…and I wanted to return the favour so, later on that week, I took her out for some drinks and food around the way at a place called Dark Bullet.
I told you about the place few times, like when I went with the mothers I met early on when the kid had just started going to school, and also when I went with my cousin.
It was like I was seeing it for the first time, though.
The first time I’d been there, I was a basket case. The second time, was over COVID and it was a ghost town and, thus, very different.
This time, I was closer to normal – whatever that means – than I’d been in years, and the place was normal again too.
Of course, normal for me means that I’m ever forgetful and clumsy.
You see, after The Dark Bullet, we went to another bar that she liked, called The Dead Poet where she had a stout and I had a light beer.
While there, I realized that I left my phone at Dark Bullet – she called them and they said they found it and I could go back any time to get it.
So, we just slowly enjoyed our drinks, I walked her home, and then headed back to Dark Bullet to claim my phone.
Bartender: What can I…oh, you were here earlier. Me: Yup, I left my phone here? Him: Ah, yes, hold on, lemme get it for you.
Honestly, New York City is such a great little town sometimes.
I need to ring up the ladies from the mother’s group to see how they’re doing.
Location: hanging out with the ABFF and her fam, plus the Firecracker and the kid, to wish Alison had the best birthday somewhere in the multiverse
Mood: tipsy
Music: I know I always come and go but it’s out of my control (Spotify) Subscribe! Like this post? Tell someone about it by clicking a button below.
A young girl: [Your son] says you’re a fighter. Me: Heavens! Now, do I look like a fighter, little miss? Her: (laughs) Noooo! Me: Well, there you go. I’m just a lawyer. And his dad. Son: (afterward, annoyed) Why didn’t you say you’re a fighter?! Me: Because I’m not, I’m someone that can fight but I’m not a fighter. There’s a difference. Him: Papa! Me: (shrugging) Besides, no one needs to know what we do in our private lives, kid. I want you to learn something here: People don’t look like they really are inside. Our insides don’t often match our outsides, for better for worse. The less people know about what you can do, the better. Him: Then why do you spend so much time [learning how to fight]? Me: Because…sometimes you have to show people what you can do.
This girl named Betty was running to catch a train about a 100 years ago when her science teacher saw her.
The science teacher was also the running coach of the school and never saw anyone run that fast – and he was the coach!
So, he convinced her to run for him and soon, she found herself in the 1928 Olympics at just 16 years old, breaking a whole buncha records.
Almost 100 years later, she remains the youngest athlete to win an Olympic 100-meter gold.
That’s not the most remarkable thing about her, though.
Just three years later, in 1931, she was in a plane crash where she was so messed up that they were sure she was dead. They didn’t send her to the hospital, they sent her to the morgue.
Luckily the undertaker realized she was alive and she, somehow, survived.
Unfortunately, the doctors said she’d never walk again, let alone race again. She spent six months in a wheelchair and didn’t walk normally for two whole years.
But she somehow did walk again and then run again – and she actually ran in the 1946 summer Olympics against the heavily-favoured Germans in the relay race.
The kicker is that she beat them.
Not my pic, obvs. Click here for more info. Man, look how happy this kid is.
The thing is, if you pull up a picture of Betty Robinson, she just looks like any other chick from that time.
You’d never know she was a beast in her lane.
I’ve met so many people in my half-century here. But the ones I always value the most, are the ones with their secret lives that no one would ever suspect.
I’ve met beasts that you wouldn’t believe.
Suppose I hope this for my son, for him to have secrets that keep him safe and happy until and unless he has to show the world what he can do.
Son: So, you do fight, right, papa? Me: Not if I can help it, kid. Remember that, too.
Speaking of meeting up with people, I met up with the Firecracker for drinks the other day at a place that a buddy from my gym told me he loves that’s all decked out as if it were still the Victorian age.
Super cool and ornate, plus it’s right around the gym.
I’d been walking past it for months without realizing what was inside.
Just like with people, the City has alla these hidden secrets that I like finding out about.
Then again, I usually tell you about them when I find about them, so we can share the secret, yeah?
2023 - This is me on Saturday during our shoot, two days before I'm 50.
