MAD man: Just a Middle Aged Dad

Nothing to add so here

2009-09-09T21:03:00.000-07:00

I'll link my sister's blog posting about our Dad. The details vary a bit, but in the end all I can do is echo those sentiments.

Happy birthday, Dad.

http://mkosboth.blogspot.com/

A note of reassurance, really

2009-09-08T10:43:00.000-07:00

So my mom is now on Facebook. Kinda odd but kinda cool too. Today she
mentioned in passing, as moms are want to do with grenades of this type,
that I seem to do lots of "who are you" types of quizzes. Like "what
Looney Tunes character are you" or Princess Bride and so on. Her
brutal (or so it seemed at that moment) insight was "oh he still
doesn't know who he is."

Ooof was my initial thought. Good god it's a silly quiz or dozen.
There's no deeper metaphysical resonance than having a bit of a
lark... Is there? Well there'd have be, wouldn't there? I mean if I
truly hold to the idea that we are speaking loudly as to who and what
we are and think then the quizzes we take (perhaps not the answer
necessarilly but that we take them and which ones) must say something
about us.

So what do these say about me? And is there something to what she said?

The answer to the former is found in the answer to the latter. Which
is yes, only not in the way I first responded. Don't I know who I am
yet at forty two years of age? Short answer: sort of but not quite.
See the most fundamental approach I take to how I engage the Universe
is an Existential bent. Ooo wouldn't Mr. Knapp be happy? That is to
say, how to do I bring purpose to my passing through this life? It
also brings with it the idea that who I am at this moment is built
upon who I have been which in turn influences who I am becoming. Am I
able to adequately express my authentic self in a reasonably socially
acceptable manner to foster inner contentment and stay out of jail?

Yes to the second. Working on the first. Which is why the answer to
conundrum posed by my mom's insight is no, I don't know who I am. I
know who I have been. I know who I want to be. I am trying to be
myself in a world that does it's best to crush that out of each of us
every day. (paraphrased from some one smarter than me but can't recall
who.)

So I take these quizzes. The answers inform me in some ways of who I
am. They also tell me I can figure out how to game the quizzes and get
the response I want. Which also tells me something. Like I watched too
many movies.

I've taken statistically validated personality profiles and loads of
junk like that in grad school. They serve the same purpose: bits of
light in the night sky that help me sort out where I'm headed. One bit
of light isn't too helpful on it's own. But fill a sky with them and
they might help you from getting too lost on the journey to yourself.

So, Mom, it's ok for me not to know who I am. I know where I've been
and have a rough idea where I'm heading. And I've learned to read the
skies.

Only one who has traveled the road knows where the holes are deep. -
Lau Tzu

People who need a whack in the head

2009-08-28T17:54:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I play World of Warcraft. Not as much as I used to, but a couple times a week for a few hours. It's an entertaining diversion. Anyhow, I belong to a guild which is made of a bunch of players I "met" ingame via connections with real life friends. So, I've played with some of them for about 4 years. We actually do know each other in many important ways. Actually got together a couple months ago in Portland for a real world face to face dinner and drinking. Much fun.

So, the guild has a website to talk about game stuff, strategies for big encounters in game and stuff like that. People also talk about real issues some times too. Imagine what's been the topic of late?

Healthcare reform... to sum up 5 pages of wild commentary: Republicans think universal healthcare will outright DOOM us all... DOOOOOOOOM! Democrats seem to think that may not be the case. Libertarians think its just all bad.

So, the rhetoric has been mostly of the "people should just suck it up" and "Capitalism would be the right way to approach this." Even though when I note that capitalism nearly killed Wall Street and the auto industry they quickly blame the government for the bailouts instead of letting Darwinian economics that place... wait. That's not Capitalism. That's Free Market... yeah, we don't do that here in the US. Free markets are scary to them what's got money and power.

One guild member who has made it excruciatingly clear that he is a staunch conservative finally tipped me over the edge. He said "I don't need them [the government] to tell me what oppurtunites [sic] I need to succeed, I can do it myself, and that is what nearly every American has been doing since the formation of this country."

What the fuck is he talking about? What follows is my response. And pretty much what I want to cram down the throat of every fucking "compassionate conservative" dickweed out there:

That's only true if you were white and male until the 1920's. And until the advent of mass communications of the electronic age, very very few people voted. And then voter fraud was particularly rampant in the post Civil War era South and pretty much all of 19th, much of 20th century Northeastern cities as well.

So, a government for and by the people... not so much. By the corporations and their pet politicians maybe. So, the theoretical mess has been foisted upon us not by us, but by backroom shenanigans of power brokers and monied robber barons.

So, please don't tell me that people don't need help. Yeah, actually I see it every day. People need help. So as much as the 'up-by-your-boot-strappers" would like to divest themselves of any notion of a social contract (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Social_Contract,_Or_Principles_of_Political_Right) so they can appease their aching consciences while they do as they please and blame the ills of society on the dregs who weight us down... remember, this country was founded by the dregs of every society in the world (except those sent to Australia) on the premise of "Give me you poor, your tired, your huddled masses, yearning to be free..."

