Showdown at Sundown

Well, I don't know exactly how this will go. Sometimes life is like that. Uncertainty is part of anyone's human experience. Uncertainty is usually replaced by certainty-- sometimes gradually, sometimes abruptly. Tonight could be either one. In a strange way, sometimes we want for lingering uncertainty, and other times we don't. If I have to choose for tonight, I choose lingering uncertainty. I'd rather gradually replace my uncertainty with the future I desire, than abruptly find out that my dreams have been adjusted. I guess I don't fear uncertainty as much as I fear certain failure.

So I sit

So, I sit here.

While you are at the beach.

I know. People asked us to come. People were kind to us. The problem isn't the invitations. The problem is the reality. I'm a difficult person. When I think about it, and I think about it a lot, I realize that there's really only one person at the beach who I reliably get along with. I wish I weren't difficult. Just like I wish I could simply wish away my anxiety.

We've got to start somewhere though... somehow we've got to try to build something positive. I don't believe that the right time to do that is at some vacation or holiday. People want too much from those times. People want to enjoy their vacations and holidays. No one wants to spend those times worrying about when the argument will surface. And, an argument will surface. Once it happens, no one will really know why. Fingers will point in different directions, but more fingers will point at me. It doesn't feel good to ruin other people's vacations, and it doesn't feel good to ruin my own vacation.

So, I had to choose... Had to choose between going to the beach with a group of people I could get along with and going to the beach with a group of people I might get along with... I only get one vacation, and you only get one vacation. How should this go?

To build something, we need to spend time together in a way that doesn't lend an advantage either person. I don't know exactly how to do that. I know that you won't try to do this on your own. And, I know that if I try to do this, I'm defeated in my attempt to put as little effort into maintaining our relationship as you do.

So, I sit.

Same old crappy computer...

18 months later, and I've still got the same junky computer. You wouldn't look at it and think it is bad-- it looks fine. On the surface it does a lot of the things that you'd expect a computer to do... It can show pictures. I can usually surf the web. I say usually because I'm forced into using firefox, and the formatting of webpages is sometimes horribly skewed on firefox.

If I want to see this thing fall apart, all I have to do is pop a DVD into the drive... I've googled "Dell Inspiron 6000 slow DVD drive" so many times, I think I'm personally impacting the search rankings. Hours and weekends disappear into a black hole of time, never to be seen again. Dell's premium tech support expired in August. I spent a few hours with them too, trying to make this work, what a waste.

I bought a MacBook about a year ago, and it runs like a gem. I don't want to put Windows on the MacBook though, because then it would run like a PC.... or I guess I should say it wouldn't run, like a PC.

Microsoft is coming out with Windows 7, or something like that. In my field, 100% of the computers are still using XP-- none use vista. I wonder what will happen when 7 comes out-- will they still offer business computers with an XP option? There's got to be a better way than this.

Tortured Perfection

I have often admired how some people can simply shrug off things that devastate me with anxiety. Anxiety is a strange beast, though. I've come to think that I may have a certain level of anxiety within me, and that I just try to find various excuses to experience it. I worry about one thing until it has passed, then find something new to worry about. I suspect other people do this too, but I don't know if everyone does this, and for those that do, I don't know if we do it all of the time.

I know that my anxiety reduces significantly on vacations, and I wonder why that is. The easy explanation is that I make a conscious choice to relax because I'm on vacation. Well, if it's that simple, why don't I just make a conscious decision to just relax, all the time? Can I make such a decision? Will it work? I probably ought to try at some point, but I don't really have to "try" when I'm on vacation, so why should I have to "try" otherwise?

I recognize that there have been periods of time in my life with very little stress and anxiety-- sometimes these periods have lasted for several months. I'm not really sure how I created these time periods, but I'm glad that they happened. Perhaps though, these time periods never really happened at all. Perhaps these are just time periods during which I have forgotten my anxieties. If that's true, maybe all I really need to do is learn how to forget my anxiety.

An interesting paradox occurs on the way to perfection, that I suspect demonstrates the idea that there is always a certain amount of anxiety. Well, first of all, I never reach perfection, but I seek it in certain areas. One such area is management of stress and anxiety. The closer I get to acheeving perfection the more anxiety I develop about maintaining my progress. As I stray further from perfection, I develop more anxiety about my failure to achieve perfection. The cycle doesn't really reach a long term steady state, but instead shifts from one side to the other like a boat rocking on the waves.

