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Goodnight, Rose

She’d love it

The first time I ever saw my dad cry was at his mom’s funeral.

I was in my early 30s when it happened. Remember speaking to him about it.

Me: Are you ok?
Him: No. When my father died, I lost a major connection to my past, but I still had my mother. But now that she’s gone, I feel unmoored from my past, like a leaf in the wind or a ship on the waves.

You should know that all my best lines I stole from people I loved.

But that’s neither here nor there.

Thought about that recently because Alison’s grandmother died the other day.

That’s Alison up above with her grandfather, Sal, and grandmother, Rose – they were celebrating Alison’s brother’s return from the army.

I’m super annoyed that bottle’s in front of Alison’s face.

You never know what little things are going to be big things until long after the fact.

In any case, Sal died some 13 years ago, and I wrote about it here.

Alison took it pretty hard, but I was glad that I was there to keep her company through that.

He and I got along great because we both liked Dean Martin and, oddly, sardines. It’s funny what people talk about.

I liked Rose a lot too. Probably one of my favorite memories with her is when I once drove out to Staten Island with Alison about a decade-and-a-half ago to celebrate Sal’s birthday.

Rose had to walk by herself in the rain, so I stepped out to steady her, and she immediately took my arm as if we’d done it a million times before.

Felt like part of the family that day.

Well, that’s not entirely true.

I suppose that I have such affection for Alison’s family because they’ve always treated me like a member of the family, even early, early on.

All of them did – even A-SIL and I kinda bickered like siblings since we met.

Now everyone in that picture above is gone and I feel so deeply for Alison’s mother, that she’s lost so much.

Then again, life is loss – it’s all about the spacing.

But even there, she’s gotten the short end of the stick.

Still, that’s her story to tell and not mine so I’ll stop here.

As much as I feel sadness that Rose and Sal are gone, they lived good long lives.

Alison didn’t, and that’s forever going to eat at me – the unfairness of it all.

And, of course, I think of my father and my mother and how I wish…so many things.

I always tell myself to see my mom more often, but life keeps getting in the way.

No excuse, I know, and yet, it is.

I’ll call her tonight. Or tomorrow.

I will. Honest and for true.

Goodnight, Rose.

If there’s an afterlife, I hope you and Sal are catching up and you’re telling him about all the madness happening around here.

And tell Alison that we all miss her terribly.

So…terribly.

Him: Would she like that I play soccer and the guitar…you think?
Me: I think she’d love it, kiddo. No, I know it. I know she’d love it.

Mood: freezing
Music: freedom, oh freedom well, that’s just some people talkin’ (Spotify)
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You don’t know what you’re up against

China (and Russia) will win

In season seven of the Game of Thrones, John Snow begs all the sides of the Seven Kingdoms to put away their differences to prepare for the coming war with the White Walkers.

He knows that humanity is doomed if they don’t unite because they’re unprepared for the war about to happen.

Hold that thought.

Many historians don’t consider World War I and World War II as two separate things – at least not in Europe.

For them, it was one long war of modernization and ethno-racial underpinnings, with Germany at the center:

    • In WW1, because the Second Reich of Germany came about as the result of the breakdown of the old-world order of empires (German, Austro‑Hungarian, Ottoman, Russian), while…
    • In WW2, just 21 years later, Germany was still smarting over its defeat in WW1 and the subsequent humiliation of The Treaty of Versailles, and it was a chance to show the world that WW1 was just fluke – that didn’t work out.

It’s only by seeing the big picture that you realize what is really happening.

Me at the Jannowitzbrücke station in Berlin 21 years ago.

While most of sane people in the world, and here in the US, see the downfall of the American Empire under Trump, which is accurate, I see that but it’s more than that.

A lot more.

If the US and the EU/NATO do become adversaries, then China – and, to a lesser extent, Russia – wins.

It might not happen tomorrow, but it’s definitely gonna happen.

That’s the last thing anyone wants.

I said it before: I love being Chinese but hate the government of China.

It was and is evil.

And a war is coming, in one form or another, hot or cold. But it’s coming if it’s not here already.

