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An infinite capacity for taking things for granted

Got COVID…yet again

Firecracker: Take a COVID test.
Me: What? Don’t be ridiculous. There’s no way I have COVID again. I already had it three times, I’m double vaxxed and double boosted.
Her: Just take one. You have a million tests, anywho.
Me: (sighing) I guess you’re right.
Her: (later) Well?
Me: I HAVE @#$@#$@ COVID AGAIN! FOUR TIMES NOW!

Felt like hot trash for the past few days.

The two people I rolled with the day before AND the Firecracker – who spent every single day with me – did not get it.

My luck runs ever true.

The fella that wrote Brave New World once said, Most human being have an almost infinite capacity for taking things for granted.

Thought about that tonight because I’m constantly reminded of my possible pasts that I didn’t realize would be so short and special to me in hindsight.

See, I’ve been clearing out stuff in the house and had to head down to the basement, which I’ve not done in a while because the basement scares me, greatly.

Not because of the spiders, or mice, or whatnot, but because of ghosts.

Well, that’s not wholly true because they’re not ghosts per se, but apparitions in my head.

Remember when alla that flooding happened and I told you that I lost most of Alison’s things then? That was true. But I still find things.

Tonight, I found a box of a 101 cookie cutter shapes. Alison got them when she was pregnant with one of the kids we lost.

She had all these dreams of making sugar cookies and tree ornaments for our children.

They’ve never been used.

And I found bags and bags of the kid’s clothes when he was younger.

See, I saved every single goddamn shirt and pants. Because I thought that, maybe one day, I’d have another fatty to call my own. And he, or she, would need some clothes.

And a crib, and a stroller, and a changing bed, and toys…

But alla that seems less and less likely now.

One of the (many) things about Alison that I adored was how unsentimental she was. As long as she had a picture of something she loved, that was good enough for her.

Coming from a poor background, my family slanted towards hoarding while her priorities were cleaniness and order. She always encouraged me to let things go.

So, I started giving away a lotta of the kid’s old clothes and things.

And I’ll probably give away these cookie cutters as well.

Alison would have.

Spoke to my therapist recently.

Therapist: How have you been?
Me: Besides getting COVID for the 4th time, pretty well.
Her: (smiles) You seem it. Tell me what’s been going on.
Me: Things have been going really well with the Firecracker and me. She understands, better than most, having alla these hopes and dreams and then having them suddenly disappear.
Her: That’s great, what else?
Me: (thinking) I think that for a long time, I’ve been unable to truly accept that this is my life. I think that for the past…Jesus Christ…seven years, I’ve been fighting – both subconsciously and consciously – the reality that is my life.
Her: And now?
Me: I don’t really have any other choice, do I?
Her: I’m proud of you, Logan. That’s a good step. You should be proud of yourself as well.
Me: I’m not sure I’d go that far, yet. But I’m trying to be better.
Her: (nods)

Location: my basement, sans COVID, thinking of my possible pasts
Mood: thoughtful
Music: the trace of a memory, stained into the past (Spotify)
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All men are little boys…

…to the parents that love them

11 years ago, I went out with Alison to Jersey City for Alison’s grandmother’s 90th birthday.

I remember thinking that her grandmother was so lucky that she got to live 90 years.

Can’t tell you how much it upsets me that Alison lived so much less.

But, I suppose, that’s a conversation for another day.

I wrote about that day and I titled it: The hours drag but the years sprint away

Never realized just how true that statement was until I became a dad.

Seeing the kid every day, I don’t really notice how much he’s grown, day-by-day, but looking at pictures, I’m shocked how much he’s changed.

The fella that wrote The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe said something similar: Isn’t it funny how day by day nothing changes but, when we look back everything is different?

It’s so true.

Everything, and everyone, is so different now.

The kid finished school today.

It seems like we just started and it’s summer vacation already.

I (barely) remember taking him to preschool when he was just 18-months old and I gave him a rum-carrier as a bookbag.

Now, he’s a full-fledged kid with opinions – lots of them.

Me: How on earth do you not like 紅豆湯, kid? I loved that growing up.
Him: People like different things, papa.

Alison loved this kid so much the short time she was here with him. She woulda loved him to the moon and back if she could see him now.

As I do.

Met up with some a group of fathers from the school for some beer and tacos the other day.

