Month the Twentieth

10.28.24 A beautiful day, and I off to the salt mines

It is glorious weather considering the date, and I have to go to work. Not that I so much mind the fact of going to work so much as the work that I will be doing. It is mindless, drudgery, tedium. A job that does nothing to fulfill me on any level, not even with money these days now that it has slowed down to its offseason business levels. Food and beverage, while pretty much all I know, is not much of a career, not for one who wants to use his brain. For I don’t have to think too much, which is sad, because I love thinking, love problem solving. And it is so far from home, a twenty-five minute commute each way. I think I am going to seek something closer to home, where there is at least a chance to make better money, and at least then I won’t be spending so much on gas and putting so many miles on my little Buick.

While I would like to make my living with this, with the words, it seems something of a distant dream, though I am committing myself to seeking it a little more diligently. In the last week I have queried two different projects, and will be querying them more in the coming weeks. Who knows, maybe I will get a bite, and then possibly even a book deal?! And then maybe I can retire to a life of writing, of stringing together words for more than the joy of doing so. A girl can dream.

For now it is the struggle with the cigarettes, with the pack of rollies that I bought today. For now it is the call from my manager to go in early to try to take advantage of this nice weather, which of course, I want to take advantage of in any way but trying to squeeze a few extra bucks out of a workday that I wish didn’t exist. It is telling when you dread every time you must pile in the car with your sandwich and drive to the next town over in order to make a few bucks. It is telling that every moment you are there you wish you were not, that you could instead be with your love or golfing or just sitting on the back porch, as I am now, typing out some sort of blissful rhapsody that will someday be remembered as immortal prose…

What a laugh, that, that I could be remembered as immortal. Or that anything I created could be. Still, the sun is shining and the windchimes intone their blissful not-quite melody, there are pumpkins on the porch for the coming holiday and the leaves scatter around as they fall from the maples that are almost bare. It is a glorious day in northern Michigan and I will not waste it going into work early. No, instead I will ply the ordinary waters of the mind, the static indifference to all things that would take away from my happiness. For happiness is our most precious commodity, inspired by simple things or elegant things, or even perverse things at times, it can grow into a tree of the proportions of the giants that tower over me now if we allow ourselves to nurture it. It can be something that makes all the silly little inconveniences of modern life seem to be the silly little things they are. It can be something that allows you to forget for a moment the things like the election that is counting down its days, or the possible consequences of either candidate winning. It can make the fact that you can’t seem to quit cigarettes at most a trifle, though it might cut short that same happiness in the long run.

I think though, that the most important consequence of happiness is that it makes you more of a joy to be around. Makes you a better person, makes your company better, makes your workdays easier, your jokes easier to laugh at. And I don’t even very often tell jokes, don’t often play to humor except as a natural consequence of my smile. And smile often and eagerly, I shall try to, for that is my greatest gift that I have gathered from these thirty three years. And from Tara’s smile, my favorite thing to see, I know that that alone can spread joy and goodwill. It is all I want to do to keep making her happy for as many years as we get together. Here’s hoping it’s upward of fifty, that we get to see each other into old age and walk each other to the threshold of death with smiles on our faces, for we know that we couldn’t have spent our lives in a way better than making those smiles permanent fixtures. 

Even now, just thinking of her smile, one blooms on my face. I wish she were here to see it, that I could greet her as soon as her workday is done, but mine will be in full swing by then, and I will have to wait until I am done to go to her and read Parable of the Believers to her, my novel that we are approaching the closing sections of. It has been a good ride so far, a most always pleasant communion that for its few hiccups has grown stronger and stronger. Oh what a joy it will be to call her my wife, what a joy it will be to raise children with her, if circumstance sees it fit. I hope so, as fatherhood would be a great joy, and having her as the mother of my children would be an even greater one. Perhaps I am beating a dead rabbit with those words, and rehashing my hopes and dreams in a way that is uninteresting to you, the reader. Perhaps you would rather I comment on world affairs, on the Iran and Israel drama that is unfolding and may continue to for years to come. Perhaps you would rather I keep my personal life out of this, as if you were the soon-to-be-ex-husband with all the feelings he must have about his wife dating what must seem like a child for the difference in our ages.

I do not know, do not think too hard about such things. Surely they matter, surely they have bearing, surely they are not wholly irrelevant. I think I will let them go now, per my proclamation that I will eschew anything that does not serve my happiness. I think I will let this end, let the thousand words or so be enough, and the rest of the free day go to feeding myself before I have to go in and endure for a few hours of uselessness. I think that I am approaching the end of my tenure there, a job I have been writing about hating since July. I think that enough is enough, and that though I am tired of bartending certainly there are places I can do so that will take less of my joy, will feel less like wasted time. Only a few times has this job felt like anything more than a job. Only a few times have I encountered anything like personal satisfaction or growth on the job. That is not good, in six months or so. I think that is my sign, and I think that as good a place to end this as any, as good a place as any to draw the proverbial line in the sand. I think, I think, I think, and then comes time for action.

TTFN,

Dick

10.30.24 You and I

I think I don’t deserve you, and that is why I am so afraid of losing you. To any number of maladies, to sickness, to another, to anything that is a threat to what you mean to me. I am bruised by the way I made you sick. I am sad that I don’t get to meet your son tonight. I wish that everything was simple and easy but alas, the family. I am sad, I am sad. I think that is because you are not near me. I know happiness in your smile, I know joy when you laugh. I can’t wait to see you in a few hours, but this is enough of this for now. Time for a pause and a reset.

TTFN.

11.1.24 Fight night, fright night

I hope that our little tiff last night, about the same old issue from a couple weeks ago, can be forgotten as we move forward. I am tired of saying I’m sorry, for I was in the wrong, but there is no healing except for time and demonstrated changed behavior. That’s all I can do, I suppose, though I wish I could wave a magic wand and go back and do better. But alas, we must live with the consequences of our actions, and bad behavior, no matter how innocent and truly just carelessness, ultimately, can still cause pain, something I never wish to cause another, let alone someone I hold so dear.