Yes, Russia is evil and dangerous but it’s not the danger that China is.

You have no idea how dangerous China is.

Because China is dangerous in ways you couldn’t imagine.

100 years ago, in 1926, China was…nuthin.

It was in the middle of (multiple) civil wars, called the Warlord Era (1916–1928). This was after the Opium War and the downfall of the Qing dynasty.

There was no unified national army, no cohesive economic strategy, no real industry of any sort, outside of large agrarian areas predominantly used to feed their own people.

It was a whole lotta, well, like I said, nuthin.

The Western powers – plus fucking Japan – controlled all the ports, legal, banking, customs, and tariffs – everything was in the hands of someone else.

100 years later, in 2026, China has the largest trade surplus in the world, reaching roughly $1.2 trillion in 2025 — the largest number EVER in human history, recorded by any country.

Think about that.

To go from a backward nuthin nation of warlords under the thumbs of everyone to a the nuclear-powered creditor nation in four generations.

That’s mindboggling.

In fact, just 24 years after the warlord period of China, China was already showing the world how quickly it learned how to use soft power in Korea – essentially handing the US the first of many defeats in Asia.

China did it again, just four years later with the Vietnam War.

Then the USSR/Russia attacked a weakened China in 1969 and should have destroyed them, but it didn’t, even with superior firepower and tech.

Culturally, the Chinese are quiet – we watch and learn. And we think.

If it wasn’t for the fact that the Chinese government is absolutely brutal against its own people and regularly threaten Taiwan, a country I love deeply, I’d admire and be proud of these facts.

But, just like here, the country is in the hands of the selfishly evil and the populous is too brainwashed or too fettered to do anything about it.

That’s what the West is up against.

But with Trump pissing off all its allies to line his own pockets so, because half of my countrymen are imbeciles, there is no unified front against China.

The united west lost the first two rounds when it was fighting China by proxy.

Fractured? The West is screwed.

If there’s a true cold war against China – and really, that’s the only war that’s possible between two nuclear empires – Donny’s barely able to play checkers against some chess grandmasters and we’ve got zero friends to help us.

That’s not good. None of this is good.

Now, I hate China because of how it treats its people. Which is to say, I hate China because of how it treats the Chinese.

Then again, the US isn’t treating its people all that well either, lately, now that I think about it.

Me: Congrats on becoming a parent! It’s tough but awesome.
Him: Any advice?
Me: Yeah, have her learn how to fight, learn how to manage her money, and learn how to speak Mandarin.
Him: (laughing) Why Mandarin?
Me: OK, so in 1926…

Location: my lightly flooded apartment, yay…
Mood: still pretty fucking upset
Music: an enemy to all mankind, the thought of war blows my mind (Spotify)
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I’m sorry for my appalling silence

Completely clue-resistant

Me: I feel it’s dishonest for me to not say something because this stuff actually matters and people are dying so this fat senile fuck can make a little more money and stay outta jail before he dies. Fuck that.
Producer: [I get it]. We are falling fast into a dark time in the states. Voice your just opinions and hopefully more people will voice theirs.

Have you ever noticed that the right-wing here in the US always seem to be militant Christians but it’s only the left-wing that ever quote the New Testament?

Weird, right?

It’s almost like they have zero actual facts even here to support anything they believe and – even here – they’re just completely making stuff up as they go along.

I started Scenic Fights as a lark, really.

Never imagined, in a million years, that it would amount to anything.

So, I’ve been pleasantly surprised with the cool things that have happened with it, such as me being recognized by fans when I’m just going about my day.

Over time, it’s grown into something I’m really quite proud of and the team works insanely hard to keep it going.

A few years ago, the producers advised me to be mindful of what I say online because SF is supposed to be for all fans, of any political spectrum.

At the time, I agreed and have, for the most part, been fairly limited in my criticism of Trump and the MAGA movement in general.

But, after the deaths murders state-sponsored executions of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, I’ve decided I can’t just tiptoe around this thing.