I really only talked to two of them, but a solid eight people showed up. It was interesting finding out about their lives.

Me: You’re a lawyer? My condolences. (laughing) I’m one as well.
Him: What do you do?
Me: Drink, mostly. When I’m not raising the kid.

I could only stay out for about 90 minutes before I had to pick the kid up from a birthday party he was attending.

Still, it’s one of those things I think I’ll do again.

When the kid was really little, my brother sent me a song called Imaginary Tea that I wrote about before.

Thought of it again when I told the kid that he was done with school and that he was starting a whole new grade next year.

Him: Can you believe it?!
Me: (laughing) Not really, kid. Not really.

He loves this shirt and wears it *waaaay* too often – no idea why.

Suppose I’ll always think of him as a little boy, even when he’s not one any more.

Like I said in my last entry, I think I understand my dad now more than I ever have before.

After all, all men are little boys to the parents that love them.

Imaginary Tea

I love you more than you will ever know
I love you no matter what you do
I’m gonna hold you as long as you will let me
‘Cause you’re mine, I love you

I loved you before I heard ever heard your voice
Before I even knew your name
I loved you before I saw those pretty eyes
I loved you right away

So, take it slow
Before you know it, you’ll be old and grown
Just remember that I’m always here
Hands you can hold on to

I love you

Don’t worry what anybody else will say
Don’t hurry to break that precious heart
When you try to be like somebody else
Remember I love you the way you are

So, take it slow
Before you know it, you’re gonna be old and grown
Just remember that I’m always here
Hands you can hold on to

And I love you

So, let’s climb every tree
And drink imaginary tea
And speak a language only we can understand
And I will fight back the tears
As we fly through the years
And I’ll keep you as close as I can

I love you more than you will ever know
I love you no matter what you do
And I’m gonna hold you as long as you will let me
‘Cause you’re mine, I love you

Location: her place and my place
Mood: exhausted
Music: I love you more than you will ever know (Spotify)
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Oh, how I wish you were here

Proud of ourselves

The Firecracker was busy for most of the following day but we met up for a walk to the pier near my pad when she was free.

There was a salsa party going on so we had to fight our way through that to make it to the edge of the pier, but it was worth it.

Me: What are you thinking?
Her: These are the times where I think, I can’t believe that I live here.

This fella named Richard Ford once said, The more we see our parents fully, see them as the world does, the better our chances to see the world as it is.

The boy just got his first red stripe in BJJ, which is kinda a big deal – certainly to him, if nuthin else.

Him: LOOK, LOOK! (shows me) Are you proud of me?
Me: Of course. But that’s not as important as if you’re proud of yourself. Are you proud of yourself?
Him: (beaming) Yes!
Me: That’s the most important thing, kid. Do things that make yourself proud of yourself, not me or anyone else.

Finding that I miss my dad the most when I want to ask him things about me when I was the kid’s age.

I mean, my mom’s still around and she and I talk about these things but I wonder what my dad was thinking when I was the kid’s age and doing similar things.

Realize all the times that my dad was right – and wrong – about things. I so wish he was here to talk about it all.

If he was, I wish I could tell him that I understand now, so much more about him than I ever did.

Wish I could tell him that I loved him, still do, and always will.

I wonder if he’d be proud of me. Then again, I think I did the best I could with everything I was given.

In that sense, then, I’m proud of myself.

Still, I wish he was here.

Although, truthfully, I always wish the people I loved were here with me.

Him: You looked like this again (makes face). Were you thinking of mommy again?
Me: (smiling, shaking head) I always think of her, but at that moment, I was thinking of my papa.
Him: (hugs me) I’m sorry, daddy.
Me: Thanks, kid. You’re my faves.
Him: YOU’RE MY FAVES!
Me: (laughing, hoping that I’ll stay in his top 10 forever)

Location: getting a second free soda at a street party because the person wanted a pic of me
Mood: hollowed
Music: how I wish you were here (Spotify)
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Upgrading my OS

I like it when we play 1950

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)
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Still speaking Martian, Pt 2

Lovely imposter syndrome

It was Rain’s birthday recently, so if you see him, wish him a good one?

Years ago, he told me about this comedy skit where there’s this guy that has a speech impediment where he can only speak in a sarcastic voice, which makes his life totally miserable and lonely.

Rain told me about it and then I told you about it.

Finally found it, if you’re interested.

