More Amos

I could post this every damn day...this is what my previous post says, much more eloquently...especially from 1:30 into the clip on to the end.

Every Day

Even when I was golden and riding high last week, I had bad moments. I can look back and see how it was a false positive. A lot was going well for me. I was getting actual positive reinforcement from people (one person I have to pay to talk to, and the other person *SHOCK* doesn't live in the area) and yeah, I probably also fed into the general good mood that goes with the Christmas season. I didn't bite on the commercialism of it all for the first time in my life, and I am really proud of that. It almost made me feel numb to "Christ"mas, but, it's better than letting the frustration of the greed that devours folks this time of year affect me.

Those bad moments, when the mind races, when the dark, irrational thoughts come in are the times that are really hard to make other people understand. It shatters me to have this indescribable pain that can't be seen by others. And on top of it, a lot of time when you talk about it you're only making the pain worse. People put up such false facades when I talk about it. You don't even want to know how many people I've gone in-depth with that I don't even talk to any more. The turnaround isn't that long either -- a couple weeks at best. Does it scare them because they see my fears inside themselves, or do they think I'm fucked up? Regardless, I am so tired of reaching out and finding nobody making the same effort and reaching for me. There is one person on the Earth who I know gets it, and who I know genuinely cares in their soul. And I left that. Talking to that person and being around that person is the only time in my life when I feel the grace of unconditional love.

I envision what it would be like to not have a tomorrow a lot. And I feel nothing. It doesn't make me sad or horrified. It doesn't scare me to think of darkness, or loved ones being hurt by my exit. See, in the mind of the depressive, we can't grasp that people genuinely care enough about us that anyone would REALLY care. Read that again please, and let it sink in. Try to step outside of your head and grasp how profoundly hopeless that has to feel -- irrational as it may be -- that's the how we think and feel. The thought of living in pain every day for another 40 years scares me so much more than not having a tomorrow.

Why sit through 40 years of pain, and hurt, and self-hatred? It's been long enough that those things should be gone, but they persist every day, and I've worked hard as hell to get over that hump. They're less frequent, but more intense - what is that??????

I keep finding that my initial instinct to like people when I meet them is far from a positive attribute...I only set myself up to get burned. More and more I see that nobody really cares about their friends and acquaintances on a real human level. For real, "how's work? how are the kids?" Nobody CARES. Everything is an act. I do nice things for people, like I go over and above, and I hear people's surprised reaction and it makes me profoundly sad. How -- Why live in a world where people jump and judge you when you do bad AND when you do good?

I was gone for a year and saw people I care about more in the six weeks being home during that time than I have seen them in the 15 weeks since I've been "home." That says everything right there. People feel obligated to come see you so they can show you their insincerity when you're living out of town -- but their insincerity is just a secret understanding that you have when you know you don't have to make an effort to see someone. "Tell ya what, you live ten minutes away now, so really, it's not as special to see you anymore...let's just save the hour or two of pretense, OK?"

It's too much work to maintain (or God forbid grow) a friendship or a relationship, so it's just easier to do your own stale shit and never expand your mind apparently. Do you know how many times I've heard people complain about their lives since I've been home? It's atrocious, only because the same people have been doing the same thing, expecting different results. When that doesn't happen they rant and rave. People are perceptive enough to acknowledge the things about themselves that make them unhappy -- but they don't have the will to go ahead and change those things. I should talk right? At the very least I've taken the leap and gotten out. I followed that pull that was always in me to leave Buffalo, but I came back...I came back for everybody but me. I came back because I saw the insincere love that I was getting while I was away and thought it was genuine.

Well, it lasted a week

I was riding high for a week, and amazingly it's crashed to an all-time low just as quickly. The absolute lack of a support system that I have here is staggeringm especially on days like this. Not only is there not a support system, it's the fucking farthest thing from it. I've said it before, but being home is like throwing an alcoholic into a bar with a pocket full of money.

It's why I escape. It's why I travel all the time -- even though some cowards anonymously call me a piece of shit for doing so. In the end, my desire to not ever be stagnant here in the 716 says it all, I just don't ever listen to it. It's fucked, because in a lot of facets of my recovery, relapse, recovery cycle, I feel like I've made incredible strides personally and cut the relapses to almost, ALMOST, non-existent.

I still have a monumentally large problem with giving the power to others. It is not a self-esteem thing or anything like that. I love myself, and feel better about myself right now than I ever have. I think I'm a great person, I treat people with respect and love. The problem is that I naively expect it in return.

The perfect example I guess would be this -- when I meet someone new, anyone, I like 'em. Anybody. Not a single judgmental thought passes through my head. Even in life right now, I'm trying to repair the burnt bridges that are worth repairing. I am just having a hard time walking away from lost causes...Regardless, I love pepole, and I have a really tough time when it comes to seeing other people struggle, and other people who have no empathy for those who struggle.

Again, cliches, but "walk a mile in someone else's shoes." Nobody can begin to imagine the pain I am in and the pain I experience on a daily basis, much like the way they can't understand how it is for those who don't have anything. It's people who tell a homeless person to get a job, or people who don't think everyone in this country is entitled to health care. It's people who say suicide is selfish and cowardly. They don't get it, and it's really hard for me to accept that people like that not only exist, but, people like that usually flourish. It's an asset to be as selfish and greedy as you can be in this culture. That shit doesn't work for me. I can't be around people who don't know what it's like to feel compassion outside of themselves and their own bubble.

I could die tomorrow and not give a fuck. And it's Christmas. I know people would be hurt, but how can I walk through this life on a daily basis feeling like I don't fit?

Corny Cliche Time

This quote has been attributed to a ton of different people, so whatever:

"The very definition of insanity is doing the same exact thing over and over and expecting a different result."

What Whaaaaaaaa?

Cleveland

When you're used to Filet Mignon, it's kinda hard to go back to Hamburger Helper.
C-Town all dolled up for Christmas -- looked pretty great

What up 13th row, 45-yard line seats -- BTW, Brady Quinn is for real

My man and yours, L.T after passing Jim Brown on the all-time touchdown list

THHHIIIISSSSSSSSS close to getting Brady's autograph!!!

The motto of the city of Cleveland "we build great stadiums so shitty teams at least have a nice place to call home."

Seize The Day

Today was the kind of day to just pray to God and say Thanks for such an amazing, heartening day. I feel tremendously restored. Hearing nice things about myself from other people....it feels good and I believe it all. It's amazing when the progress you feel like you are making is validated when other people see it in you, and articulate that to you.

Or if you'd like, just sit back, at a distance and judge me without ever getting to know me....I'll take the love and affirmation from people who I hold dear in my heart.

A lil' Mason Jennings for you:

guess where I was....

Super eerie being in the bedroom Lincoln died in

perhaps Biggie and P. Diddy shot him because Abe 'repped the West Coast though??? Or perhaps I'm an ass and make my 12 year old cousin do ridiculous things in gift shops?

Ford Theatre

oh those witty children

3 hours of traffic for a normally 45 mintue drive, boredom, and a digital camera = making a beautiful 8-year old girl pose like she's 50 Cent

Yikes

I just wanted to share this and drop and F-Bomb, saying that this is exactly FUCKING it. This drills where I am at at in recovery RIGHT NOW.

STAIND -- FADE

I try to breathe
Memories overtaking me
I try to face them but
the thought is too
Much to conceive

I only know that I can change
Everything else just stays the same
So now I step out of the darkness
That my life became 'cause

I just needed someone to talk to
You were just too busy with yourself
You were never there for me to
Express how I felt
I just stuffed it down
Now I'm older and I feel like
I could let some of this anger fade
But it seems the surface
I am scratching
Is the bed that I have made

So where were you
When all this I was going through
You never took the time to ask me
Just what you could do

I only know that I can change
Everything else just stays the same
So now I step out of the darkness
That my life became 'cause

I just needed someone to talk to
You were just too busy with yourself
You were never there for me to
Express how I felt
I just stuffed it down
Now I'm older and I feel like
I could let some of this anger fade
But it seems the surface
I am scratching
Is the bed that I have made

I'd especially like to thank (nts) any of y'all who would have come to see me if I was laid up with a physical illness but haven't shed a second of your time for me because it's mental. If you even have to ask if I mean you, then I do.

Y'all who I love and know have been there with me, heart and soul, thoughts, prayers and simple gestures like a text, phone call a visit, or whatever...I love you and appreciate you more than I can express into words -- I love you more than I love Curtis Granderson and PS3 COMBINED (a lot more...sorry Curtis and Sony).