I write this on Holocaust Remembrance Day, 2026.01.27, which seems particularly fitting.

To my loyal readers, I unreservedly apologize for my appalling silence this whole time.

I regret not writing this sooner.

To wit: If you’re a Trump/GOP voter and read me, don’t. Honestly.

You’re a traitor to everything this country once stood for, and you can get bent. Full stop.

The insane mental gymnastics the MAGA voters go through to justify their absolutely batshit interpretation of what it means to be a loyal American is just pathetic and gross.

If that weren’t bad enough, it’s just the sheer embarrassment of their existence; they have the complete confidence of the rich C- student that’s never been right but has never suffered for always being wrong.

It’s invariably those people in group projects that were the main reason why I’ve struggled with group projects and here – at a macro-level – is no different.

We’re struggling as a nation right now, not so much because they’re clueless, but because they’re completely clue-resistant – fighting every bit of fact they can, despite all evidence to the contrary.

Now, before you write me anything, just know that I don’t give a flying fuck about anything you have to say.

There’s a buncha reasons for this that I don’t have the time and you don’t have the baseline intelligence to process.

But – as a general rule – I don’t read jack shit from whiny apologists of draft-dodging, gold-star family mocking, senile, incontinent, lying (so much fucking lying, JHC), child-raping pedophiles.

Sidenote: If he’s not in the files, why spend all these YEARS hiding them? Occam’s razor.

Ergo, whatever self-assessed brilliant insult or witty comeback you’re planning to write, just know that I’ve been called worse things by better people.

I’m sure you and the circle you call your family tree are not unfamiliar with this.

In summary: Fuck you and the horse you rode in on, you broken pencil of an excuse of a human being.

If I’ve entertained you even for a millisecond, know that I’m embarrassed and wholly regretful for that, although I’m guessing that 97.4% of what I write is beyond your fourth-grade reading level.

May I suggest you find someone with the time and crayons to more fully explain this all to you, you submissive fucktard.

“Submissive,” because  – deep down – you know, you’re this way because you’re too scared, too confused, and too jealous of a world you couldn’t hack and need someone to tell you what to do because you utterly failed on your own.

May you choke on a $2 egg with the only medical professional available being a MAGA adherent of Wormbrain Kennedy Junior.

tl;dr: Go fuck yourself, you paste-eating, cosplaying, pedo-worshiping traitor.

Glossary

  • The New Testament: The 27 books after the Old Testament; if you’re a Christian, technically, this is where you should be quoting from.
  • A lark: Something done for amusement
  • To wit: “That is to say”
  • Unreservedly: Completely
  • Get bent: Go have sexual intercourse with yourself
  • Macro-level: Big picture
  • Incontinent: Unable to control urination or defecation.
  • Urination or defecation: Peeing or pooping.
  • Occam’s razor: The simplest explanation is usually correct.
  • Ergo: Therefore
  • Apologist: Someone that offers excuses for someone or something else.
  • Adherent: Follower
  • tl;dr: “Too long; didn’t read.”

 

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Location: Evidently, 1938 Germany
Mood: in-fucking-censed
Music: ask ’em, “How much should we give?” They only answer, “More, more, more” (Spotify)
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My old ghosts

Always soupy grey

On the flip side of kindness, Sara and I were out at the Surgeon’s house the other day and I told them that Johnny and I stopped speaking.

When we were much younger, there were times I woulda called Johnny my best friend.

But, in the end, he chose money over decades of friendship.

Him: That was it? You never spoke to him again?
Me: He called me once, drunk. Didn’t pick up. There was nothing to say. I didn’t want someone like him in my life. Around me. Around my kid.

Because it’s one thing to be unkind to me, but to be unkind to a friend of mine AND betray a trust?

That I can’t forgive.

Because you can forgive most things, but you can never forgive treachery.

Which brings me to the Devil, whom I’ve not seen in ages.

Not since before COVID.

Throughout the years, I’ve ping-ponged between enemies, frenemies, and friends with him. We’ve had so many differences, arguments, times when I legitimately feared for my safety.