It’s not like I didn’t want to have friends.

I just talked like a weird 49-year-old Chinese-American man with a Queens accent…when I was 13. That was my speech impediment.

Met a pretty girl once in 7th Grade. Told her she looked lovely. And she and her friends called me a weirdo and worse.

As an aside, I say lovely all the goddamn time now.

In junior high, the closest I had to friends were a girl named Julia and a guy named Phil. I’ll tell you about them someday but, not for a while because I wasn’t exactly kind to them.

And the reason was because I started making friends here and there.

I did this by reading books like How to Win Friends and Influence People and Think and Grow Rich.

Books are really amazing things. But I digress.

By the time I got to high school, I (kinda) started figuring out how to talk like everyone else. I always had a Queens accent but used words like lovely and idiosyncratic all the time – studying for the SATs didn’t help matters.

In many ways, I always felt the weight of imposter syndrome – as if someone people would figure out that I was super mechanical at being social.

Step 1: Introduce yourself by looking someone in the eye.
Step 2: Shake their hand.
Step 3: Repeat their name.
Step 4: Smile.

And so on.

Yet, for the most part, people didn’t figure out that I was a ghost in a machine, pretending to be human.

The girl I called “lovely” was named Stella.

She wrote in my junior high school yearbook that I shoulda asked her to the JHS prom. She went with a guy named Edwin instead. It was junior high school where I slimed down and started dressing better.

It was also then I learned that if you look good, people will talk to you, even if you talk like a weird 49-year-old Chinese-American man with a thick Queens accent.

Hence my being unkind to Julia and Phil. That is one of the earliest of my 10,000 regrets.

A much smaller regret was that, for years afterward, I wished that (a) I didn’t tell Stella she was “lovely,” and (b) I asked her out to the JHS prom.

Didn’t realize that I was speaking Martian while everyone else was speaking English.

I wanted desperately to be understood, like that guy in the video above, but I didn’t know how.

I’m bringing alla this up because the two arguments I had recently have been on my mind.

Both were with people that mattered to me in some way and in both, I couldn’t make myself understood. And I suppose the same was true in reverse.

35 years after Stella, they were speaking English and I was speaking Martian. Or vice versa.

One ended with me being told to leave in the rain, the other, being told to get out at a desolate intersection after midnight.

Everything I said was construed in the worst possible way and there was no way I could make myself understood.

I always say that we’re the prisoners of our 14-year-old selves. In both arguments, I felt like I was telling Stella she was lovely and all she heard was that I was weird.

Every so often, we feel the weight of the chains we forge for ourselves as kids.

I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it. 

This is where I sat, waiting for the library to open.

In the end, the question really is, how much do we want to be understood and how much do we want to understand someone else.

These days, for me, most people aren’t worth the effort. I’d rather just be with my (e)books again.

But some people are worth the effort, even if you realize it too late.

Spoke to one of the women that helped me survive 2017 recently.

It wasn’t – at all – what you would call a “good” talk.

But she also didn’t tell me to go fuck myself, so I suppose that’s a net positive.

Location: West 79th Street, giving the boy a hug and telling him I’d see him soon
Mood: mute
Music: you do not need to speak (Spotify)
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Life is Sweet

Until there isn’t

Had a pretty terrifying moment earlier this week. Was walking outta Union Square to the gym when this pretty huge white dude was yelling at this younger skinny guy.

But the white guy was so focused on the skinny guy, that he didn’t notice the hooded guy following him – and clearly holding a weapon of some sort in his right hand under his sweatshirt.

Note that it was 80+ degrees that day and he had a hoodie on and his hood pulled over his head.

The skinny guy ducked into a fire station and the firemen told the white guy to just go home. It was only then that the guy stalking him crossed the street, all while eying him.

I looked around for a cop to flag down but, of course, didn’t see any. So, I popped into the nearest store and waited a bit.

The city’s becoming like it was when I was a kid. This is not a good thing.

While the boy was away, I found that heart you see above on the table. He left if for me to find. Stood and stared at it longer than you might imagine.

That was an unexpectedly sweet find. But I was also cleaning out his class stuff – he brought everything home for summer vacation – and I came across his class folder. I’d never seen it before because it was in always his classroom.

He put pictures up on it of all the people he loved the most. In the middle was his mom and someone I didn’t expect him to put up.

