Reality Check

Well, I haven't written in over a week, and I told you I probably wouldn't.  However, I only said I wouldn't be writing over the weekend, where I had an amazing time back home in the great snowy north.  But then I didn't write all week either, and there's really no excuse for this, except I was pretty lazy.  Well, I'm back to tell you all about it, whatever "it" happens to be.

No matter how much fun I had back home, the whole thing gets put into perspective when you get news that a good friend has come down with a serious illness.  My dear friend Chris was diagnosed with Meningitis, which last I checked, can cause serious, long-lasting physical harm, and can even cause death.  I was always aware of the sickness, but never really knew much about it, and to be honest, I still really don't.  The first time I was made aware of the severity of the illness was when I was reading the extremely depressing website called www.mydeathspace.com.  On that site, there was a Myspace of a young man, I believe he was a college student, that had died very, very suddenly from Meningitis.  This shocked me, because he was just sick, and no one would have thought it was as serious as it turned out to be.  Just a healthy dude, and suddenly sick, and suddenly dead.  Scared the shit out of me.

Well one of my close friends lives in Lansing, MI, where they are starting their family together.  When I got home from my vacation, or maybe it was when we were traveling home, I was informed that he has Meningitis and was in the hospital.  They didn't know if it was viral or bacterial at the time, and I knew from that research before that the viral one was the deadly one, but that either way, this was not a good thing.  All of a sudden, everything I had just done, all the good times I had just had back home was absolutely secondary to what the young Wright family was going through.  What I'm ashamed of is my immediate non-response to the situation. You see, we're all connected from everything like Facebook and Twitter, all the way down to good old text messaging and phone calls.  There is no excuse for me not to send my best wishes and thoughts and prayers to Chris or Cindy.  What the fuck was I thinking?  I think part of me was scarred shitless about the whole thing, so I froze.  I don't know, but I felt/feel badly.  I'm sure it doesn't matter, as my response is the least of their or my concerns.  But I still feel like I want to do something.

What I really want to do is give Chris and Cindy and Vada a huge hug.  I want to be there with them to help out, even if I don't know if there's much I could do.  It just makes you realize how lucky we all are to have friends and family and health and happiness.  It's yet another reminder to never take life for granted, because things happen out of the blue.  The fact that Chris is up there in some hospital, not really doing all that well, it makes me so sad to think about.  How can Chris not be his normal self?  It's so scary.  This was my best friend for years and years.

I don't know about God and all that, but if there is a god of some sort, please, I beg you, be nice.  If there isn't, I don't know who to look to.  We all feel like we need a higher being to take care of us in these situations.  I guess that's what we all need sometimes, to know, or hope, that this thing we cannot control is being controlled by someone that has the power to make it right or at least make it comfortable.  I thank the doctors that are taking care of Chris.  I don't know all the details, but I assure you, whatever they are doing to help him, they are truly wonderful people who get to save a life of a friend and a father and a brother and a son, and that's their job.  My job consists of doing nothing and getting a paycheck for it.  These people have made a decision to save lives on a daily basis.  That's pretty fucking sweet.

I don't know what else to say, but I think we should all pray for Chris and Cindy, for whatever good it may do. They are going through a lot right now.  I just want everything to be normal again, and I'm sure they do, too.  I hope that day comes sooner rather than later.  

The Old Me's Dead and Gone (to you)

I just wrote an entire blog post, edited it, reread it, and deleted it. I simply could not put those thoughts and feelings out on the internet. I'm not that kind of person. BUT, I will touch on the subject, without blasting someone in the process.

The subject I refer to above, is the feeling of being forgotten, like out of sight out of mind, sort of thing. Now, as I have made it painfully clear in the past year or so, I am a transplant from one part of the country to another, and that means I moved away from a lot of people that I love and care about. The feeling is mutual, even if they don't quite say so everyday. Or even if it's very rare that you hear from them at all. I know those people back home are my friends. There's no question about it. Some people have a harder time than others understanding this, and that's okay, they didn't expect to be "forgotten" about after they moved. I was expecting it, because I had a friend go through the same thing, so I knew what to expect. He didn't, and that's how I learned what to expect. His misery is my gain, sort of, I guess.