"So if we love someone, we should train in being able to listen. By listening with calm and understanding, we can ease the suffering of another person." -- Thich Nhat Hanh

Little Battles

My head is awash with so many different things. From the ridiculously meaningless and goofy, to the profound and inspiring. Seriously, as I sit here, I am juggling two quotes in my mind...and also a touch of anxiety about the Orlando Magic point guard situation...but I digress -- One of the quotes tumbling around in my head is from one of the worst movies ever -- Heat, and one is from Thich Nhat Hanh, a Vietnamese Buddhist monk. I think the first one is universally known for it's corny-ness, but it goes a lil' somethin' like this "don't let yourself get attached to anything you can't walk away from in 30 seconds flat...."

Attachment is something I'm pounding my head against the wall about, seemingly for the last couple of weeks. Why are bonds that have done more harm to you than anything in the world so sacred? It's an amazingly curious thing to keep getting burned by the fire because you feel drawn to it. We ALL do it. You feel obligated to be near it, even when you know the damage that will come. IT IS CALLED SELF-REALIZATION and/or SELF-ACTUALIZATION when you acknowledge this, IT DOES NOT MEAN THAT YOU ARE BLAMING SOMEONE ELSE...Don't patronize me with your dime store psychology....This is where the second quote comes in, and it's much more profound, trust me...it's so profound, I'm going to block quote this bad boy:

"When you plant lettuce, if it does not grow well, you don't blame the lettuce. You look into the reasons it is not doing well. It may need fertilizer, or more water, or less sun. You never blame the lettuce. Yet if we have problems with our friends or our family, we blame the other person. But if we know how to take care of them, they will grow well, like lettuce. Blaming has no positive effect at all, nor does trying to persuade using reason and arguments. That is my experience. No blame, no reasoning, no argument, just understanding. If you understand, and you show that you understand, you can love, and the situation will change." Thich Nhat Hanh

Now, what the hell ties this all together? There's a thread here somewhere.

The underlying problems I have aren't with Buffalo. I love the city. I think it's amazing. I'm not sure I've been to a city that has a cooler area than the Elmwood Village down to Albright-Knox and over to Delaware Park and the Zoo....So I really struggle when I say that I can't see staying here because it will stifle MY growth. I <3 Buffalo but MY growth is the most important thing in the world. Sadly, recent events have hammered home that it may not be in my best interests long-term to stay here -- and this is where good ol' Val Kilmer's quote from Heat comes in (I think????...good Lord is this convoluted).

I'm not running away from anything or anyone. There's no reason to hold on, or be attached to negative energies...it's not running away, it's just a natural drifting apart that happens when there is stagnation versus growth...The drifting needs to happen if I am to ever kick this thing...Fuck it, not only kick it, but be somebody who lives mindfully with grace and peace every day.

The fucked up thing is, the very people who scoff at the idea of negative energies, and call people, say, with an altar that has a Buddhist statue on it a "weird-o" are the ones who I am "supposed to" be attached to. Their narrow-mindedness should make the drifting apart LESS painless right?

As in the quote by Thich Nhat Hanh, if you understand, and you show that you understand, you can love. Well, right now I am on the opposite side of that -- I am surrounded by people who don't understand, and thus, don't show that they understand...so they can't love. I'm through with loving because I am "supposed to."

I've never blamed a single person on this planet for anything (other than Scott Norwood). It truly is what it is. I've accepted this totally and completely. I'm the lettuce and when I look into reasons that have led me into not doing well, not growing, I know what they are. They are painfully obvious, yet, I took that fertilizer, a fertilizer that I knew was doing more damage than good, and I kept using it, thinking eventually it would work (magic!!!).

I've done fucking awesome since all this has gone down (maybe the best two days of mindfulness I've had since coming home). I've hopped out of bed (at a time when most of you are closer to dinner than you are to breakfast) and I've mindfully affected the quality of my day. I have taken a walk when I wake up both days this week...I raked the balls out of the front yard, and then I raked the old lady next door's lawn yesterday. Today I did a walking meditation through the neighborhood once I got up ("Every path, every street in the world is your walking meditation path" -- Thich Nhat Hanh). I just take it in RIGHT THERE.

It saddens me that these profound moments motivate me or act as a catalyst. I wish I could do this on my own, find it inside of myself to be my own motivator. But I think that these are the little battles I need to keep winning in order to eventually, naturally, be my own motivator. The only thing I am battling right now is the depression. It's not one big fight, it's a million little battles. I see those around me who understand, or at the very least show that they CAN understand. Those are the people I want near me.

Kid

My man Amos:

I quit

Done

Heart-Breaking

When will people see that this isn't a joke -- it's not something you get over, like a cold, or the flu???

This shattered my heart this morning:

German goalkeeper who suffered with depression for years committs suicide

"Depression took its toll on 'keeper" - Enke's widow

Germany goalkeeper Robert Enke, who committed suicide on Tuesday, had been battling depression and was first treated for the illness in 2003.

His widow Teresa said he feared their adopted daughter Leila would be removed if his illness became public knowledge.

He had also struggled to overcome the death of their biological daughter Lara, who died at the age of two in 2006 of a rare heart condition.

Germany have called off their friendly with Chile in Cologne on Saturday.

Enke, 32, who had played for clubs in Germany, Spain, Portugal and Turkey before settling at Hannover 96 in 2004, walked into the path of a train near his home having left a suicide letter in which he apologised for hiding the condition of his mental state.

Teresa Enke said: "I tried to be there for him, said that football is not everything. There are many beautiful things in life. It is not hopeless. We had Lara, we have Leila.

"I always wanted to help him to get through it. He didn't want it to come out because of fear. He was scared of losing Leila.

"It is the fear of what people will think when you have a child and the father suffers from depression. I always said to him that that is not a problem."

The couple had adopted eight-month-old Leila in May, and Teresa said her husband had cared for the girl "with love - until the end."

She continued: "When he was acutely depressed, then that was a tough time. That is clear because he thought there was no hope of a recovery on the horizon for him.
"After Lara's death everything drew us closer together, we thought that we would achieve everything. I tried to tell him that there is always a solution.

"I drove to training with him. I wanted to help him to get through it. He didn't want to accept help any more. Football was everything. It was his life. The team gave him security."

Enke was hit by a train travelling at 100mph as it passed through a level crossing on its route between Hamburg and Bremen.

His wife Teresa, making a courageous appearance in front of the media, said the couple had tried to overcome years of depression through therapy.
Dressed in black and struggling to hold back tears, she said: "We thought we could do everything and we could do it with love but you can't always do it."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel contacted Enke's family.

"She communicated her shock and compassion to the widow of Robert Enke in a very personal letter," said government spokesman Christoph Steegmans.

Enke had won eight international caps and was expected by many to be the choice to play as goalkeeper for Germany in the the World Cup in South Africa in 2010.

His doctor said he had been treating Enke since 2003, during a turbulent time when the goalkeeper had several unsuccessful transfers to clubs.

"He suffered from depression and fear of failure," Valentin Markser told reporters.

Markser said the player refused to be treated on the day of his suicide, saying he was feeling well.

Enke had lived in the shadow of more illustrious goalkeepers Oliver Kahn and Jens Lehmann for almost a decade - and it was only after the latter's international retirement last year that he emerged as a leading contender for the position, despite earning his first squad call-up in 1999.

One of the two Spanish clubs he had represented, Barcelona, held a minute's silence before dedicating their King's Cup victory over Cultural Leonesa to Enke on Tuesday.

The other, Tenerife, said their players would wear black armbands in their La Liga match at the weekend. All teams in the top two tiers of Germany's Bundesliga will observe a minute's silence and wear black armbands in their next round of matches on 21-22 November.

Hundreds of fans gathered outside the Hanover stadium and offices on Wednesday, leaving flowers and lighting candles in Enke's memory.

"We loved him. He was our idol," one fan said. "We will never have someone like him. Not only for us but for the history of football this is a great tragedy."

Fin

It's funny...when this all started, I knew where the stigma would come from. I knew the people who'd joke about everything that's happened like a fucking high school kid making fun of the retarded kid in school. It ended up being true. I also knew the folks who'd take on my depression as if it was their own. I think it's called displacement theory. Yep, that happened.

I had blind faith in some people, but I also had faith that some people would be completely awful towards me, so I avoided them.

Sometimes you think of all of these things, yet, it doesn't go as planned. Our first inclination is to think negatively, and we're surprised. Sometimes, sadly, it goes exactly as you thought though....that's me.