Just the particulars
Me: What if one day you get new glasses and realize how old I am? Firecracker: I don’t think so. Maybe I’m just more into antiques than I thought I was.
1973 – 0 Years old
4. You can reinvent yourself again and again
F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote Alison’s favorite book, The Great Gatsby; I loved that girl as much as I hated that book.
When I was in college, I spoke four languages and was certain that I’d end up working for the Foreign Service.
Then I changed my mind and wanted to be a writer – ended up writing for several national publications including one of the first major articles on Windows NT versus Novell for Computer Shopper, and some travel articles for the New York Sun.
While doing this, I worked in the club industry and made a name for myself, which a few people still recognize me for.
1983 – 10 Years Old (and starting to get fat, hoo-boy, did I get even bigger)
Then I decided I wanted to build networks and ended up building a 100-seat computer network for a Fortune 600 company on Madison Avenue.
Then I went to law school to become a lawyer. Then I went to CNET and became their first International Sale Manager. Then I went back to being a lawyer.
Then I bought my building with some friends and became a building manager.
Then I got another degree and became one of only 350 people in the New York State with that degree while still working on my legal career. Somehow found myself lecturing on the law all over including Europe and New York. Even won an award.
I also started teaching kali on the sly just a block from my pad and started up a private jet company.
After Alison got sick, I gave up everything and became a cancer researcher, a caretaker, and then a father.
Somehow, in my late 40s, I also became a YouTuber and a gym owner.
Look, my point is that Fitzgerald was fulla shit.
You can be anything you want to be. You get to decide and no one else does.
I decided at 14 that I didn’t wanna be fat so I stopped being fat. It was as simple and as difficult as that.
Few things in life are actually difficult; the most difficult thing you’ll ever do is to decide to do something.
Everything else after that decision are just the particulars.
1993 – 20 Years old – My brother edited out the people next to me in this pic – in fact, he did all these pics. He’s crazy talented, that boy.
This is dangerous – I speak from both personal experience and as a new father.
My greatest fear is that kid’ll meet some knuckleheads that get him into trouble.
Look, you choose your friends because they mirror some quality you have or desire. I don’t have any close friends that are, say, massive gamblers, because I’m not a massive gambler.
You don’t get to chose your family but you do get to choose your tribe. So, if the people that you hang out with are a buncha people that cheat on their partners alla time, you’re gonna become someone that chats on your partner.
If you’re the most successful person in your group, this is probably a bad thing, too. You need a better group.
This is one major reason why I didn’t want to continue some romantic relationships I was involved in; because, while they were usually fine, their friends weren’t the type of friends I wanted in my life.
Or my kid’s life.
Him: (a long time ago) I heard you two broke up, I’m sorry. Me: It’s fine. There’s no tragedy that doesn’t have some positive bonus and the bonus here is that I literally never have to pretend to enjoy hanging out with her lame friends again.
This is why I’ve cut so many people outta my life – because I want to be around people that point me in the direction I want to go.
Speaking of bonuses, here’s a bonus tip.
2003 – 30 years old
Bonus: Sometimes, Logan, you gotta say, “Fuck it, I’m out.”
If you are the average of the five people you hang out with the most, then I’m grateful that Bryson’s one of my oldest and dearest friends – for a whole host of reasons.
He’s dangerous; he boxed with Dolph Lundgren, is a brown belt in BJJ under Fabio Clemete, is a black belt in shorin ryu karate, and is also a skilled Japanese fencer.
But, he’s also a great father and cook, married to a beautiful doctor, and helped build a buncha businesses that you’ve probably visited.
Most importantly, though, he’s a great human being. He’s the kinda guy I wanna be, so I try to hang out with him whenever I can.
Years ago, I visited him and his then girlfriend (now wife) out in San Francisco and I was probably depressed when I met them.
I was struggling with whether or not to quit my job and also leave the girl I was seeing.
For the former, it was a great job but I wasn’t sure I wanted to continue being involved with it. The latter? Well, kinda the same thing.
I had all the mixed feelings of duty, loyalty, guilt, etc.
Him, his wife, their roomie, and I, somehow ended up on a boat in the middle of a lake where we got into a water gun fight with some group of people on another boat.
I got onto that boat confused and depressed and left it feeling..pretty good.