I’m honestly not sure how he got these pictures, let alone print them out. That kid’s gonna be a handful when he grows up.

In any case, it made me sadder than you might expect. Because they were the mothers this kid never got to grow up with.

Suppose the closest I can explain is guilt.

Guilt that I can’t give him the family he wants. It might forever be just him and me.

He’s only six and he’s lost enough, I think. I’d rather never introduce him to another person than for him to wish for things that will never be.

Her: It’s not fair, Logan. You want someone to just give you kids. What about what we want?
Me: That’s the whole point. I don’t want someone to have a kid because I want her to do it, I someone to want a kid because she wants it too.
Her: You already have a kid!
Me: We all picture the family we want in our heads. This is not, at all, what I pictured for my family.

I suppose there’s always tomorrow. Until there isn’t.

Paris keeps calling me, which I find interesting.

Because I always thought it’d be Berlin.

Nothing is ever like I expect it to be.

There was a song I loved once, that has a line that goes, Life is sweet, despite the misery.

Dunno if that’s true anymore. I find the bitterness of misery cuts through everything.

Although, life does have its moments.

So, I’ll stay until he’s ready.

Me: I missed you so much, kid.
Him: Me too, papa. What’s for dinner?

Life is Sweet
by Natalie Merchant

It’s a pity
It’s a crying shame
Who pulled you down again?
How painful it must be
To bruise so easily inside
It’s a pity
It’s a downright crime
But it happens all the time
You wanna stay little daddy’s girl
Wanna hide from the vicious world outside
But don’t cry
Know the tears’ll do no good
So, dry your eyes
Your daddy he’s the iron man
A battleship wrecked on dry land
Your mama she’s a bitter bride
She’ll never be satisfied,
And you know
That’s not right
But don’t cry
Know the tears’ll do no good
So, dry your eyes
They told you life is hard
It’s misery from the start
It’s dull and slow and painful
I tell you life is sweet
In spite of the misery
There’s so much more
Be grateful
Who do you believe?
Who will you listen to
Who will it be?
It’s high time that you decide
In your own mind
Tried to comfort you
Tried to tell you to be patient
They are blind
They can’t see
Fortune gonna come some day
All gonna fade away
Your daddy the war machine and
Your mama the long and suffering
Prisoner of what she can not see
They told you life is hard
It’s misery from the start
It’s dull and slow and painful
I tell you life is sweet
In spite of the misery
There’s so much more
Be grateful
Who do you believe?
Who will you listen to
Who will it be?
It’s high time you decide
It’s time you make up your own sweet little mind
They told you life is long
Be thankful when it’s done
Don’t ask for more
You should be grateful
But I tell you life is short
Be thankful because before you know
It will be over
‘Cause life is sweet
And life is also very short
Your life is sweet

Location: earlier tonight, on 18th Street, telling him not to cry
Mood: empty
Music: life is short. Be thankful because, before you know, it will be over (Spotify)
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Dreaming of Revenge

A deadly diaspora

More thoughts on Ukraine: Do you remember when I went to Boston and wrote about the Irish?

Did you know that there are seven times more Irish in America than there are in Ireland? Legit.

There’s a new world coming – again, provided these fuckers don’t blow it up first – and it’s going to be a diaspora of Ukrainians who aren’t going to forget who and what did this to them took their home from them.

Like, the Irish aren’t forgetting about the famine anytime soon. And the Jews aren’t forgetting about the Holocaust anytime soon.

And, as I’ve said before, if cancer was a person, there is nothing on earth that would stop me from getting to him/her after what it did to my family. Nothing.

I’m beyond incensed over what’s happening in Ukraine and I’m 100% Chinese.

I can only imagine the hatred and dreams of revenge that young Ukrainian men and women are feeling right now.

I wrote a novel once that you can buy on Amazon if you’re so inclined. In it, I opened the book with a quote from artist Paul Gauguin:

Life being what it is, one dreams of revenge.

Knowing as many Ukrainians as I do, I don’t see them forgetting who and what did this to them who took their home from them.

I don’t think the Russian government/Putin fully realize how many of these young men, women, and children now dream of revenge. That’s not a good thing for them.

Her: Did you read about…?
Me: I did.
Her: Wait, you didn’t even hear what I was going to say.
Me: If it’s about the war, I did. I most definitely did and wish I didn’t.