My problem manifests itself in Buffalo because of other people. I'm NOT blaming anybody, but, these are triggers. Drop an alcoholic into a bar. Put somebody with lung cancer in a room full of smokers. Drop someone with zero self-esteem in a life where people constantly speak negatively to them and drop guilt on them -- not understanding that they have a life of their own now.

More and more I see that I need to be gone -- but please just put it in your head, think about what other people have to go through. I know when you're in your routine it's hard to see through other people's eyes. Imagine being in a place where you've lived for 26 years of the 30 years you spent on this earth....and having it not feel like home.

I thought I'd come back here and the love and peace I found in myself would be a shield. It's worked a little bit. There are parts of my life, triggers in Buffalo, that I've pushed as far away from me as I possibly could. But it's not enough. This is all fucked up. I can't cry every day. I can't have suicidal ideations and night terrors any more. One night I sat here and wanted to start a suicide note just to see what it would feel like, and what it would look like.

This is where it all starts up. This is the catalyst. The snowball is this big fucked up negative energy and discomfort in my own skin. It's rolling down the hill and getting bigger and picking up speed every day. This is getting worse. How is that possible? I feel so so devastated. I've given, and given and given without a single thank you. My family has given and given and given without a single thank you...and now I have nothing. My pride is non-existent. My self-worth is on the floor. I'm useless, and on the doorstep of Brylin again. I came here being told there would be people I could talk to if I needed to...they've magically evaporated -- but were they ever really there? Why should I stay? Why should I stay? I can't come up with one reason why.

K-K-K-K-Kerouac

I think of Dean Moriarty...and sometimes I hope he thinks of me.

There's a stirring in me that doesn't stop. It's funny to see how people react to my when I am in over-thinking mode. I get emotional, I cry, I think of suicide. Those are all things that I don't wish upon myself, but when the storm comes it's what happens.

It's not a psycho-babble book, or a technical, dry, boring read written by a psychiatrist. The most important book anybody could read to understand where I am at, and where a lot of people like me come from, is one of the greatest books of all time. I beg you to read On the Road by Jack Kerouac. I'll give you my copy. Download the audiobook, anything. It is it.

The rambling, manic impulses that Kerouac so brilliantly and beautifully illustrates are what make me me and what make depressives, and folks with bi-polar them. It's the timeless, vague and never-ending battle of looking for an identity -- a tale that goes back to the Bible. In this modern day what Keroac writes about is a lifestyle that isn't mainstream, and never really was. It's a very stigmatized way of thinking, much less a way of living.

But it's what stirs in me every minute of the day. I can't exist like this, stable, in a job, in a dull routine every day. It has clicked into place since everything happened in May of 2008. The chaos that goes with all of this...it's when I am most comfortable.

Recently, after going to Vergas with the boys, it hit me hard. The best day I had there was when I was alone, left to just do what I wanted to do -- and I had no plan. No itinerary. I just did.

How do I meet a middle? I know realistically that what I'm talking about isn't possible, short of being a vagrant.

Another, maybe a bit more mainstream example of what I mean is Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer. Not sure if it's a commonly known story, but Chris McCandless left it all behind. He was one of us. He was someone who felt deeper and hurt more than most. The world bothered him more than it bothers 99% of the world. He took the money he had saved, $24,000, and donated all of it. He was an idealist, and an introvert...but an introvert who, when needed, could flash the charm that drew people to him.

This is what I think about as I also contemplate how the first 15 minutes of the news tonight will be about a football game, while this country wages two wars under the threat of a potentially nuclear Iran (think Hitler, only Hitler with the power to nuke Israel in his hands). The resources that we spend on clothes, and cars, and iPods while people in other countries don't have running water and have a life expectancy of 45 years old. Countries where men rape women who have AIDS thinking that will cure them of AIDS (think of what this does to spread the growth of AIDS).

I'm not in a position financially to help this out, and that hurts me a lot. I do what I can. I donate monthly. I wear the "INAMTANM" shirt and explain what it means to people who ask. But it's like trying to put out a fire with a glass of water. There are amazing people over there trying to help as much as they can. I struggle with that. I'd love to go and help, but almost every opportunity is tied to Christian ministry -- and I'm not comfortable with that at all. Ministry seems to me to be so incredibly un-ethical, immoral and exploitative. These people have a desperate desire for basic human needs...it's not an opportunity for you to impose your beliefs on people who have nothing else to grasp onto. It just doesn't sit right with me. There has to be a way to help, and not push an agenda.

Thanks Jeff

Thanks Jeff for this. Sorry it was so late, people don't ever comment and I just read your comments to my post a few weeks ago. Made me cry man! Thanks!

"Heavenly Father, I come to you today and pray that you help my friend Kevin, and for that matter, that You help me (and others like us), to find our true place and purpose in this life. At times, we've been blessed with such clarity from You about what it is we should be doing, and where it is we should be going (even if we've never acknowledged You as the source of that wisdom). And yet, there are still times like now when we still feel lost and burdened by the weight of our feelings and uncertainty. Please help us to break free from that doubt and from any fears! I admit that I regularly charge off after my own desires before consulting You about which direction I should go. I guess that's why they say that human beings are the only creatures who speed up when lost. I don't want to be lost anymore. Dear Lord, I pray that you will not remember the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions. Please think of me according to Your mercy and for Your goodness' sake, O Lord. Lord I turn from all of those sins that I committed and I ask for Your help in washing the memory and thoughts of that sin completely from my mind. Please restore me to faithful obedience to Your Word, and fill me with Your Holy Spirit anew, so that I may keep Your commands all the days of my life. Lord Jesus, I invite you into my heart anew today, and I ask forgiveness for all of my sins. Jesus, thank you for dying for my sins and for forgiving me of them through your shed blood for me on the cross. Please take away all the sinful 'old things' in my heart that defile me, and replace them with the 'good things' that you desire to grow in to my life. Please wash away all the sinful crud and tendencies toward evil and replace them with a hunger and thirst for your righteousness. I need your help, Lord God, in living this new life in Christ. Please send your Holy Spirit afresh into my life to help me, heal me, lead me and transform me. I also pray that your shed blood washes over me, protects me, and that I am counted worthy to escape the things that are coming upon this world in the form of your righteous judgment. Lastly, I pray that you have mercy on this nation even though we deserve your fierce judgment for our blatant sins that are before you. Help us to see the error in our ways as individuals and as a nation, and lead us to repentance before it's too late for us. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen."

I look forward to the scorn and stigma...

Every Day

It's hard to explain what it means, but every day I am here my soul feels tortured. I exist, and I don't want to just exist. I'm in a waiting room, waiting for the next piece of drama, the next piece of negativity, to hit me. It feels like I'm suffocating.

I get it...

You're arrogant...we get it. With so many people in REAL need in this world, and you're the charity case? Is there any end to your ego? Shake yourself.

This gon' get ugly

It's amazing how hard it is to be easy. The best way that any of us can live is obvious to most everybody, yet, how many people truly live it? To live without judgment, to remember that every single one of us are the same when you turn the lights off and we're by ourselves.

We all WANT to be happy, but at every turn we do the exact things that are going to make us depressed, that are going to bring drama into our lives, and that are going to be immense road blocks to that elusive happiness.

It has to be repetitive, just like in school when you're learning and studying. It has to be drilled into you. No one thing, one place, one car, one person can make YOU happy. Happiness isn't surface. "I love my kids, I love the Tigers, I love beer." Fucking terrific. That's great. Currently I love Madden for PS3 and love that Michigan is going to dominate the Big Ten within the next three years. It's perfectly fine to love those things, but the different levels of love and happiness are something I just fucking fight and battle and struggle with every single day.

I don't wish to be someone who can't see the layers and depths to life and people though. I don't want to be non-feeling and just exist...and call that happiness. But this is me in a nutshell (perfecy example) -- yesterday there were 17 separate terrorist attacks in Pakistan. The Taliban is waging war on Pakistan and killing hundreds of innocent people every week in an effort that will end up being fruitless if Pakistan every mobilizes. The consequences of this happening in a nuclear-owning nation like Pakistan, just two doors to the right of Iran, could threaten and de-stabilize India, Afghanistan, Iran and the entire world. It's incredibly sad and hurtful, and scary as shit.

What leads off every news channel last night? Even on CNN, "the most trusted name in news," is some hoax that a kid is trapped in a fucking balloon in the skies of Colorado.