And it was because I started telling him alla these issues I had with the girl and that job and he listened, politely, and then simply said, Sometimes, Logan, you gotta say, “Fuck it.”
I added on the “I’m out” over the years.
The number of times I’ve said, Fuck it, I’m out, since that day has gotta be at least in the hundreds, if not thousands.
It’s an incredibly powerful statement and one that you can whip out at any time, in any situation.
Bad job? Bad relationship? Bad habits?
Fuck it, I’m out, is a perfect answer that leads directly to Tip 4, which is reinventing yourself.
But be careful, because it is so powerful. Use it with caution.
2013 – 40 years old
Once told you about this snippet of a Batman cartoon I watched when I was younger.
In it, a villain was trying to convince Bruce Wayne that Bruce was mad but Bruce/Batman fought back and won.
When his friend asked Bruce why he was so sure that he (Bruce) wasn’t crazy, he answered simply that the voices called him “Bruce.”
But that’s not what he called himself.
I’ve been many things I’ve been proud of. I think that, by the time you read this, Scenic Fights will either be at exactly 400,000 subscribers or close to it.
And I’ve got some big things happening in my life that I may or may not tell you about in the future.
But none of that matters, really. In my head, I’m the kid’s father. Full-stop.
If that ends up being the only thing that I’m known for, I’m ok with that.
Substitute teacher: And you are? Me: (pointing at the kid) His father. Her: (brightly) Oh! He’s a wonderful child! When I said that I was a substitute, he came up to me afterward and said that if I forgot anyone’s name, to ask him because he would tell me. He was my helper all day. Me: (laughing) That’s awesome. Her: He’s awesome! Me: You’re not wrong, lady. You’re not wrong. (sighing) He takes after his mom. Her: You two are lucky. Me: (nodding) Yeah. Lucky us.
I’ve been alive for exactly 18,250 days.
I’ve only got 8,250 days left, if I’m…lucky.
Hopefully, I’ll keep writing and you’ll keep reading, yeah?
2023 – This is me on Saturday during our shoot, two days before I’m 50.
The last few people I’ve dated, including the Firecracker, have been on the shorter side, which I find amusing.
Me: Man, you’re tiny. You’re like half a person. Her: No, I’m not! I’m a whole person – I have all the parts.
I have most of my parts, but I’ve been worried about how some of them have been functioning lately – mainly my eyes.
My eyesight has been getting progressively worse since I got kicked in the head the night I covered class.
Rang up the doc that I saw a few weeks back and he told me to stop by his office again this past weekend.
One thing that I really like about him is that he runs a tight ship. Within 30 minutes of my arriving he, was already wrapping up the visit.
Him: Everything looks good, your retina is solid, and you just have a touch of cataracts. Me: So why does everything look blurry? Him: Ah, well, you’re developing monovision. That’s when one eye sees distance and one eye sees up close. Your right eye is now essentially for reading while your left eye is for seeing things far away. Me: Whoa, that’s wild. Because I got kicked in the head? Him: (nodding) But it doesn’t have to be a bad thing. Most people have to have surgery to get that, but you now have it naturally. I have it naturally myself and it’s why I don’t need glasses.
All-in-all, it was a relief.
It’s still weird to walk around and have things so blurry alla time. But he says that I have to practice looking at things far away with my right eye and reading with my left eye.
How hard can that be?
One thing that I found interesting was that, when I first met the doctor, I barely knew the Firecracker.
Now, I’d spent the last two months seeing/chatting with her on the regular.
Funny how life works.
Location: a small room, watching her eat an apple pie in her bed
Mood: wondering if I should eat an apple pie in my bed
Music: I’ve lost more than a heart could take (Spotify) Subscribe! Like this post? Tell someone about it by clicking a button below.
Me: Look, we just have to make this work for… Simultaneously: 40 years Her: Jinx! You owe me a coke. Me: What? That’s not a thing. Her: Yes, it is grandpa…
The Firecracker likes to poke fun at our age difference but I don’t really mind at all.
See, I wear it like a badge of honor.
Cause the ability to get old is a privilege. Not everyone gets that chance so I’m grateful to get to be an old man.
I think our lives go through a series of thematic changes.