If that's no longer the case... if you can rely on no one but yourself... if you can expect no help to maintain even a modicum of tolerable housing, health, food, education... then shutter the windows and sell it all because the American Dream is dead...

No ONE ever made it in this country on their own. Save for a very few exceptions. And it is those exceptions that people keep touting as the example for the rest of us. What a load of crap. We live in community. We live in constant contact with others. No one makes it alone.

If you do, you're a Family Guy episode, so throw up a fence, secede and name yourself King Peter. See if it goes any better for you.

Semantics are important

2009-08-03T18:54:00.000-07:00

There are a few things I'd be quite happy never ever ever to hear ever again in my life. (Yes, Michele, that song is one of them.) One of them has peaked my pique today. Not sure why, but where there is grist, mill it. (millet?)

Right: If I were you, I'd (fill in the sage words of advice).

The existentialist in me rails against this phrase for the following reason: if you were me, you/me would have my experiences and thought processes all of which would inevitably lead you/me to the same conclusion at which I/me have found myself the result of which would then be me asking you for input. At which point it all becomes a recursive logic loop upon the likes of which seasons of Star Trek (the Various Incarnations) were founded. A worm hole suddenly appears and I find myself face to face with my Van Dyke'd (not goteed as popular nomenclature would have you believe... Google it, g'wan, I'll wait) evil twin who is crazy good with a rapier.

So, don't say dumb things like "if I were you". Words are important. How we say what we say carries far more weight than the stunningly wrong children's rhyme would have us believe. "Sticks and stones" and all that... yeah, well, chuck a rock at me and I at least know how to respond. As a kid, if you hear things from your parents that aren't so helpful, how do you respond? I have a case load of kids who would vehemently disagree that "names will never hurt me." Not that the parents in question came right out and said dummy, idiot, or whatever.

Oh no no no. That'd be far too easy to address. This is the best type of insidious parenting, "Yes (insert example of child's exemplary behavior, praise, what-have-you), BUT (insert qualifier that completely emasculates the self esteem of said child)." Loads of fun to correct in parents who are NEVER the cause of their child's "problems"...

Really? All this just spontaneously occurred? You, model parent, modeled parenting immaculately? You are the exemplar of humanity you expect your child to become? Huzzah! Huzzah! Huh-freakin-ZAH! And yet, this child with some genetic predispositions toward behavioral patterns and some penchant for environmental imprinting has managed to avoid all of those powerful influences, the nearly nigh omnipresent presence that is you in all your glory to become this wretch of a human? A mockery of all that you bring to their world? This child who deigns to shun that which you would bestow upon them...

Say it ain't so.

The toughest day of my life was when I realized two things: A) I needed to be the person I wanted my kids to become and B) I was going to fail at that horrifically. I am far from perfect. As my kids remind me. But they appreciate the effort and the honesty.

Semantics are important. Sticks and stones may break your bones, but words can scar so deeply.

Chemicals askew...

2009-07-30T21:01:00.000-07:00

One expects certain behaviors from professional peers. Mistakenly apparently, but I thought I had reasonable expectations. I don't know what I was thinking. I make no secret of having ADD. It's a fact. It is part and parcel of who I am. It goes a long way to informing others as to why I think in the slightly askew manner I do. Which often times catches me off guard that other do not indeed think the way I do. Mostly I notice this when some one else and I say the same thing the same way at the same time followed immediately by a look of stunned horror slamming across their countenance only to be peeled away as they attempt to find humor in this.

Or so it seems to me. I may be interpreting the event a bit askew.

In regard to my ADD and a less than ideally structured work environment and how I struggle to manage all the paperwork details, minutia about which what goes where when and for whom... none of which was ever adequately explained (anyone ever heard of an Employee Handbook? I hear they're all the rage ever since these guys came up with the concept of desktop publishing)So, me and ADD, anyhow, I had a coworker say to me "I know just how you feel."

Uh huh... reeeeaally?

Those words are forbidden in my profession. See, I do NOT emphatically DO not KNOW how you, or anyone else for that matter, feel about anything... eh-nee-thing. Anyone who says otherwise is lying.

I know how I might feel in similar circumstances, but it is all conjecture and supposition. It is the difference between sympathy and empathy. A person may be going through a difficult time. A difficulty of their own design and thus are merely getting their come-uppance. Do I sympathize? Nope. However, they are having a difficulty. I have had difficulties. I can empathize with how that sucks, is demoralizing... etc etc etc [insert counselor blather here].

My coworker does not have ADD. She does not know what it is like for me in my head when the day's demands have dragged the last vestiges of a coherent train of thought out into the parking lot and kicked the living daylights out of it and handed me back as spinning, foggy, dazed pre-frontal cortex that wants nothing more than to become blissfully unconscious for 15 to 20 minutes. My brain just wants to reboot.

