Light and Dark Life

It is hard to write.

It’s hard to do anything, really.  But it’s especially hard to write.  I wonder why that is?  Fatigue?  Apathy?  Time?

I have this great software – Adobe Contribute CS4 – that is an absolute joy to use… and fantastic for blogging.  And I have things to say – things that seem very important to me at the time, and things that need to be said.

And yet, somehow, I cannot find the time to click on the little "Ct" icon, and type what I think into the computer.

I think right now that the problem is twofold.  Fatigue – I am always tired.  I have a job I really can’t stand, but which pays so well that I can’t leave. I have a 4-year-old daughter, who can be a huge joy but is always a huge drain.  She needs attention – from me specifically – and I have made it my goal to make sure she GETS all the attention she needs so that she grows up strong and healthy and independent – unlike her father (me), of course!

And time – I have no time.  Because in addition to the main job and the daughter, I have two side jobs, which always hint at the promise of paying really REALLY well, but, so far, haven’t quite started to do so, but which I also cannot give up because of my responsibilities to my family.

Certainly not apathy.  I do care.  I care about what I say here; or, put another way, I write about the things I care about.  And I care about my family, and my child, and making a record that she can explore when she’s older.  (Which reminds me that I might try video podcasting later on – wouldn’t THAT be fun!)  It’s just that at the end of the day, I’m too tired to do anything but crash.  So my writing here thus far has been sparse.

Things will doubtless get better in the future, but then only at their own costs: I will have more time to do the things I need to do (like read, and write, and eat more healthily, and exercise, and work to make more money), but at the expense of having less time with my daughter, who will be in school full-time in 16 months (time flies, primarily to bring us pain.)

Meanwhile each day is like the day before, and I am still alone, and worn out, with no time or strength. Just a lot of things and people I care about, and yet am unable to do or be with, respectively.   Lots of memories, and little hope.

This morning I had a rare opportunity to watch TV for a few moments. I have satellite television, with the full package of pretty much every channel, so the odds are that I can find something to watch. Today, I spent a few minutes with CNN.

The story of the hour was about an 11-year-old boy in Atlanta who had committed suicide – that’s right, an 11-year-old took his own life – apparently because of repeated bullying by peers at school. I did the math – that works out to 5th grade. I can barely remember anything about 5th grade, and while I was certainly one of the most nerdy, geeky kids in the school, I was only bullied once, by another student who had problems at home, and I recovered pretty quickly.

Apparently, the world has changed, and in multiple ways. Schools are apparently much worse places now than they were when I went to school 30 years ago.  In my day, the worst thing you ever saw brought to school was a frog. Knives and mild drugs were just making their entry, as far as I knew, when I was leaving high school – and even then only as distant rumors at other schools.  Now, knives are obsolete, and heavy weapons and heavy drugs are the norm.

And let’s not forget the other side of the coin.  30 years ago, teachers and educational staff were much less educated about safety and student health and well-being than they are now, and yet today – even with increased training, established procedures, and regular school-wide lectures – the situation is still much worse.

How is it that the victim’s complaints, and the victim’s parents’ documented complaints, could go unheard? How is it that the school district’s response to this tragedy is a canned "We are reviewing our policies" statement?  I’m guessing that the bullies in question – those students who did the bullying – are mentally distancing themselves right now, convincing themselves that it wasn’t their fault, that they had nothing to do with it – and their parents are lock-step behind them.

The District Attorney is on the case, personally investigating what laws can be brought to bear against the offenders. Sadly, it seems that the staff cannot be held legally responsible.  Even more sad, the parents of the kids appear to not be liable.  I find that to be repugnant. They are the adults. They are in the position of strength. They should be held accountable for what happened there. But, as with so many things that are wrong with our country, they won’t. At least the bullies themselves will: the District Attorney is planning to charge the kids with assault, battery and related misdemeanors… and is planning to classify the charges at hate crimes… making those 11-year-old "children" some of the county’s youngest felons.

But, really, can 11-year-olds be held accountable? Should they? I was an intelligent kid, but in 5th grade, I had no sense of empathy or compassion – I didn’t know such things existed. It was a time of rapid growth, but certainly not a time of much wisdom or experience. And like my peers, I was shaped, sadly, by my relationships with my family and extended family.  Popular wisdom these days seems to favor age 8 as the beginning of accountability. Could these 11-year-olds conceive of the possible results of their actions? Can they even now that the worst has happened?  I don’t know, but I’m quite certain that they cannot understand it as adults would. Their understanding is limited at best, if it exists at all.