I made the kid some duck confit again – the first time around, he kinda liked it. Well, he liked it with the rice at least.

This time around, a lot less so.

Him: Why can’t we just have McDonalds?

Now, here’s the kicker – I said the exact same thing to my dad ages ago.

See, when I was his age, my dad owned a Japanese restaurant and food that he couldn’t sell and would go bad, he’d bring home for us.

So, we had sushi constantly and lobster and crab pretty regularly. I remember him telling us that we would regret this when we got older and he was totally right.

Me: OK, if I gave you some barbeque sauce from McDonalds to dip the duck into would you…
Him: Yes! I want that.

Ah, it’s moments like this I wish my dad were here so I could tell him about the boy. And that he was right. About so much. And that I miss him terribly.

Now, I want some sushi. Or more duck. Or even McDonalds.

I’m just hungry, yo. That, and I like to eat my feelings.

Speaking of eating my feelings, Daisy’s back. Kinda.

It’s a long story and hard to explain.

I’ll try and sort it all out for you at some point. Really, I’m trying to sort it all out for me, but I’ll tell you all about it if I do.

Location: at the gym, getting repeatedly strangled by Pez and Erin
Mood: so, so, so hungry
Music: Home Sweet Home (Spotify)
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Trying to be better

The kid is in first grade

It’s weird having the kid back in school again. I feel as if no time has passed this summer but so much has.

And yet, here we are, in a new grade, with new classmates and teachers. Picking him up the first day, I met his teacher for the first time.

Me: So how did he do?
Her: Well, you obviously know how social he is. He made a lot of new friends pretty quickly.
Me: Yup, that sounds like him.

He does have some social anxiety when we first show up to anything, but I encourage him to feel whatever he feels.

Him: I’m sorry I’m scared, Papa.
Me: (shaking head) No. Don’t ever apologize for your honest feelings. You’re always entitled to your true feelings, kid, and no one – not even me – is allowed to tell you that you can or cannot feel something that you honestly feel.

This actress named Charlotte Cushman once said, To try to be better is to be better.

Suppose I tell the kid these kinda things in the hopes that he’ll try to be ok and, maybe, that will be enough to make him ok.

I just want him to be ok.

Alla that sounds very sensible but the truth is that I question my own feelings about any number of things.

And yet, I try my best to not get down on myself for feeling what I feel.

And what I don’t feel.

Her: Why?
Me: I don’t know. I just know I’m not your guy.
Her: Well, thanks for telling me, I guess. (later) I didn’t even want dessert.

It’s still a work in progress. I’m trying.

Looking back at women I’ve dated, there are at least three women that I know that married the very next guy they dated after me.

That’s just off the top of my head.

Suppose, after me, it became very clear what they did and didn’t want in their life, for better or worse.

Writing that made me laugh. Perhaps I’m just so awful that some people needed to marry the very next person to get me outta their systems.

Maybe trying to be better isn’t enough after all.

Someone just rang my doorbell from my building. He found a crowbar on the floor in the hallway and it’s pretty clear, someone was trying to break into one of the units here.

I should really move to the burbs.

Location: in my apartment building
Mood: exhausted
Music: been feeling lazy, I’ve been going crazy (Spotify)
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personal

Trapped in a Spider’s Web

Sometimes, you gotta say…

Him: This is what you do, Logan. You survive things.
Me: I’m tired of surviving things, man. I wanna live. I’ve been a shell of myself for the past seven years. I wanna live.
Him: You will. You’re the strongest guy I know.
Me: But I don’t want to be. I’m tired of being the strongest guy people know. I just wanna be a normal dude with a family and a boring fucking life. Why is that so much to ask?

In my life, I’ve had a number of horrors. Some turned out to be fine, like when I thought I had testicular cancer but I didn’t.

The first real horror was when a family friend stole my life’s savings at 34. Six-figures. At that moment, I thought I had hit rock bottom. Was too young to realize that there’s always more room for down.

My father dying was a horror as well. But, we all understood that he lived a good long life.

Of course, we all wished he lived longer and died more peacefully. But wishes are for children. And I stopped being a child decades ago.

Alison dying was the most horrific thing that has ever happened to me up to this point. It still gives me nightmares. It always will.

But two weeks ago, someone stole my phone number – not my phone, my phone number – and that was the start of a horror that was nowhere as near as bad as Alison and my dad dying but far worse than losing my life’s savings at 34.

