Drew in Zombieland

This moves me so…

Not sure if it’s America finally embracing soccer or the win itself but something inside me knows this is as big of a moment for the USA as well as the rest of the world.

Our finally coming around, en mass, to soccer (football) almost seems like an end to American Exceptionalism and the horrible Bush Doctorine, preemptive war type thinking that has kept the USA seperate from our fellow humans the world round, for so long.

Or maybe it’s just a beautiful game. Excuse me while I weep like a fucking baby. USA USA USA!

Grandpas yell: “get off my lawn and don’t come back.”

Grandpas say it a lot and I shoot back with:

“lawns and their upkeep are a serious addition to the nightmare that is our inability to preserve our resources. See Grandpa, the sod you’ve replaced 8 times in the last 5 years is grown in a field where crops could be grown. The water used to cultivate that grass field for you used ridiculous amounts of water we don’t have.

Then that shit gets sent to your house after the last batch died because you live in a desert grandpa (California). Kentucky Bluegrass doesn’t belong in the desert Grandpa.

Then you water that shit AND THE FUCKING SIDEWALK and the fucking road everyday for ten weeks until it dies and you spend a thousand bucks having it replaced.

And don’t get me started on the amount of wasted resources and pollutants that the little team of Mexican Americans use each week to make sure you precious lawn looks perfectly manicured so you can sneer at the neighbor Jenkins who has turned to a xero-scape, desert lawn that requires no upkeep.”

Then I not only step in his yard on his grass, i also break his sprinkler heads when he’s not looking.

(edit: in reality I have no grandpas left —)

Oh Man, I wanna take this opportunity to apologize to the Chase executive dude that was invited by my employer to come and offer us their services.

He was standing in the turn around area in the main entry handing out Chase Credit card offers or some other nonsense and when he semi-shoves the paper into my hand I wasn’t even thinking when I looked at the paper, laughed at the realization it was a Chase credit card offer and proceeded to crumple it up.

I didn’t look back after I tossed the wad of Chase paper into the trash. That wasn’t very nice. The whole thing wasn’t very nice but in my defense, they are a scum sucking vampire corporation.

But still, sorry dude

Makes me feel warm and sad at the same time. Brilliant song and group.

We all carry a certain amount of inundation in our bodies for the perceived world around us. This amount is like a water level that when exceeded cause us to fight or flight.

In Adult Children, this normal level of inundation is increased by a certain amount causing the person to be walking around on egg shells just waiting for the other shoe to drop and the fight/flight to kick in.

I am an Adult Child and I get inundated by the silliest things:

- I hate wrist watches because they’re too constricting

- I avoid wallets because they feel uncomfortable to sit on.

- I rip all my clothes off when I get home from work and wear my boxers because clothes are too constrictive.

Inundation cause people to run from relationships, avoid advancement as well as avoid groups and other people. Inundation is sometimes the culprit behind loners and lifetime bachelors as well as mid life crises and mental break downs.

Sometimes my cat inundates me when it wants to snuggle. When I realized that, I realized I had a problem.

I was at rock bottom when i started unearthing that ancient anger and pain from my childhood and as I gained strength to act on my own behalf, I was still at the maturity level of a young child and lashing out was all I knew.

That same Christmas I decided to let these two jerks (my parents) know exactly how I felt about their drinking and their drama. I got some big Christmas cards and in the ugliest magic-marker I could find I blasted them both back to the stone age.

I told them about themselves but good. I laid into their selfishness, their inability to make me feel safe, for all the years I had to be the parent, for the loss of my childhood, for the fact that I had to carry around a small pack in case I had to leave in a haste.

I got even nastier about their disgusting habit of drinking and cheating on each other. It was ugly and the magic markers made it look like a crazy person was stalking them-

My mom (who i am still close to) was devastated, but in a good way. She talked to me and held an ongoing conversation and this became the launching point for our further relationship. Dad said nothing. He never reaches out and I stopped trying. One for two…

Looking back I am so proud of the little boy who, even though he was scared and sad, still for the first time took charge and stuck up for me. He acted on my behalf and I will never forget what he did for me.

The anger I feel for what they did has totally subsided (coincidentally it has lessened at the same rate as my inner self-hate has lessened) But I will never forget what they did and never forget how I got out of that hell and became the man that I am…becoming.

If you could get one minute of undivided attention from every single human being on this planet, what would you use it for?

I would tell them that the atoms of out bodies are traceable to stars that manufactured them in their cores and exploded these enriched ingredients across our galaxy, billions of years ago. For this reason, we are biologically connected to every other living thing in the world. We are chemically connected to all molecules on Earth. And we are atomically connected to all atoms in the universe. We are not figuratively, but literally stardust.

Neil deGrasse Tyson answering question from Reddit.com user-

http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/bwe6j/neil_degrasse_tyson_answers_your_questions/

Foster a good relationship with your inner self. There is a lot we don’t understand about head talk but one thing we do know is that the head talk is what leads us to decision making and if that talk is flawed, negative and angry (derogatory) then willpower will be diminished.

I went through a lot of new-ish recovery the last 10 years and can tell you from experience that if you clean up the head talk and eliminate the negative talk, habits will change quicker and easier.

I created a third person (healthy Gary) to talk to and be the parent to the scared voice and the negative voice in my head (negative is my mom and dad - scared is my true sad self) - slowly but surely I negotiated, very lovingly (lovingly even to the negative voice) the stuff the voices were saying and developed a dialog that helped create a sense of safety for the weak voice and a sense of love for the negative one.)

And my weak voice began to feel more safe and protected, changes started happening at an incredible rate and will power grew as well. With my inner voices all on the same page, I made deals with them all to get things done: Little (weak) Gary would do exercise because he wanted to meet girls. Negative Gary turned into ‘warning Gary’ as he realized he was just going over the top and we would listen if he toned it down.

I created a safe place for my voices to thrive. I know this sounds silly but this shit works like no one’s business. It helped me grow my internal age from about 13 emotionally to about 27.

From the album Bitte Orca I give you Dirty Projectors and their varied and sumptuous music. The song is called ‘Stillness is the Move’:

That totally reminds me of my dad. All my life I hated the man and with good reason as he hit me and was drunk a lot and loved to make fun of my weight but there was always something really unnatural to the idea that I would hate my own father but I did with all my heart.

Later on in life, as I got better, I started to see the whole picture of my childhood more clearly. Because he was an alcoholic and less than the ideal husband for my mom, she turned me into her surrogate husband - I went everywhere with her, listen to her issues, her problems, commiserated with her about other men and especially about my dad. We would even go so far as ganging up on him and mocking him openly to his face. I would protect my mom at any price and he was no exception.

Now that I’m 40 and so much better inside and out, I can see how that dynamic ruined how I saw my father, how I ganged up on him for my mother and how her issues and inner hatred were transferred to me…a child who needed his father.

These days I have a horrible time relating to men which is all the more weird because I am heavily into sports and guy things but have very few guy friends. I am also rediscovering my ‘guy’ side and trying to do more guy things to offset this empty feeling I have for my father and for the absence of men in my life. I don’t blame my mom so much as she was doing what people do when abandoned by their alcoholic mate but I can now see how much stuff was put on my dad unfairly and without being true. My mom’s hatred became my hatred and my relationship to my dad has never been the same.

Now don’t get me wrong, he was a shithead for the most part but because of this sick and crappy dynamic of an alcoholic family, I was never able to see who he really was and I can now see that that guy was more than just a drunk - he was my dad.

PS - this exact same dynamic can happen in any dysfunctional family - not just for alcoholics.