Yet, he was oddly never treacherous. Dangerous and heartless, yes. Treacherous, no.

Me: It doesn’t bother you? Hurting people?
He: Not particularly.
Me: Why not?
Him: Maybe they deserve it.

And now I’m left wondering whatever happened to him.

I suppose that, if he’s still out there, I wanted to say, thanks.

For so many things.

If nuthin else, a good Old Fashioned with rye.

This was 20 years ago. That may or may not have been him.

After all these years, now that I’m older, I finally understand some of the things he was trying to tell me when I was a young and hot-headed man, and he was the older, wiser fella trying to teach me something.

I think I’ve finally experienced enough of the world to understand what he was trying to tell me all this time: That the world was always soupy grey and only children see things in black and white.

For better or worse, what I thought was cruelty this whole time was – in fact – a form of kindness, in some perverse way.

I was just too naïve to see it.

On that note, I thought about one of our very last face-to-face conversations.

Me: (later) Why do even care?
Him: (laughing) You’re the last reliable guy in New York. In 20 years, you’ve never said you were going to do something and not do it. Out of all of them, you’re the only one that’s never let me down.
Me: That’s it?
Him: (shrugging) That’s a lot. Finding someone whose word isn’t just bullshit is a lot, Logan.

Well then, I suppose, for alla my faults, I’ve done something right.

There’s a thought that you never know whether something is a blessing or a curse until long afterward. I think the same is, roughly, true for people in your life.

Johnny, someone I once considered one of my best friends betrayed me, while the Devil, whom I called that in my head and hated at times, ended up making me so much of who I am today – in a good sense.

Even this late in the game, I’m still learning stuff.

Location: West 74th and Columbus, looking at what mighta been
Mood: wistful
Music: He’s getting ready for the showdown (Spotify)

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Unkindness, Pt 2

Running into people

Like I said, a buncha people from my past have been making a reappearance in my life, in a manner of speaking – either they actually have or I thought about them, which I’d probably not done in a while.

First is someone I’ll call the Cellini Coach whom I last saw out in California.

I call him Cellini because, like him and Jason Everman, he’s insanely successful in some seriously disparate fields:

  • He sold a buncha companies to Google and Facebook – you’ve absolutely used his stuff if you’ve been on either of them – and might be a billionaire. I’m not sure.
  • He’s also a ridonk fighter – fourth degree black belt in BJJ from Gracie Barra, great boxer, and trained shooter and wrestler – and is kinda my private coach on certain things (see below).
  • He’s also getting his master’s degree in philosophy a Oxford.

Despite alla this, though, he’s a pretty quiet and down-to-earth kinda guy.

Him: Don’t put up a picture of me.
Me: It’s ironic that a fella that helped invent the internet doesn’t wanna be on it.

Plus, even though he’s a super busy and successful guy, he’ll still take the time out to answer questions that I’ve got regarding certain aspects of fighting which I always appreciate.

Like most kindnesses I get, it’s a kindness that is neither expected nor warranted.

Below is him acting as my coach, which he totally doesn’t need to do, and yet he does.

We met up just this past week a mutual friend’s physical therapy joint – Recalibrate PT, which is probably one of the best PT spaces in the city IMHO.

There, Cellini he took two hours outta his super busy schedule to give me a private lesson to help me fix a buncha issues I’ve been having with my game.

I also ran into a whole raft of friends while there that I’d not seen in ages, including my buddy Sawyer – who was training with my friend Cotton (whom I also recommend if you’re looking for a personal trainer).

Me: Dude, we loved Masters of the Air, whatever happened to your character (Lt. Roy Frank Claytor)?
Sawyer: In the show, he just disappeared but in real life, he survived WWII and fought in the Korean and Vietnam Wars, which he also survived.

On a somewhat related note, I recently had a phone call with someone whom I was unkind to ages ago.

He said I never apologized to him for being unkind to him, but he seems to have forgotten that he wouldn’t let me apologize to him.

Still, I suppose that’s really neither here nor there; I could have apologized again but chose not to again.