It would be like me saying I know just what my mother, sister, wife and daughter went/go through with their period merely because I've been around them my entire life. Not friggin likely. All I know is I want some of them to take The Pill so they are not homicidal and I want another to stay away from it for the exact same reason.

Point... I know I had one. If this daffy bint is going to say to another professional something patently wrong wrong wrongitty WRONG... what is she saying to her clients? I shudder to think.

Language... it's all about language. I listen to the words people utter about their loved ones... about themselves... about hateful things done to or by them... about humanity in its chaotic manifestations... I listen to words said by a mother to a daughter that cuts deeper than anything she has done to herself... memories of fathers years missing... of wondering why what was done was done... words uttered in attempts to make sense of acts insensible.

I do not know what it is to feel these things they feel. But I know what it is to hurt. I can listen and witness. I have seen it make enough of a difference to know it is not wasted.

Does it play a role in my own struggle against depression? I'm sure to some degree. At times, it also helps. It provides perspective. Helps me remember it is just chemicals in my head... chemicals that are slightly askew. Only in this case, not in a good way. And there's the difficulty; finding the edge where one bleeds into the other and stepping back... I find I have wandered far beyond the edge and into a landscape I had left behind years ago. Familiar and desolate... comfortable and discomfiting...

Chemicals askew... "Oh bother," said Pooh as he worked to hide Piglet's mangled corpse.

Inquisitive do-gooders

2009-07-29T20:02:00.000-07:00

I am not as mysterious and opaque as I imagine I am. Well, maybe mysterious. But my coworkers quizzed me today about my mood. They'd noted a distinct lack of "me" lately. Which I take to mean my sardonic, cogent and insightful banter has been less couched in witticisms and bon mots of late.

Yeah, well there's nothing like a good case of anhedonia to bring a mood down.

It's hard enough to feign caring with clients who need some clinical help (versus those who are merely using up oxygen and hastening the Universe's headlong dash into it's ultimate entropic state... which since nothing changes at that point, can it truly be called an end?) let alone muster my dwindling resources to get all rallied up for the manufactured crisis looming just across the horizon; moving offices and divvying resources.

Ye gods... we are professionals. Let's not cry over which figurines get put in which play therapy room. Really. I kid you not. I couldn't give a shit and if your clients can't cope with that sort of change, there's some serious shit that needs to be addressed. And I for one do not have the energy to friggin help you manage your fragile, sad, nervous, whiny pathology.

So when they ask me what's up? I shrug, roll my eyes and try to decide how real to be with these people.

I have little reason to be depressed. I have a job... it's an ok-ish job. It has the plus of being a job anyhow. Bills are being met, more or less on time. Some money is being saved to replace the rapidly disintegrating couches. I can put fuel in my bike... yeah, and yet, there it is; depression.

And not the fun kind of melancholia either. Navel gazing and sophomoric philosophizing Byronic moodiness this is not. This be full on righteous despairing of purpose against the corrosive weight of time... mmmm, tasty.

I wonder at times which came first; my existentialist angst or depression. Is the ADD genius confined by the realities of the interstitial existence and the inherent limitations of biology (hence the ADD) and that feeds the depression? Or does depression arise from some ineffable quality that is itself then expressed ADD-ishly thus creating a wicked feedback loop of frustrations vs accomplishments?

I see my daughter struggle with school. Not with learning, with the crap of school, of conforming to that regimen and how she does not fit. Lord knows they will not do shit to help it fit her... Sorry, teachers, public schools are not the place for the odd kids. Not your fault. You've got to help the middle of the bell curve. Get a standard deviation away and there's gunna be trouble. On the low side, there's tons of help. On the 'gifted' side there's... more stuff to do, but only if you can organize yourself and haven't already been crushed into ennui by the inevitable "Teacher Who Just Doesn't Get It"... we've all run into them.

Mr. Assenheimer... Mr. Maybower... Yeah, I'm talking to you. Failed me in freshman English and totally messed up my chances at having Algebra make sense...

Eat it! I've got 2 Master's degrees... assholes.

I see these things and I despair.

I try not to.

But I do.

I think I hide it well.

But I don't.

And inquisitive do-gooders notice and ask how I'm doing. And I have to decide how real to be with them.

Some days I'm more real.

Some days I shrug and hope my ride home sweeps some of the weight away. For at least a little while.

Oh, lookit! A thought!

2009-07-15T17:34:00.000-07:00

So, a friend pointed me to this article http://www.marketingvox.com/kids-online-time-jumps-63-in-5-years-044616/

To which I said so? Big whoop. If I read it correctly they are talking about a jump from 7 hours to 11 hours PER MONTH. I shall wait for the oxygen to refill the room after the collective gasps hoovered it up... Right. And the stat 65%... ok. Um, for a headline it's sensational, but what is it really? Is that a number to really be alarmed about? Or should we be concerned that the average kid spends 1600 minutes a week watching TV vs 3.5 minutes of meaningful interaction with their parents? (I'll cite that as soon as I find the article, it's at work) 3.8 hours a day of TV vs .5 minutes of substantive interaction with parents...

