my careless contagion

Disconnected, from Face to Face's 1992 album Don't Turn Away (which is, in my opinion, a perfect punk rock album) is a simply-worded song. The lyrics aren't complicated. The singing is straightforward and predictably angsty and overwrought in typical punk-rock fashion. I saw Face to Face perform a few times. Keep in mind this is a three-piece band. These sounds are coming from three people each playing an instrument. The bass alone is perfect. As a whole, it's profound and simple at the same time and paints a perfect picture of what many people feel at some point in their lives, which is a disconnect from those around them (and maybe even themselves).  Before I go off on a tangent, here are the lyrics.  You don't know a thing about me Is there something that you should know? I can tell you what you want to hear Let your inhibitions just go No you don't know what you will give up You don't know what you want It may take you years to find out You don't kno...

The above verse is from Psalms. I have said this verse literally thousands of times. It is very important to me, as it got me through some very hard years. I recall waking up some mornings, my body full of pain, not much to look forward to, and grabbing onto this verse with all my might. Let's face it, I don't have a whole lot going for me even now. I squandered most of my gifts. I wasted time, money, talent, chances, and garnered a whole lot of trouble. I believe we should take responsibility for our actions, and I have done that. However, I was also programmed through an abusive childhood to choose the life I did. But that's not my point. My point is, every day is a gift from God. Every moment — even the unbearable — is an opportunity. Many times I have prayed relentlessly for something to change. Long after the point of despair that nothing would ever change, God changed everything so quickly it made my head spin. When God moves, sometimes it happens all at once. ...

This article. I read this at work and wanted to bawl. Go ahead and read it. It's about an old, married couple who died 33 hours apart. When you've been married 68 years and grew up together, being without that person feels like dying anyway. So when they leave for good, you follow them too. This story really touched me, so I'm sharing it. They were one person. I think that's rare in this world, at least it is now. Everyone has their own agenda now. Theirs is the kind of relationship I wanted, and now I'm staring at a future that is very lonely. Staying with one person — that one person who makes you feel alive and complete and happy your whole life — that's what I wanted. Yes, I know there are hard times, you don't have to tell me that, but how you feel about that person doesn't change. That's special. I feel my life has been incredibly unfair and unkind. I try not to complain, but, still, it's there in front of me. And, on top of that, I...

Alex Honnold after his death-defying, 3,000 ft. free solo climb of El Capitan in 2017. Death is terrifying. It's like walking through a door you can't ever reopen. It is the most final thing we can do. It's not that our lives are so short, though some of them are. It's that we're dead for so long.  So many millions and billions have died before me. I should be assured it is nothing but common to die. Yet, I have not died, therefore, it is an uncommon experience for me.  I'm not concerned about myself, as I trust my eternity to God. I did nothing to be brought into this world, He has gotten me through my life thus far, and my eternity is entirely up to Him, as well. However, what about those left behind?  I've contemplated suicide many times, for years, really. Most of my life. I remember being in the back of the family car (station wagon, Suburban, I don't remember which) and wishing with all of my might to die. I was banished yet again to the...

Last post! That wasn't so bad, was it? I'm now officially sick of myself. I bet y'all are too. 31) I like messing with people. Not all the time, of course, because that's obnoxious. At my old job, one of my favorite things to do was to tell a string of jokes about something until someone joined in. At that point, I would turn on them and act horrified, like they had gone too far. That still cracks me up. I'm pretty sure 99.9% of my humor is for my own amusement. 32) I don't remember my first time having sex at all. I just wanted to get it over with. I waited 20 years for it, but I have no recollection. Ain't that how it goes? You wait so long for something and then it's over and you don't even remember it, like cotton candy in your mouth. Furthermore, I don't know if this is a function of my bad memory or what, but I don't even remember what sex was like, period. 33) My favorite book is the Bible. After that, let's see, t...

Alright! You're halfway to the end! I'm starting to wish I was a lot younger because I don't think I can come up with 41 random facts about myself.  Also because it sucks getting old. And sometimes I forget where my keys are. 21) I love BBQ potato chips. I used to be obsessed with Jolt Cola. I have a Surge CD. Surge is a beverage that was created in the 90s. They tried to market their beverage with alternative music. I don't know how I got it, but the Surge CD was actually two CDs, the other you were supposed to give to a friend. I didn't hate anyone that much to give them the CD, though I don't know where the other CD went. These days I use a lot of stevia. Once upon a time, I actually grew stevia. It's a fascinating plant. I used to have an organic garden, so I grew a lot of cool stuff. I've always been pretty open about the food I eat. For instance, I hate kale (and a lot of other brassicas), which is strange for someone who supposedly tries t...