In any case, I figured that, since I was the one originally in the wrong, I’d just go ahead and apologize again to him, again and did that.

I’m hoping he took it to heart just because I would hate for anyone to suffer because of something I did, but that’s really his decision to make and not mine.

I suppose we all do unkind things as much as we do kind ones and, when we do unkind things, we should try to fix things when given an opportunity to do so.

This actually reminds me of something else entirely, but I’ll tell you about that later.

Location: my freezing pad
Mood: possibly sick with a broken toe
Music: I thought it was just another fight (Spotify)

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Unkindness, Pt 1

Reliably unreliable

Was supposed to see A-SIL our in NJ today, but the weather was just gross so we just all stayed in, although my brother did come by because he’s in town from Cali.

It’s just as well, we’re all feeling run down around here.

Me: Are you sick?
Her: I dunno. I just feel like I’m fighting off something.
Me: Same. I don’t feel sick per se, I just feel…rough.

Think I said a dozen times just in this blog that the trait that I find the most attractive is kindness.

So, it logically follows that unkindness is the most unattractive quality, at least to me.

Before Alison, I once briefly dated a wealthy lawyer. She was attractive and very nice to me.

Just…not to everyone else.

She was rude and curt to waitstaff, always late to everything, and never – ever – did what she promised she’d do. Not for me or anyone else.

She was reliably unreliable.

One day, a rude event on an escalator followed by another one to a waiter in a restaurant was enough.

When we broke up, I remember Cappy asked me why and I remember saying, “Attractive is temporary, douchebag is forever. She was a douchebag.”

When we broke up, her sister – a successful lawyer in her own right and whose personality I liked more than hers, actually – told me that she and her husband would buy me a new Porsche if I reconsidered.

Remember telling them, “I’d rather have a Metrocard and be alone, than have a Porsche and be with her.”

Because, at some point, you just tired of making excuses – to yourself and others – for someone’s poor behaviour. It’s exhausting.

It was with her that I came up with the term, “Something a lot like love.” Cause, at one point, I really thought I loved her as she was attractive, smart, successful, and nice – but only to me, which wasn’t enough.

But I obviously didn’t love her, because I left her.

And I never once regretted it.

Bring this up for two reasons:

The first is that I’m so regularly pleasantly surprised with just how kind Sara is, along with all of her other good points.

I honestly don’t think that character trait can be overstated enough when it comes to just having a life partner.

Because looks and so many things can go away and, in the end, you’re stuck with who they are deep down inside.

Who Sara is is just as nice on the inside as she is on the outside.

There’s a second reason, though, which is that a whole raft of people from my past have been making reappearances in some fashion in my life and I’m reminded about how much I value this trait because some of the reappearances were very kind while others were less so.

But this is already a longer entry than I had expected it to be, so I’ll wrap it up in the next one.

Location: wet and gross NYC
Mood: cough cough
Music: all over everybody seems unkind (Spotify)

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Fat Logan and the Bouba–Kiki Effect

The shape of our lives

Her: I can’t imagine you as a fat kid.
Me: Oh, trust me, I was.
Her: I just can’t picture it.
My mom: Do you want to see pictures of him when he was chubby?
Her: Yes!
Me: Oh god…

If I said the words: Spike, Crack, Snip, or Kick and asked you to imagine that the sounds the words made had a shape, what shape would they be?

What if I said the words: Gooey, Balloon, Smooth, or Marshmallow?

If you’re like most people, the former comes across feeling kinda hard and pointy while the latter comes across as soft and rounded.

This is called the bouba–kiki effect.

Basically, words give us a certain feeling and have a “shape” to them in our heads.

Thought about this the other day because I’ve been telling everyone for years that I was fat at 14 but I only recently realized that was inaccurate.

I was fat in 5th grade so I would have been 10 then.

That was the most traumatic time of my childhood.

Childhood traumas stay with us for so long because of how time works relative to our age.

Case-in-point: I was fat for four years, from 10 to 14.

For a 52-year-old, that’s not that big a deal – after all, it only comprises approximately 8% of my life (4/52=0.08).