Not Five minutes... POINT 5 minutes otherwise known as 30 seconds. Holy CRAP! I feel like I ought to apologize to my kids for bothering them so freakin much. Ya know, actually asking them how their day went and l i s t e n i n g. Sure, maybe it's because I'm a counselor... or maybe I'm a counselor because of it.

See that's where the whole "Internet use up 65%" alarmism is so damned misleading. It's meaningless! Is it because schools are encouraging kids to do research online? Isn't that a valid and good reason to do something? Maybe it's because they are chatting with their friends and don't have cell phones to txt their little minds into oblivion? Oh, heavens! Not internet chat! Worry worry worry! Good god, maybe the parents ought to be more involved and thereby lessen their childrens' exposure to unknown elements beyond their control. But if the kids aren't chatting/playing games online/being social at a distance, parents better not groan when the kids say A) "I'm bored", B) "There's nothing to do, or C) "Would you drive me to (where ever) or "Can (whoever) come over?"

And besides 7 hours to 11 hours a month. Who's kids are these? Mine must be screwing up the curve something FIERCE. 30 days in a month = 720 hours. So previously kids were on line about 1% of the time. Now... 1.5% of the time. Hmmm, THAT's a statistic that seems meaningful. Why? Not just because I came up with it, but because it has context. There's more than just numbers. There's a sense of how much of a month that ends up being. It's like... 15 minutes a day up to 25 minutes? Or so. My math is sketchy.

Bah. I've spend more time being bemused by this that your average kid ages 2 to 11 spends on the net.

After 4 years and 64k in the hole...

2009-02-26T20:50:00.000-08:00

and after the monthly payment on that student loan debt I am making... fucking minimum wage.

Things I Learned from My Dad, Part 2

2009-02-05T16:36:00.000-08:00

Ok, because the Big Sis got me thinking and cuz I think he’s due some credit…
Things I Learned from My Dad part 2.
Ok, don’t remember being taught how to shake a hand, but that is what I recall being taught. Moving on and to why this is relevant at all. As if relevance ever played a part in my skull. My bike, my toy of toys, my nemesis, my selfish indulgence, my Honda CBR 1000rr go fast, take your breath away with acceleration even exotic supercars (Lambos, Porsches, Ferraris, Astons et al) except the Ariel Atom (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaWoo82zNUA) cannot hope to match. Naught to “Um, Gee, no, officer, I didn’t realize I was going THAT fast. Yes, I’ll surrender the key” in 3.5 seconds.
Back to Dad. Well, until yesterday (2/4/09) the bike had been mostly disassembled in my garage since… oh September. Why? Because I believe I can do what the grease munkies down at the local shop can do even if I can’t do it quite as efficiently. I believe I can pull nuts and bolts off something that is frankly a brilliantly high end piece of modern engineering, fiddle about with the innards and put it back together in such a way as to A) not have pieces left over, B) have the object de not-working work and C) not only work but have actually FIXED whatever was wrong with it in the process.
I have a habit of leaping before I look. The converse is also true; looking and never leaping. Knowing that bit of the equation, I have a tendency to heave myself from the precipice, notice there’s scant water in the pool and wonder how to change adjust my drag coefficient enough to slow myself down so the mere puddle of liquid will be sufficient to keep me from splatting on the tiling. (“Arch! Arch!... Angels!”)http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089126/
This fearlessness, nay recklessness I owe to my Dad. I recall being given carte off-white at an early age to use his tools as long as I didn’t hurt them and they were put back where they came from. Much to the distress of a few mechanical clocks, and other assorted items that were deemed ‘take-apartable’. But the watershed came when I needed to work on the bicycles in high school. My friend, Mark Podojil, was coming from Ohio to Connecticut to join me on a ride out on Cape Cod with my church youth group. In order to make sure the bikes were up to it, the pastor advised doing maintenance on them. With Dad’s ok I tore the bikes apart. Given this was junior year in high school and things were… uh, tense between us often this strikes me as remarkable. I got the bikes put back together and they worked fine.
Next was the Lawnboy. A simple 2-stroke engine, but not to someone who knew nada about internal combustion engines. I mowed the lawn and got tired of the thing dying on me, a lot. I was given the go ahead to pull it apart, clean it and reassemble it. As I recall, it worked better afterwards. Might have simply been the new spark plug, but I still did it.
Since then, I’ve yanked parts out of a Chevy Cavalier (minor cross threading of transmission lines in the process, but still no more expensive than having someone else change the radiator), the Izusu Rodeo, Ford Probe, and Honda Accord. I’ve torn apart and rebuilt a number of bicycles over the years. I’ve pulled windows from one house and successfully replaced them, replaced siding on both houses I’ve lived in as an adult, and lots of little projects along the way. OK, Mom inspired some of the interior fearlessness, but Dad gave me the willingness to use tools much to my left thumb’s detriment.
You gave me the confidence to try things, that I can do things that seem daunting. I repainted the house this summer and had to redo the siding around the chimney (metal insert fireplace/chimney) which led to having to redo some of the internal framing due to dry-rot. While I was teetering a story and a half in the air nailing T1-11 in place (I loathe that junk), the neighbor happened to ask how I knew how to do this stuff. I glibly answered, “Never assume my willingness to do something has anything to do with my knowing how to do that thing.”
That is what my Dad taught me.