Well anyway, I feel bad for the guy, man. He still feels forgotten about after all this time, and it really shouldn't be that way. I know that people back home are busy, and have probably moved on from you and I. They don't have time to call or text or message you on facebook, because they have lives that we're not a part of anymore. It's a sad reality, but nonetheless, reality. You can't go harboring grudges against the people you once called friends back home because they never contact you. You're just not around anymore. You're out of sight! I understand this, and I hope someday you will too.

Should We Talk About The Weather?

As you could infer from my previous post, I was quickly running out of topics to write about. I'm still in that, and since I don't know what else to say, I'll just do what usually happens in conversations when people don't know what to talk about, but want to talk anyway. Talk about the weather.

It usually happens when I phone home, to check in on the happenings of the good ol' Upper Peninsula. More often than not, it's when I talk to my dad, or when my friendly local wife talks to her dad. Maybe it's a dad thing? I don't know, and I don't think so, because this happens all the time. You call, or maybe not even call, maybe you are just talking to whoever, and the weather comes up. Crazy, eh? This weather is something else, eh? (Note, not all people say "eh" after everything they say, but that's what I typed, so I guess that still comes natural.) A snowstorm, or Lightning storm, or perhaps some thick-ass fog. A flood, perhaps? The weather is just such a nice and easy topic to deal with, because unless you're a hermit, you know what's been up with the weather, generally. Not to say you know we're having such nice, pleasant weather lately because of a huge ridge of high pressure currently sitting comfortably over the middle Tennessee area, which is true, by the way, but you generally know that the heat has eased off and the sun has been shining and the breezes blowing. You know it's been nice lately. Everyone knows it's been nice lately. So you can have the conversation with anyone!

Comparing weather from one region to another is also popular, as I touched on above, because, it's been nice here, but it's been shitty there, or vice versa. It would be odd to call up dad and be like "did you hear what that retard Ron Ramsey said here in Tennessee in the Governor's race?" No, you say "It's been hotter than Hades here." Easy conversation, that is universally recognized and understood. I always take note when conversations turn to the weather. What a useless conversation unless it's with family. You're just killing time, at this point. No, you're wasting my time. I don't care if it's been a cold, shitty summer. I want to know how you are doing personally, not how you're region's weather system has been unfavorably affecting your volleyball league. Not that that happened, but if I ever call a friend, not just an acquaintance but a real friend from back home, and we start talking about the weather, then our friendship has surely fallen apart, or at least we just don't know where to begin, because it's possibly been too long since we last spoke. So if I call you and you start talking about the weather, just stop. I don't want to hear it. In fact, I probably already know how your weather has been, because I pay attention to that shit. Why? Because I care enough to look that shit up, occasionally. As noted by my knowledge of the current high pressure system we're enjoying right now, I clearly missed my calling. I'm a fucking amateur weatherman myself. I know what's up with everybody's weather. I just don't feel the need to have conversations about it with my best friends.

Again, not that this happened, but just giving a heads up.

Got Married

You know, its been over a year now, and it feels like a generation ago, but there are still some decisions I made in and around my wedding last January that I can't help but regret. I know that I was under intense pressure to do things correctly, and make sure all were happy, but there are certainly some decisions I made that I would like to go back and change. I know that no one would care, and they were understanding of the decisions I had to make, but some of the other mistakes I made were pretty dumb.

First off, I STILL worry that it looked like I was slighting a good friend, and one of my best friends in the whole world that day, by asking him to be my pianist, and not standing next to me with my brother and new bride. I hope I made it clear enough, on that day and leading up to the day and after the day, that having him in that position was in no way a slight to him. I wanted to include as many of my closest friends as I could in Tuxedos. This was the logical decision then, because he is the best pianist I know. There was no stupid order or ranking of my friends with whom were dressed up nicely. All were equal! At least that's how I viewed it in my mind. I certainly hope no one would feel like they were slighted. I feel like I slighted them though, in a way, just because I wish they all could have been my best men. They are the best men I know, though. So, I don't know I hope they understand. I say they because I'm including the ushers, too.

Second thing I regret is only inviting two of the security supervisors to the shindig. Why did I only choose two? Why didn't I just invite all of them, knowing some of them would have to work anyway? What the hell is wrong with me? And to make me feel even more stupid for my stupid decision, neither of the ones I actually invited showed up, and one that invited as a "come later and drink with us" guest, actually showed up. What a mistake. Why didn't I just invite him outright? What was the purpose of only inviting him later? To make me feel bad for leaving out people I like?

I don't know, these things have just bothered me for quite some time now. Carry on.