But enough about that, fences seem to have been mended this morning. But I can’t shake the feeling that this is going to nag for a while at least. I hope not, but I fear so. I think that I am going to be a better person going forward, make fewer mistakes if I can help it. Of course one often does not realize that they are making a mistake until it has been made. And I made a rather large one. Isn’t it always the case that we get in our own way, isn’t it always the case that all our problems are our own making? I think I’m going to move on, to the night coming up, our Danny Zuko and Sandra Olson costumes, coupley as if there was never a conflict. I hope that we do not retread the same ground again, any time soon.

It seems that I have slipped back into the old pattern of self-pity at times, crying yesterday over the memory of being in the hospital last halloween. It was such a terrifying night, a phantasmagoria of my own imagination that had me playing boarding school games though there was no one with whom I was even interacting. Thinking that my birthday was different, that the timelines had been altered. That pasts that didn’t exist were bleeding into the life I was living, and that all sorts of mad fancies were reality. I wish I could have forgone that entire trip, for it really was a trip though I had taken no drugs. I think if I had one thing to do over it would be that trip to leg’s inn. But wishes and buts, as they say.

There is a party tonight, and we are going, together, though the bad taste in my mouth from last night’s hard feelings sits heavy on my tongue, despite the assurances that me running around and putting together costumes is appreciated and that I am loved. I guess there was no stopping of the loving, and that all makes it a little bit worse. It makes me feel bad, badly, terrible. Sick to my stomach and achy in my head. It doesn’t feel good to cause the one you love distress, it doesn’t feel good to have made her feel small and unimportant. I want to make it up to her every day of every year, hopefully many of them to come. The goal is close to fifty years, and I hope only a few of them are spent in conflict, if any. I know it can’t be kittens and rainbows all the time, but I hope to make it that way as much as I can. 

That is enough, I need to get ready for work. I wish I didn’t, and I almost forgot that I had to leave soon. I thought we were past the turmoil, but I have a hunch now that it will rear up every once in a while for quite a while yet. And that makes me sad. It makes me hurt too. I think that is a good thing, that I deserve to hurt. You hate yourself for what you did, more than a little. Even if it was small, or at least seemed small. Things have a way of festering, and all because of an unrelated weird comment. Sad night, sad night. Hopefully tonight will be happier. Because I need it to be.

11.3.24 Sunday morning, coming down

Here I sit watching bagels being made, awaiting anxiously the doughy goodness, looking at the smiling beauty whose fingers are coated in flour, fake nails and all. St. Stephen with a rose, and I clearly in the garden of earthly delights, the beautiful, paradisiacal realm where the coffee steams and I can just rest and see where the morning takes me. Of course our clocks are all screwed up with the resumption of standard time, and so we slept longer than we were accustomed to though we had no time we had to get up…

Enough, enough! Basta! This is a space for ranting about ideas, about thinking big thoughts! Enough of these inanities! I think, with three days left in this election, that it is all a shitshow, and I want no one to win. Of course someone must and I don’t know which evil is more evil…I think maybe I will protest! Who knows, there are a few days left, there are only a few days left, thank God (circumstance in this case)!

I haven’t had a cigarette, or any nicotine, in over twelve hours, and I intend to keep that rolling…I wish I had more to say this morning, that I was not so concerned with nothing as to have little of anything to add to the discourse. It is a pity, truly, to have exhausted the wellsprings of creative thought so early in the year. God help us, no matter what happens on Tuesday! I am an anxious ball of nerves and breathing exercises are no help! I wish to dissolve into a black hole that will swallow this planet whole and leave a gaping void in this system instead of an inhabited world. Is that too much to ask?

I do not think it matters so much, ultimately…I remind myself that government is not greater than God and that life goes on regardless of who is in office. And yet I am torn, and yet I am conflicted. It would kill my mother to hear this, as she is full steam ahead for Kamala, but I do not trust her. She seems the JD Vance type of being anything she needs to be to get what she wants, and that worries me. I also don’t feel her fit to be commander in chief. And don’t get me started on orange guy. Who knows, who knows, and my delusions on the issue of heaven and hell outcomes, of biblical implications of how you cast your vote only serve to confound the issue. I am a mess ladies and gentlemen, but there is an end in sight. Thank the good lord.

Delusions, delusions, always delusions. Why must I be so afflicted, and why can’t they be reasoned with? Why can’t the fact of reckoning with it as a delusion rob it of its emotional heft? Why must it still feel real and push me into uncomfortable strata of being? It is okay though, I ride the wave, surf on the swelling anxiety as my leg shakes its restless little circles in the air. It is enough, truly, to be vertical and to be breathing, and I must remind myself of that fact often. I wish so many things, and I wish that none of them would come true!

That is enough of this. Sleep tight, those of you reading before bed, let not my worries drown you like they drown my happiness this morning. Let me forget for a minute that things are going the way that they are. Let me remember that I still have someone to touch, to kiss. Even if that too can cause anxiety, it is a blessing, from circumstance which might be greater than God, in the end. I think that is my Ted talk for today, I hope I didn’t bore you yet again.

TTFN,

Dickie 

11.5.24 Election day

Oh the joys of this cycle being, finally, over! To hear no more campaign ads on the television, to hear no more griping from my mother about the possibility of another four years of Trump. I do not care who wins, though I voted. It is likely to be a shitshow in any case and I hope only for a continuation of normal life on the ground level. There is so much static, so much media static that it is impossible to know anything about anyone. But of course it will take weeks to count the votes. Of course it will not be over because in four years we will do it all over again, with another pair of angry factions divided by a passion that I do not feel. There is no saving America, I’m afraid, and America is both Great and not Great, to supplant the rhetoric of DJT.

There is no doubt that we are a superpower, with our military might (though it seems that China is making serious gains on their long con to take over the world), with our GDP so large that it is impossible to ignore in any conversation about the world economy. We are here to stay even if our institutions fail, and I lean on my uncle’s assertion that Government is not greater than God. Meaning the force of what is, in this case. I hope that that continues to be true, that we don’t find ourselves mired in more senseless wars, that the economy keeps growing and that I can have a share of the pie. That freedom means something to the people in power, that people can be less oppressed. Who knows, who knows. Those things mean different things to different people. And that is okay, that is what makes democracy work. All the rhetoric about being a dictator on day 1, about gender affirming care for illegal immigrants, designed to alarm, to push the fear button, to make us do what they want.