First day!

2009-02-02T17:34:00.000-08:00

And I am beat! Some one else make dinner.

Good things: the new work place feels like a good environment. People LIKE working there, but still have their personal caveats.

Bad things: um, I'm ADD, can some one impose some structure? No? Oooo, buddy, this is gonna be fun.

So, the last 25 years in just over 2 single spaced pages.

2009-01-26T19:39:00.000-08:00

Right, how to begin? This little stroll down memory lane is brought to you by what is in all probability a doomed experiment in “social networking”. More a comment about me than society at large. SO before I get off on some tangent, let's wander back to when all of the Clash, and the Cars were still alive, Styx wasn't a county fair band, and you still carried 25 cents to make a phone call in case something happened. That wonderful world of 1985...

Graduated Bay Village High School, dead center of my class.

Went to Geneva College, failed my first semester classes (except English and Bible... oh whatever). Did take an aptitude test that showed parallels to Advertising Exec, or Psychologist... had I ONLY paid closer attention. Architectural engineer is not on that list. See note about first semester classes.

Off to Ohio University, studied, occasionally. Got a BGS (Bachelor of General Studies or “I didn't have to take a language to get this degree” degree) and then right into the OU Telecommunications School for an MA in Communications, Screen-writing. I dust it regularly and still have not paid it off. I offered to return it but they were not amused.

Oh! Shit, right between those two degrees went and got married (08/25/90) to Cathy Hight. Still married much to both of our occasional bemusement and more frequent relief.

She got a degree in Physical Therapy and a job in Salem Oregon (where she has worked since). We packed the van and headed west the day she graduated in '91. 90 F and 90% humidity, I have NOT looked back.

I wrote some, tried to sell some, wrote more than I sold which isn't a big feat. See note about student loans. Short stint at Sears Automotive as the “Sorry, your car's not ready yet” guy just when they got creamed by the scandal of pressuring people to buy questionably necessary repairs. Then moved to a local coffee house/cafe. Worked the morning shift with a guy named Dale. We had fun. I don't drink coffee.

May 20th 1993 Erin Terese Kosboth born! May 22nd 1993 I change my first diaper, ever... I start drinking coffee and in August 1993 'retire' to become a Stay-at-Home Dad. (Just noticed that SaH D is phonetically “sad”... ooo, had I ONLY paid attention.)

June 8th 1995 Nathaniel Levant Kosboth born. I have that diaper thing down PAT... for girl babies anyhow.

July 4th weekend 1996 we move into a real house! Tiny tiny tiny, but bigger than the apartment. And I get a golden retriever, named Blossom. She was one year old and really, the name fit.

Loads of fun. Start working at the local psychiatric crisis center in April 1999. Diagnosed with Severe Clinical Depression August 1999, later ADD tagged on. Actually, it was a HUGE relief. “Wow, it's not just me being a complete jerk” or something close enough to that. Bounced around in PCC for a few years until in 2004 I got accepted to George Fox University's MA of Counseling program. I had found I kinda liked helping people and to have people reveal their stories to me was often very humbling. And I'd been told I'm good at it.

Moved to our current house that same summer on July 4th. Will never use Uhaul ever again. Rented us a truck they KNEW had bad glow plugs that killed to engine... grrrr.

April 2008 I finally graduate and begin the arduous task of getting paid to do something.

Refer back to the line way earlier about Ad Exec and Psychologist... I now have 2 MA's, one in an advertising related field (really trust me on that, lots of research on audience demographics n'crap) and the other in a psychology related field... I have GOT to learn to pay more attention.

Oh, September 7th 2001, bought my first motorcycle. Have broken a collar bone and ridden thousands of trouble free miles since. I try not to focus on the 30 feet I got wrong, but still carry the surgical plate and screws used to brace my collar bone (then removed later, obviously) around in the tail of my bike as a totem (a 'walk-away').

My daughter is about to get her driving permit and my son is nearly in high school, which in a scarily symmetric way is about where this tale began.

The rest is detail. Questions? Yes, in the back there...

