only single one. So, the setup questions happened at the end, several drinks in.

Her: You’d like my best friend, she’s an investment banker.
Me: You should know better than to set her up with a fella like me. For one thing, I’m a high-functioning alcoholic.
Her: (waves hand) Let’s not mention that part. She’s super wealthy, if you want to be a kept man.
Me: (laughing) Do you think I look the way I look to not be a kept man? But really, if she’s your best friend…
Her: What else are you looking for – besides being a kept man, that is?
Me: Hot, busty, smart, Caucasian, 30-39. I don’t think you fully appreciate how shallow and vain I am. Kindness is a plus, though.

Must be giving off a single vibe.

Katsmw: That waiter was totally hitting on you.
Me: I could tell when the kid gave him our address and he mentioned that he lived near us. All the boy needs to do now is to give him my PIN number for my bank accounts.
Her: (laughing) Man, you can really flirt with anyone.
Me: (shrugging) It’s 2021. I do a lot for free drinks…

Location: Yesterday, Park Slope, Brooklyn
Mood: coffee/coughy
Music: I’m sick of being sad. Ooh, I could be happy (Spotify)
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PSA: Talk to Someone

Mental Health Awareness Month 2021

May’s almost over, thank goodness, as it’s an awful month for me for reasons you probably already know.

Having said that, May’s also Mental Health Awareness Month and I wanted to get in this entry before the month was over.

This Thursday, I’m seeing a therapist again for the first time in over a decade-and-a-half. My buddy Miller’s been really supportive and encouraging for me to just talk to someone.

Should note that I’m actually not in a bad place right now, all things considered. But the insomnia’s  always just one poor food choice or one argument away. And that’s not a good thing, because my insomnia’s always a trigger to bigger problems.

With the kid and my age, I’ve gotta be extra vigilant to be ok.

That means brushing my teeth three times a day, exercising regularly, watching out for carbs, avoiding zombies, keeping up with the people important to me, and making sure that I’m on top of my mental health.

If you’re not making sure your health – mental and physical – is where it needs to be, you’re setting yourself up for a difficult time down the road.

Broken people become broken people over time.

After all, alla your life’s problems can be divided up into health, wealth, and relationships. So you should be spending a little bit of time on all three every day.

Being a gym rat, I meet tons of people that are also very attentive as to their physical health but I wonder if they’re equally watchful of their mental health.

The thing is, you gotta take care of your mental and physical health because when you’re not ok, it’s the people you love that pay the price.

Someone’s gotta pay for you to be alright, and it should be you and not them.

May’s almost over but attention as to your overall health never ends.

Him: Why do you go to the gym so much?
Me: So I can stay healthy and stay with you a long, long time.
Him: Will you go away?
Me: Someday. But not for a while.
Him: Not for a hundred thousand years?
Me: If I could stay with you until the end of the world, I would.
Him: That’s a long time!
Me: Not long enough, kiddo. When it comes to the people you love, there’s not enough time. There’s never enough time.

Location: Chinatown, eyeing the carbs
Mood: healthy
Music: It’s easy when you’re not around (Spotify)
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Trust is the coin of the realm

Are you Logan?

While walking the other day…

Him: Hey, are you Logan?
Me: Who wants to know?
Him: Hey man, I’m just a ScenicFights fan.
Me: Get outta town!

Interestingly, it happened pretty much exactly where someone else recognized me for 72nd to Canal, about fourteen years ago(!).

And, in a decade, I’ve gone from being a corporate lawyer lecturing in front of the Paris Bar to being known as the guy explaining why you can’t unzip another human being with a hammer.

Wonder what Alison and my dad woulda thought of alla this.

It’s pretty wild but if you go to the last Scenic Fights video that went up, you’ll see that Chad made a cool little (improvised) call-to-action, where he basically tells the audience that, for their entertainment, he will put me in a triangle choke, essentially by putting his crotch in my face.