I think I could have not voted and everything would have been okay, but I did, and things will likely be okay. It is this prayer that I send up in smoke, like cigarette smoke, like campfire smoke, not like incendiary devices on airplanes, as I read yesterday Russia was plotting. Our lives go on, our lives go on and we struggle and feel joy and pain, in unequal parts; we see what we see and there is no telling what your neighbor will do. Tomorrow you could be killed in a car crash, could be murdered. It is all so fragile and I wish to call for unity, not political unity, which is impossible, but unity in our humanity, the things that we value. Who knows what anyone thinks, who knows what anyone will do? Isn’t it enough to exist, and to be happy. I know I am happier than I have ever been, and that is something I don’t take lightly. I have a duty to continue to be a good partner, to continue to hold down a job, to continue to be good to the people I meet and the way I voted or the way that the politicians conduct themselves has very little to do with any of that.

Of course it all matters, it is our civic duty and all that. I think I would like for a reasonable election cycle, but I do not hope to see another one in my lifetime. We are so divided, so so so divided, and I fear there is no cure for the fracturing. I think that we will grow farther and farther apart and maybe even split down the middle. Maybe Trump, as aides suggested, will even use the military against civilians. Who knows, who knows, but that sounds like the fear button again. Business as usual and a total wild card. Which is worse? Who’s to say?

I do think that there is good in this world, and I hope it will triumph, though I don’t think that the Christian dream of Revelation is more than a dream. That we will see a new age of prosperity and peace seems distant with all the strife in the middle east and eastern Europe. Can’t we all just get along? Rodney King said that. If it were up to me to decide I would pick E. God is suffering. That’s a throwback, one that if you have not read all of this you might not know about. Who knows anything about anything in this age of 24 hour news cycles, and internet propaganda, of saturated worldviews when people still do stupid things all the time. Hell, I do stupid things all the time. And I’m having my second beer at 11am, as if this was a normal day to get drunk before noon. Though of course, two beers will not get me drunk, or even buzzed. I like to think that is a good thing, that it means I can show restraint and still imbibe. What does it mean to be enlightened? Does it mean that you know everything? For that would be a great and terrible burden.

I think I will end this rant on the note that whatever happens, I care about you. About you and yours, and all that you hold dear. I hope you have no hate in your heart, and that God (the force of what is) smiles on you today. That you get laid, that you have food to eat, that you have shelter from the rain that seems to be falling all around this week. And that you have joy, that you have most everything you want so long as you are reasonable in your wanting. I think that when the moon smiles on the lake tonight I will be nestled up with one I love deliberately not following what happens on the national scene. I do not care, truly, I think it is all bad. But I cast a vote, and that one vote, while not likely to make much difference, matters, statistically. Statistical significance for the win, and obscurity for the other win. I love you all, I hope that your guy (or gal) wins, for your sake. I will not be holding my breath.

TTFN,

Richard.

11.8.24 The lights go up on Broadway

There is a light on in this room but it is nothing compared to a stage light, nor anything close to the sun, which is shining through the window and making me long for longer warmer days though we have just gotten to the season of light in the morning and darkness at night. What a shame that it feels that it is midnight when seven o’clock rolls around. What a shame that we return to standard time at all. Why not just Daylight it all year, let the evenings run later. Who thinks that this is a good proposal and as a result I should be elected king of the world? Who thinks that if you have love in your life you are luckier than anyone deserves to be, or alternately, that everyone deserves to be as lucky as you?

What a convoluted and strange rhetorical question. I think that this is getting to be a bore to you, dear reader, that you will tire of buying these books in only the second volume, and that my dream of twelve volumes will fall flat because quite frankly I have run out of things to say. Only, have I? I think that turning garden beds today was exercise that I needed, though I did not enjoy it, as I rarely enjoy manual labor. And still dirt under my fingernails from transplanting herbs so they might overwinter. And the light streams in, and I type on, watching the shadows grow longer with each passing minute. I am going to watch a movie tonight, and drink some wine. Do you even care about that?

I think that I do, that my life is important to me in a way that this week’s presidential election was not. I have talked to some people very happy with the outcome, and some very sad, or even angry with it. I am neutral, I did not care much who won, so long as our democracy continues, and though this seems the route where that is less likely to happen, I do not think that things will collapse. Clearly Kamala wasn’t the right woman for the job, clearly America spoke decisively on that issue. Because it wasn’t even close. It wasn’t even close at all, and DJT has a mandate to fix us up however he sees fit. Who knows what that will be, now that the campaign is over and he has no reelection at stake. Some people are excited, some people are terrified. I am neither, merely curious to see what he does with his newfound power.

For power was what was at stake, and I maintain, as I told a dear friend the other day, that humans who want power tend to be the worst kind of humans. The people I respect most only want to put their head down and do their work, whatever that might be. And they hope that they get their share of the pie, that they are taken care of, that they do not face strife and persecution. I do worry for the trans community, of whom my aunt is one, and for the gays, though the right told me the other day that he was the first president to enter office in support of gay marriage. I don’t know what is true anymore, or who to believe. I am not smart enough or informed enough to know who is good for who, or who is good for what, or who is good, generally. 

It remains to be seen whether the nightmarish hellscape envisioned by the left will emerge, and the same could be said for the low price utopia envisioned by the right. From the middle 

I will say that I am neither happy nor sad about the outcome. Both choices were bad, to my estimation, and how many elections could I have said that about in my life? That was ambiguous, I meant that the answer was several. Biden-Harris was not a great four years, and America rejected it outright on Tuesday. I don’t know what he will do, this Trump man, for he has no obligation to fulfill anything he said on the campaign trail. He’s a real wildcard, and one that I am anxious, not necessarily in the negative sense of that world, but just in the sense that I’m truly curious to see what he will do. He has my attention, that is for sure. That was a trouncing, a more decisive margin of victory than I have ever seen in a presidential election. It speaks volumes about what America feels, which is that what we were doing wasn’t working. I do wonder what would have happened had there been a more open nomination process when Biden stepped down. Perhaps things would have gone differently, but the ramrod Kamala train hit a concrete wall and folded up like a paper plane against it, that’s for sure.