Back when I was young and stupid in my early thirties, I thought that my debilitating insomnia and my breakup with the Reporter was the worst thing that coulda happened to me.
Looking back, I’m shocked how naïve I was.
During that time, my life was a dramady – some comedy mixed with some minor drama.
Speaking of Colin Hay, when I met Alison, I think that my life was still a dramady but definitely more drama than comedy, as we felt the weight of life as a young married couple.
We had our ups-and-downs but we were just trying to figure out how to have a life together. With a fatty of our own, somehow.
Always felt that, once we got the kid, our real lives would begin, that any minute now, our ship would come in.
But it never did.
It never occurred to me that I was living my real life until it was too late.
During Alison’s sickness, Lorde was huge because it was the only album I had on my phone and I was so busy trying to save her and our life that I didn’t have time to change it.
Still never listen to Lorde because it brings back such vivid memories.
Think I would throw up if I heard Pure Heroine again.
Jesus, I musta heard that album easily 200 times during the first four months.
I was so busy that I literally didn’t have a moment to download any new songs and it was waaaaay before Spotify.
Anywho, in the song, Buzzcut Season, there’s a line that goes, “It kissed your scalp and caressed your brain.”
Remember hearing that line and thinking that, even with Alison bald and stick thin, I still thought she was beautiful and I was so lucky to have met her.
Some days I’m built of metal, I can’t be broken But not when I’m with you You love me real, we have it all Can’t leave me now I love the way, you are today Run away with me now
Kept hoping it was all a bad dream, I’d wake up, and she I could run away somewhere with the boy and live the life we were supposed to live.
The years afterward were gutting for so many reasons that I’ll just keep my theme song during that time to myself, if you don’t mind.
But right now, at this moment, honestly don’t know if my life’s gonna be a dramady again, another tragedy, or something altogether new.
There’s a song by a fella named Mike Blume, who released his latest song under the name Whatever Mike for some reason, called In-Between.
The chorus goes:
I’m inbetween Right here where I want it Right here where I want it I′m inbetween
Dunno if the rest of the song is really super appropriate to my life right now but those few lines perfectly encapsulate how I look at my life right now.
I’m in-between alla these memories and hopes, life and death, happiness and sadness.
All of it. I’m in between all of it.
Somehow, it’s ok because it’s better to be in-between than toward the end. Nowadays, at least.
Nothing is as I wanted it to be, but I’m happy where I am right now.
Which makes me anxious because happiness is so rare for me. Then again, what is life, if not a tragedy fulla joy?
I think our theme songs changes with the years, so I suppose we’ll revisit this topic again from time-to-time.
What about you?
What’s your theme song?
Me: Why do you hurt me? Her: (laughing) If I don’t have old jokes, I have nothing here, Logan. Nothing!
Location: this afternoon, walking in the sun with Firecracker down Broadway
Mood: introspective
Music: I’m between, right here where I want it (Spotify) Subscribe! Like this post? Tell someone about it by clicking a button below.
Watching either my BJJ or kali instructor do their thing is always something impressive. It’s like they can read your mind and know what you’re going to do before you do.
It really just comes with experience and knowing what’s possible versus what’s probable. The longer you do something, the more you see what the likely outcomes to things are.
I’ve run my building for decades now. Think I first told you about it some 16 years ago but, really, I’ve been managing buildings with my dad since the 90s. Did my first big deal when I was a senior in high school.
Kinda like Trump and his dad but without the greed, lying, and closeted racism.
Because of that, I’ve seen the same mistakes happen time and time again.
One thing I’ve had the worst luck with is a specialized lock called a mortise lock. Up until recently – I’m guessing due to things AirBnB and people wanting higher-end stuff – it wasn’t very common here in the US but is super common in Europe.
Except in NYC where almost every building has these goddamn things.
They’re elegant but very confusing to people that have never used one before. Because one single lock with one single key controls three different types of locking mechanisms on a door; a single mortise locks:
the knob itself
a deadbolt built into the lock, and
the latching lock.
To make things even more complicated, there’s an internal toggle that switches on the knob lock (number 4 in the diagram below). So, let’s just say that there are three “locks” in this single lock.