This affects me profoundly and it IS why I have this incredible disconnect with everything around me....with this life. It has to be a dream that this is really happening. Most people I know couldn't tell me where Pakistan is on a map, but the "hey, did you see that shit about the kid in the balloon?" conversation had to have happened a million times yesterday. Add to it those glimpses of TV shows and websites judging what people wear, or how much money they make or don't make. I get "first day of school" tightness in my stomach when I think about this shit.

But before, I used to feel guilty about that. I don't now. That's part of the progress of counseling and reading and meditating. I surround that and accept it as it is. There isn't anything I can do about Pakistan directly (I'm sure that is the defense of most people as to why they'd rather watch balloon-boy on the news). What I can do is meditate on it, on an area that Ghandi held so dear, an area that born nearly every organized religion that we have today. Send love to those who are suffering over there, and pray that the people in leadership have the strength and ability to bring this to a peaceful end.

These terrorists aren't just suicide bombing anymore. They are doing their own personal Virginia Techs all over the country. Picture yourself sitting at dinner innocently with your kids and spouse, and some mad man comes in strapped with a bomb and automatic weapons, just shooting anything they see. How is it so hard to connect with what is going on over there?

I can't change anybody, but it does seem as like Buffalo is plagued with a myopia that not many other cities in the country has. It makes sense. Nobody from outside of Buffalo moves here, so, it's so parochial. But it's hard to get a grasp on that and accept it as it is. There is something to say for this insulation that is Western New York though. The pain of the world never gets let in, since for so many people here Cleveland is an exotic weekend getaway. It leads to people being incredibly self-involved though. Without a global grasp of this world, and this life, people have nothing outside of their lives to care about.

This isn't good or bad -- it just is. It's just not how I can exist.

It's really hard

My grasp of things is pretty good. I'm an intelligent kid (man?), I have perspective, I've traveled, I'm well-read, whatever....and, I think too fucking much. Way too fucking much.

It's a funny relationship I have with traveling. I guess it's my vice, whereas, I love it more than anything, yet it comes with a cost. Obviously financial costs, but, I wouldn't trade-in my debts and take away experiencing sunset on the Pacific, a game at White Hart Lane, and shit, being in Kansas City on a Wednesday in May with my Dad watching the Royals play the flippin' Twins. Wouldn't think for half of a second about it. No regrets. Thursday afternoon roadies alone to see Detroit play in Cleveland -- my favorite shit on the planet.

The REAL cost is that it gets in me and stays in me and it can't get kicked. The hangover sucks. It's a big part of this whole shitty equation that I'm trying to figure out. I love the road, I hate what it does to me when life has to happen...and life does have to happen....I'm not delusional.

What it is, I know what it is. It's hard to say, and it's hard to think, only because it can be completely mis-interpreted. I'm happier alone. I don't mind being around people...I like people, but, I've never, ever found someone who I was completely drawn to that I felt the incredible urge or neediness to always want them around at all costs....but I don't think I ever will meet that person. And that's OK. I've put a lot of people off because of that, and by no means has it ever been intentional. I guess I'm flaky, whatever people would call it...but, how I identify with the world has nothing to do with any other person on the planet.

Only in this spot though can compassion truly make its way in...and true, real love. If you live for somebody else, even your kids, you stop living for yourself...you can't do that. Give me real deep thought on this for a second -- day to day, everything is the same for most folks. They claim to be happy, and yet, whenever I have come across anybody whose ever gone out of their way to tell me how great things are, an incredible sadness is in their eyes. To brag, to be a billboard of happiness is outright phony.

It's completely bi-polar living to think of yourself as happy. Because underneath that is always the opposite, waiting to bite you. It'll bite you when your car breaks down, and it'll break you when you get shit on at work, or if say, Leodis McKelvin fumbles....(I'm just sayin', relax Buffalo).

If you weren't happy, what would you be? Sad, angry, broken, depressed, fucked up, whatever.....Where is humility, silence, stillness and compassion? It's so simple, yet painfully rare. You're just setting yourself up happy folks. When I hear someone tell me how happy they are, I shudder, because that mental construct of happy is not ever, ever permanent.

Happiness is in your soul. You can't think of yourself as happy. The greatest words to articulate this have already been taken:

"There is no way to happiness. Happiness is the way.
There is no way to peace. Peace is the way.
There is no way to enlightenment. Enlightenment is the way." -- Thich Nhat Hanh

It's no THING, it's no BODY. It's nameless, faceless. I'm there at moments. In those moments, that's where I find true grace, and it can be in such simple things. You know where my latest memory of grace comes in? And I look forward to this every time I am home -- when my little niece, 8-year old female Jerry Seinfeld, sees me, she yells "Dee, Dee!!!" and sprints full speed, usually tripping on her flip flops, or dropping her backpack, and leaps right into my arms. It's so pure, and I can understand where parenting can be transcendent in moments like that.

There's gotta be more

I am larger and better than I thought. I did not think I held so much goodness. --Walt Whitman

3eb -- ridiculous

Time tick tick ticks after me
My mp3 is out of juice
I wrote a song for you but what's the use
How'd I get knocked so loose
Someone I swear I'll never be
Who trades his dreams for security
Walks this city blindly
Lately it's a little hard for me to see
And it's all disappearing and it all falls apart
And it seems like the ending is a lot like the start
Nature has its own rules like gravity crushing me
And liars are robbed of memory
Lately it's a little hard for me to believe
At least you left a mark on me
But I think there's a reason
At least there's a sign
And all that we call chaos
I will say is by design
But I'm just lying
What you need is a sharp knife so
You can come back now from an all time low
Seems like I'm the only one
I wish I was a sharp knife
Swing that blade right through my life
Careful you could hurt someone
I wish I was a sharp knife
To cut
Some new friend can you hear this
Can we return to fearless
Merry pranksters one and all
Chase that devil down the hall
Yes it's all disappearing
And we should all just go along
And all would be so easy
If I could say just let it be
But that's not me

If you think suicide is cowardly and selfish then you just don't get it. We feel like a burden, and anybody violent and depressed enough to do it? The last thing on their mind is a want to be the center of attention. We want to not be a worry for those who love us, and sometimes it's the only answer after everything else has been tried and failed.

Out

There's this really weird un-easiness about me for obvious, and not-so obvious reasons. Moving back home, my Dad in the hospital. Makes sense why I'd be uneasy. But that's not it at all. I can handle all that. I'm having a hard time releasing resentment that I have towards people, as hard as I try.

It's stifling. I fully and entirely believe in removing yourself from situations that make you feel the way I am feeling now. And maybe that's just it. I really can't do anything about it. It's this simmering pot of loneliness, depression, frustration, sadness, and anxiety. It's always there and ready, and sometimes people or events come along and turn the heat up on the pot. I don't have any way to jump out of the situation. My hand is being forced, and I really feel suffocated.

Now it sounds like I'm blaming others and not taking any on my own. But nothing could be further from the truth. Everyone, in every walk of life have this...these catalysts that can spiral you down, but I just absolutely fail at knowing how to not let it get at me.

It's simplistic to say that I feel like the closest people around me just don't listen and respect anything that I have to say, but that really is a big part of it. On one end, every time I have an idea or a plan, there's a voice from somebody else -- the "yeah but..." or "no, that's not right." One day it's the best day ever, next day it's the best day to die. It's so fucking defeating. And that's part of what I am coming back home to -- terrific.

On another hand, I am putting all I am and all I have into coming home and trying to make it good...trying to make it work. The response is nothing. Just another day of mindlessness. I am fucking sick and tired of giving, and going out of my way for somebody else, and expecting even the littlest bit back in return. I've played this game too many times before, and I know what the result is going to be.

There it is right there. Expectation of others to be the way you are, the way I am. To be gone a year and think people will take the horror that they saw me go through, and take a little bit upon themselves and try to change. If they cared they'd want to welcome me home, with the knowledge that things are going to be different right? I haven't seen one ounce of evidence that things are going to be better then they were when I get home (for good?).

Why do I have expectations of others to value things as much as I value them, or put as much thought and effort into things as I put in. Why do I keep punching the wall, knowing that eventually no good will come from it except a broken hand?

Everything down here is the same as it was when I said I'd never come back when this was all said and done. I'll never come back down here and stay in Lakeland ever again once that truck pulls out of here. At least I didn't expect that to be different in a short time. I expect someone to wake up at some point though (and when that doesn't happen, I hope I can just dismiss it, and not hold on to it). Shit just doesn't make sense down here.

I thought maybe when I came back to Buff in July I was home for good, but, the same shit happened there, and I feel so trapped. Living here (Florida) is absolutely not an option. Absolutely not. The people down here are great (like people in the restaurants, stores, and people in group down here -- all fantastic). They really, truly are. The ratio of good people to assholes down here is a lot better than it is in most places in the country.

