Category Archives: Personal

Personal

Words from Steve Pavlina

—Everything in quotes below is from Steve Pavlina. I’ve mentioned his site before. While I don’t agree with a lot of what he says, sometimes his words strike a chord with me. I don’t usually quote long passages. There are enough nuggets of interest hidden in the paragraphs below to interest someone else, too, I would htink. 

“My life and my writing are intricately intertwined, such that it’s impossible to separate the two.  When someone reads this web site, they’ll eventually come to know a great deal about me as a person.  Usually this creates a skewed and inaccurate impression of who I am today because I change a lot over time – I’m not the same person I was last year – but it’s close enough.  Getting to know me makes it easier for people to understand the context of what I write, which means that more value can be transferred in less time.

I’ve told many personal stories on this site, including my most painful and difficult experiences.  I don’t do this to be gratuitous but rather because those stories help make a point – that no matter where you find yourself today, you always have the opportunity to grow in some small way, and no matter how small those changes are, they’re going to add up over time to create massive lifelong growth.  That’s a lesson we all need to remember.”

If the stuff I’ve written on this site means I’ll never be able to run for a political office, I can live with that.  I’m willing to write what is true for me, even if it goes against my social conditioning.  Being honest is more important to me than being popular.  But the irony is that because bold honesty is so rare among civilized humans, in the long run this may be the best traffic-building strategy of all.
People often warn me not to write things that might alienate a portion of my visitors.  But somehow I keep doing the opposite and seeing traffic go up, not down.  I don’t treat any subjects as taboo or sacred if they’re relevant to personal growth, and that includes diet and religion.  It’s no secret that I’m a vegan ex-Catholic.  Do I alienate people when I say that torturing and killing defenseless animals for food is wrong?  Perhaps.  But truth is truth.  I happen to think it’s a bad idea to feed cows cement dust and bovine growth hormone, to pack live chickens into warehouses where the ammonia from their feces is strong enough to burn their skin off, and to feed 70% of our grain to livestock while tens of thousands of people die of hunger each day.  I also think it’s a bad idea to pay people to perform these actions on my behalf.  It really doesn’t matter to me that 999 people out of 1000 disagree with me.  Your disagreement with me doesn’t change what went into producing your burger.  It’s still a diseased, tortured, chemical-injected cow, one that was doomed to a very sad life because of a decision you made.  And you’re still responsible for your role in that cow’s suffering whether you like it or not.

That last paragraph is a good example of the kind of stuff I write that makes people want to put me in a cage, inject me with hormones, and feed me cement dust.  It wouldn’t surprise me terribly if that ends up being my fate.

I write what is true for me, regardless of public opinion.  Sometimes I’m in the majority; sometimes I’m not.  I’m fully aware that some of my opinions are unpopular, and I’m absolutely fine with that.  What I’m not fine with is putting truth to a vote.

I take the time to form my own opinions instead of simply regurgitating what I was taught as a child.  And I’m also well aware that there are people spending billions of dollars to make you think that a burger is not a very sad, diseased, tortured, chemical-injected cow.  But I’m going to keep writing to help you remain aware of things like that, even though you may hate me for it.  That defensiveness eventually leads to doubt, which leads to change and growth, so it’s perfectly fine.  I’m good at dealing with defensiveness.

I don’t worry too much about hurting people’s feelings.  Hurt feelings are a step in the right direction for many people.  If I’m able to offend you so easily, to me that means you already recognize some truth in what I’ve written, but you aren’t ready to face it consciously yet.  If you read something from me that provokes an emotional reaction, then a seed has already been planted.  In other words, it’s already too late for you .

My goal isn’t to convince anyone of anything in particular.  I’m not an animal rights activist, and I don’t have a religion to promote.  My goal is to awaken people to living more consciously.  This requires raising people’s awareness across all facets of their lives, so they can make the big decisions for themselves.  It requires breaking social conditioning and replacing it with conscious awareness and intention.  That’s a big job, but someone has to do it.  And if I don’t do it, then I have to admit I’m just part of the problem like all the other hibernating bears.”

Diuturnal, Personal

A Personal Blog, A Personal Note (From My First Blog)

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“I can only write from the porch of my narrow world.” -x

Some people try to stretch everything said and done to include people not intended to be in the commentary. If someone tries to get you to believe that I’m talking about you, please stop and look at the person trying to make a claim. If you think I’m writing about you, there is probably nothing I can say to dissuade you from the idea.