In less than a week, we increased our subscribers by 6,000+ to 116,000, and garnered close to 1,300 comments, the vast majority of which were sending me condolences.

To paraphrase our producer, if there was ever a masterclass given for calls-to-action, Chad would be mentioned for his.

Check out the comments, cause some of them are hilarious.

Decided that I wasn’t going to accept any more setups because they’ve always been a disaster. Always. Since I was a kid.

Me: I could give you the line that it’s not you, it’s me, but I feel that’s unnecessary.
Her: Yeah, it’s you.
Me: (nodding) Fair.

A friend of mine asked me how I met so many women in my life so I told him. Now, he’s on a tear like I’ve never seen – you would not believe it if I told you.

Actually, maybe you would…

One thing I did ask him, though, was to stick with some of my rules; the second of which is brutal honesty and the first of which is: Leave people better off having met us than not.

In other words, we’re not trying to hurt anyone. But I think I’m breaking that rule myself.

For example, the girl I went on that date with last week stayed on my mind all week but it’s a lot more complex than that.

So, I need to figure some things out before I start involving other people in the mess I call my life.

Speaking of messes and brutal honesty, the kid lied twice recently.

Once about practicing his instrument and once about scribbling on the walls. Regarding the latter, it was obvs it was him because I’m 48 and my scribbling on the wall days are long past. He denied both at first but then admitted to them.

Me: I’d rather you tell the truth, even if it’s something bad.
Him: Why? You’ll be mad.
Me: Having someone mad at you is ok as long as you’re honest. “Trust is the coin of the realm. Everything else is details.” (George Shultz.)
Him: What does that mean?
Me: It means that if you’re someone that people trust, people will always accept you. Everyone wants to be with people they can trust.

I have a packed schedule all week. I’m:

      • training two groups of corporate people in self-defense/kali
      • having two private training sessions
      • helping a buddy work on his audition reel
      • trying to find some time to head to the law firm
      • childrearing as per use
      • helping a buddy with his business idea
      • trying to see about a girl

All of that stems from people trusting me to get the job done.

On the plus side, it’s nice that so many people want me to help them with things. On the negative side, there are only so many hours in the day.

Me: Lies are complex. Truth is simple. All things being equal, the more you lie, the more complex your life becomes. The more you tell the truth, the simpler your life becomes.
Him: I’ll won’t lie again.
Me: (laughing) You will. It’s the nature of people and we’re people. But, if you do lie about something, make sure it’s worth the cost of the lie and the subsequent complexity you’ve introduced into your life.
Him: I don’t understand.
Me: You will. I’ll make sure you understand.

Location: in front of a stack of weapons. A stack.
Mood: violent and busy
Music: I can wait for you (if you want me to) (Spotify)
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A little déjà vu

An unexpected night at the gym

Pez was helping out again with the boy and the two of them randomly decided to go to the High Line together.

She sent me some hilarious pics but I can’t post most of them.

They came back for dinner and afterward, she said, “I’m thinking of heading to class tonight.”

Me: Whoa, wait, are you driving?
Her: Depending on traffic, probably.
Me: Can you bring the kid and me?
Her: Sure, do you have a car seat?
Me: (puzzled) I’m a parent. I have a car seat.

I got clearance from the gym owners and Chad, the instructor, to bring him.

It was the first time that I’d ever brought him to the gym and both he and the people there were great. I gave explicit instructions for him not to leave the bench for any reason and he didn’t.

Because Chad and most of the upper belts knew him, they all made sure he was fine. Mouse was there too and he spent several minutes trying to get her attention. In the end, they caught up and it was sweet to see. For a moment, I forgot.

Afterward, Pez gave us a lift back. But not without some more entertainment.

Him: That was fun. Can we go again?
Me: It’s like two hours after your bedtime. I think that’s the real reason you want to go again.
Him: (sleepily) No…

If my birthday was the most I’ve been insulted in recent memory, then the past few days have been some of the most ego-boosting.