Maybe the saddest part of this entire year though is this -- I thought it would bring my Dad and I closer together. I thought I'd have someone to talk to, who understood everything, but more than once I've poured it all out to silence, or "huh? I wasn't paying attention" or "I don't know what you want me to do." The end result is going to be a chasm that won't ever be able to be patched over. That hurts a lot, but it is what it is. I've resigned myself to the fact that he's been taken away from his true nature. Everyone else has realized that a long time ago. I was the last hanger-on, and I'm letting go.

But I already don't want to come home. Do you see where this starts to get hopeless and leading back to where I never want it to lead back to? I have nowhere to go here...I don't want to be here. I want to be home, but, why? For what? For this delusion that things will be different? They've already proven that they won't be. If in the brief snippets of coming home things are fucked, why do I think they won't be fucked when the daily grind starts back up?

Don't ever let somebody else define who you are.

If you have an amazing day, just thank God at the end of the day. It's so simple, but some people live their whole lives without moments like the ones we're blessed with.

I live my life in widening circles that reach out across the world. I may never complete the last one, but I give myself to it. -- Ranier Maria Rike

"True love and prayer are learned in the hour where prayer has become impossible and the heart has turned to stone.". -- Thomas Merton

All you need is already within you, only you must approach yourself with reverence and love. Self-condemnation and self-distrust are grievous errors...all I plead with you is this: make love of yourself perfect.

Fuck hospitals...especially hospitals in Polk County.

Word

My windows are open. If your air is dirty, that's you; you don't need me to help clear the air, you need yourself...open a window. I've never felt this good about things, felt this good about myself, and life in general. I carry no weight on my shoulders.

Anyways, the new Third Eye Blind album is out, and it's amazing. It's a big deal, believe me. It's been six years since they've put out an album, and I've seen them I think seven times live...Lyrically Stephan Jenkins is one of the best songwriters on the planet, and I owe a lot to them as a band. Being from San Francisco, they've got this beat/Kerouac influence on their lyrics, and Jenkins said in an interview once that On the Road changed his life.

On that, I picked up the book when I started college, and it changed my life. It made me fall in love with books, and led me to choose my English major. Most importantly though (and read it please...I'll lend you mine), besides the beautiful writing that is Kerouac, it instilled in me what I've lost in the last three years or so. That love of life experiences just fell apart as I got focused on "supposed to" living and money, and all of the trappings. I've gone into enough, but, I lost me. It's made crazier, because on the album there's a line "I've been lighting myself on fire the past three years." I've lit my old, happy self on fire over the last three years, without a doubt. This is why music and literature are art (well, MOST music and MOST literature). It moves you to a sublime place.

Timing has been really odd in the last 15 months of my life. Every big change has happened on the fly. I thought I was moving to Michigan, maybe permanently. The house in Michigan sells when nobody in the country is selling a house. And it happens the day before we left to go to Maryland for Thanksgiving (my favorite week of the year by far). I left the day after my birthday, and my stuff, in the Budget Truck will be rolling into Buffalo the day before my birthday....and I'll be spending September 12th in Detroit -- so it's come full circle.

I was in town in the perfect amount of time to find a house, and all the paperwork and headaches were done (knock on wood) the day before I left to come back down. Sadly, even with my Dad's medical issues, timing-wise it was all good with looking for work down here (I think it was a sign that Florida is not home), and even being able to be down here for his follow-up surgery next week.

I've had a crisis of a lot of things through this, but one of the most important things that was tested was my faith. There is unequivocally a higher power. I don't know its name or gender, or any of that, but I know that with belief, breathing and waking up every day simply trying to smile and laugh...that's it. It doesn't matter if you live in a third world country, Buffalo, Florida or Albuquerque. You make your own happiness.

The best song on the album:

Monotov's Private Opera

Every moment of your life
Is a chance to get it right
Any moment you've been living in
You could turn it on like a light
All the weight of the years
Has got me burstin' into tears
Standin' here with nothin'
I stand alone inside my fears

Like an atom reveals a deeper state
Well I swear for me tonight
It's not too late

To tell you baby
It's you and only you and no one else
And I'll mean it
Even when I'm talking to myself
I said maybe, it's you and only you and no one else

How I miss Moscow
Those people really know
How to have a good time
In a mixed up state of mind
And Monotov's Private Opera is closed
So I guess I'll go home now
Cause there's no wheres else to go

And I will tell you baby
It's you and only you and no one else
And I will mean it
Even when I'm talking to myself
I said baby, it's you and only you and no one else
You and no one else

Now I'm stuck inside a poem
And then I'm walkin by myself
In the dark, all alone
And these actors and dramatists
They won't send me home

Well, maybe I'm like my father
Strung out on something or another
Held to a standard
We were always sinking under
And maybe I'm like my mother
She shattered cause no one loved her
Maybe I, Maybe I am like no other

And some moments are more real than the books I've read
And a good woman, maybe she meant what she said
Cause to feel you now ya know, it goes straight to my head

So I'll tell you baby
It's you and only you and no one else
And I will mean it, even when I'm talkin' to myself
I said baby, it's you and only you and no one else
Talkin' to myself
Talkin' to myself

And everything changed in a day
And I know another one on the way
And I'll tell you
Everything changed in a day
And I know another one is on the way

Hipitty-Hop

What is life?
Life is like a big obstacle
put in front of your optical to slow you down
And everytime you think you gotten past it
it's gonna come back around and tackle you to the damn ground
What are friends?
Friends are people that you think are your friends
But they really your enemies, with secret indentities
and disguises, to hide they true colors
So just when you think you close enough to be brothers
they wanna come back and cut your throat when you ain't lookin
What is money?
Money is what makes a man act funny
Money is the root of all evil

Stigma

It's a funny thing man, to live alternate to the norm. But who amongst us doesn't have something they do or enjoy that wouldn't fit a social stigma? The truest test is to ask yourself if you stifle what you are and who you are because of your fear of stigma.

It's insidious to watch the news when the inevitable stories arise about gay Senators or gay evangelists stifling who they are, even when they are caught in moments of weakness. They are so afraid to let their true selves be shown. It saddens me so much to see it, because these are grown men, in their 50's and 60's who are so away from self-actualization, and so afraid of stigma that they will ruin lives of other people just to save face and maintain a facade.

My stigma is obvious on the surface. Most of y'all have talked about it, and I know you've even joked about it. It's pathetic, because anyone who has said a negative word about what I have gone through is so off course in their own lives that I take some empowerment from them.

The depression, and subsequent events that have followed in the last 14 months have been the best thing that has ever happened to me. I shudder to think of where I would be if I, like those poor souls who keep it stifled underneath a hollow outside, were to have never gone through this and just continued on a path of false happiness.

I've learned that the judgment of others will always be there...No matter what you do, someone will be there to knock you down. But my foundation was weak and those people who just thrive off of defeating others won time and time again.

What I thought was a foundation of who I am was ultimately built on nothing, and I crumbled. Now I have a rock solid foundation, based on things that I know, things I've come to learn about myself and the world and most importantly things that I share with people who matter to me, and things they've shared with me. I was rocked to the core, and in reflecting, it didn't take much to break everything in my life open...But it was only so that everything could be built better in the end. Thank God it happened.

The world is a cruel place...It's horrible sometimes, but, life truly is suffering. Take that how you will. If you know me, you know how I understand that and interpret that. If you don't, or you think that's a fucked up philosophy, or a that's a cold way to look at life...then you just don't get it, and you should probably keep looking for ways to fill the void. We're never going to get on the same page...and that's OK.

Something to help y'all....Hopefully

The Pause. Something that's so much easier in theory than it is in practice. It's an important part of human interaction, and key to avoiding the assaults that we tragically all launch at each other on a daily basis. There isn't anybody in America that doesn't do it, but it's because of everything that we've lost sight of here. Life in America is about acquiring things, and the bullshit ideal of "keeping up with the Joneses." Pressure is put on most people, and they find it hard to handle, so when it all becomes too much you lash out in anger, or resort to drugs or alcohol to cope (much as I have since being home).

I'm trying really hard to install this huge piece of the puzzle, the pause, into my life. It's one of the hardest things I've ever done, eventhough in theory it sounds incredibly simple.