Part of the reason I started this blog was to get my words out, even if imperfectly, so that no one could easily set their record in my regard. This isn’t a two-minute dash to angrily lash at people. It’s a long-term commitment to share some parts of me. When I’m gone, it will be hard for people to attempt to change the nature of who I was. They will try, but these thousands of hours of seriousness and farce found here will drown out the attempt. A person doesn’t just sit down one morning and write hundreds of posts without some motivation. (Even if it is misguided motivation.)

Everyone reading this has their hobbies. Whether it is sports, napping, television, long walks, or any other activity, it translates into time spent in the manner they see fit, even if no observable benefit to them or society will result. Each of us wastes our lives to some degree. Whether writing will result in a better life for me isn’t a real question: it will. Whether I will say stupid things or inadvertently hurt people also is a dumb question: I will.

For those who know me personally, you can’t just accidentally find this blog and start reading. If, by a miracle, that is how you found me, you should know that continuing to read it is a choice. Like any account of a person’s life, my words suffer from the present moment, meaning that a person’s mood at a specific moment can color the tenor and meaning of one’s words. I’m prone to the same ecstasies and sorrows as most other people. A careless synonym can sometimes set a reader’s mind far away from the intended purpose. In the same way that the bible admonishes masters not to overhear their servants, you should know as you read that written words are powerful things, capable of provoking emotions that weren’t intended. They can also unintentionally wound people we love.

Revisionists insist on painting their lives with a soft brush. They’ve even given themselves convincing amnesia about their past. I’ve written a lot about the need to remember that my parents were capable of so much good – when they weren’t at the mercy of alcohol or anger. The violence overshadows that potential. But I don’t walk around whimpering about my horrible childhood, and I don’t use it to justify anything I’ve done. Of course, if I am indeed fooling myself, that could also be stupidity on my part. Whatever stupid or bad things I’ve done are at my own feet. People who know me intimately will tell you that it is almost ‘just’ a horrible story to me. I laugh about it quite often. Not that fake laugh-to-cover-unhealed-wounds laughter, but the authentic, healthy “Can you believe it?” laughing.

Much of my goal each day is to avoid cynicism. Like you, I fail.

I write words to appease whatever drives me to do so.

Personal

03032014 Quote for the Occasion (By Me)


If you seek the best way to sharpen your ax, ask the person whose hands frequently wields one – not the man selling firewood on the roadside.   –X Teri   
I worked hard to encapsulate something I kept trying to remember to use at work.  

Personal

The Right To Choose Who Is In Your Life

This is an edited version of the original post. I still believe in everything I wrote but I also confess that I used a sledgehammer to drive my point home.

This isn’t a story of forgiveness or of my inability to forgive. If a husband beats his wife repeatedly, no one demeans the abused wife for getting out of the situation and protecting herself. No one in his or her right mind, I mean. Family bond or previous relationship do not negate a person’s right to insist that he or she be left alone, to feel safe, or to simply take a “time out” away from anyone or everyone.Those who choose to attempt to force anyone to talk to them are very similar to those charged with stalking. Only the people involved know to what extent any allegations of disrespect, hostility, or rudeness were actually at play. It’s easy to rush to judgement.

I had people who’ve crossed the line. Whether you would say that I over-reacted or not, it is irrelevant. The proverbial line is wherever I decide to draw it, independent of family, friends, pastor, or neighbor. Once someone says “enough,” no one gets to argue the point. It belies a very central flaw in that person’s way of thinking. It isn’t respect or love; rather, it is a refusal to see other people as equals and of equal stature. I don’t want people in my life who operate this way. I would expect someone to react negatively, but the only responsible option is to step back and evaluate the situation. If the other person or people think that I am wrong, no amount of screaming, threatening or demeaning me is going to make me wake up and decide I’m being wrong-headed. It makes me think that you are crazy.

Growing up in a violent, impersonal cauldron of hate and anger has forced me to learn the hard way that dealing with this type of aggressive behavior is no longer an option. It’s not because I’m cured or immune from it; rather, because it became overwhelmingly evident that some people are so infected with the need for anger and drama that nothing I could say or do was going to reach their brains and placate them. I can’t change them but I can control whether they are going to be allowed to further infect my life. 

