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.