With judgment a part of all of our hearts unfortunately, we're conditioned to snap judge everything. The 24-hour news cycle, and the God awful "talking head" shows on ESPN feed the monster. Michael Vick is a perfect example. Dog-fighting was truly part of his culture from childhood. He just thought that's what you did with pit bulls. Yeah, he knew at some level it was wrong, but, is there anything in your life you do that you know is wrong on some level but continue to do it? Vick was so aloof as to the cultural perception of dog-fighting that he did anything but hide it, which led to his easy conviction. There's an incredible back story that none of us know, just like the fact that there's an incredible life story to you and me and everyone else that we just don't know as outsiders.

We never saw Vick on a day-to-day basis. We don't know anything about Vick before he emerged as a freak of nature quarterback at Virginia Tech. Despite this, across any news platform, the guy, who none of the people who were speaking on him knew personally, was roundly vilified, received death threats, and disgusting things were said about him without a single damn person owning up to the fact that in the end, we don't know the whole story. We never walked in Mike Vick's shoes as a child and know what his norms are. But our first inclination is to judge from afar. All we know is surface, but so many more things should go into account for why Vick immersed himself into the dog-fighting culture.

When others in the black community come out and say that in a lot of urban areas, dog-fighting is a part of the culture, people scoff at the thought, and again, sit in their ivory towers and dispense judgment.

Life isn't black and white. There's a lot of gray area, yet, in these cases, where people know maybe 1% of the whole story, we're so quick to violently judge and tell someone he shouldn't have a career, or freedom.

Carry it into your daily (I hope they aren't daily) battles and fights, and nit-picky squabbles. Before you judge, before you respond with a sour comeback that only increases the fight, stop. Pause. Even if it takes pausing and leaving the room for a second. Pause, breathe, and think about the nature you were born into before society got their teeth into you. Our essential human nature is to be loving and kind. We've been corrupted by a streaming barrage of negativity and judgment since the second we came to this world. But if you pause, and let that loving kindness open up in that pause, you'll avoid so much conflict in your life. You'll let love conquer the sarcastic or nasty statement you were going to come back with.

Let it take time. In truth, that's my biggest problem. I think all of this should and will be fixed overnight. In the grand scheme of things for me -- it's only been a year. I've made a lot of fantastic progress in that year, but, I beat myself up a lot because I think I'm going to magically wake up and be completely who I want to be. It takes lifetimes to get there for some. It won't take that long for me, but it's an incredible work in progress. It's a project that might even take longer than the construction on Transit Road!

But what if the pause stops one fight this month, and you can keep working on it? A few months from now, maybe it stops two fights, and it stops you from judging someone from the outside.

What helps me most in the pause it to stop, take an incredibly deep breath, with a huge exhale. I think of the exhale as breathing out of all of that shit, all of that negativity and hostility that was about to come out. It may take more than once. Breathe it all out of you, and concentrate on ways to stifle the fight before it completely erupts. Believe me, it'll come back to you like you just awoke from a trance....a trance of unconscious thought and reaction. The Pause brings in consciousness, and our conscious minds and hearts are by nature good and loving.

There is only one world, the world pressing against you right this moment. There is only one moment in which you are alive, the here and now. The only way to live is by accepting each moment as an unrepeatable miracle.

I guess that's how it's gotta be

There's so much strength and beauty in art. It's fairly ridiculous. So, I unabashedly love Amos Lee. Amos has a song, "What's Been Going On?" Tremendous. Youtube it, iTunes it, steal it, whatever. It's just incredible, and incredibly on with everything I have gone through in this enormous process. A process that still is far from completed...I don't know that it'll ever be completed.

Again, I foolishly expected things to be different after being gone so long. The fucked up thing is that I know in my heart things aren't going to be different. Nothing is the same, but nobody has changed. I want to believe in people. I want to think that as I've grown, that others have grown. It just isn't the case, and that hurts like hell. I'm not depressed, but fuck man, I've cried more since coming home two weeks ago then I cried in three months in Florida. Those three months in Florida, aside from the occasional trip to Seffner or guest appearance from great friends, were pretty solemn, and isolated. I had my Dad. I had Joyce. I had me. I had books. I had group on Saturdays.

The world here, in Buffalo, kept spinning on the same axis, and for some reason I thought that wouldn't be the case. WHY? Less than four days here what am I getting? The same shit, hearing the same shit talk being filtered through the same channels....Directed blindly towards people.

Play this game for a second. Think of all the people in your life who you feel close to. I mean people you know intimately (and if you take that to mean sexually, just stop reading this). Do you really know them? I hope you do, I really do.

All I know of them, those who I know intimately; it's all surface. There aren't three people on this planet at this instant who know how vulnerable I feel...even on my best day. There is one -- MAYBE two.

Think about the next time you sit in judgment of someone. Think about that next time you hear a second-hand story about what so-and-so did the other day. How the fuck can you sit there and judge what and who they are based on actions that you have no background to the circumstances of?

I have no idea how else to say it man. Don't take this literally, please. I'm not a musician. I'm not from Philadelphia....Aside from that, this is exactly fucking right on. It hurts me to listen to Amos articulate all of this word-for-word. I've thrown this up here more than once, but now that I am home, it's never, ever been more painful yet relevant. Self-acceptance, radical acceptance -- "What you did...it's alright. You gotta move on. Seasons change." Fuck yes:


"It's a human thing man." Why are people so fucking voided?

But we all must find our own way

I guarantee nobody has this one...I don't belong anywhere. ANYWHERE. I've given it a chance, I even came home early for THIS? It's terrible. I don't feel like I am supposed to be here. I don't want to be here, and I don't need to be here. What the fuck am I doing?

A lot of where I am trying to get to is this place where I am comfortable with being in my own skin....being alive. I feel so incredibly stifled in Buffalo, like I've never felt before, even through the darkest times.

It's an amazing awakening though. I connect with my therapist on a very, very deep and profound level. I love going to talk to her....She gets "it." I don't want to lose that. SOME folks who I banked on coming back and focusing more on, people who helped me when I was at my lowest point -- there is nothing there. It's like it was a false positive. Distance made the heart grow fonder, but it never made the head grow stronger.

You can hope, pray and think that things will be amazing all you want. In the end it comes back to problem #1 since this all began -- I can't think and expect others to understand (but I do...and it hurts that nobody gets this)....But with that all said, there are five people in Florida who despite all of my warts, have never judged me. They've only embraced me and looked out for me...even when I was hesitant, frustrated and lonely. That hasn't fucking happened for even one day in Buffalo. Not one God damned single solitary time. That hurts more than I can ever explain in words.

But I beat the absolute shit out of myself because of everything else, and I fucking hate it -- mainly, leading myself to believe, magically I guess, that things would be different here after a year. Not one God damned thing has changed in anyone. The negativity still smothers me, the angst, and drama, and bullshit just wash over me every time a word comes out of mine or someone else's mouth. I don't get it, and can't do this.

I LOVE Buffalo. I played soccer tonight, and every last person I played with was amazing. I lingered and talked to a few guys who approached me and wanted to see if I cared to play on Sunday mornings, and at the very least be there next Wednesday to play. They wanted to grab a beer at some bar in East Aurora with me, but I sweat like a whore in the Vatican, so I wasn't about to go to a public place with a sweat-soaked white t-shirt. Anyways, there IS an amazing heart here, but, my mind is sick because of the people I can do nothing about. The heart in Buffalo, the thing that makes me love the 716, is non-existent in the cards of life that I have been dealt.

It's like this -- I will be horrible metaphor guy here: There's a bear right? Well, about a year ago he realized what a dumb fuck he was for continually entering a trap...the same trap that had always been there. He started to hate himself for how stupid he was for falling into it time and time again. Still -- he did it. Something broke in the bear though. He decided one day that he was going to try to avoid the area where the trap was at all costs. He did OK. Sometimes he would visit to see the trap was still there, but he didn't step in it...He just tip-toed around it from time to time. He observed its presence, but never let it destroy him. Never, ever, ever, ever will that trap be gone. As long as it's there, his best move is to avoid it at all costs. It may suck to not go near that area because there is a lot to be missed, but, that will all be long in the past sooner than later.

After a while the bear was saddened by his inability to avoid the trap on a daily basis. He thought enough time had passed....the trap can't still be there can it??? He was a bit ashamed that eventually the only answer was to avoid it completely...so he went back to the area for good, again. Nothing changed though. The same trap was there, only, it was larger, and nastier because he was used to life without the threat of the trap.

I looped myself into self-love which I will never be ashamed of. I like myself, and I love myself. I am proud of who and what I am for the first time in my life, but I am at the realization that I won't be able to live a life worth living (in my eyes) if things stay stagnant here.

I harbor a lot of hope in people, and that hope has been shot to shit since the plane landed.