But their parents should know better. Those children are shaped by their relationships at home, first and foremost. I don’t even know who they are, or what their situations are like, but if statistics are my guide, the odds are that they are playing out behaviors learned from their parents.  It is likely that these children have been bullied themselves – either directly by parents or by older siblings with the parents’ tacit consent, and those parents should be held accountable for such abusive evil.

And yet, most of those parents probably believe that they’ve done nothing wrong.  And why is that? It is because hostility is becoming the norm in our society.  We have changed, and are changing, from a cooperative, welcoming society, to an untrusting, controlling, rude and hostile society. This must not be permitted to happen, but it cannot be stopped. We have brought it on ourselves as a country, based on choices we’ve made as a collective group over several hundred years, and we’re bringing it on ourselves as a world. We are learning to love to hate.

In his book "Friday", Robert Heinlein asserts that one of the key indicators of a dying society is "immense personal rudeness."  Certainly we are seeing rudeness and hostility everywhere. What does this mean for us as a country, a people, and a world?

It occurs to me today that, just as life is transient, so are our thoughts and memories.  There are many who believe that we should keep a journal for our posterity, and those others who come after us, and I do not disagree.  But I also take comfort in recording my own thoughts for myself – my future self – to read and recall. There is so much that I know I have experienced and forgotten – so many empty holes where memories once were – that I feel the ever-increasing importance of recording these things – if not for others, at least for myself.

But as I have said before, time is fleeting. With so many pressures facing us, how am I to ever find the time to write?  It is a difficult challenge at best. But no matter what the obstacles, I believe that taking the time to make a record of yourself, your thoughts, your experiences, and your life, is a worthwhile endeavor, and that such time is time well-spent.

Some of my close friends have often thought about recording our memories and our collective experiences. I hope we get a chance to do that soon. Technology makes it so easy – we should not pass this opportunity up.

Shortly after waking up this morning, I was interrupted by the sound of a loud bang, followed by the sound of a man groaning in pain just outside my house.  Grabbing my phone and running outside, I was shocked at the site that lay before me:  A bicyclist had been struck by a vehicle, leaving the bicyclist immobile on the pavement. 

I found that my left hand had already dialed 911, and I immediately got help started towards the scene.  The dispatchers kept talking to me until the police arrived.  Their questions were at once important, and horrific.  “Is the man conscious?” “Is he breathing?”  “Is he bleeding?”  “Is anyone else hurt?”  “Did anyone get ejected from the car?”  Questions that I answered quickly and mechanically, and did not stop to think about until after paramedics had arrived, carefully loaded the man into the ambulance, and departed.  Only then did I have time to recover myself, and begin to contemplate the larger questions.

In a way I envied the public safety professionals who were involved.  To them, this was something they were sadly familiar with.  They had jobs to do, procedures to follow, work to do and people to talk to afterwards.  For me, sitting at home on an early morning, there was nothing to do but contemplate, and ponder.

And yet, as my own day got started, the stark realities and sharp memories I had faced earlier in the day were driven from my mind, and I sunk into my own comfortable world of forgetfulness.

How tragic… and how normal. 

We are surrounded by transience.  It seems that almost everything is impermanent.  And, interestingly, I’m not quite sure what to do with that.

Today I celebrate the completion of 42 years of life: I turn 42 today, and begin, interestingly, my 43rd year of life. It strikes me as funny that we reckon the years of life in that way – it would seem to me that it would be just as logical to say that I’m now 43, since I’m passing through my 43rd year of life – but I will pass through year 43 at age 42, and such is our strange global tradition and custom.

42 is a number of good fortune, and is considered highly auspicious. For example, 42 is the number with which God creates the Universe in Kabalistic tradition. It is the angle in degrees for which a rainbow appears. Interestingly, 42 is an episode of Doctor Who, set in real time, lasting approximately 42 minutes. And, of course, if you’ve ready Douglas Adams, you know that 42 is the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything. Since my 42nd year of life (during which I was 41), rather sucked, I’m hopeful that AGE 42 brings with it better days. I hope the same for you all this year as well.

Those who know me well know that Tolkien has been my FAVORITE author since I was, literally, old enough to read, and so I will mention a quote from him. In his book, The Fellowship of the Ring, he writes, “I don’t know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve.”

Indeed he speaks for me as well. Time has passed, carried us away, along our own life paths, into our own worlds. My own life is quite busy and overwhelming. As a result, many of you I never got know as well as I wanted to. I never had the time to spend with each of you that I had hoped to have. And I don’t communicate with many of you very often at all anymore. To my GREAT sadness. Know, however, that I am grateful for the friendship and kindness you’ve shown me, and that you are not forgotten, nor will you be. My absence is not due to indifference, rather only to, well, the insanity of life.