I ask that anyone being asked to step back stop and seriously consider how you might react. 

Personal

(But I Eat it Anyway…)

 

Most of my life, I have avoided the desire to eat meat. Even while I was eating it, of course.

My family was one of red-blooded Americans vying to get out in the wilderness (but not too far, of course) in order to kill something from a safe distance. And eat it. And blather on about the adventure of it all. Or force people who had no interest in eating it – to eat it.

Much of my life, I would much prefer vegetables to flesh. I still do. A few years ago, I went quite a while deliberately not eating animal flesh. Despite the biggest personal issue of my life going on at the time, I felt better than I had in years – and since.

As I get older, I can more easily say that I wouldn’t miss meat if it disappeared from the world right now. Beef Jerky and Slim Jims are mostly about the texture and spices. Pepperoni is also about texture and spices.

Also as I age, the evidence, at least to me, is fairly clear that we should not be engaging in meat eating. Or that if we do, it should be a much reduced rate. We should be processing meat with much more care and without so many chemicals and contaminates.

Do I understand that I’m a hypocrite? Yes, of course.
When you take a hard look at how beef and poultry are mass produced, in combination with how it affects the planet, it’s a no-brainer.

Personal

Tab (the soda)

Tab cola is one of those exotic things from my past. I love everything about it. Like the funyons from Piggly Wiggly I wrote about earlier, it evokes memories that normally lie dormant.

Earlier this year, I went to amazon.com to buy some and have it shipped to my house. It’s strange to think that things like this are so easily purchased online. While it hadn’t been too long since I had drank Tab, it seemed like a lifetime. This soda was once very easily obtained in a variety of stores; like so many other products, it got pushed out by the shiner, newer products.

I remember the first time I ever drank a Tab. It was sometime around November, 1976 and my family had moved back to a place near my hometown of Brinkley, Arkansas. I had some coins during 3rd grade recess, and one of my classmates, Calvin Hill, showed me where the coke machine was. (We called all soda machines “coke machines,” by the way.) The machine had grape soda, regular coke, orange soda and things like that. But Tab caught my eye. I bought a bottle of it and Calvin looked at me like I was a madman recently escaped from the local asylum. Bear in mind that I had been raised on the idea that Coke (the original) was the preferred soda. Tab’s taste back then was very tart. Tab never tasted sweet or smooth. In fact, its distinctive weird flavor is why I loved it so much. Most people thought it tasted like boiled tree bark – but given my strange tastes, that, too, might have been a great choice for me. The bottle was very cold and I drank it so fast that my stomach swelled from the carbonation. As poor as I was, I drank one every chance I could.

It’s strange how our memories are tied so closely to tastes and smells of our childhoods. Even though I drank a swimming pool of Tab throughout the years, it didn’t lose its appeal to me. I would like to be very clear, too, that I didn’t drink it because it was “diet.” When I first tried Tab in the 3rd grade, the word “diet” was about as foreign a word as I could imagine. There was simply “good” and “not good” to eat.

(By the way, I would like to mention that I generally don’t remember names at all from early school. There are just a few that come easily to the tongue. I’m trying to remember to remind people that I’m not in possession of a great memory and sometimes I should be. With a name like mine, you might jump to the wrong conclusion that names are easy for me.)

Ancestry, Biographical, Personal

08022014 Macaroni Afternoons With Grandma

As I was finishing off a delicious can of V-8 this morning, I had one of those surprising memory associations assail me: one of the many reasons that I love V-8s might be that the overall taste is evocative of summers at my grandma Nellie’s house. I’ve consumed a few thousand V-8s in my life; I can say that without fear of exaggeration. To have just now made the connection between the tomato aftertaste of V-8 and being at my grandma’s house was a nice surprise for me.

One thing grandma loved to fatten me up with was plain macaroni. After cooking it, she would add tomato sauce and/or paste to the water and let the macaroni continue to soak up more water. The heated concoction would pass the aroma around the kitchen and house. Even if I had recently eaten, I would tell myself I could eat a big bowl of macaroni and tomato sauce as “just a snack,” as if an entire box of any kind of pasta is anything less than a ridiculous challenge to most people. The legend that I could consume a dozen adult portions at one sitting was no exaggeration. It was an easy, cheap food to make for me. It just so happened that I LOVED macaroni cooked this way. There were many afternoons were I would eat the entire pot of macaroni by myself, usually washing it down with Coke from a 2-liter bottle.