I am tired of politics, and I hope everything turns out alright. There is never any guarantee of that, never any guarantee of anything besides the taxes and death of Benjamin Franklin’s proclamation. And I happily pay hoping to get things like roads and bridges in return. I think that’s reasonable, and while I wouldn’t mind healthcare or higher education in return as well, there seems little chance, with our divided political landscape, of ever replicating anything like what goes on in Europe. And who knows if that would be better, who knows if the government (the American government especially) is capable of running an efficient bureaucracy. Trump has promised to try, so lets see if he can really drain the swamp and make the trains run on time. Of course it was Mussolini who accomplished that so long ago, and we all saw how that turned out. Uphold the constitution, or lead us down the primrose path into fascism. Only time will tell.

I think it is some of each, if I’m being honest. A demagogue at worst, and a loose cannon at best, we have elected a leader who is beyond the usual systems and standards of control and restraint. Maybe he will get us out of all the wars that are threatening to draw us in. Maybe he will channel funding from defense into social welfare, but that would be a big break from the Republican party who elected him. But who knows, I am trying to be optimistic, trying to look on the bright side of life, and of death, as Monty Python instructed me. Surely I will have some of both on my timeline. Surely life will come first, and I pray it keeps on going swimmingly as it has been for quite a while. Since I met the woman who it feels is the love of my life. Who it feels makes my brightest days brighter, and my dark days not so oppressive. Here’s hoping that that lack of oppression extends to all humans everywhere, for that, I am certain, is something everyone deserves.

If we were vampires and death was a joke, so too would be the oppression of our fellow man. But as it is we are all going to die and if I can relieve another’s suffering, I am going to. Provided it is a reasonable sacrifice to do so, I suppose. I will not be a martyr, and my happiness is perhaps my greatest priority. In that way I am not a saint. Not someone who, it will go down, was too nice, as I was accused of being the other day. I think I am just an average guy, an average straight white man in a white man’s world. It was not the worst lot to draw, I will admit that, if I am sorry that the world can’t be a little more equitable. Is that white guilt, or is it just my natural sense of empathy reaching out to all the people not as fortunate as I? It is impossible to say, though I feel little guilt for the circumstances I was born into, and it has not, strictly speaking, been an easy route to the current stability and peace that I seem to possess.

Because I have struggled, long and hard, to regain a sense of self that is not inflated and so the object of great negative importance, which is to say the flip side of grandiosity that makes you the target for nebulous, nefarious schemes that will lead to your ruination. The feeling of being God is double edged, ladies and gentlemen, and can also make you feel like because you are the center of the universe that all the evil forces in the world are out to get you. From the technocrats to their Artificial Intelligence, from the law enforcement officers (not technically, at least not entirely, evil, I admit), to the prosecutors to the warlords at home and abroad. There are no shortage of phantom enemies that you can be afraid of, and just a few months ago I was paralyzed, afraid to be in front of the windows lest I be handcuffed and ferried off to jail to be stabbed, literally, in the back. 

It was a dark trip, replete with shapeshifters and doppelgangers, with heinous crimes that I was to be framed for. Of course I am not a criminal, not someone who transgresses the law other than maybe the speed limit from time to time. Not even because I am scared of retribution, not really anymore anyways, but  because I have no reason to. No desire to do anything illegal, and not so careless as to commit the common offenses like drunk driving and the like. The world is a beautiful place when you can go see the incoming sheriff and shake his hand and look him in the eye as he talks about his vision for a better policing model. Is anything perfect? No, but it is closer than I have ever been, and I am grateful to have a seat at the table of society even if at the moment I am a bit player in this grand and odious comedy of errors that is playing itself out on the world stage. 

I think, in saying that, of Ukraine and the whole Iran Israel Palestine clusterfuck, of the situation in Sudan, CAR and Central America. Violence all over the place, senseless violence that leads to nothing but death and destruction. And we are complicit, under Biden-Harris, in much of it, though I suppose the roots of the Central America and Africa situations go back a lot farther than they have been serious players in American politics. I think if I had the power to end all the wars, as I have heard that Trump has said he will do, I would do my damndest to deliver that reality for the world, for the people on the ground who have to worry about bombs in their upturned faces. I am grateful to be a world away from all that, and for the blessings that have been bestowed upon my life by God (circumstance in this case). Glad that I cut out of work early that Friday in April and met Tara. Glad that we have made it six months together (almost seven!) and grown so close that I want to spend every night keeping her safe and warm.

That I have happiness, and contentment, and that the president of the United States hopefully can’t do anything to rob me of that peace. So it doesn’t really matter that when the lights come up on inauguration day, and DJT is sworn in as 47, we will have elected a man with the possibility of tyranny. There may have been just as much possibility on the other side, upon reflection. With any luck our democracy will survive, and maybe even flourish under the new regime. I hold out hope that all will be well, though certainly not for everyone. With any luck the revenge tour won’t materialize, will just be the bluster of a man who wanted to stir up his base, and succeeded, certainly, in doing that. With any luck this will be just as much business as usual as the other side purported to be. A man can dream, can’t he?

TTFN,

11.11.24 King without a crown

Sorry, that is tongue in cheek. I sat in the dentist’s chair for what seemed like hours this morning as he drilled and chiseled and eventually installed a temporary crown. It was a pain, and I couldn’t feel my lip for most of the day, but at least now I am only left with a slight sore spot in my mouth and not a more permanent injury. It has been a fine day, all told, with my car once again functional (needed a new battery) and a stolen kiss from my love after I ditched work to work on projects for work. Fortunately it was dead and I did not need to be there, as time has proven.

That’s enough about my day, how was yours? Of course you can’t answer that, this is a monologue, not a dialogue, and even if it were how would you enter your response? There is no form here for a reply, no way that you can get your message to me, the sender. No reply, isn’t there a Beatles song by that title? I don’t remember and the truth is it doesn’t matter much, none of this matters much it is just me logging on to try and distract me from the fact that I don’t have much going on this evening, as it is a girl-week and I am dubiously welcome in the dollhouse where I would spend most all of my evenings if given the choice.