A girl I dated a while ago rang me to hang out recently; I hadn’t seen her in ages. So, we met up around her new pad. I told her about some of the conversations I had recently.

Her: Kinks? I seem to only really like guys that graduated from Stuyvesant High School.
Me: That’s a weird kink.
Her: (continuing) There’s you and X and Y. That’s three. You’re all smart and cute.

Her: So, you and Mouse are finally done?
Me: Looks that way.
Her: Good. I met the perfect girl for you.
Me: (shaking head) Nope, nope, nope. No more setups. Do you know how many setups I’ve had in the past month? Actually, my whole life?
Her: (shaking her head) They don’t know you like I know you. This girl’s exactly your type. 33, blond, busty, green eyes, super smart, and a boss. Wants a family.
Me: OK, I need a picture. (hands me her phone) Whoa, ok. What’s wrong with her?
Her: (shrugging) I don’t know if she’s good enough for you yet.
Me: First of all, super flattering. Second of all, you just said…
Her: You deserve the best. I told her all about you, so we’ll see.
Me: Hopefully not everything. I like to surprise people with some of the things I can do.

Honestly, the biggest turn-on – my biggest kink, if you will – is kind people. There’s something about someone that goes out of their way to make your life better.

Conversely, there’s something so ugly about people when they’re cruel and hurtful. It’s the biggest turn-off.

Anywho, she and I didn’t work out for reasons we don’t need to get into here. But she was beyond sweet and I told her that.

Thank goodness for the good souls.

Her: I started seeing this guy I really like so I’m not gonna invite you back to my place.
Me: Good choice, we’ve got alcohol and you’re being incredibly sweet so that’s a dangerous combo for me.
Her: I thought you didn’t make out with your friends.
Me: (laughing) I never said we were friends, darling.
Her: (smiling) It’s good seeing you again, Logan. I’ve missed you.
Me: Same, Lviv. Good luck with your fella.

Saying goodbye to her was reminiscent of Daisy and Gradgirl because they, like her, belong to someone else.

But, I suppose we all have our roles to play and I guess I’ve finally accepted mine as the other guy, which is precisely what a woman once told me ages ago.

See, she wanted to fix me up with her kid but she didn’t know how old I was so I politely declined.

And she got upset and said I only seem to seek out people that can’t be in relationships because I enjoyed the game. I told her that wasn’t true, I was looking for my biggest fan.

But, that was then. Maybe – now – she’s right. After all, I was the love of someone’s life once and that should be enough.

Boy: You’re home!
Me: I am.
Him: How was your friend?
Me: Very sweet.
Him: I wanted to meet her.
Me: (laughing) I think you’ve met enough of papa’s friends. Come on, let’s go play.

Location: Upper east side
Mood: flattered
Music: This is feeling a little déjà vu (Spotify)
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Aposematism

Red and Yellow

Me: I think you’re off starting next Monday
Him: I’m off starting this Monday, papa.
Me: Well…that’s suboptimal.

Thought the boy’s Spring break began April 5th. I was incorrect.

Annnnd…shitballs. Here’s Pez watching the kiddo because I was in a pinch.

Her: You have the cutest kid!
Me: Thank you – you’re the best!

Earlier this week, I did some legal work that beat 96% odds.

Him: You did good work, Logan.
Me: No, I didn’t do good work. I won with 4% odds, that’s not good; that’s fucking fantastic. I did fucking fantastic work. They weren’t ready for me.

Because the kid was off, we went up to Connecticut to see a buddy of mine so the boy could have a playdate with his daughter.

While I was there, I took a picture of myself looking very out of place in my usual red leather jacket and the woods.

I always had this bright yellow/orange jacket – that picture below was taken by the Green-Eyed Schoolteacher back in 2007 – but when Alison got first got pregnant in 2011, I had my tailor make me a bright red leather jacket as a celebration.

It took a few months to get to me and, by then, we already lost that child. That was the start of our hell, which only ended six years later when she died. It was complete bullshit.