They’re mechanically beautiful and like most beautiful things, troublesome.
(c) Bella Maximum Security
It’s hard to explain but if you’re ever in NYC, just go to any old building and check out the locks. Chances are good, it’s a mortice lock.
Anywho, when Chad and I opened up the gym, I knew that this lock was gonna cause us problems.
I cannot tell you how many times I’ve had to return to NYC after being in NJ with Alison or the reporter (who also lived in NJ) because someone got locked out due to one of the three locking systems of the mortise lock locking a tenant outta their pad.
So, I hooked up this very elegant wifi enabled lock to bypass the mortise lock entirely in the gym with the kicker being that we could unlock the lock anywhere in the world.
But the students kept yanking at the wifi lock, because it’s oddly shaped and some people thought it was a handle, breaking it.
Super frustrating.
Chad was mindful of costs, which I understand, and didn’t wanna replace the wifi lock and I was too busy to fight him on the matter.
Unfortunately, he got COVID earlier this week so people had to cover class. That part was fine. The issue arose when one of our buddies, Thundercat was helping around in the gym and locked all three of the locking mechanisms on the mortise and also locked the deadbolt we had the wifi lock attached to.
Obviously, he was trying to be helpful so it’s not like he did anything wrong per se. But since we never used the mortise, no one had a key for it.
Long story short, about 10 people, including my kali instructor, were standing outside for over an hour waiting for Chad – who was still sick with COVID and had to schlepp all the way from his warm bed – to come by with the one key necessary to open the lock. Poor guy.
He went up alone because he had COVID, and didn’t realize how the lock worked – again, not his fault either, look at that damn thing, hence my wanting to bypass it altogether with the tech solution – and told everyone to go home before I had a chance to say anything.
I wanted to take a look and expected that Thundercat broke the key in the lock because Chad couldn’t get it open but it turns out that it was just the trickiness of the lock itself.
By the time I opened the gym up, several people already left.
Honestly, I feel that I shoulda insisted on replacing the tech lock and sealing off the toggle of the mortise, which I finally did with athletic tape.
But it’s so hard to explain and I always figure it’s best to just let people figure things out for themselves.
Like I said, I’m upgrading my OS. I’m trying to focus on just making sure I’m working ok before I try to fix anything or anyone else.
Me: Put on your long socks. Him: I don’t wanna. Me: You gotta trust me on this, kid. Him: I don’t wanna! Me: [In my head: It’s raining. Which means you gotta wear your boots. If you wear your short socks, they’ll get pulled down in your boots, which means that you’ll keep stopping every five minutes to fix them, meaning we’ll be late for school] Hokay. But we’re not stopping for any reason.
Me: I have to be careful with what I say and do around him. Him: Of course, you’re his father. Me: (shaking head) More than that. He’s a little kid. I’m god to him. I provide him love, a home, food, everything he knows about the world. I’m his god and I have to be careful because of it. All parents are god to little boys and girls.
Before Alison got sick and died, I went to church most Sundays. I believed in God and Christianity, most likely because my mom did. If she was Muslim, I’m sure I woulda believed in Allah. But that’s how it goes.
Then Alison started losing babies and I quietly clung on to the hope that there was a merciful god and he would show her/us some mercy. And then she got sick and died in May of 2017.
Exactly 90 days later, my father died in August of 2017.
This whole time, another relative of mine was sick that I never mentioned because I was asked not to mention it.
There’s so much I tell you about; imagine if you knew alla the things I don’t tell you about. But we all have our three lives: Public, private, and secret.
All three losses were devastating to me. Imagine if your spouse, father, and close cousin all died within a few weeks of each other, how would you fare?
In all of this, I also lost my career that I spent 20 years building. An entire portfolio of clients gone – poof. Because I didn’t give a shit about it anymore.
Me: (to a different woman) What happened to your last fella? Her: (shrugging) His family wanted a nice Catholic girl and I’m … definitely not that. What are you? Me: Oh, I’m a devout atheist. If there is god, he can go fuck himself.
In the New Testament, when Jesus is on the cross, he cries out, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” He’s in pain, dying on some wood, and his father is nowhere to be seen or heard. And that’s when the son just gives up.