Oh I am such a sap, such a sucker for love. I want to roll myself up in a blanket and tumble down a snow covered hill. I want to climb a tree in a thunderstorm and stop myself from stuttering. I want to hold somebody special’s hand as we watch a movie and she edits the million photographs that are piled on her proverbial, not literal desk. I think maybe that is too much to ask today, I think I want nothing more than to end my day wrapped around her warm body, our shared warmth almost too much beneath the fuzzy blanket and the comforter.

Surely you have tired of listening to me pine by now. Surely I cannot still be an entertaining messenger from the great beyond as I was when I started this, musing about God and isness and the very stuff of ontological curiosity that made this blog what it was. I think I have lost the thread, should maybe take a break, but I am much too stubborn. I think I will change the subject though, from my love for the one I love and my desire to spend every waking moment making her happy to something a little headier, a little grittier, if a related topic to a certain degree.

I have been drinking some good wine recently. Perhaps most notably an Etna Rosso that knocked my fricking socks off on Saturday. It was so nuanced, so complex, and yet so rich and savory that I didn’t even recognize it as nerello. And the night before that we had Montelena Chardonnay, which though probably a far cry from the legendary 1973 that astounded the world, was frigging delicious as well. A testament to pedigree in Napa Valley, certainly. To people who know their way around a winery. To people who respect the grape but also the barrel and the finished wine. Oh what joy to be drinking well in the slow months of the year. Maybe I will even have a new job soon enough, one where I get to use my brain instead of just my chatterbox. I think I could do with talking less to people these days, it just wears on me and drains me and I make drinks mindlessly thinking I would rather be somewhere else.

I am happy to even have a prospect, though it is no sure thing, that is for sure. For one the position is incipient and though technically one I have held before I left that employer in a manic spell with a huge number for wine inventory and probably a personnel headache. Still, I am happy to even be considered, and I know I would do great, as any change would be invigorating and I would throw myself into the job with all the passion I bring to the wine world, which is considerable. I want a challenge, an intellectual challenge, an educational challenge, a challenge of any kind really, as I am bored of my job and wanting change to bring myself back into equilibrium.

I’ve got to run, my ride’s here. I think I’m going to kiss a pretty woman in just a few minutes, and for that I am grateful. I am grateful for so many things, there aren’t enough hours in the day to count them. So let me say thanks, to all of you who have contributed to me standing on my own two feet and getting back on the horse when it seemed like I had no means and no mobility. Thanks again, mom and dad, for all that you do. I love you all so much.

TTFN.

11.12.24 The sun is shining and I feel alright

There is a lot of friction in the world right now, a lot of people angry, and perhaps with reason to be, but I do not think that anger is fruitful most of the time, and that we should cultivate peace whenever we can. But what does peace mean? Does it mean that we should lie down and take whatever comes quietly? Or does it mean that we should stand tall and unwaveringly support what we believe? Or does it mean some secret third thing? I am not a source of answers, have never been a source of answers, preferring to ask questions and let you decide. I think that is my role as the diarist, think that is more fruitful to the peace that I think I need.

Maybe you need it too. Maybe we all need it. And yet the world is at war, is looking to be more at war than it was a year ago, when it was decidedly at war. I wish it weren’t the case, but it is far outside my power to influence it in any way. Not that I am helpless, nor even hopeless, but I think that to recognize my smallness is fruitful for me, for my peace. I sit and listen, to the song on the radio, to the breath of the heater rising up through the vents. I think about all I have to be grateful for, think of all I have been blessed with. And of course these blessings not necessarily from God, unless you believe absolutely in all that. If God is a disembodied personal force then He is out of his league in ensuring peace on Earth. The sons of Satan, as someone once described them to me, are alive and well and doing their damndest to keep us running scared, or running, even, for our lives. I do not like to dwell on that, just keep my head down and keep typing, keep showing up for work, keep going about my days like there is no tomorrow, knowing of course that there probably is.

It is a strange thing to be mortal. To know that one day your days will come to an end. It makes me scared, and sad, and also happy, in another way. It gives weight to the present moment, to my runny nose (cigarettes, ugh!), to my aching tooth. It makes me feel alive, alive in the sense of not yet dead, but also in the invigorating sense that the phrase is often used. I think that if I can make it to fifty years with Tara my life will be complete. That I will have accomplished, with lasting love, what I set out to do here when I was born 33.5 years ago. Not that I had a goal, necessarily, was simply thrust into this world by the force of what is. And if I can have a son of my own I will strive to instill in him the kindness it is said that I possess. And if I have a daughter I will try to do much the same. It is strange to be thinking about kinder when I have spent so many years thinking that I wanted nothing to do with them. But I want to know the joy of my baby’s belly laugh, want to see first steps and hear first words. To join into the mystery of parenthood, the struggles and triumphs of trying to prepare a child to live in a world that seems to be changing rapidly and uncontrollably.

I am not so scared for the future. Though there are certainly things to be afraid of. I do not fear, for I have my wits and my integrity, and I have love in my life, though sometimes I suppose I am afraid to lose that. There’s nothing so scary as the tenuous nature of happiness, which they say is like a muscle that you must exercise in order that your capabilities grow stronger. I wish to be happy for the rest of my days. To know what it is like to look at your partner growing older and smile and be grateful that they have reaped the benefits of being alive. To know that you bring them joy as often as you can, to know that they care for you as you care for them. To cast aside the insecurity and neuroses and just enjoy the fruit of love as it falls from the tree of life.

It is hard to see the light some days, and for that I am sorry. Not personally sorry of course, I certainly did not make this world. Sometimes I fear that things are going terribly wrong, and that I will lose everything I hold dear. Sometimes I fear that I will never reach the worldly success that would provide me with the purpose I am lacking in my present employment. Sometimes I fear that I am falling behind. And yet this project grows, I send my books out into the world, I have some success with the job that I do have. If I sound pitiful it is only because I am, because I fear so often that things are moving on without me. That I will never make it to the promised land.