I drank a second V-8 later today, this time deliberately thinking about how much it reminded me of grandma’s macaroni, sitting on a rough wood floor, watching a very poor tv signal, enjoying myself as if I were a king.

It is hard to imagine anything simpler than those moments.  No amount of complexity and choice would have made those bits of macaroni any more delicious.

Were it possible, I sometimes would choose to be able to go back to one of those summer afternoons, with nothing except a bowl of macaroni, a glass of coke, and a small house on a small rise in the road, looking out toward the big world with my grandma and granddad. I never noticed how scarce my tv options were and I never felt poor at their house. And I would never have thought I wasn’t well-fed.

Ancestry, Biographical, Personal

08152013 First Time I Was Read My Rights

Another amusing hallmark in my distinguished life involves the first time I was read my rights.

I attended junior high school. Southwest, to be specific. Life was a mess. Another trailer had burned and so my family moved to Tontitown to live with a paternal cousin, Leta. I had left behind my best friend and his mom, who had saved me from my family more than once. I was still infrequently wetting the bed, mom and dad’s alcoholism was at a seeming crescendo, and my dad and his cousin Leta were having an affair, which they thought was secret. I was getting one horrible beating a week, minimum. (I think maybe my dad had a quota that only he knew about!)

I don’t remember which class it was but I was facing South, looking out the window and doodling. The classroom was on the outside of the building, on the front near those horrible holly bushes with thorns. (I was thrown into those horrible bushes more than once by bullies.) I was chewing grape Bubble Yum gum, which I had just bought on a payment plan from Bobby. Honestly, I was in a funk and not paying attention to anything. The teacher interrupted my thoughts by saying my name, evidently more than once. I was expecting to be in trouble for not paying attention and doodling. Instead, someone had knocked on the class door and asked to see me in the principal’s office.

I was confused. I didn’t know if meant I had done something bad. As I got close to the office, I could see a couple of police in the office. Due to my parents, my idea about the police up to that point was mostly distrust and anger. But what flashed through my mind was the hope that my dad was dead. I can’t help how that sounds -it is true. The image of the police officer almost convinced me that he had finally gotten so drunk that he had died driving. I knew that if dad were dead, I could get away from my mom, too. (Dad had been in several terrible drinking and driving incidents. He was driving the car in 1970 when my cousin was killed. He totaled a truck while we were living in Tontitown with Leta. Etc.)

When I was escorted into the office, they started asking me weird questions about my name, where I lived. They probably assumed I was an idiot at first because I didn’t want to answer questions without knowing where it was headed. I jumped to the erroneous hope that maybe someone had reported abuse at home. Instead, they started reading me my rights, one line at a time.”Do understand these rights?” No, I didn’t, but I said yes. I wondered where my brother was or where another adult might be. It seemed odd that no one on my behalf was present.

They began asking a lot of strange questions about checks, mailing addresses, alcohol, whether I had ever smoked cigarettes or anything else. There were a lot of questions. I could see that they were changing from aggressive to a little perplexed. They could clearly see that I was confused and way out of my element.

As they could see I was very confused, they finally told me that someone had stolen a stack of checks from my cousin Leta and had written several hot checks on the account. One of the police asked me, “Do you know who stole them or could have stolen them?” I looked right at him and said, “Probably (insert name here), she usually is at the bottom of everything like that. But it could be my mom and dad – they are always in trouble for drinking.” I’m paraphrasing, but that’s basically what I got out of it. The two police looked at each other in what I thought was surprise.

They then asked me at least 25 more questions about (insert name here), who her friends were, did she smoke, do drugs, etc. I was as honest as I could be. As the interview was about to end, one of the policemen asked me if there was anything else I wanted to tell them. I almost cried but instead of saying anything, I just said “no.”

I remember later mom and Leta have a screaming fight about the checks but I went out into the woods across the fence to get away from the nonsense. 

I felt dirty, like I had been accused of something horrendous. I doubt whether they thought I was really involved. I think it was more of a fishing expedition. But it was strange being questioned by the police without someone else present while I was still in junior high school.