Can I leave it all behind when it is all I know? And how hard is that going to be?

Eek

This gave me chills (and yeah, it made me tear up a little bit):

You will be walking some night...
It will be clear to you suddenly
that you were about to escape,
and that you are guilty; you misread
the complex instructions, you are not
a member, you lost your card
or never had one...

-- Wendell Berry

The Game

"A man can be destroyed, but not defeated." -- Ernest Hemingway

That seems a little convoluted at first read. Destroyed and defeated are similes right? Dig deeper though, and it sums up the last 15 months of my life.

In every way other than physically, I was blown up, I was destroyed. The pieces were all over the place, and at times it didn't look like they'd ever get put back together. My demons destroyed me, the outside world destroyed me on the inside, but at the end, the game was never over -- I was never defeated and I'm far from it now.

You can't go very far without seeing the parallels in everything. Drug addicts who get clean don't allow defeat; alcoholics who stop drinking fend off defeat. All the way down to something as trivial as sports. I think about the Detroit Tigers...just like I do in most life situations -- I draw the parallel with my Tigers.

In 2003 they were God awful. One of the three worst teams in the history of baseball. They were right there, ready for infamy in the final week of the season. With six games left, even if the Tigers went four and two, they would have hit the record books as the worst team in baseball history. Three of those final six games were against the playoff-bound Minnesota Twins...they were screwed. But it didn't happen. A team of nobodies, historically awful, dug in and won five of their final six to stay clear of the ultimate record for futility. They got destroyed all season long, but they weren't defeated.

Hemingway's quote comes from The Old Man and the Sea. If you know much about the book, it's typical Hemingway. Bleak and dark with moments of shining hope. Santiago, a weathered old fisherman who went out to sea for 84 straight days without ever catching a bite, never gave up despite seeing and living through what most of us would consider hell.

Everyone in town thinks Santiago is a hopeless bum...a joke. He survives the driest of dry spells by recalling the plight of others, and drawing inspiration from their battles, their perseverance, and their eventual mini-triumphs. Santiago thinks of the pain of his heroes, specifically Joe Dimaggio (see, Hemingway deferred to sports too!) and the pain he played in late in his career. Still, Dimaggio's mental toughness carried him through the darkest, most painful days. He was destroyed at times -- by the media, by his own body -- but he kept playing, much like Santiago, who kept fishing. They were never defeated.

In the end, the desire and drive to not be defeated cannot come from anywhere else but inside of you. There is nobody else who can fight for you. Hemingway hits the core of something I deal with every day of my life. The days where I cry, still, but don't tell anybody. Days that could easily erode very quickly. Man cannot be defeated, but I think the caveat is -- if he doesn't let it happen. That's life, and I think that's the key to figuring out this whole giant mess. Never being defeated means always finding hope in the rubble. It means healing depite being broken apart.

That's why I need to leave Florida, and never come back unless it's to Tampa, Orlando, the beach, or anywhere but Lakeland. It's a mess down here (and it has nothing to do with Lakeland or it's people...I actually LOVE the people down here). A man who I have always looked up to as my strength and my rock is letting defeat wash over him.

Your brain is a muscle that, like every other muscle, needs to be used every day, and needs exercise. If you turn the power over to someone else to think for you, and allow yourself to be a passenger while someone else makes all of your life decisions for you, down to the simplest things imaginable...then you're planting the seeds of ultimate defeat.

I did what I needed to do for me while I was away from home. My sabbatical of a year has awakened me a lot to things. I feel a hell of a lot more comfortable in my own skin. I respect myself more, I like myself more, and I've gotten in touch with something inside of me -- a soul I never knew existed before my destruction. I can't control how other people choose to live and conduct themselves. It hurts like hell to sit by as a passenger sometimes while loves ones just seemed resigned to defeat, but, to be happy I CANNOT LET IT GET TO ME. The freshest of fresh starts is happening in a little bit less than a month, and that's such a beautiful gift that so many people never, ever receive.

That plane takes off next week, and an icredible weight comes off of my shoulders. A weight that has been off of a lot of other people's shoulders for a while now. I'm the last person hanging onto the ring, but, I'm letting go of it too.

Tao Te Ching - Lao Tzu - Chapter 56

Those who know do not talk.
Those who talk do not know.

Keep your mouth closed.
Guard your senses.
Temper your sharpness.
Simplify your problems.
Mask your brightness.
Be at one with the dust of the earth.
This is primal union.

He who has achieved this state
Is unconcerned with friends and enemies,
With good and harm, with honour and disgrace.
This therefore is the highest state of man.

Every time I write I fear that someone will take the things I write personally. It's not at all. It's me speaking on ways that I don't want to be, yet, it's ways that I totally recognize that I was and how that led me to my depression and self-hatred. When you're having a bad day and want to just take a baseball bat to a tree -- well, that's how writing works to get the shit out of my head.

Anyways, this passage really moved me. The first two lines are really powerful. Those who constantly say their lives are perfect, and proclaim to anybody who will listen that they love their lives are truly very hurt. What is the motivation for people to do this? I have no idea. By doing it, it's boasting and bragging and arrogant, and it makes people feel like you're rubbing something in. It turns people off of you very quickly. Those who are truly happy in their lives, again like before, do by non-doing. Non-doing is also non-saying. True happiness is something that cannot be articulated and bragged about. It's something that sadly few know (I certainly don't), but, those who know it -- true happiness (I am going to take Gahndi and the Dalai Llama's word for it) -- say that it comes from within....I've lived to where I thought opulence was the way to show I liked my life (remember, "supposed to living"), but, that just led me to wanting to acquire more, and fill a void. If there is any kind of void to fill -- you aren't happy.

Nowadays, I feel rich through life experiences, and remembering the amazing things I've been blessed to be able to do and experience. It's no longer what I've amassed, or how I make a nice little living while I feel like I barely do much "work." I don't have the need to tell anybody how amazing things are because it's all in my heart and in my head. Instead, psychotically, I'd rather tell people how shitty my life is, which is sadly also an all too common human affliction. But, when there is someone you come across who is truly down and out (believe me -- I know!), it's so absolutely about having compassion.

Taking the time to show genuine care when a fellow human being is down can mean the world, and have a real ripple affect on the planet. Compassion for others opens the flood gates to personal happiness also. This can only be obtained by gaining a global grasp of the world, and the life that exists outside of your bubble. To know of the suffering going on this world will make you so much more apt to true compassion, and again, it's an unbreakable chain that will make you appreciate what you have and what you are that much more.

The middle stanza can be mis-represented and thought of completely wrong if you're in the wrong mind set. All I take out of it is "Temper your sharpness, simplify your problems, mask your brightness." Pretty simple. If you're bragadocious about your happiness or your wealth, people despise this more than anything on the planet. It's just like when athletes and celebrities pull the "do you know who I am? card. How disgusting is that?

In the end, when we're all alone, we're all the same as each other. Money, job, stature, relationships, whatever...It's great if you're happy, but, to borrow (errr, steal) a line from Wavy Gravy "we're all just bozos on the bus." We're on this ship together, and when you strip it all down, we're all fucked up, we're all capable of greatness, and we're all amazing gifts on the planet.

Non-doing

It's so funny to see people who are always on the go, doing nothing substantial or meaningful, yet, always being busy. They are so obviously out of love with themselves that they have to fill every moment of awake time doing SOMETHING. If, God forbid, they have a moment in their day to themselves, they start to shake like a smoker who needs a cigarette.

That was totally me, without a doubt, and I think that's why it affects me so much when I am around people who are like that now. It's frustrating because it ends in a crash almost a million times out of a million. It happened down here with my Dad getting sick. Between Dad and his wife they both move at a thousand miles an hour, yet neither of them go anywhere, and nothing they do changes anything.

I'm not talking about work, or sports, or anything like that -- anything recreational. I mean those moments when you're home, and the options are to go out and shop, buying things you don't need, or cleaning something that really doesn't need to be cleaned. The other option is to just sit, and breathe, and take everything in. Be mindful of the things around you. Live and love life. Enjoy yourself. That sounds so simple, yet, it seems like it's so rare.

Spiritually, I believe that my Dad getting sick was a sign that things need to slow down, but it is breaking my heart that the lesson has gone right over their heads. Briefly, it all came crashing down, and that could have been permanent. What would have been left? Remembering those amazing moments that you've had together, or obsessing that there are a couple empty fucking glasses in the sink and that the vacuum needs to be run?