Unfortunately, when you’re 14 years old, those four years comprise almost a 1/3 of my entire life up to that point (4/14=0.29).

But it’s more than that, isn’t it?

Like, you don’t really remember much before you’re eight years old.

So, when I was 14 years old, I only remembered six years of my life, really.

This is actually the THINNER version of me.

That means that, those four years of my life – ages 10 to 14 – felt like most of my life, about 67% of it, to be exact (4/6=0.67).

My point is, if words have a shape and feeling, so too do periods of our lives.

I submit that periods of our lives have a weight and shape to them as well, and only we can see and feel them.

When people say, “Just get over it,” or, “That was ages ago,” they’re not being honest with how everyone processes their youth differently from everyone else.

For me, my fat years feel soft, heavy, slow, and oversized – everything was a drag and depressing.

Even now, if I had to describe my overweight years, despite their only occupying 8% of my total life, it FEELS closer to 33% of my life.

And this is why I try to remember that the kid is processing the world very differently than I am.

Yes, he’s 10, but he really only remembers stuff and people from when he was about seven or eight, so he’s really only lived maybe three years or so?

He doesn’t truly remember much beyond that, although he has a sense of things, like the bouba–kiki effect.

Like he has a sense of loving being in NJ with his grandparents and Queens with his cousins.

He just knows they make him feel good in one way or another.

That’s why, even some 40 years later, I still know exactly what it feels like to be a fat, friendless, kid.

It’s always why I’m always obsessed with food and being fit.

Because even though it was (several) lifetimes ago, deep down – well, probably not even that deep down – I’m terrified that I’ll wake up trapped in that fat kid’s body once more.

Which, let’s be honest, is only a few poor carbohydrate decisions away.

Me: Hit a new milestone today.
Her: What’s that?
Me: Welp…somehow, I’ve eaten four pounds of peanut butter in five weeks.
Her: You’re kidding.
Me: If only. (thinking) Now I gotta go out and pick up more peanut butter.

Location: my dry-as-a-bone room
Mood: stressed
Music: I paint a picture of the days gone by (Spotify)

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I despise Disney

They never shoulda taken off Kimmel

I’ve owned stock in Disney since I was 23.

“Owned” being the operative word as I sold alla it back in September when they took Kimmel off the air.

Still, that doesn’t stop me from despising them.

From a legal standpoint, they are probably one of the most evil companies on the planet from an intellectual property attorney standpoint but that’s a wholly different conversation.

I have a tattered and torn copy of The Brothers Grimm, read every story there at least twice.

And The Little Mermaid was one of a million books I read as a kid.

Girls I dated in high school and college always wanted to watch Disney films for some reason and I remember watching The Little Mermaid and its saccharine plot and being so pissed off.

But the film I find most offensive is The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

See, I read that book when I was like…13? Way too young.

I think my dad had a copy, so I read it exactly once. But, holy shit, that book fucked me up.

It was the first time that I understood the cruelty of people to other people.

Never really got that before reading that book.

Seeing how Disney sanitized it and made it into a completely different thing upset me, so much that I never did see the end of it – probably never will.

Later that same year when I read the book, I learned about the holocaust, like really learned about it.

I get why people deny it even happened; the cruelty of it all seems unbelievable.

And yet, that’s exactly why people need to know about it. So that we can steel ourselves against ever allowing such a thing to happen again.

Even though it does, indeed, keep happening.

In today’s news cycle, the cruelty of people to other people is just sickening.

Can’t help but think that maybe it’s because companies like Disney spend all their time feeding all these syrupy stories of nonsense when life is poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

There are ways, I think, to entertain but also let the truth of things settle and change people.

 

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Location: my apartment, which smelled like freshly baked bread
Mood: dry
Music: At least I know what I make-believe (Spotify)
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Worth keeping around

Just show them a great first date

Me: Wait, you have how many unread messages from guys?
Her: (checking phone) Hmmm, 1,021?
Sara: (laughs) That sounds about right.
Me: Man, it pays to be an attractive blonde female.