This is only part two of four! Hang in there! More random things about me. 11) Continuing where I left off in the last post, here's a funny thing about Mr. Hookie. His family moved from the same town my family moved from to the same town we moved to (in a different state)! He had a son in my grade. There was also a girl in our class who moved from that town to the same town we moved to! The three of us graduated together. There's a picture of us in graduation gowns. I'll respect their privacy and not post it here, though. I'm still friends with the girl, but I have lost track of the boy. Or he lost track of me. We were friends for a while, but I was a dick to him so I guess it's fair he doesn't want anything to do with me anymore. 12) The town where I went to college had a telemarketing company. A lot of students worked there, as I recall. I remember receiving a call from that company, trying to sell me magazines. I was so lonely, I stayed on the line lon...

Forty-one random things about me. Because this blog isn't self-indulgent enough! Hopefully I can scrounge up 41 somewhat interesting or strange things about me — one for each year I've been alive. Considering how boring my life is, this may be a challenge!  1) The first crush I had on a girl was Kristin Braley (above). She was my babysitter's daughter, a year older than me, and a lot of fun. She taught me to eat my boogers. We played with sandstone in her backyard, grinding it to dust. I said I would marry her. She was also a tomboy and had freckles, which is probably why I still like girls with freckles to this day. The last photo I have of her she was about 15 years old, but I have no idea what became of her.  2) When I was very young, my imaginary friend was Mickey Mouse. After school, I went down to the office where my parents worked. In the basement behind a partition, they had set up a cot for me. It was the darkest, scariest place conceivable for a ch...

I've walked through 600 miles of pain so much was said and done I don't even remember my name I retraced my steps down to the river  where I watched her lifeless body float away, forever away and by the railroad tracks where I drank in my car and broke my empties on the hollow moon, his eyes sadder than mine I fled from everywhere just so I could breathe but the places I found strangled me just the same It seems the blows keep coming like a metronome keeping time The stars shine down on my madness tonight what I've done I cannot undo my apologies flow like a river and it will never be enough to save them from what I've done or save me from this bitter, seeping wound Precious things and precious people I'm not allowed to have they slip like sand through these slick hands What makes you roar, son is what keeps you alive then, sir, it's pain and hate and rejection and trauma and suffering flowing in my veins no wonder m...

This is going to come off as a dumbass post, I'm sure of it. I'll give it a shot, though. My idea, though it may sound antithetic, is that saying no to something is actually saying yes to a whole lot of other things. One of those books that affected me as a young man was Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls. It's a book primarily for boys, I think, but it has some universal lessons. One of those lessons is letting go.  The young boy in the story wanted to teach his hounds how to hunt raccoons. But he needed a coon pelt to do that. How do you get a coon pelt if your dogs don't know how to hunt coons? A raccoon trap was the answer — a hole bored into wood with a shiny trinket in the bottom. The hole had to be large enough to admit the raccoon's little hand yet small enough to hold it once it grasped the trinket and made a fist. I experience the same thing when I make a fist in a Mason jar. It's not fair, of course, for the raccoon, as they love shiny t...

Humble pie. I don't think I would have ever called myself humble in my previous life. This new life, however, has shown me my true value.  My ex-wife once said when we first met I was "so cocky," and you know what? She's right. I was a cocky son of a bitch. I had faced so many ridiculous challenges in my life and overcame them, beat them small; what on earth could get in my way? I had to be cocky. I grew up in a household where I didn't get any respect for any of my God-given talents or any of my hard work. I spit in the face of adversity, rampaged over obstacles, laughed at the devil, and rode hard into the night. I was unstoppable. There is pride in being young and capable and full of energy. Because of my inscrutable misadventures, I've had to jettison many things of little or no worth just to survive. My pride was one of those things. With 41 years under my belt, I've seen many changes. I've seen the world change, and I've seen myself ...

It's a peculiar death, the death of a romantic. It may look like any other emotional disturbance to the average onlooker, but those who have been there know it's not your average broken heart.  There are tomes full of advice for those who dare fall in love. Throw those away, for you are a rare soul. You are a romantic. You believe against all odds. You hope against hope. You sometimes despair of life because your heart hurts so much, because it just can't reach who it wants to reach, because it lost the one person who was worth more than the world to them. The death of a romantic is heartbreaking to watch. It's like watching the first broken heart the world has ever seen. It's spectacular. And brutal. And it makes you want to scream at them to just buck up, let go, face the facts, walk away, get mad, break something, do anything but endure what they're enduring.  But they just break. They melt. Their life oozes out of them. It's like watching a pri...