In Tolkien’s world, the tradition is for people to give presents to other people on their own birthdays. Not very expensive ones, as a rule, and not so lavishly as one might think; but it was not a bad system. Actually in most circles every day in the year it is somebody’s birthday, so that everyone in that world had a fair chance of at least one present at least once a week. And they never got tired of them.

This is a system I quite approve of, in fact. So although I have no way to give you all gifts, I will at least give you my wishes that this year, and every year, will be filled with goodness and all the things your hearts each desire… and my thanks for your friendship, past and present. Happy my birthday, to YOU!

It is often said that "Knowledge is Power."  But I believe that a universal, if previously unknown, truth is that "Knowledge is Pain."  I believe that knowledge of any form brings with it a certain amount of pain, and that the more profound the knowledge is, the more pain it can cause.

Although I hope someday to be more free, I currently work in the corporate world.  In my position, I see a great deal of information, both personal and professional, which passes through my computer and before my eyes all the time.  Much of this information is automatically compromised for my viewing by the computers I take care of, and it is information which the human originators think is private, even though I have repeatedly told everyone in the company I work for that nothing is private on their computers.

Sadly, they ignore my warnings, and engage in repeated streams of personal diatribes against bosses, subordinates, and coworkers that would stagger the imagination. Even more sadly, for me, is that sometimes these conversations are about me.

In C.S Lewis’ well-known book, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which is itself a part of the epic and powerful Chronicles of Narnia, lead character Lucy Pevensie finds herself, at one point, in a wizard’s office, looking for a particular spell in a spell book.  She was supposed to search for a specific item, for the purpose of helping her companions, but is intrigued by the other spells she sees in the book.  Indeed, during her search, she finds and skips other spells, but then decides to try a little spell on the side for herself.

The spell she casts is entitled, "A spell to let you know what others are thinking." She quickly casts the spell, and is rewarded with a vision of a girl she knows from school – a girl she thought was her friend – badmouthing her to other girls at school.  Devastated, she is unable to withdraw from the vision before she hears the entire conversation.  Later, discussing the incident with trusted lord and leader Aslan (who is in fact a Lion in the story), Lucy recounts the pain and disillusionment she experienced when viewing the vision.  Aslan tells Lucy that the girl she saw really did care for and like Lucy, but was afraid of the other girls and spoke only out of the weakness of her heart. Taking in this knowledge, Lucy realized that she would never be able to forget the comments that were made, and that her relationship with the girl would be forever damaged because of it… a fact which Aslan Himself confirmed to her.

This, then, is an aspect, at least, of knowledge, that must not be forgotten.  Is ignorance bliss?  Is it better to not know?  Perhaps, perhaps not.  But I myself can testify that it is constantly painful to have to work with and smile in the face of people whom I know are spending their time badmouthing me to each other, behind, as it were, my back. 

The fact that I am not the only target, but am rather just a "target of opportunity" among many, is not relevant.  The fact that they might actually like me, in some cases, and are acting out of weakness, doesn’t matter a bit.  My perceptions of these people are forever changed, my relationships with them forever altered, simply because I know what they are thinking, and saying.

Knowledge is indeed pain.  Let the world beware.

 

For many, indeed I think for most, the world is a somewhat unsafe place.  As the years pass, it’s easy to become withdrawn, protective, distant, from those we do not know or trust.  We deal with enough rudeness, anger, and hate that we just assume the worst in people and decide to stay away whenever possible.

This is something which is at once understandable, and tragic.

I myself experience this irony frequently.  I am daily let down by people that I think I should be able to trust, and it gets to the point that it becomes very hard to deal.  One of my hobbies, inherited from a mentor who is no longer with us, is Amateur Radio, (also known as "ham radio"), a hobby which involves making contact with and communicating with other Amateur Radio operators across town, or around the world.  I love the hobby, I love the equipment, I love the memories of the adopted father who introduced me to it… but it has been a very long time since i have picked up the microphone and spoken.  After all I’ve been through, I really just don’t feel like talking anymore.

And yet earlier today, on a day I had just run up the street for a quick sandwich, I was asked by a man behind me in line "what all those antennas on [my] truck are for", and before I could even answer, he went on to introduce himself and proudly tell me that he recognized my "ham radio antennas" and that "[he's] a ham, too!".  A very pleasant, if brief, conversation ensued, as this person showed me the simple kindness of a brief, friendly conversation about a common hobby.

We forget, I think, how important life is.  I know for myself, as do my closest friends, how quickly life can end, and how precariously it can begin.  No matter our circumstances, I believe that we all have within us a need for simple kindness.  And I believe life would be much better for us all if we were able to grow beyond ourselves and live up to our responsibility to show kindness from time to time.