He says, “I’m thirsty. I’m done. Take it.” And he dies.
Because imagine if you’re dying and your dad knows this and you call him.
He picks up and says, “I know you’re dying, I know you’re in pain, but it doesn’t matter, I’ll never speak to you again, you’ll never see me again.” And then silence. Pure silence.
Now that’s pain. I’d give up too.
But that’s what happened to me. Times four.
Now, this fella named William Makepeace Thackeray once said, Mother is the name for God on the lips and hearts of all children.
But the kid never knew her. So that leaves me and me alone.
Still, with all due respect to Mr. Thackeray, my dad was my god as a little boy because I think it’s fairer to say that parents are gods to their little children. He and my mom were mine.
As an adult, my god was the god of my church and Alison – there was no sin I would not commit to keep her alive.
My minor god, but something I worshipped nonetheless, was my career. I think most people, if they were honest, would say that the thing that bring them income and security, they worship, to some degree.
But in 2017, I was hollowed out because I lost all my gods – everything I ever fucking believed in – all between the months of May and August. Alison, my dad, my religion, my job.
Poof. Gone.
And I filled those gaping holes with rage, women, and varying forms of pharmaceuticals. Not a single woman from that period speaks to me.
Because I was just rage and sadness and they were all unfortunate enough to be swept up in it all, hoping that I could possibly be normal.
I’m just starting to feel normal now, five years after the fact.
My buddy Jaerik commented in 2007 that I was never angry. Cause I always felt anger was the most useless of all emotions and I was pretty anti-emotion as a whole.
During NYE, one of the sisters remarked that there must be some part of me that believes in the Christian god somewhere and that’s when I realized why I was so fucked up for so long. Because this whole time, I thought I was grieving the loss of my wife and my dad, and – to lesser extent – the death of my old life and career.
That’s when I realized that I lost my religion as well.
Man, I lost all my gods at once. Losing one would be enough to drive anyone starkers. I lost everything that I felt made me…me.
To answer my friend’s question: The god I knew and believed in is as dead and gone as Alison and my dad is. The only thing with any spark of life is my career and even that takes a massive backseat to raising the kid.
Somehow, realizing that that night was the missing piece in my head and I felt my head quiet in ways I’ve not felt in over a dozen years – not since at least November of 2011.
Glad they asked me out for a drink, I gotta say…
And that’s why I decided to upgrade my OS. Or rather, replace it altogether.
It was originally built on ideas, people, and things that no longer exist, save for things about Schopenhauer that I still believe to be true.
But I’m tired of the anger and the rage. I miss being the quiet grey man no one knew could fight or knew experienced the devastating losses I did.
Then again, I wish alotta fucking things and I’m tired of wishing for shit that’ll never happen, people I’ll never see again, gods that never existed.
I just want things quiet again. In my head. In my life. I want it quiet, peaceful, and calm.
I think I’m at like 5% now in the upgrade process.
Him: Papa, I got a golf game. Do you want to play golf with me? Me: I’ve never played…sure, kid. Lemme finish this email while you set it up, ok? Him: OK! There’s a blue ball, a yellow ball, a green ball, and a red ball. Pick two. Me: Red and yellow? (thinking) No, wait. Blue and green, please. Him: OK, I’ll be red and yellow. I’ll get it ready. Hurry up with your email and let’s play! Me: You got it, kid. I’ll be right out.
It was totally last minute; we were supposed to just meet up for drinks at 6:45 and I was gonna see RE Mike, but the food was good…
…the drinks were solid, and the crowd and company were great…
…plus, there was live jazz so, before you knew it, we were toasting 2023.
Sister1: It’s 10:50PM! Me: Welp, I guess we’re staying here. I need another drink.
The two of them are in the growing group of people that don’t want to be in this blog, which I get, which is why I’m trying to keep the conversation as non-identifiable as possible.
Still, the first sister had a list of really insightful questions which led to some pretty deep conversations I wish I could share with you.