There can be so many more of those moments of being...presence...and it really is that easy -- you just have to let them happen. This is doing by non-doing. I will guarantee one thing to anybody -- constantly going, going, going is not the way to live.

I love traveling more than anything on the planet. I traveled like a mother all the way through my early twenties, but, that slowed to a halt. What started to happen was I began working so much that when I wasn't working, I felt a subtle guilt stirring underneath me. When I was involved in something I loved doing, the joy was not what it used to be because of that underlying guilt. "I could be getting this set up right now...I could pick up a shift and have that much more money to put into savings, or to pay off the couch, etc..." It's a vicious cycle of racing thoughts that rob you of your essential self.

I stop myself a lot now when I start doing that stuff and I ask myself the simplest question ever, and answering it is supremely easy. "Would 12-year old me think what I am doing now is awesome?" The answer to that was always a resounding yes in my early 20's, but the answer has been no for a really, really long time. The easiest way to stifle that question is to keep busy -- doing.

You can't change other people, it's not your job, and it's usually not welcomed (even though those same folks have NO FUCKING PROBLEM telling you what you need to change or what you're doing wrong). What you can do is shut them out, and I'm getting good at doing that. Hell, if I'm the only one that pulled something out of the horror that has been the last two months, that's great, but it makes me sad because I'm not the one that the lesson was intended for.

July 15th....that's how it gets fixed permanently. For now, it's work, Amos Lee, reading, writing, the gym and Netflix on Demand for me. Resistance is futile -- to say anything would be to dump gallons of water into the ocean.

The Past

I don't know how to cope with what's been pounding around in my head lately. There is a lot for me to focus on at the present moment -- moving back home, my Dad's health, work, and just riding the waves day-to-day -- yet, I am killing myself over the fact that I flat out can't shake the past year off of me completely.

I read an article about Joey Votto of the Cincinnati Reds yesterday, and it brought back so many nightmares from when the depression was eating my life away last year. And I think I have said it before, but, my darkest days now are when those thoughts flood back into my head. It's a living nightmare....Perfect example is when my Dad was in the hospital. He had apple juice on his breakfast tray, and, the cup looked identical to the apple juices that were at the hospital I was admitted to. It triggered me, and I had to go to the waiting room and cry it out, breathe, and try to clear my head. Just visualizing that now still makes me sick.

Anyways, in the article Votto talks about how he couldn't be alone during his depression, and that he always had the phone ready when he was alone, so he could call the hospital or friends and family. It is an absolute impossibility to describe what that feels like to anyone that has never been there. I am in tears now just thinking about the suffering of Votto, myself, and others who I have been blessed to meet in the past year that have suffered with depression.

You need the phone on your nightstand for a few horrific reasons. 1.) in those depressive episodes, getting out of bed seems like the hardest thing anybody in the world could possibly ask you to do in that moment and 2.) that phone, that damn phone, needs to be there so you can call the hospital, the suicide hotline, and anyone close that could save you when the darkness dominates your thinking and you're just ready to end the game.

It would be amazing to just want the phone close because you're watching a movie and don't want to have to get up and get the phone if it rings in the middle of the movie. Nope, the phone becomes a suicide prevention device in those moments. I tried to call those moments scary moments, but, scary is an absolute injustice to the writhing around in tears, screaming, racing thoughts, zero self-worth and lack of desire to keep living. What boils inside of you can literally not be described in words...I wish I could...

People-wise, I've washed my hands (or have I?) of caring about the people who've not understood me, judged me, and talked shit about me behind my back through all of this. As every day ticks down to me coming home, I worry that those other people have the power to fuck up everything I want to do when I do get back though. It baffles me how anybody who has never taken a minute to get to know what I've been through can tell people I love and care about that I'm not worth it. It happens in every facet of life, on a much more small and insignificant scale (like when I get mad at Brandon Inge striking out yet again, but don't consider that Brandon is a loving, caring husband and father with a lot on his plate off of the field).

But the common thread is there. We only truly know those who we are completely intimate and open with, yet people judge so clearly from the outside when in fact they have no fucking idea what it truly going on. I have a lot of friends, and I love the hell out of all of them, but for me I could count the people who I feel truly know me and understand me on one hand. Still, some folks who I haven't seen or spoken to in months upon months are what I am worried about? Why am I letting this happen?

And that's why I - the apparent "selfish asshole" - have to just make it about me, my ideals, what I want and to go from there....but I worry that I'm flat not wired that way. I still identify that idea as being selfish, but I know it's the only way to be if I want to not relapse, and ultimately lead a good life and achieve personal happiness.

I'd love to come home in July, and just worry about finding consistent work, and starting a life. If those were the only things on my plate I'd be loving life, but I know there are so many mini-battles waiting for me, that I wonder if it's even fucking worth coming back. I'm blindly, and maybe foolishly, optimistic that my inner-strength has solidified enough that fights prompted by the words of ignorant others won't take the toll they've taken in the past. I just don't know if that's true.

Inspired and Untired

As it always does, my writing is prompted by song and verse. A lot of what I read today was just incredibly prescient to the past year of my life...and then I start to think about the light I find in music.

No reset button, where I stand now is where I stand, the past is over. I'm in Florida, a place where I genuinely like the people I've met....I'd put it at 90%. Everyone down here is so sweet, like in the service industry and anyone you interact with daily. I'm not sure if it really is a Florida thing (southern hospitality and all), or if my new perspective has subconsciously set in and I enjoy the moment, the now, more. I've always wanted to, and tried to see people for their good, and I'm so lucky because so many people in my life are amazing human beings.

I feel blessed to have all of you guys around me, just a phone call or text away. I knew you guys were amazing before, but, now it means so much more to me than you'll ever know. I can only hope you guys feel the same way about me, but ya know, the most important thing for me is that I love myself. I'm not there yet, I still defeat myself when I get a compliment, and hurt about things, but, I AM getting there. When I can fully love myself, I can fully love Y'ALL (I can't get y'all out of my system...it's there forever now).

My openness could be startling when I come back though. It probably has cost me down here, but I don't care, because it makes me feel good. At an interview they ask me why I'm in Lakeland, and my cheeky answer is usually (I ask myself that ALLLL the time), but when it gets going I explain, unabashedly raw, what happened that lead me down here. I guarantee that's why I didn't get the job, but, with the way things happened with Dad, it's a blessing.

But when I come back, I want to be more than just how we were. A perfect example of this is Joe Liberta's sister-in-law, Pammy. When I see Pam, I'm happy, but, in her presence I feel happy....don't overlook that word, because believe me, there's plenty of folks in Buffalo who I would never say I am just plain happy when I am around them. There's nowhere I'd rather be in those moments where Pammy is there, Izzy's being Izzy behind the bar, and Joey L is hugging me telling me how much he loves me. It can be a little better though, because I know we all have fears like a mother fucker, and pain beyond "oh, the Mets lost" or "oh, that guy fucked me over." I know firsthand that talking those out with someone you completely vibe with is the greatest feeling in the world, because a lot of our low self-esteem and self-worth comes from our unspoken fears. What I've found is, when you find someone, or a group of someones to talk to about that stuff, an incredibly large boulder comes off of your back...and VOILA, you have new friendships based on some pretty deep connections as a nice parting gift for that rock being lifted off your back.

I wish people could come on out and let it all down and be who they really are, because everyone has their guard up, even if it's just a little bit. My guard is down completely, and I'm an open book when I come home. I am just gonna flat love the hell out of y'all, tell you I think the world of you, and you're just going to have to deal with it....How amazing would it be if people genuinely told you they think you're amazing a couple times a day? There's no need to curse people down, or say something if you don't like them, ignoring, walking away, and subtracting yourself from the environment is so simple, and so necessary.

I'll start -- Gnome, I look up to you as a big brother because you're such an unbelievably caring and sincere guy, who has at times (the Charles Rogers dance) made me laugh hard as I ever have in my life....and Danielle, Little D, could not be more perfect for you because her spirit, her love of living, and sense of humor shines from the minute her head hits my lower rib-cage and she hugs me (had to make a short joke -- my bad). And if Evan's first words are "Michigan", then he'll officially be the greatest baby since baby Jesus.

James Morrison: "Sometimes I feel so full of love it just comes spilling out. It's uncomfortable to see, I give it away so easily!"

With everything that has happened in the past month, I think a step back was probably to be expected, but other than crying a lot when the news "you're Dad may not make it" came out of the doctor's mouth, I haven't stepped back. I'm ready to come home, I miss ALMOST everyone up there, and can't wait to be who I am now around people I love more than anything --- plus IKEA bedroom furniture isn't going to hurt!