Grinding sound v.2

2009-01-21T13:17:00.000-08:00

Quick note, the Honda Accord was built in Ohio where we happened to live at the time. So, it's not as if US workers can't build well. I suspect people would rather build an amazingly well crafted piece of machinery than a ho hum piece of poo if given the chance.

I mean, I'd rather work on a Ferrari than an Opal any day. I'd rather OWN a Ferrari and pay some one to do the work right but that'd take winning more than $7.oo in the PowerBall now won't it?

What's that Grinding Sound?

2009-01-19T15:56:00.000-08:00

OK, my mom sent me this old Calvin and Hobbes cartoon

as a corollary to the auto industry internal think… kinda funny and kinda right.

Odd thing is I was JUST not ten minutes before driving my car pondering some related stuff. I drive a 1988 Honda Accord, that’s not a typo for the year. It has 10k shy of 200k on the odo. We also have a 1999 Ford Windstar with about 90k on it. Full disclosure: I got the Accord from my parents who bought it new so I have done much of the damage done to it myself (aside from lodging birds in the grill while in Florida and having it sit in a P&W parking lot for a day… not sure I’ve done much other than abude the tranny and engine), the Ford we bought used in… uh, 2003?-ish, and I have a 2004 Honda CBR1000rr motorcycle which might explain the lowish mileage but I don’t rise the bike THAT much.

THE POINT!!... what was it? Right, I drive a 20 year old car. I, by which I mean my wife, Cathy and I, have never bought a new car. New bikes yes, motorized and human powered, but no new cars. I’m 41. How un-American can you get? I have had the Honda’s head gasket replaced, the front right half shaft and the clutch replaced, and there is a leak in some window seal somewhere that has let water inside causing condensation to accumulate on the interior and then transmogrifying into a unique stink. It’s 20 years old… stuff wears out. But I love the car.

The Windstar… yeah, thus begins the litany: power steering pump failed sending ribbons of steel into the rest of the steering, Anti-lock brake sensor lights up randomly (no apparent fault in the actual braking), engine light ditto, automatic locks don’t quite work as advertised, cup holders in the front dash retracted never to be extracted, cup holders mounted to middle row of seats dismounted themselves (although given the gargantuan amount in a fast food cup they may have just killed themselves for fear of another litre of sugar water being crammed into them), an oddly loud front right axel (I’m betting a wheel bearing has gone) and finally… the paint. Paint is not covered by warranties. Did you know that? At least not Ford warranties anyhow. Wonder why?

Is it cuz their paint DOESN’T STICK??? I’ve seen loads of Windstars circa 1998-2002 with the peeling paint syndrome. To which Ford says, “Weather and other circumstances may lead to results which we cannot account for…” or… Bite me, sucka!

Fords I do not love.

Perhaps the make more/sell more cars paradigm is the problem with the industry. The yard stick is all wrong. Currently the value of the company is based on revenue from selling more cars. To sell more cars there needs to be a demand for more cars. Ok, I build an excellent car and that customer won’t be back for a decade since the car is fine. I build a shit car and… Yugo anyone? So… I’ll build a mediocre car, pass it off as “Quality is Job 1” and Joe Consumer will be back to buy himself a spiffy F150 with side step rails, the jacked up suspension and off-road options (though he lives in suburbia) in just a few years because we told him we’ve improved the cars we make…

Unhunh.

The Ford Model T got 33 miles to the gallon in later versions and until Prohibition could run on ethanol… hunh. 100 years ago…

What’s my point? Ms. Daimler-Benz didn’t have gas station on every corner whilst she tooled around Bavaria. There were more unpaved roads than paved in the US until the mid-60’s. The economy of building shareholder value instead of building a good business has apparently tanked, hard.

My point? Listen closely enough and you can hear the paradigm shifting without a clutch.

Meloncholy music and Me

2009-01-14T14:37:00.000-08:00

Allotta alliteration...

Right, music. Seems to be a (wait for it) theme (HA!) of late. Point? Point is none of my music is comfy. (None might be stretching it but tough.) It all evokes some... flavor is the best I can describe it. I've read and studied about synesthesia and this ain't it. Maybe. What it is for me is the whole friggin emotional package the tones, words, and memories plus my current state of mind (which lemme tell ya is dicey) all adds up to.

Case in point: James Taylor's Greatest Hits. I cannot listen to that album. I can listen to the songs, but not the album. WAY too loaded with associations to a uh, rough time in my life. The Cars Heartbeat City... given to me for my 17th birthday by a semi-girlfriend. My best friend's sister whom I was encouraged by their family to take to a couple dances... "But, Eric, your parents know me..." He shrugged. We went. That album evokes my basement bedroom, the smells, the emotions, the images of moving from CT back to Ohio in between my junior and senior years in painfully vivid detail. Lunacy. That was 24 years ago... twenty four. Almost 25. The only thing in my world aside from family that's been around nearly that long is the '88 Honda Accord I managed to wrangle from my parents.

