wandering the sheltering sky

I have a friend in Austin that’s going through a divorce. We don’t get to talk often; i’m on the west coast and busy. She’s in Texas and probably busier.

Her marriage wasn’t a terrible marriage in the way that those sorts of things go but it was fundamentally flawed. Ten years later and she’s single again.

And in one of our far too infrequent conversations, she made an interesting comment- one of the things she’s been pondering is what commonality, what common thread have the men in her life had?

Her question began the same question within me. But whereas her direction was probably more towards finding a common fatal flaw that she was initially either attracted to or overlooked, i took it a different direction. I started to wonder what the common thread was in the women i’ve loved; many of which i love to this day to one degree or another.

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Over the last few years, i’ve tried writing this. I usually found myself getting into more detail and nuance than a simple post demanded. But again, it’s not a small statement of fact that i make when i say that this was one of the pivotal moments of my adolescence.

I’m writing this for both people that went to my high school and those that did not. There may be excessive explanations at times.

In 11th grade, i was signed up for chemistry. My teacher was a generally mild mannered man that we called Dr. Don. I think his last name was Williams or Walters. He was geek chic more than a decade before anyone acknowledged geeks in any fashion other than to taunt, torment, vex, harass and make their lives a living hell. I can’t say i was a good chemistry student. In fact, it’s probably safe to say i was a bad chemistry student. Come to think of it, i was pretty bad at everything school related or otherwise. The only thing worse than my academics at the time was my love life. But hey, i could cultivate a nice crop of acne that was the envy of OPEC. I lost count of the number of times i woke up to disturb the petroleum engineers that were prospecting my face.
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I think i’m writing this more for myself than for anyone that might read it. My enthusiasm for writing on synaesthetic has waned in the last few years. I honestly can’t give a single answer as to why. Part of it is after being treated for my sleep apnea, i’ve become a different person. Part of it is i’ve allowed myself to get drawn in and distracted by gaming. Another aspect is that sometimes i don’t know what to say anymore.
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My friends Carolyn and Daniel visited me in October of last year. We were about 2 weeks from the peak of autumn and color changes were happening so fast that you could see the difference from day to day. We were able to see the Columbia Gorge as well as Silver Falls. At some point i turned to Carolyn and said, “Believe it or not, it’s even greener in Olympia.” She looked at me like i was having a tin foil hat moment and that my noodle was all full of crazy sauce. Possibly trying to placate me or simply unable to conceive that it could possibly get ANY greener than it was in Oregon, she just very nicely said, “Ooookaaaay.”
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It’s been a terrible winter. In fact, the only winter days we’ve had were before 21 December (that’s the first day of winter for those who don’t know). Yesterday was as unremarkable as any other day of late. High 40′s, low 50′s with a non descript grey sheet stretching from horizon to horizon. But something odd happened. I saw it for the first time in weeks; perhaps months.
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I’m in the locker room at my gym a couple of days ago and the pundit on the Stupid Box has cranked his Righteousometer to 11. “Tiger needs to apologize!”, “Tiger should stop playing for 6 months and get his life together”, “Tiger will lose his endorsements and his career is possibly over.”

These are just a few things i heard that day and since then i’ve heard far more and far worse.

Not trying to be crass here but to all you self appointed moralists, go help yourself to a large cup of Shut the Fuck Up.
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Last Sunday i was in Olympia. There’s a pond/ small lake near where Adelle lives. In months past, we’ve gone there to see several species of duck vying for the chunks of bread that we toss to them as well as lazy fat newts bobbing near the surface, chowing down on crumbs too small for the birds to notice.

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I’m sitting in on a meeting of educators this morning as they discuss engaging the seniors at our school in the seminar they have to present before they can graduate. One of them mentions a reality that resonated with me, “…and we have to watch to see that they don’t become frustrated and shut down.”

There probably isn’t any other phrase in my educational experience that describes me. Wait, there is one more: “He becomes bored easily and daydreams often.” But i digress.
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Until recently i had believed that Austin’s favorite cocaine fueled paranoid sociopath*, Alex Jones, had given up on living on the backs of the weak minded, ignorant and racist flock that followed him. This is mostly due to the fact i live half a continent away from Austin. As it turns out, i was wrong- in fact, Jarhead Jones is still around and apparently richer than ever from his crockumentaries and his fleecing his flock of their money.

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I'm a mavrik ! How about you?

A few days ago i posted this image of a group of white people at a house, showing off their Confederate flag (what i’ve heard some call The Traitor’s Flag) with signs in their yard that read [sic], “I’m a mavrik” and [sic] “socialest”. The former, presumably being a reference to the bold souls that wrote this sign and the latter being a reference to President Obama. And while it’s possible they’re maverick’s in illiteracy, chances are these are just a group of ignorant, angry and possibly inbred twats.

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