When Sara and I met up with Amanda the other day, we – like always – asked about her dating life.

Because now that Sara and I were married, it’s nice to live vicariously through her, the ABFF, A-SIL, and others.

Us: So…what’s the latest?

On a related note, the other day, I posted the above image on Facebook that someone sent me from rando reddit post (which I’ve since lost).

Didn’t think much of it – four friends of mine commented and I went to bed.

When I woke up the next morning, I had several hundred comments and, a few days later, over 400 comments.

Some were fine, with many of my female friends commenting how bad it is out there for them.

But the number of questionable – and I do mean questionable – responses from men really floored me.

They ranged from whiney and excuse-filled – somehow, a short, old, arthritic, minority widower is anything but average…

…to angry and…jealous?

I’m not sure how to understand this fella below, who seemed to be upset that I even went on 180 dates in 18 months, which is about 10 dates a month, or 2-3 dates a week – something I told you is totally doable if you just…do it.

It’s all so profoundly sad because men want to meet women and women want to meet men, but they are clearly speaking very different languages.

And what I found most shocking is that so many men were offended by the demonstrably true things I said: Which is that whenever a man goes on a date with a woman, he runs the risk of wasting his time and/or money.

But whenever a woman goes on a date with a man, she runs the risk of wasting her time and/or getting assaulted, raped, or worse.

And yet, men will say this kinda stuff without a hint of irony:

Did you know that ladies? That “men are assaulted at a much higher rate than women?”

It’s news to me – and, I’m sure, news to you as well.

In any case, he obviously doesn’t know that I met Alison after I got robbed of all my money, or that I met Sara after I gave up most of my clients and got robbed (again).

It *MUST* be because of money or something else that women like about me but not actually me – not because I’m actually a decent human being who can talk to a woman because that would mean, well, maybe it’s you, dude.

The funniest thing about that guy’s statement is that my oldest readers know that my fave thing to do while out and about was to see how many women I could get to buy me a drink in a night.

One night, I even got a girl to get guys to buy her a drink to give to me. That, my friends, is how you afford to go on a ton of dates without going broke.

No one ever dated me for my money.

Honestly, I’m not that good-looking, I’m old as dirt, I talk a lot with my hands, my back is just crap and the rest of my body isn’t far behind, I’m overly pedantic, etc.

And yet, I have zero problem meeting and dating women, probably because of two major reasons:

    1. When I was single, I put in the time. I got shot down, repeatedly. I most likely got turned down 2-3X more than I succeeded.
      • But when I failed (beyond her having a boyfriend), it was always my fault: I was too nervous, I was too forward, I was too hesitant, something.
        • That’s how you get better at anything – by not blaming someone or something else but by fixing the only thing you can control and change, yourself.
        • Do you remember when Alison rejected me? I accepted it and told her I hoped she’d reconsider…and then I immediately picked up three other women, two within the hour. It’s never the other person’s fault.
    2. The other reason? I respected the fact that women take a chance every time they went out on a date with me or anyone else.
      • That meant that when a woman did go on a date with me, I was always grateful they took a chance, and I rewarded them for taking that chance by being a decent human being and showing them a great time.

That’s it.

That’s the big secret, fellas:

Stop complaining, put in the time, and be a decent human being.

Being interesting and non-needy helps.

This singer named Craig David had a line in a song that I always told myself whenever I felt like whining: Instead of me feelin’ sorry for myself, gonna get me somethin’ tonight.

Because you can’t whine or anger your way into someone’s contact list.

Show someone a great first date, and they’ll come back for great second date.

You’d think this would be pretty easy.

You would, clearly, be mistaken.

Women have to go through thousands – thousands – of men to find one worth keeping around.

You gotta be worth keeping around to be worth keeping around, man.

Location: the gym, trying to survive against 20-somethings
Mood: annoyed and embarrassed
Music: it’s so late, yet, I’m so up for it (Spotify)
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Categories
personal

Leaving holes in our lives that cannot be filled

As Happy as I could be

Him: (after meeting the Firecracker) You have a type.
Me: (shrugging) It’s not so much that as there are certain traits in a partner that I value. And the partner that I would pick to be my “until-death-do-you-part” partner would have the most of those things because I value those things.