I never wore it while she was here and only rarely wore the other jacket during that whole time. Instead, I wore my beat up dark red leather jacket – that’s me when I was in Prague twenty-five years ago – and my other rando stuff.

I told a buddy of mine that most of the world lives an unexamined life. If anything, I examine the world around me a little too closely.

Why do I think the way I do?
Why do I dress the way I do?
Why does this matter to me?
What does this mean?

When Alison died, I wore only black for the first six months. I wore only black because I saw only black.

And then I realized that I had to reenter the world, as much as I didn’t want to. But after that, I put on my red leather jacket and wore it out for the first time. It’s pretty much my daily driver now, although I do break out the yellow/orange jacket on occasion.

There’s this thing called “aposematism,” which comes from the Greek ἀπό apo “away” and σῆμα sēma “sign.”

Aposematism, then, is “a sign to stay away.”

Basically, dangerous things are often brightly coloured, with the most dangerous things either red or yellow/orange against black.

      • Black Widow (red against black)
      • Yellowjacket (yellow/orange against black)
      • Murder Hornets (yellow/orange against black)
      • Monarch butterflies (orange against black)
      • Pitohui (red against black)
      • Poison Dart Frogs (blue, red, and/or black)

Just to name a few.

I wear bright red and yellow against black because I’m a lawyer with two decades of experience that teaches knife fighting in his spare time.

There are other reasons but that’s all I wanna share right now.

Most people, subconsciously, get that a guy doesn’t wear a bright yellow/orange or red leather jacket unless he can.

Although not everyone uses the sense god gave them. On the way to one Scenic Fights shoot, I had this conversation:

Him: You want to start some shit?
Me: I think I do, homie.

Subtlety only gets you so far sometimes.

Although, to be fair, I also paid extra to have a paisley print put into the red jacket and artwork to line my yellow/orange one.

I thought it made them look prettier. 

Location: home
Mood: pretty
Music: Ooh-ooh-ooh, that’s my violet (Spotify)

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Memories of a chocolate teapot

Seeing the world but once

Me: What’s wrong?
Him: Annie doesn’t want to play with me. Can we go?
Me: OK, let’s go to another playground.

I’ve noticed something interesting about the kids that my son is closest to – they’re all hapas like him.

Dunno if this is some subconscious thing or because there are so many hapas running around the Upper West Side.

This lady named Louise Glueck once said, “We look at the world once, in childhood. The rest is memory.”

I couldn’t agree with that statement more. I think that, by the time we’re 14 or so, we know the broad contours of what we like and we don’t like.

For example, there was this little girl named Jennifer that I used to hang out with all the time growing up. We were both maybe six or seven, way before any real rational emotion was possible, but all I knew was that I loved hanging out with her.

She was blond with coloured eyes. Just like Alison.

I tell my friends to always be careful that they aren’t controlled by their 14 year-old impulses. But sometimes, you can’t help it – I’m no different.

In any case, the way I look at it, I have nine years to shape this kid’s perception of the world and I feel I’m already running outta time.

As much as possible, I try to have him the see the world for what it is – both the good and the bad – rather than what someone else wants him to see, what’s for sale.

The things he values now, he’ll value the rest of his life so I try for him to value things that are innately valuable. Those things that cannot be taken from you, like skills and kindness.

Because, in some way, we’re all prisoners of our 14 year-old selves.

Him: Isn’t that cool?
Me: It’s about as useful as a chocolate teapot.
Him: (laughing) What does that mean?
Me: Think about it, kid. It’ll come to you.

Then again, he may just be fine.

After all, he’s not just my kid, he’s Alison’s too. And maybe he won’t be quite as lonely as I was, growing up.

Me: Are you ok that Annie didn’t want to play with you?
Him: (nodding) I’ll meet someone else. (later) This is Sandy, papa, she lives on West 74th.
Me: (laughing) Hello Sandy who lives on West 74th. Why don’t you two play and I’ll watch your scooters?