Yet it can crush me.

ELO, Kuiama...
Elvis Costello, Almost Blue and loads of others
Billy Joel... Glass Houses, The Stranger... big mojo
Madness
Dire Straits
David Bowie... holy cow, hugely powerful

Anyhow, I could just list my iTunes library, but that's 8874 songs, 543 artists (I think that's off, maybe that counts albums).

I hate being so easily affected by external influences. Some days it's much touchier than others. Today being an extremely sketchy. Probably a result of stress from a couple of job interviews, neither of which I've heard back from. One I WANT (working in the ER), the other not so much (working with troubled kids and their families. Loads of paperwork and crap). Actually not at all, but I will take it if offered and since I don't want it odds are it'll be offered.

Gah... lost my train of thought. I'll be back.

Journals... blogs for the pen and paper set

2009-01-05T14:15:00.000-08:00

Yeah, I was never very good at keeping a journal, even for classes where they were required. Some of my very best creative writing occurred on the pages of a daily journals for college credit.

Ok, new rules; I will insert random comments as I see fit, but italicized. Liiiiike... currently playing: Delta Spirit, cool folk/rock/alt rock band. The daughter and I have that connection, music. We are avid consumers of music, explorers of aural and tonal landscapes. (Ooo, THAT sounded pretencious.) The point being I love that she will share her discoveries with me and also plows through my collection of CDs. She has Billy Joel on her Myspace page... what 15yr old has Bill on their Myspace? I catch her listening to him from time to time. And she'll pop past songs like they were Sham-wow commercials ("cuz we can't do this all day"... really? It's your job so I think you CAN do it all day) on the DVR, so I assume if a song is playing it is actually being listened to.

Writing... I have a degree in that arcane and time honored/worn (can't decide which) art, but it languishes in the dust accumulated over 17 years... Good god, crashing wave of existential angst there... (Surf! Muther F#%@er! SURF!)

My kids are old enough to not need my attention as much as they used to (previous excuse for not writing, see JK Rowling for how valid it might not be) so while the job search continues, perhaps I oughta really try to exer/orcise that craft a bit.

Oh... and we have a new cat, Oslo.
He's a slinky cat, quite a goofy guy who seems innocent compared to the pumpkin shaped and colored grand ol'dame of the house (our other cat, Kiki) who makes something of a rukus when he ventures too near. Too near being a vague and changable distance. Laying in front of my monitor is one of his favorite things. Next to sitting infront of it. (Yes, not a pic of him sitting in front of the screen... I know.)

Cute little guy.

My Shrink Laughs at Me

2008-10-08T22:54:00.001-07:00

I'm too smart for my own good I've heard it said often and from varied sources. It occurred to me today though I'm not sure what that means. Under it lays an assumption of fundamental dumbness if while one has intelligence one is unable to adequately wield (I before E... can't remember THAT) it without causing grievous harm to one's self. Kinda dumb.

Oh, and to contradict my sister (MidLifeMama - A Change of Life) I AM a therapist. I'm just not getting paid to do it. An important distinction cuz otherwise I just wasted the last 4 years in grad school if I didn't get a piece of paper with snazzy printing on it. My second snazzy piece of paper with Master of Arts in (fill in the blank). Might actually use this one. This one is a Master of Arts in Counseling. Oooh aaah... "Yes, it is your parents fault, but it's time to get over it and grow up. That'll be $70.oo." Yeah that about sums up what I learned. Except I learned how to drag it out and say it in nicer ways.

Non-sequiter: Headphones, Bose TriportIE are ok, but disappointing for a C note. While Platronics makes a geeked out over ear (around ear and comfy to boot) antennae looking set with a boom mic for $70 that have astonishing clarity for the price. When pundits speak of instrument definition and seperation, I thought my hearing had taken a few too many hits. Then I stuck these on my noggin and wow... very nice. Lindsey Buckinham is a crazy talented guitarist. Too bad he was stuck in Fleetwood Mac.

Where was I? Smartness... yeah.

In high school my best friend, Jim, and I were not the class clowns. We wrote for them. We were to one's who got other people in trouble while looking decidedly innocent in our front row seats with popcorn and libretto handy. ("I think Act 1 went rather well...") I hated school. High school anyhow. What a deplorable waste of time. (Big words are used to show my brain is brainy thus lending creedence to my opinion.) It probably didn't help to have undiagnosed ADD. That's a safe bet. Got diagnosed at 35 after scraping the thick accretion of depression and self loathing aside to find the root cause.

Root causes. I like those. The behind the scenes stuff that really drives us, motivates us, often without our conscious awareness. My shrink laughs at me. He shakes his head and waits for me to do his work for him. It's only fair since I don't let him sink back into the "therapy platititudes". I know them. Use them even. So he's got to stay on his toes. I have to say, the guy is really smart too. Probably the only reason I bother talking to him rather than just getting my monthly dosing of better living through chemistry.