It is a need I certainly have… and a challenge I still struggle to meet. 

The pain can be overwhelming.

We are all, I think, influenced by music to one extent or another.  Music brings meaning to our lives, in a way that very little else can.  And while I, like my contemporaries, have been influenced by the music of my decade, there is one artist who stands out above all the others in terms of bringing meaning to life, the universe, and everything, and that artist is: Chris DeBurgh .

Chris released a flurry of music in the 80s and 90s, but we in the United States didn’t see as much from him after that.  Like so many of us, I think he retreated to his home country (or at least home area – Europe) and focused more on the local market.  Travelling to America has, after all, rather fallen out of fashion this millennium.

But Chris is still alive and well and doing his thing, and has several recent albums worth mentioning.  The Road to Freedom, released in 2006, has a number of fantastic new songs, all with the signature CDEB touch.  More recently, Now and Then, Chris’ latest compilation album, was released just last year – with a surprise – a new track called “Live for the Day”, which is totally a Chris-style message.

Best of all, he’s got a new album coming out this year (2009) called Footsteps, in which Chris has recorded 13 songs which are his personal favorites – songs which inspired him during his own life… including “Turn, turn, turn”, “We can work it out,” and, amazingly, “American Pie!”

It was so uplifting to me to discover that Chris is still going strong – good news that I had to share here!

There are so many things out there that I have given up… so many things lost. Or, perhaps "things" isn’t the right word. How about "so many opportunities lost". Hmm… maybe "lost" isn’t the right word either, since it implies finality. Yet what I describe is an ongoing process. Let’s try this:

There are so many things out there that I am giving up, every day… so many opportunities being lost with every passing moment… the prospect of what I could have done… should have done… could BE doing and SHOULD be doing… is so huge as to be overwhelming.

Each day we all do what we can. For most of us, that means "just dong what’s in front of us." Life presents us – seemingly without our involvement – lists of things we need to accomplish each day. And, somehow, we accomplish those things, just in time to drag ourselves, beaten, back to bed, to do it all over tomorrow. And tomorrow. And tomorrow after that.

I could tell you of the lists my own life forces on me. But doubtless you know your own lists. I can quote Steven Covey and Tony Robbins until I’m blue in the face, but I’m not here with the answers. I don’t know the answers.

I don’t even know the questions.

Around me, near and far, people congregate and pursue their interests, hobbies, and lives. I belong to a website dedicated to the production and sharing of new music… but I’ve never had the time to upload much less even produce my own stuff. I belong to a group interested in amateur radio, and own several radios myself… but I never pick up the microphone these days, or even turn the radio on. I don’t even know if the batteries are charged.

My memory stretches back and encompasses other such things… times that seemed happy doing things that brought happiness: producing plays and other productions in high school. Social groups full of friends. Skiing. My God, how I miss skiing! Not just the skis on the snow, but the bus ride up with friends, the hanging out in the lodge over pizza and hot chocolate, the midnight stop on the bus ride back at Wendys, followed by the most beautiful girl I knew at the time falling asleep on my shoulder as we were driven back home.

As Dolly Levi would say… not just acquaintences… friends.

Blink. I went from 18 to 41 in no time at all. Now, decades later but just moments later, it seems, I can count my friends on one hand, but the miles between us are innumerable. I went through the socially-expected steps of spouse and children… and came up relatively empty, and alone. I did all the things I was supposed to do, but ended up with nothing that I wanted, and a life I really don’t.

Quantum theory implies that there are other mes out there, who made other decisions and are living other lives. I perceive things not so much as quantum threads as timeline alternatives. What if X instead of Y. What did I need to do differently to be happy? Why did I not do those things? Why am I where I am now. What did I do wrong?

And it’s ironic… at 41, my life is arguably less than half-over. And yet I barely have the strength left to look forward, since there seems nothing to look forward to. I am unwilling to pay the necessary costs to break myself away from where I am, and feel that the opportunities I had in the past would never re-present themselves even if I were in a position to choose them. And as for new opportunities… I see nothing but darkness there.

Indeed, while I can see alternative timelines branching out from my past, I see none whatsoever branching out from the future. Like Dune’s Paul Atredies, I am trapped in the vision of prescience, unable to move or deviate from the path because the cost would be too horrific. But unlike Paul, I have no attendant vision to give me hope. Only a vision that is empty, and feet that are stuck to this never-ending yet dead-end path.

Somewhere the snow is falling, and the fire burns warm on the hearth. But my skies are dark, and my house is definitely empty.

In the night I had a dream.

But explaining the dream will require some background.