Only who promised what? Did they even promise it to me? Should I go back to school and suffer through the boredom of being told what to read and what to write? Would that deliver me unto better social standing? My mother certainly thinks so. But that is nothing new, as it is nothing new that I struggle with menial labor which doesn’t require me to use my brain. I need to use my brain, they tell me I have an unusual one. Tara says I have a beautiful mind, which reminds me of that movie as I type it now. Not that I even saw it, but still know something about it. I hope to do better than to be remembered as a schizophrenic man, to achieve success and stability and live a long and productive life. I think these are reasonable goals, and even achievable ones. I just want everything to turn out alright, to turn out better than alright, to turn out so well that I can scarcely believe my luck.

That is my desire at this moment, and truthfully, with her, I can scarcely believe my luck. She demures at every occasion and says she’s “just regular”, but the truth is she’s the best thing to ever happen to me. The rock on which I build my church. Not that I’m starting a church but I have always liked that phrase. Have always liked the idea of something so solid it can be used as a foundation for something great and lasting. And Jesus’ church was certainly lasting. It seems to be gaining steam as the twenty-first century progresses, seems only to be gaining in stature, at least in America. Who wants to be bigger than Jesus anyways? Look what a headache that was for John Lennon. I think I would like to be smaller than Jesus, but maybe bigger than Dan Brown. That’s a big ask though, as I will likely never sell so many books. But who knows, maybe there will be a broad appeal for the things I have written. Maybe I will even fulfill the prophecy of Fahad Almonsour and win a nobel prize. First son of a first son, who knows, maybe he knows something I don’t?

I think that is enough for the moment. I think I will get on with the productivity I need to accomplish today. Maybe I will send out a query, maybe I will finish my work project. Maybe I will fuck off and do none of it, but sit for twenty minutes and so stabilize my mood, which is pretty stable as it is. Maybe the curiosity I possess for the world will bear fruit, that someone will hit upon one of my queries and say “this guy, I want to know more”. Or maybe I will toil endlessly in obscurity and be discovered after my death. Maybe all this talk of God and of mortality will prove to be fruitless, and I will never make my mark upon the world. Maybe I will never be read, and all this typing was just for me. That would suck, but it wouldn’t be the end of the world. Though the dream of being a stay at home dad and a writer sounds pretty damn good to me, and I’d like to see it. 

Basta. Enough. I am doing my best and that’s all I can do, and that is good enough for now. Surely tomorrow I will also have no news on my writing career, surely tomorrow I will be in the same straits I am in now. It is likely, but not assured. Things could go to shit, or turn to gold. But likely tomorrow will be much the same as today. And somebody would trade all their tomorrows for just one yesterday. I don’t want yesterday back, but I would take Saturday back for a good number of tomorrows. Or maybe I just want more tomorrows like that day. Let’s go with that, to future that looks like the best days of the past. There’s a lot of static, and I think that is just the way of the world. I like to think that I can pierce it with a horde of a million golden arrows, like that mantra of Rama that vanquished Ravana’s demons in that myth. But this is real life, and there is only diligent progress to be had, only incremental steps I can take to get where I’m going. That is good enough for me.

TTFN,

Richard

11.15.24 Last, last, last

At last we can say that we can put the past away. That we can put down the cigarettes, that we can put away the jealousy, the delusions. For yesterday was a day of flashbacks to painful things, painful beliefs from my past that reared up as I sat to meditate. Leave it to sitting still and feeling what you’re feeling to drive you temporarily insane. But that is behind me. At least for now. There is no clone of me going to shoot Donald J. Trump from the Washington monument. That is a preposterous belief, and one that I laugh now to say out loud though yesterday I was quaking at the thought. The foundation being my belief that I built a quantum computer that consumed a number of years of my life—also a delusion, as it turns out. No, I am a writer and a poet, not a wizard, no modern Tesla, just regular old me who if I am to shape the world will do it with pen and paper. There will be no transformation by advanced technology on my account. I can scarcely use a word processor without it correcting my grammar, if that tells you anything.

I think that it is silly that I used to believe all those things, now that I am (mostly) past them. I put a lot of effort and time into crafting a legend around myself that only I believed. And it caused me a lot of strife and unhappiness, it put me in the hospital more times than I can count. I think that if I could go back and relinquish the thoughts of being a god, of being more than a man, I would, but of course past is past and stone clad fact tempered only by the faulty lens of memory. I think that if I could change anything I’m not sure I would, on second thought, as it brought me to my present happiness, the present joy of holding my baby tight each night as we lie down to sleep. I think any past that brought me to that place has been worth it, even if maybe I would have ended up there anyways.

To a certain extent it was fate that brought us together, or so it seems to our sentimental mortal perspectives. Both of us somewhere we shouldn’t have been, or at least the timing shouldn’t have been the way it was. There was no reason, if things went according to plan, for us to be where we were when we met. She was late and I was supposed to be working, but wanted vodka (I don’t even like vodka) and to see my buddy who it turns out wasn’t even working that day. I think it is madness to believe in fate, but I am a well established madman, aren’t I? Who knows if it was fate or just coincidence (what is the difference, effectively?) that brought us together, but we have talked every day since, and seen each other on most of them. Never looking back, we have dived headfirst into a love affair I pray to the skies, the vast and infinite reaches of space with its stars and its comets, will go the distance. I am tired of floundering in mediocrity, want to make it to the land of milk and honey where the promise of love is realized and we can flourish in the light of day that for the first time this afternoon seems to be shining.

I think that I am happy that I get to go see my baby when I finish this entry. Happy to go downtown and pretend for one night to be a lady (it is the opening day of firearm deer season and the town does a ladies’ night in honor of the absent husbands). I think I am glad that I don’t have to weather another hour alone in this tower on the hill where I feel lonely and tired and sad so often. Why can’t it all be unicorns and rainbows? Why can’t I just not be so depressed when I have to spend time alone. That is why I have had so much trouble quitting cigarettes. They fill up the day and ease the restlessness that comes from the meds, that keeps, even now, my leg moving in circles on the fulcrum of my other knee. I can’t sit still for the life of me, but without these drugs I am a madman who is no good for anyone. I suppose it is a small price to pay for my sanity.