Maybe Oregon isn't the best climate for a sufferer of depression. Summer (July - Sept) fantastic. though there are always 2 or 3 weeks of ludicrously hot. 105+ isw not unusual. But at the same time, effectively 0 humidity. Nyah, East Coast. Oct, and May/June are messy as the seasons fight it out to see who's gonna get to inflict themselves upon the hapless populace. Nov - Apr are dreary. Bleak like the moors of Western England are bleak. Bleak like how the rest of the world sees our current Town Idjit in Chief. Bleak.

Too smart for my own good... what does that mean? Too introspective for my own good? Yeah, I'll cop to that. Too cynical for my own good? On occassion, but I can usually explain (A before I... too many weird rules, oh E before I there) why it makes sense to have my outlook. My sister noted she's a Myers/Briggs INFJ. I'm an ENTP... well, the I/E in that is pretty neutral since I score slightly one side or the other based on the day. Anyhow, according to www.knowyourtype.com ENTPs are spontaneous and adaptable. They find schedules and standard operating procedures confining and work around them whenever possible. They are remarkably insightful about the attitudes of others, and their enthusiasm and energy can mobilize people to support their vision. Yep... if we can figure out how to play nice with others on any given day. And in my own defense I am WAAAY better than I used to be at it. Mmmmm, Ritilan my favorite flavor. "This rational response to stressful situations brought to you by Monsterous Pharmacutical Conglomerate, Inc."

Enough.

Music suggestion: A Little Less Conversation [JXL Radio Edit Remix]. Go find it. If you like the feel, the groove of the Ocean's 11-13 movies... this is the aural equivalent of the best scenes.

Good grief this was random. Which is why my shrink laughs at me. I'm ok with it.

Hmmm, a blog... now I need to think of something to say...

2008-10-02T16:15:00.001-07:00

Right, where to start? Kidney stones? Might be a bit early in the process for that. Overwhelming sense of doom as I note my life rushing past in a haze of pointless jobs and idiotic bosses? Maybe. Reflections on the political landscape and a sense of doom that has pervaded my life for about 8 years? Nah, a bit inflammatory for the first go.

Kidney stones it is! Yeah, they suck. Weird thing is last night one just shot out. Had some odd discomfort the past few days, but nothing like I've had before. The cool thing about kidney stones is you get morphine. The bad thing about kidney stones is you need morphine. This one was startlingly large considering the ones that have landed me in the local ER vomiting from the pain.

And yet, there is was. Time to wax philosophic. Please hold on whilst I shift gears while doing horrid things to the clutch.

Not sure how the connection was made in my brain. Odd things happen there. I found myself thinking about A) how different I felt and hadn't realized how crummy I had felt, and B) stepping back to wonder what else could be dislodged from my life that would result in a similar catharsis. In what ways do I feel crummy and not even realize it? More importantly, how to I resolve those things?

No clue. Really. Well, maybe some.

My kids are 15 and 13, girl, E, and boy, N. I find myself seeing them very differently than I suppose my father ever saw me. It would require more introspection than I believe he is capable of carrying out. Mostly because of fear. To wander out into your own internal landscape means being willing to See Things as They Are (as much as is possible at that moment in time given the mental state, one's understanding to start with and all that wonderfully Freudian/Jungian, Socratic/Platonic crap we carry around). Yeah, that ain't my father. He'll glance at the Pool of Self-discovery only to decide it's too cool out, he didn't bring trunks and ate too recently for a swim, turn his back and saunter back under the sheltering branches of His Perceptions.

What the hell am I talking about? This all worked so much better while I was in the shower this morning. I think so much more clearly there.

I find myself seeing my kids as My Legacy. Kind of an odd third person feel to that sentence, but it fits. I find part of myself looking around, observing and gnawing on motivations, possible futures, what does it all Mean and generally being far too Existential for my own good. It's also kind of a "duh, genius" thought.

Oh there it is!

What won't I see in their lives? One set of my grandparents have seen me get married and have kids. I'll probably see my own get married and see my grandkids, but will I see great-grandkids? Much less see them get to high school. (Not sure how much my grandparents are retaining at this point, but that's a different matter.)

I've been missing my little kids. I was a Stay-at-Home dad. I've been privileged to experience my children in a way few fathers do, sadly for them. The fathers not my kids. My son's voice is cracking. My daughter ought to be getting a bunch of looks from the boys. And I'm pissing kidney stones, seeing some gut where I've never ever had gut and wondering how to still be romantic in a marriage that's old enough to vote? (Do not deluge me with obvious responses, please. It takes 2 to make it really work. But that's another post.)

Mid-life crisis? Not really. More of the same, really. Just the stakes are bigger than at 20 years old. The navel gazing carries more weight now and more lint.

I guess I'm going to use this as a place to ruminate and chew on my thoughts. Maybe find an answer for myself. Maybe find out where the 20 year old has hidden himself.