One of which ended like this:
Me: I’m thinking 2023 might be the year I finally lose my virginity. Sister2: (laughing) Did you go to church summer camp? Is that why? Me: No [to the second question] BUT I did go to summer camp, once actually. Of course, because it was me, it was because of a girl, but that’s a whole ‘nother story. Her: I think that Christian boy in you is still there, somewhere. Me: And that’s where you’re wrong. He died the day my wife died. But we can change the subject…
Because of that, I came to a realization the next morning – and a pretty wild one at that, which deserves its own entry.
It’s part of the reason I decided to upgrade my OS in the first place.
I spoke at length with my therapist about my realization today.
Me: An acquaintance of mine told me a little while back that, in all the years he’s known me, he’d never seen my level of rage that I am these days. He said that, when it comes out, I’m a completely different person. I didn’t realize how long I’ve been angry for. Therapist: And now? Me: I’m still angry, of course. At the unfairness of it all. But, it’s not blinding rage anymore. Her: I hear it in your voice. Me: What? Her: The quiet.
Her: I’m sorry about your wife. Me: So am I. All my gods look like her. Her: What does that mean? Me: Nuthin. (brightening) Let’s play a game…
It’s the first day of 2023.
I’m writing this on a computer that I first built when Alison was still alive and upgraded repeatedly, such that there’s nuthin left of the original computer, just like I talked about in my Ship of Theseus.
One thing that I did after the hack was to upgrade the operating system of that computer from Windows 10 to Windows 11, something I did with great reluctance.
Still working through the pros and cons of that, but I note that I went through Windows 7, 8, 8.1, and 10 on this machine before finally arriving here.
Just like the philosophical exercise of the Ship of Theseus, the question remains if there’s anything left of the original computer that I originally built all those years ago.
Speaking of philsophy, this blog has, more than anything, been my own personal repository of how I see the world, kinda like Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations.
Suppose my operating system has always been based on German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, who was introduced to me in my 20s by the Devil.
One of my earliest blog entries spoke about a quote that served me well my entire life: With increased intelligence comes increased capacity for pain.
When Alison, my dad, and another relative got sick – all at the same time – and I essentially gave up my career(s) to try (and fail) to save them, then lost Gradgirl and Mouse, I think that the truth of that statement is why I’m here writing you now.
Schopenhauer’s worldview was that life is, at its core, suffering.
Life swings like a pendulum backward and forward between pain and boredom. – Arthur Schopenhauer
At no point in this blog – through all the highs and lows – did my baseline OS change; it was always run on some variant of Schopenhauer.
And you know my feeling about those who’s worldview never changes. I can’t be a hypocrite.
All this, despite the fact that some baseline beliefs of his contradicted directly with my own heart’s desire.
For example, I’ve always wanted family and family, by definition, requires children. Yet Schopenhauer, like my billionaire buddy, feels that “Bearing children into this world is like carrying wood into a burning house.”
Schopenhauer, as the base operating system of my life, was ill-equipped to deal with the overwhelming sadness and despair of it all, for various reasons.
For example, Schopenhauer’s world view of Wille zum Leben respected love like one respects a dangerous animal, but it doesn’t deal with love, which I both respect and submit to.
To Schopenhauer, love is an illogical means to an important end: The extension of our very species.
I understand that but, having loved and lost in the profound ways I have, I think it’s an idealized version of what humans are actually capable of.
While it’d be nice to live a life purely pragmatically, the way humans are designed, it’s not practical. Because emotions exist and aren’t going away.
I need an OS that reflects that reality.
The Devil’s gone from my life and, while I appreciate all that he’s shown me in the world, the OS he helped build for me doesn’t work with who I am now, especially given all that’s happened.
Moreover, I want more for my son. Assuming that Schopenhauer was correct, and our universe is only what we experience through our mental facilities – our operating system – then I plan on giving my son the best one I can.
After close to 30 years of working on myself, I think that answer lies in Stoicism. Not “stoicism” with a lower-case “s,” rather the full philosophy of Zeno, Marcus Aurelius, and Seneca.
The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts. – Marcus Aurelius
I don’t think, at all, that Schopenhauer was wrong, or that the last three decades of my life were wasted. Rather, I think that it’s served its purpose for what I needed for that time and that version of me. Now, I have a new purpose – the boy – and that requires a new way of thinking.
We suffer more often in imagination than in reality. – Seneca
It’s still early yet in all this. Just like it’s early in the new year.