When I was a child, my parents were somewhat absentee, especially emotionally. As their only child, I existed to them somewhere along the spectrum bounded by annoyance and aberration, usually residing in the vicinity of "burden to be avoided." As a result, by my teenage years, I had found role models in other adults outside of my biological so-called family, and the chief of these, the one who stands apart from and at the head of any others, is a man I’ll call "Den."

My father introduced me to Den when I was 12 or 13, as Den was a coworker of his. Den had an interest in computers – back then, the Radio Shack TRS-80 was the latest thing – and I had knowledge of them. So, when Den wanted to set up a "Bulletin Board System" (the ancient precursor to today’s forum), my father felt that a good way to get me out of his view and house for a while would be to foist me off onto Den.

His plan worked all too well. Den had a son my age, who I’ll call "Denny", and his relationship with Denny was tenuous at best. The victim of several parental divorces, Denny was the typical rebellious child, coupled with just the right amount of apathy as to tear apart the heart of his father daily. Denny and I became uneasy friends, but, needless to say, Den and I had common ground, if from opposing directions, and bonded instantly.

There is no way to convey the meaning and light and healing and absolute sense of love this person brought into my life. He became the father I never had, in literally every healthy sense of the word. For the first time, I began to understand why my life had always been empty, and all that I had never gotten from my biological so-called parents. I could write for the rest of my life, and never tell you all. But I will try, as time passes.

But for now… Den had a farm in the rural lands about 30 minutes north of where we lived, and he was working on building a house there, and converting the farm to a combination airport and, later, wild geese preserve. Going "up the road" every weekend to "work on the farm" became one of the best times of my young life – the only light in a life of darkness.

I grew up, grew older, time passed, and I eventually got married. But throughout my life my love for this "adopted father" grew, along with the sense that I needed to "return home" soon, to be with him and spend time with him again. One week after the day of my wedding, I received word from my bitterly jealous and thus gloatingly triumphant biological parents that Den had died in a plane crash four weeks previously. They waited long enough to ensure that I missed everything, including funeral, memorial, and follow-up services, of which there were many. It turns out that Den was loved by many more than just me, which came as no surprise to me.

This was one man who was taken in his prime, who had potential to do so much more good, and whose loss lessens everyone who knew him, and, indeed, I believe, the world.

In my dream I was walking on the farm again, and Den was alive again; although I never saw his face in the dream, yet I felt his presence in the dream and knew he was there. His son, who, after Den’s death, took over the farm and converted it to a vehicle repair shop and moved in to the house on the far side of the airstrip, was living in that house in my dream, too, even though Den was still alive. I didn’t see his face either.

But a new house had been built on the near side of the airstrip, away from the old house, and many people were there whose faces I did not know, and yet I understood, in the way of dreams, that these people were friends of Den’s, or, perhaps "represented" friends for the sake of the dream. They were all there, enjoying time together, and I was there, and a room had been built in the house that was mine, and I was to move in immediately and live there, home at last, at peace at last.

The dream morphed and cross-dissolved in the way of dreams: the house and "Den’s part" of the farm detached, leaving Denny and the airstrip behind. The farm was no longer a farm, but a smaller yard located in a town where I lived once, halfway "up the road." Day turned to night, summer to winter, and the farm house turned into a more elegant multi-story house, in which the friends were down on the first floor, and "my room" was on the second floor, with more floors above. A woman was there who was my mate? wife? although she bore no direct representational resemblance to anyone currently known to me. I looked out the plate glass window, and saw streetlights, and snow falling softly. A large Christmas tree was being put up, in what turned out to be a parking lot. Snow continued to fall, and the lights on the tree sprang to life, and I was able to see that the house was now right next to a small, quaintly-styled outdoor shopping mall.

The first floor of the house, where people were gathered, now turned into more of a bar/lounge/restaurant scenario… quiet, dimly lit, full of people there to spend time together. My "home" was built above it, with a stairway leading down to the lounge, and, upstairs, somewhere, it was all still Den’s house. His son was left behind, not part of this place at all.

In the final scene of this dream, I was standing outside looking at the shops, and the house-turned-restaurant-with-a-house-over-it building, feeling the snow on my face, and was, for a brief moment, reminded of Guinan’s description of the Nexus from Star Trek: Generations. She said, "It was like being inside joy, as if joy was something tangible, and you could wrap yourself up in it like a blanket."

For the briefest moment, I felt wrapped and protected, and whole. But alas, it was only in my dream. All too quickly, the dream vanished, to be replaced by the voice of my three-year-old, insisting that she needed me to "help her go potty."

A brief but nevertheless bright patch of light in an otherwise dark life.