Location: earlier today, watching some scooters by some stone elephants
Mood: hopeful
Music: All you got to do is blink your eyes and the years go by like that (Spotify)
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Snyder’s Justice League is about family

You should watch it

I was never a true fan of Zack Snyder’s version of the Man of Steel but I did think he had his moments.

But, after the fanboy disappointment that was the theatrical release of The Justice League, I figured what Zack had in mind had to be better.

So, I’ve been quietly waiting all this time for the Snyder cut of the film and I saw it this past Friday.

It was amazing. The whole time I was watching it, I kept saying exactly that: This is amazing.

My brother was at my place while Chad and I watched it and this is essentially how we looked for four hours.

Him: This is amazing.
Me: (five minutes later) This is amazing.

It’s supposed to be 90% different than the theatrical release and I gotta say, that number is accurate: It’s a completely different film.

Snyder left the production after the suicide of his daughter Autumn, which is such a horrible thing to even contemplate that I wish I could just gloss that fact over and not think about it.

But that’s impossible. Her death, forced her parents – Snyder’s wife was heavily involved in the film as well – to just bail.

And I get it. When Alison died, nothing mattered. I had zero capacity to do anything beyond merely function, drink, and womanize.

Still, at some point, we either get on with living or we get on with dying.

I did the former and so did Snyder.

These pics are all from when I went to ComicCon back in 2017.

Interestingly, the film is as much about family as it is about superheroes.

      • The Flash is trying to save his father.
      • Cyborg is trying to forgive his father and deal with the loss of his mother.
      • Aquaman is trying to know his mother and see his father.
      • Wonder Woman is trying make up for leaving her mother.
      • Superman is trying to live up to the aspirations of both sets of parents, biological and adopted.
      • And Batman…well, he’s all about his parents.

For all the amazing special effects and the thrill of seeing my childhood heroes in a worthy live-action film, it had a far more heart than I was expecting.

Honestly, it’s worth four hours of your time if you haven’t seen it.

I saw it on the night that I normally go to kali but, because of the gout, I could only stay for half-an-hour.

It’s a shame, because my buddy Panda stopped by. He, and another buddy, Thor, both have gout and they told me the same thing: I needed to drink copious amounts of water.

So I did that, and the next day, felt markedly better.

So good, in fact, that I went to roll in Brooklyn, which ended up being both a good idea and a terrible idea, terrible because I thought I almost killed someone.

But that’s a story for tomorrow.

Location: earlier today, baking for the kid
Mood: thoughtful
Music: Sometimes I think this world’s too much, all the hurt, all the hate (Spotify)
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We can breathe together

How’d it all go?

That post I wrote about years about about the grief button remains the truest thing about grief I know.

This past weekend was busy, tiring, and fun. Oh, so much fun.

Chad, who’s normally pretty funny, was messing up the shoot for everyone because he was just full-on hilarious.

Me: (to the director) You gotta leave if you can’t stop laughing.
Him: (though tears) I gotta, yeah. I gotta.

Hopefully, some of the insanely funny things he said will come across the videos.

And Mouse and I have been getting along better than we have in a while. Plus the kid’s been adorbs.

All-in-all, I’ve been doing pretty well. That is, until I did my taxes.

You see, Alison did our taxes because she was a math whiz. And when she got sick, I did them, as best I could. Been doing them ever since.

I just finished them up before our weekend shoot when I remembered that our tax software was linked up to Alison’s email addy so I signed in and…nuthin.

Evidently, Yahoo erases ALL YOUR FUCKING EMAIL if you don’t log on for a while. Which I didn’t. She had that email since she was a kid.

Everything that made her life hers, digitally, was there. Because she lived before texts and FB but after email so the bulk of her digital life – as it were – was on that.

Gone.

That gutted me.

But then I spoke to her mother and we both agreed that, because I never read her emails in the four years since she left, I never would have. And I have no business reading it because those were for her and not for the kid or me.