But I spent the last month reexamining my life and need to discard the things that aren’t working for me anymore, if they ever did, and find things that do work.
Don’t think you’ll notice any drastic changes here, per se. Just little things for myself as I try to give myself and – by extension, the boy – the tools I’ll need to be the best version of myself.
Man conquers the world by conquering himself. – Zeno
I’m still me, but I wonder how much of who and what I am/was is still there or if I’m a completely new being altogether, just like this computer I type alla this out on.
On that note, let’s start the new year off with a song.
This is by a young woman named King Princess that my brother introduced to me a little while ago.
Can’t put my finger on it, but it always makes me dream that my life might be better than it is.
Maybe it’s the line that goes, “I will keep on waiting for your love,” which goes directly against Schopenhauer’s distant respect of the concept of love.
Because love’s not only something I respect, but also something I want – to both give and receive – so it’s worthy of patience and time.
Even if it never comes my way again.
Here’s to 2023 and changing for the better.
Her: (surprised) Why did you do that? Me: (shrugging) Seemed like the right thing to do at the time. Her: (laughing) OK. (pause) You can do it again.
Location: in the first hours of 2023, on W 97, wondering if we should sell our apartments and move to NJ
Mood: new(ish)
Music: I love it when you try to save me (Spotify) Subscribe! Like this post? Tell someone about it by clicking a button below.
A batch of 60 double-chocolate oatmeal chip cookies
A batch of 60 oatmeal chocolate chip cookies
Four chocolate cakes
Two banana breads (which are just cakes)
Alison was always the baker while I was always the cook but she’s not here so I gotta do this.
It’s a different skillset than cooking but it’s still enjoyable.
It’s always been the cleanup that I hated; that’s what made Alison and me such a great couple – she loved to clean, I loved to cook. It was a good yin-yang.
Now, I do it all, for better or worse. But he’s happy and eating well, and that’s all that matters.
Everything’s made with high-fiber, high-protein flours like carbquick or almond flour, monk-fruit sweetened chocolate chips, oatmeal or nuts, and erythritol or coconut sugar for sweeteners so everything’s actually not-bad for him and some are actually good for him.
But he doesn’t know that, he just knows he likes them.
And I try to play the role I need to play to make sure he keeps wanting more.
Me: How is it? Him: Sooooo, good. Can I have another? Me: Well… Him: Please?! Me: (mock sighing) Fiiiine, I suppose you can have ONE more. Him: YAY!
The kid’s ability to be innately social is something I find endlessly fascinating – only because it’s such a foreign thing to me. I’m very social but by design.
He’s just naturally social in a way that Alison and I were not. Not sure where it comes from but, like I said, it’s so interesting to me.
For example, the kid went to a birthday party last week where he met another boy that invited him to another birthday party, which was this past Sunday.
And then he had another birthday party on Friday – in a building that I sued once that went all the way to trial and decision, which is a whole ‘nother story – where yet another boy invited him to a birthday party on Saturday.
One party was at Medieval Times, someplace that Alison always wanted him to go to so I’m grateful for the experience.
Him: I’m hungry. Me: How is that possible? You just came back from a birthday party at Medieval Times. Him: (shrugging) I didn’t like the food. I just had the cake. Me: (stopping everything I was doing) You didn’t like the food?! Whose kid are you?! Him: YOURS!
Honestly, this kid is as popular and social as I was not at his age.
Not sure how I feel about this but I’m hopeful we can manage it so that he doesn’t make it into a burden nor burn out with it early.
Me: You had THREE birthday parties this weekend. I think that’s as many I’ve gone to my entire childhood. Him: I know, I’m tired. Me: (laughing) Awww, poor popular you.
Put up the tree. Finally.
I remembered where every single ornament came from.
I’d forgotten so much and it’s too much to remember all at once. Way too much.
Him: Why are you looking…? (makes a face and stares off into the distance) Me: I’m just…papa’s in his head again. Him: Oh. It’s ok, papa. Me: Thanks, kid.
Location: tonight, covered in flour but happy to see the kid happy
Mood: so. full. of. cake.
Music: got too many friends (Spotify) Subscribe! Like this post? Tell someone about it by clicking a button below.