I think it is there that I will leave off, with the sanity that they seemed worried about yesterday, saying that when I get sick I get sick fast. I know that I was not getting sick. I was just having a traumatic stress response. I was just feeling the past as if it were present. Today it is gone, there is only this aching in my head, there is only this minor quivering in my fingers. I think there is nothing to fear, that the future will mostly leave me out of the national scene, at least as far as politics is concerned. With any luck the national scene will find my writings compelling and people will buy my books and I will get rich and retire to the typewriter. Filling up my days with belly laughs from a baby boy and letters arranged into sentences into paragraphs into pages into books! That is the dream, that is the dream, L&G. I’m sorry I don’t have more to say today, but I’ve gotta run, I’ve got a date with an espresso martini and a pretty blonde. That’s more than enough reason to leave you all alone…

TTFN,

Dick

11.19.24 7 Months!

Oh what a joy to be continuing to grow together, to work through the hard things, the sticky things and come together to cry at a sad movie and then kiss and make love and sleep soundly beside each other the whole night through! It gives my life purpose, it gives my life gravitas. Having something to lose makes you realize how precious that is, gives me all the motivation I need to put down the cigarettes and start exercising. To live healthfully and make every moment count. That is my goal, as I sit here to address you as Scorpio season wanes and the rain comes down outside. A light rain, a gentle rain, the kind of rain that makes the flowers open in springtime but now just serves to wet the fallen leaves. The very leaves we blew into the street the other afternoon so the city might dispose of them how they will. Oh, seven months of happiness, seven months of bliss.

I think that if I could wish something for everyone on Earth it would be to know a love such as this. To know what it is like to miss your beloved every moment you are apart from them, to look forward to every little shred of time you get with them. Even just now, sharing a quick sandwich in her office a serious blessing. Something I looked forward to since she left me this morning to go to said office. And I just a sap who wants nothing more than to sit under her legs while she edits photos for her side hustle. To lie beside her in the bed, to hold her hand while I’m falling asleep. A great love comes only once in a lifetime I speculate, and this my great love. I’m lost in the big feelings, lost in the way she looks when she’s looking at me from across the room. Lost in the way her eyes sparkle when she smiles! I am hopeless, L&G.

And yet I have so much hope. I have hope that this will continue for many years, and that we can continue to make each other happy in the way that both of us admit that we have never known. That we have never been so happy as in the last seven months is a hard thing for two grown adults to reckon with. How much time was wasted being less happy than we could have been? And yet that perfect sequence of events, that fated meeting at that restaurant bar when neither of us kept the schedule we thought we would. And then later, kissing her outside of the vodka bar the single turning point of my life. I will never look back except to enjoy the happy memories. And the sad ones too, I suppose, the fights and arguments that seem to happen only when we have had too much to drink. There is a lesson there but we are slow learners.

Strange to think that just yesterday I was a wreck of nervous emotions. Feeling that I had wronged my baby in a bad way, though as she said yesterday the things were really quite small. And that movie My Old Ass putting it all in perspective, how precious these little times, the moments spent snuggling on the couch yesterday, or the way my sleep moan made her horny, or the way she tasted as I kissed her through the tears when the movie made me cry. Or the way she kissed me this morning as she left me naked in the sheets, or the way she ate that sandwich that we split. Watching her do anything brings out a radiant joy in my heart, holding her hand is enough to make me blush. I am lost in the love affair, and happy to be so. Hoping it goes on forever, even knowing that of course it cannot.

But almost forever, if we can stretch it out for another 587 months and reach our goal of 594, just short of fifty years together, that is a dream I almost dare not dream. For it would be epically sad to fall far short of that goal. To have tragedy befall my life, or hers, I suppose. I want all the time in the world because time is our most precious resource, the thing we are least able to get back. Money comes and goes, as do so many other things. But time and love, that timeless, precious, precious resource, cannot be got back once they are squandered. So I will cherish every moment, every gesture, every kiss. Every day that she is in my life is better than the ones where she was not. I have never been so happy, and though I’ve said that more than a few times in here it bears reiterating. The life I wanted to live surprised me over a Stoli martini in a time when I was drinking alone a lot. A time when I was desperate for anything to rescue me from the sadness that had become mostly unbearable. And now to have it replaced with its opposite, what a gift!

There are so many things in this world to be sad about, but they are outweighed by the thing in my life that I value most. Tara, oh Tara, how could I have ever lived without you? How could all those meaningless hours this winter, those poems that made me feel some sort of purpose, have brought me to you? I am glad they did. Glad for so many reasons that counting them here would be useless. Glad to know you at all, and glad to belong to you in the way that I do. For I am yours, I am sold on the future with you. I don’t think I could ever want anyone else, I am so in love. I think that is borderline cliché but it rings true to me in this moment. It has shown me that some things don’t matter as much as others, and that we must cherish the things that matter most. That we must hold dear the ones that make us happy, and you at the top of that list. Thank you for being you, there is no greater pleasure than getting to spend my life making you smile.

In summation, we have entered the eighth month of knowing each other, and from the get go we both wanted to spend as much time together as we could. And talked every day, and so our connection has grown, with neither of us ever being bored. Every text message makes my heart drop slightly, makes me pause and wish to see what she has to say. Even the arguments, which seem so pressing at the time, fall away as insignificant when it becomes clear how much we care and value the other. When the light of our love shines down on me there is no doubt. I’m going to spend the rest of my days making you happy, going to do everything in my power to ensure that you feel as little pain as is possible. To make the sun shine down on you even on rainy afternoons like today when I must be going to work soon and won’t be able to cuddle up with you until much later. Even these days with their agonizing boredom are worth it knowing you wait for me at the end of them. With that, I will always have enough.

TTFN,

Richard.