So much worse. You have no fucking idea.

I’ve spent the last two weeks trying to fix everything but it felt like being trapped in a spider’s web. I could move, but I knew it was just a matter of time before the inevitable.

Just like when I was 34, it’ll be years before I return to the level I lost and I feel, some new horror is waiting for me.

The thing that kept me up the most was that I had no one to help.

While friends like Chad and Miller were constantly checking on me…

Him: I’m at the beach, homie. Just checking in.
Me: I’ve got ok moments and awful moments. I still can’t wrap my head around how much I lost. It’s mind boggling.

…it’s not the same as a partner in life.

Don’t think I’ve ever felt as alone as I have in the last two weeks. It made me realize exactly where I am in life with many things.

I guess I’ve been sleepwalking longer than I care to admit. But, if nothing else, I’m awake now.

The thing that hurt the most was that the boy had his “graduation” the week everything went down and, even though I was physically there, mentally, I missed the whole thing.

He’s been away so I’ve the time to clean up my life and this here blog. If you click a link and find it broken, it’s probably due to this thing.

(c) Associated Press

But then I read the news this morning that they’ve been finding children’s bodies in the rubble in Florida and I realized that this was nothing compared to the grief these families were dealing with.

There’s always more room for down, so I’m grateful for what I have; the friends and family I have, among other things.

Years ago, when I thought I hit rock bottom – which seems laughable in hindsight – Bryson put both of his hands on my shoulders and said, as gently and as seriously as possible, “Logan, sometimes, you just gotta say, ‘Fuck it.’ Fuck this shit, man.”

Some of the best advice I’ve ever gotten. Still is.

Fuck it. It is what it is. I survive shit. Even when I don’t wanna survive shit, I do. I eat grief every fucking day and have for the past decade. A little more won’t change shit.

That’s all I’ll say on the matter.

Back to the usual nuthin soon.

Location: home, looking for some papers and a goddamn mosquito because, of course, there’s a goddamn mosquito here
Mood: fuck it
Music: Sorry, I’m not home right now (Spotify)
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personal

True things are often awful

Is that cocaine?

Him: I’m afraid.
Me: It’s ok to be afraid. But we live our lives despite the fear, not just with it, ok?
Him: Ok, papa. I’ll be brave.
Me: That’s my boy. Don’t be afraid. Let’s go on an adventure.

Almost one year later, I finally went for a reasonably long bike ride with the kid. We went up Riverside up to about 140th. Pac was across the river in NJ and I had half-a-mind to go there but I wanted to slowly ease the kid into riding the bike.

He reminded me of Rerun on Peanuts.

Him: That was so much fun! Can we do it again tomorrow?
Me: Yup! Remember that life is on the other side of fear. Life is always on the other side of fear, kid. Everything you’ll ever want, is always on the other side of fear.
Him: I don’t understand.
Me: You will.

We ended up going again the very next day all the way down to Charles Street. God, I love that kid.

That pic way down below is him belting some Rolling Stones at a birthday party we went to afterward.

My buddy Ian’s an actor and he needed help filming a reel for an audition. It didn’t take too much time and was pretty interesting, I gotta say.

Him: This is a lead part.
Me: Great, if you get it, I can borrow money?
Him: (later) Thanks, man. This was a huge help. Wait, is that cocaine?
Me: What? No, it’s from national donut day.

Been helping another buddy deal with massive changes that’s been happening in his life.

Me: It’s like that Hemmingway line I like so much: Life is gradually and then suddenly.
Him: (thinking) I hate to say it, but it’s probably a good thing this happened.
Me: You know that, if humans died out, Earthlings would probably look like crabs?
Him: What?
Me: Crabs. If left to their own devices, living things tend to become crabs. Because organisms – individually and wholly separate from each other – become crab-like through evolution. It’s survival of the fittest, and the fittest animal on a planet that’s 70% water is a crab. So animals that look like they’re related, aren’t. They just figured out that they should be crabs.
Him: That’s crazy.
Me: I’m telling you this because you and I independently, and without consultation, came to the same conclusion. While this is terrible that it happened, on whole, for us, it was a benefit. It’s awful to say, but true things are often awful.

Location: Charles Street, with the boy
Mood: excited
Music: she loves cocaine and the nineteen seventy-five (Spotify)
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