I often wonder if I would have less stress if I had less material things. I don't know the answer to that now, but I'm going to find out. It's all part of a plan. The 8 year plan.

I am the enemy.

I recently made an anonymous post on a blog I follow. I didn't mean to upset the moderator of the blog, but I did, and he made a post threatening to delete future such posts, and issuing a stern warning. He also made some other comments too-- like "you only recently found this blog", which didn't really seem true, since I've read it regularly for months, but compared to some of the regular posters there, I am relatively recent. So, I wondered if he somehow was able to figure things out about me. Perhaps he couldn't pinpoint me exactly, but just knew roughly where the post was coming from.

So, I decided to post a comment on my own blog, since no one else ever has, and see what info I can figure out about the post (the other blog is also on blogspot, so I figure we're both getting the same info). When I tried to access my blog as a casual browser might, McAfee told me that my blog was known for asking for financial information and other nefarious acts! I was astonished-- it's a ten post blog with no subscribers and no comments. I think only a handful of lost souls have ever seen the blog. I certainly ask for no information. I started to wonder if somehow there was spyware on my computer and it had infected the blog-- doesn't seem likely though. I mean, my computer may be dirtier than a whore on vacation, but I doubt I would somehow be able to transfect a site like blogger, and restrict the transfection to only my blog, and somehow ask for financial information when the only input for users is the comment box... No, it's just crappy antivirus software.

Anyway, McAfee stinks, obviously. I'm glad I pay for this software, otherwise I'd delete it.

Oh yeah, and as far as I can tell the other blogger can't really tell who posted on his site. I guess if I'm wrong, he'll post here. Perhaps he was threatening "anonymous" in general, as he could stop anonymous posting, and/or certainly he could any comment he desires. Anyway, he made an excellent point at the end of his warning to me, if I've got so much to say, I ought to say it on my own blog-- he's definitely right about that.

I changed it.

I changed it because I wanted to. Not because I had to. That isn't really a sentence, but on a blog, I can make a sentence out of any collection of words. Just left end it with an uppercase, and right end it with a period. Sentence.

Anyway, I've been gone a long time. I think I've lost a lot of my introspection. I think I know why. I don't know if it's growing or just working, but I think it's there. First I lost my ability to see the future, and then I lost my ability to introspect, and now usually I just am. When I really work hard I can think about that and not like it, but most of the time I don't notice it, and even when I notice it I'm not sure if I care. Worse, I'm not sure how to make myself care.

I won't promise to write more. I'll just try to.

That's not what I want

I've been expecting it for a while. That discussion.

"I haven't heard from you in a while. You could call more often." He suggests.

"Dad, you could call me more often, too. A relationship is supposed to be a two way street. I call you more often than you call me. I've done so for the last 10 years, and I've got the phone records to prove it." I respond.

"That isn't how it works. You call me."

"It's better for you to keep that rule intact than to have a relationship with your son?"

"You need to understand that, later in life you may regret that. Let's just say that certain things someone in your position may feel entitled to might not be there when the time comes."

"Is that what you think I want? Why would you think that? Since college I have never asked you for money-- not even to help pay for medical school. That's 11 years without asking for a cent. I don't visit you. I call you ten times a year to remind you that you have a perfectly good son that you refuse to engage in a meaningful relationship, and to remind me that I do more than you do in attempting to keep our relationship alive. Despite this, you think that I want your material possesions? I don't even know what your possesions are. I don't know what you have in your house, your bank, your mind, or your heart. I don't know what you have that you care about; that you hold special. I know it isn't me. The idea that after you pass I will want your things or your money is simply wrong. I don't know what your things are. I don't have your money, and clearly I don't care to 'work' towards getting it."

The words came out, but it was useless. Shortly after "Is", the mind stopped listening. A crystal glass swirled rocks of ice around some Jack Daniels, only barely mixed with some diet coke. The noise continued for a while, and then he replies softly, and slowly "Well, it's up to you." The tone of his voice is different this time, and it's disturbing, and he knows it-- that's the point. It's not the voice he uses regularly-- not the typical drunk swagger. It's the old voice. The voice of the father who has been gone since 1997. The current imposter is using the old voice as an impersonation-- an impersonation of someone he once was, but clearly no longer is.

The anger builds inside of me, as the imposter rubs salt in the wound of losing someone cared for. "Well, it's up to you, too." I reply.

The only thing I'm sure I'll have in the future is the same thing I have now: an unsatisfactory relationship with my father.