Ancestry, Biographical, Personal

Christmas, Frankenstein, Springdale History and Dawn’s Birthday

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Aeons ago in the 70s, me, my brother and cousin Jimmy wanted to see a movie on Xmas Eve. The “new” Springdale Malco Twin theater was opening that night. Since my cousin Jimmy almost always got his way, all it took to implant the certainty of it was for him to mention it to his mom – about 100 times in an hour. I’m fairly certain that my Aunt Ardith gladly drove us to the new theater to get rid of us for a couple of hours. She barely slowed down as she drove up to the new theater as she handed my cousin unlimited candy money and lit a new cigarette for herself.

It didn’t hurt that the theater was up the road from Jimmy’s house. In those days, 412 was a 2-lane highway 68 and Carley Road was barren of most development. It was “about 1/2 a cigarette of driving” away from Jimmy’s house. (Our mothers smoked like chimneys. Everything could be measured in “cigarette increments.”)

Of all possible movies, we decided to see “Young Frankenstein.” It wasn’t exactly the most yule-spirited of movies. There were very few people at the theater. I’m not sure that the theater had publicized the soft opening that much. Not even all the seats had been installed, supplies were stacked everywhere, and the place felt like it had been opened on a dare.Even eating the popcorn, as delicious as it was to us as young kids, reminded us of fresh plastic.

Despite there being few people at the theater, it turns out that my wife Dawn and her father were two of the other handful of people in the theater that night, probably wondering why three goofy young boys were in the theater with them causing a commotion. As for why a dad would think a young girl would be a great audience for Mel Brooks and Gene Wilder causing their mayhem? Who knows. Let’s face it, for rambunctious boys,  though, “Young Frankenstein” is definitely an excuse for a lot of exchanged whispers and laughs. Madeline Kahn and Gene Wilder exchanging hilariously and minimally-concealed risque references only fueled the muffled laughter.

Did I mention that Christmas Eve is Dawn’s birthday and that she was there in part to celebrate her birthday? It was one of those strange serendipitous convergences for Dawn and I to figure out that we were both in the same place at the same time when we were both considerably younger. (Everyone can easily imagine me being at “Young Frankenstein,” but almost no one could picture Dawn being there.)

Coincidences happen. It’s just refreshing to know that we share not only the opening of the Springdale Malco theater, but also this crazy movie on one of the most unlikely nights of the year. My wife doesn’t have any other birthday memories from that day, so it’s reassuring to think that we share such an outlandish memory in common on her birthday from so long ago.

I can’t think of “Young Frankenstein” without thinking of my cousin Jimmy or my wife, who had the misfortune of being saddled with a holiday birthday.

Update: Now that Gene Wilder has sauntered off, smiling like only he can, I’m glad that serendipity prevailed on that Xmas Eve decades ago.

 

Personal

Hobby Over Children

A couple of people I know feel cheated by one of their parents. The mother had a hobby that all but eliminated the children’s importance. Most of the mom’s free time, money, and mental focus were dedicated to the pursuit of the hobby. The hobby also rendered the home to be an unclean mess throughout their childhood. The children had to fend for themselves or do without. The hobby resulted in at least one bankruptcy, liens on property, etc.

(In fact, if the mom were asked for pictures of the children, the mom wouldn’t have any to show people, but carried an entire album of hobby-related pictures.)

Fast forward twenty years. The revisionist mom doesn’t want to discuss her negligence toward the children. Any mention of the negligence is ignored and if it can’t be ignored, an attempted dismissal of the allegations ensues. The mother can’t understand why the children could be wounded by her betrayal or why it would be so important to continue trying to understand so many years later.

It is easy to wait until later in life and hope that time and memory have softened the details and other people’s desire to dredge up the past. But “let the past be in the past” is not a useful cliché in situations where real emotional damage occurred.  It’s a good reminder, but only goes so far and should only be applied when the issue at hand is small – otherwise, murder wouldn’t have an unlimited statute of limitations, would it?

One of the daughters had a couple of complete mental breakdowns in life. When she speaks of the negligence brought on in part from her mom’s hobby, the anger and hurt are still apparent after so many years. She tells a story involving a counselor, one that both mother and daughter visited. The mom said that she couldn’t devote more time to the daughter, as it would harm the pursuit of her hobby!

I don’t really have a “point” to this blog entry, it’s just another example of how stupid we can be at times.

(In my own personal case, my parents spent a fortune on drinking, cigarettes, and stupid pursuits. It was their right. But it wasn’t right of them to do it.)