The Firecracker isn’t Alison, but they have a lot in common – far beyond both being blondes with coloured eyes.

This shouldn’t be surprising because I seek certain things, just like everyone else does.

For example, they’re both female, which makes sense, as I like females. They’re both unwaveringly kind. They both liked that I cooked and I liked that they both cleaned.

Etc. Etc.

I’ve always said that we spend our lives looking for our tribes.

Who’s the ultimate example of your tribe if not your partner?

And if your partner isn’t the ultimate example of your tribe, why isn’t s/he, and why would you be with her/him then?

Firecracker: Are you happy?
Me: (thinking) Yes. But it’s complex.

This fella named Oliver Sacks once said:

When people die they cannot be replaced. They leave holes that cannot be filled, for it is the fate – the genetic and neural fate – of every human being to be a unique individual, to find his own path, to live his own life, to die his own death.

Yeah.

And when someone leaves your Venn diagram, they take with them that unique space in your life that only he or she coulda occupied.

So, I have a hole in my soul the shape of my dad that was carved out once he died.

Just like I have one in the shape of my grandmother.

But the largest hole is that of Alison. It’s still there, as are the others.

That’s not changed. It never will.

After all, grief is the price we pay for wonderful things.

My father, Alison, my grandmother – they were all my wonderful things.

So, when the Firecracker asks me something like, “Are you happy?” The answer is yes.

But, imagine that you lost your left arm seven years ago. And in those seven years, beautiful and terrible things happened, because, that’s how life is.

Assume that you’re lucky and the beautiful things far outnumber the terrible things.

I’d assume you’d be happy.

But you’ll never be as happy as you would have been if you got a chance to enjoy those wonderful things AND still have your left arm.

Except, it’s not just your left arm. It’s your right hand as well.

And other bits and pieces of your body soul.

As happy as you could possibly be, you’ll never be as happy as you could have been sine qua non/but for the losses.

That’s the truest answer for the Firecracker’s question and it’s something that I’m acutely aware of for my son.

Because, as happy as he’ll be, as good as a parent as I could possibly be, he’ll forever miss having his mother raise and love him.

He’ll forever be missing something most people, myself included, take for granted.

And my heart aches as to the truth of that statement.

It’s why Mother’s Day/Alison’s birthday is such hell for both of us.

Note that the same is true for the Firecracker.

Because we met after she’s lived decades of her life and the purpose of life is to wear you down.

She too has injuries that she bears so that, as happy as she might be with me, those injuries remain. But that’s her story to tell.

I know that I can make the years the Firecracker and I have together as happy as I can.

But I also know that there are things that I can’t do because we all have those holes in our souls in the shape of the people and things we’ve loved and lost.

I like to think that, it’s not so much that I’ll die one day, so much as it is that I’ll have so many holes in my soul that, one day, they’ll be too many for me to go on.

I’m 39 in this picture above and the main one.

My friend Nadi took them while we were having dinner one night.

Life was perfect at that moment.

At that moment: My clients are awesome, and my career is taking off. My dad is alive. I’m happy and laughing with friends. And she’s alive and we’re about to start a family. Three kids. Suburbs.

Alla that.

A year after that picture: Alison and I lost our first pregnancy. It was the start of a winter of sadness and pain that I wouldn’t have believed possible for anyone to survive.

Nonea that.

But, in that moment, I was happy because I didn’t know how fucked up life could – and would – become.

Man, the lucky never realize they are lucky until it’s too late.

I’m realizing how lucky – at least right now – I am.

And I’m grateful to the Firecracker and the kid for making me feel lucky again.

It’s been such a long time.

Me: But I’m as happy as I could possibly be right now. I have no capacity to be any happier.
Her: Ok, I’ll take that.

Location: A dark bullet bar with some new friends and good stories
Mood: lucky happy
Music: It’s gotta drive you crazy, how you keep it all inside (Spotify)
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