That brought me some peace. Still, it was a rough day/night.

Then today – the very next day – I got a phone call from my very last client that I did work for back in 2015 before Alison went into the hospital.

Him: I had a question I wanted to ask you so I hope you don’t mind my calling. Hey, how’d it all go your first child? Boy or girl? How’s momma?
Me: … I’m…outside right now him, actually. Can I call you back?
Him: (confused) Oh, sure. Sure. We’ll catch up later.

And it’s like I stepped on the grief button and just stood on it. Grief-stricken.

It hit me all at once. I remembered.

I remembered Alison telling me to take that one last gig because we would both be busy raising the kid for the first 60 days and we’d need the money.

Little did we know just how fucked up the first 60 548 days of the kid’s life would be.

My uncle, my other uncle, Nick, Kirk, my dad, Fouad, Luciano, I remembered them all at once today, vis-a-vis Alison. And it was too much to bear.

For just a moment, I felt the awful emptiness that I felt after Alison left.

I stood there with the most insane impostor syndrome feeling you could imagine.

The fuck are you doing, Logan? You’re not a dad, you can barely raise a houseplant. And you’re trying to raise a kid without her? Are you mad?

So, I just crumpled into the same park bench that Alison and I walked by a million times but never sat at because we never had a kid that needed watching on that goddamn park bench.

Him: Papa, papa, can I…wait, what happened?
Me: I…I hit something and it hurts. So, I had to sit down.
Him: Was it your foot? (I nod) I’m sorry it hurts.
Me: (deep breath) Thanks, kid. You go play. Papa needs to just breathe through it.
Him: I’ll stay with you. We can breathe together! (starts breathing deeply)
Me: OK. Thank you.

Location: Back in the basement of my brain, again
Mood: like the song below
Music: Shit, you’re a mess, you’re a mess, good God, you’re a mess (Spotify)
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Categories
personal

Goldfish are limited to the size of their bowl 2

Be Better

Close to a decade ago, I wrote this entry about how goldfish are only small because of the bowls we put them in. Without being in a small bowl, they can grow up to enormous sizes.

Case in point, just the other day, a nine-pound goldfish was found in a lake. They figured that someone didn’t wanna keep it anymore but also couldn’t just flush it down the toilet so they tossed it into Oak Grove Lake in Greenville, South Carolina. Without any constraints, it just grew to a massive size.

I was talking to a buddy of mine the other night and he told me that cut out a raft of friends. Mainly because they didn’t like the fact that he was changing.

As he was telling me this, I remembered Johnny and alla the other friends that I cut loose throughout the years. That same time that I cut him loose, I cut a mutual friend of ours loose too.

He had accused me of trying to ruin his business but I told him that I was a seasoned lawyer; if I wanted him shut down, he’d be shut down.

Me: I found it insulting that he thought I would try to shut him down and fail versus actually have him shut down.
Him: (laughing) That’s funny. What happened next?
Me: I told him the truth –  that his punishment was that he didn’t get to hang out with me. That’s punishment enough.

They were all holding me back in one way or another and I couldn’t have that. I couldn’t allow that.

Life limits you enough; you don’t need those around you holding you down too.

My friend’s bummed that he had to cut them out but I think we both knew he had to.

After all, we’re the average of the five people that we spend the most time with and these people – all good guys – just didn’t see the world the way he did. It’s as simple and complex as that, because your friends mirror you.

Your friends have to grow with you or you’re left with only two unpleasant options:

      1. Not grow.
      2. Outgrow them.

He picked the latter.

The ending of any relationship is sad, the more meaningful the relationships are, the sadder the ending is. I should know.

Me: You ok?
Him: I think so. I feel free, I don’t want to go back to the way I was.
Me: And you shouldn’t want to. Trying to be better than you were yesterday isn’t something you should ever be ashamed of.

Location: today, being threatened with a linguini
Mood: better
Music: tell myself to be better and I just can’t help but hope (Spotify)
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