11.20.24 Golf Day, Date Night

I think that days like today, while hard to weather, to fill up without the familiar vice of the cigarette, are good for me. Tonight we will go to dinner, drink riesling and eat paella and generally enjoy each other’s company. Today I played simulator golf. Swung the club even though the weather outside is nasty. And if my teeth hurt and my head aches so be it, I am having a high noon and watching the rain come down. I am sitting in the dollhouse alone listening to music shuffling on a song Tara showed me yesterday. A song tangential to one given to her by an old boyfriend. She says she doesn’t think of him when she hears it, and I believe her. We must trust that things fade, that the past can be the past, and that our pasts, the flaws we have had in the past, won’t necessarily rear up again.

I am happy L&G, happy because my life is moving in an exciting direction. Happy because today I did not have to work, and only smoked the cigarettes I had this morning, then put them away and haven’t had one in hours. Tara’s fault for buying a pack yesterday. I will not be tempted by their availability this evening, will stay on the patch and prove that I can resist the temptation. I think that I am going to make it out alive, for at least a little while longer. That I am going to look at all these empty bottles and smile and look at the full bottles of sparkling water and smile also. At the puzzle we borrowed that we have not started. All the things, all the things.

For it is everything that brings the smile to my face. Even the pain of her absence, which is presenting as anxiety, is welcome. For it means I care. For it means that she means a great deal to me. I like knowing those things, like feeling like this even though it is unpleasant. We must feel all the feelings, must feel and grind out each inch of our worthiness from the unwelcome guest of nervous tension. It is better than paranoia. The cops are not descending on my position here at the table. The law is not out to get me. I am going to go out to dinner tonight and come home and snuggle up to the beauty that makes my life so much better than it was before. There I go again with the broken record. The tune that rises from the grove and then the skip that makes the same four bars rise up again. Over and over again I will sing her praise, she is the one, L&G, and truth be told I have ordered her a ring.

Of course none of you will read that until long after it is relevant. It is my secret with this document, with Tara and I am happy to keep it that way. I can’t wait to have the physical thing in my possession. To show it to her and have her try it on so I can see if it needs to be resized. For I told her about it, and even showed her the picture. Because I hate secrets and I was too excited. And I loved the look on her teary face as she wept with joy to see that I do indeed have good taste in jewelry. So now we are secretly pretty much engaged. And I am happy with that. Happy that she will be coming home to me soon and hopefully not smoking a cigarette on the way. If she does I will chastize her for smelling bad as she has me so many times. Nice to return the favor, and nice not to want one. It sounds disgusting, if pleasant. One must put down their more sinister vices if they are to survive to see 594 months of happiness. What an outrageous goal, but one I am hopeful to achieve. 

As the traffic streams by on the street outside and the sound plays from the speaker and the rain falls all around this house I think I would change nothing about this moment, unless of course she could be here to share it. Of course missing her is its own perverse pleasure. The quavering of my nerves makes me sure that I want to give her that ring at the earliest convenient opportunity. Makes me sure that she is the one I want to spend the rest of my life with. That is a beautiful thing, I thinks, and I thinks too that I would be stupid not to cherish the one who makes all my days brighter, who I can love in a way I never thought possible. I truly did not know it was possible to feel this way. It is a joyous surprise to have such intense emotions, especially after so many years feeling sorry for myself and feeling that I was stifled by the haldol. I got a shot today, and maybe that is the reason for the tooth pain and the headache, or maybe it is cigarettes and nicotine withdrawal. There are too many variables to know for sure why I am feeling less than 100%. But it is fine, I am happy, and I am glad that the hours are ticking off quickly to when I will get to kiss her again.

Islands, the hours I get to spend with her. And between vast doldrums. Long stretches of feeling like I want to be somewhere else. Maybe that isn’t healthy but if I am being honest I don’t care. That is just the measure of how much I value every minute I get with her. Every second spent looking in her face, listening to her sing, sometimes even as I’m trying to kiss her, makes my heart smile. I know that that is worth the inconvenience of having to miss her sometimes. I know that that is worth the pain of being apart. I know that when she gets here my heart will leap, my mood will soar. She said she saw me wake up the other day and have a look of absolute joy, requisite happiness on my face when I saw her. It is moments like that that let me know how sure I am. That I have fallen hopelessly in love. That I am lost without the caress of her hand upon my face, without the feeling of her thighs wrapped up in mine. Oh what little joys, what big happiness from little things! I can’t say enough times that I hope everyone gets to experience this in their life. That I hope I get many years of it. That only will death interrupt this relationship, so strong is the bond that grows stronger with every passing moment, every message from the workday, every night spent snuggling in that soft bed. 

If I could wish one thing it would be that this go on forever. If I was so foolish as to waste my wish on that, I would probably know the hell that is forever. But God loves the fool, so they say, and I am just one fool in a hoarde of a million suckers. Looking for love, finding it, and trying to hold it close because you realize how precious it is and that your life is short and that the number of times you will do anything is limited. Every sunset is but one of not so many, and every moonrise the same. The wind will only howl around the eaves so many more times, and the rain will only grace the top of your head so long as there remains ambient water. When the sun explodes we will see the meaning of forever. When the earth stops spinning on its axis we will see the meaning of forever. When I think about forever I only want to spend it in her arms. Such a sap, Richard, such a sap.

But I do not care, I am glad that I have something to wish would continue. That I have someone who values me and who cherishes what I bring to the table. And of course whom I cherish and treasure as well. There is no time like the present to grab onto that pretty girl and kiss her on the mouth. Of course you should ask first, because consent is very important. There is nothing worse than a sexual harassment lawsuit, except maybe a rape charge. Sorry, that got dark, but I am just meandering through the afternoon looking at all the pretty things in this house that is, admittedly, a mess. It is okay, I think I will go, sit still and drink my second high noon down. Think that there are only minutes left until baby comes home. And I get to love on baby. What a strange turn of events from the beginning of this years entries. The call to quit drinking, the feeling of brutally low days, crying in public, drinking alone. And here, drinking alone but waiting for love to come home. Something so intense I could not have fathomed it when Aries season rolled around again. Now, eight months on from that I am living in a different world, and better off for it. That is what I have been trying to say in this entry. That I am glad things have turned out the way that they have. That that is enough, that that is the thing I was waiting for even if I didn’t know specifically what I wanted. Funny how it turns out that way sometimes.

TTFN,

Richard.