Category Archives: Uncategorized

When that which we think is, isn’t.

Disclaimer, I hunt, I believe in the right to keep and bear arms, I believe in the right to be free of unwarranted search and seizure, my home is my castle, collecting rainwater for my garden and orchard isn’t against the law, it is saving for a later day.

I also believe if you hurt a child, a woman, or a country of people who you intentionally kept uneducated for monetary and aristocratic reasons, that you should be hurt and healed multiple times until the scales are balanced. I also believe that if you are a hypocrite I no longer have to listen to you and that any words you proffer as advice, leadership, or caring from your last hypocritical point forward, are all lies and I don’t care what comes out of your sub-nasal blow-hole, because I quit listening one lie back.  That said I also believe we need the Erin Brockovich of the world, that the small man needs someone to keep out big industry, mom-and-pop shops are the life blood of America, and that everyone can use a hand up from time to time, and that growing your own food should be a standard of practice, not “those weird hippies at the end of the street”.

But when the liberal media and liberal actors tell us that shelters are bad, and eating animals are bad, and Sarah McLachlan guilt’s us into sending money in every time we hear her songs on the radio, and that it all might be a lie; I’m lost. You mind yours, I’ll mind mine, but don’t use sad images and guilt to get Legend and MonkeyHead to talk me into liberating multiple dogs from the local shelter, because “we have a big yard”.

Please someone prove to me this article is Huff Post‘s attempt at being the http://www.duffelblog.com

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nathan-j-winograd/peta-kills-puppies-kittens_b_2979220.html

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I’m afraid to get old

This weekend was somber weekend, Veterans day, and a financial management class that is making me feel like a kindergartener in a bouncy house full of high-schoolers, and I’m stationed away from Legend and MonkeyHead. So I went to see a couple of movies, Last Vegas, was pretty awesome. Do you think about your friends from grade school? Do you wish you’d kept in better touch? Go see this movie and that guilt may have you running to the lobby to exhaust the battery on your cell phone.

I won’t give away the movie, but I can say De Niro has aged a ton since Heat, and by the previews apparently him and Stallone are both afraid of not being able to act anymore. But what struck me is this; I have an awesome wife, a great marriage,and a stable relationship with MonkeyHead. The problem is we’ve done it all through the phone, Skype, and email.

For 10 years I’ve traveled the world doing what I loved for the country I love,at what I now believe is  a detriment to my marriage. No, we aren’t getting divorced, or at least I haven’t received that memo yet, but as I watched the movie and realized that in the blink of an eye, I’m going to be 60. What if Legend leaves before I’m ready to? In all reality though, if the past 11-12 years is any indication, that will never happen, But if she does, how crushed will I be? I can foresee my life slowing to a grind of what ifs, and should-haves. I dig her, the things we do together, the places we’ve been, the conversations I’ve paid attention to. I can’t imagine that ever not being an option, but what if? What of my children? I can be a bit maniacal at time, has that pushed them too far? Do they remember it, or have they already picked out the ankle chain and cave for my 65th birthday? I don’t know but I’m scared to get old, and be alone after what seemed like forever to find the person that actually puts up with me and can put me in my place.

I just want that chance to fill a thousand Shutterfly books with pictures of weekend get aways, pets and luau photos, and show them so much my grand-kids can tell me whats going on in the pictures better than i can remember, and maybe one day Legend and I will be the next generational commercial.

So I try to listen more, not spend too much money, am set on what I won’t do when talking to my girls. I might even chip down the honey-do list, but really I think to set and just listen to nothing with Legend at my side might be enough to give me the strength to push my fears away.

for Legend:

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People can let you down

But not this time; when you think of the jerk who cut you off this morning, the chick that took the last treadmill, the kids that scratched your car. Remember a simple thank you, a heartfelt  “how are you?” and then listen to the answer, these things mean something, over tipping the cart girl cause shes freezing to bring you that coffee, let people know you care, find something and pay it forward, take a chance and lift up your fellow man. As Gandhi said “if we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. … We need not wait to see what others do.” or as you might have heard it…” be the change you wish to see in the world”

to give you hope

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Duck Dynasty on Success

Thank you to the Robertson family for having and displaying family values, talking at multiple engagements around the country on the importance of parenting, loving one another and deriving your success from your’s and you family’s efforts and nothing more.

Hard work, focus, planning, mentorship, followership, drive, belief, support, motivation, trust and faith. Can we take ten minutes a day to demonstrate this to our children, family and co-workers, can we live a laugh that serves as a “how to” guide for those we influence most? or are we destined to Al Bundy our life over our single lifetime accomplishment? See it and speak it into existence, what you take in is what you’ll give out.

phil

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empowerment in the age of complacency

English: Royce Gracie

English: Royce Gracie (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Welcome back, if you have never read me before, let me fill you in a little bit. i am a 23 year veteran of the military, with multiple deployments where bad people prove their displeasure in Americans by shooting at them. I am married to Legend, my rock and we have MonkeyHead and Bubba, plus 4 dogs. Those girls are the light of my life and both are totally different people. Bubba is loud, outspoken, and has her daddy’s calm temper and quiet voice and personality. (<-sarcasm) MonkeyHead is introspective and a million times smarter than I am, she doesn’t believe in the victimization of woman, or the need to use sexual images to sell music. She has read all the Harry Potter books, except the last one, and the best way to punish her is to not let her read at night. She is also only ten, having standards, morals, and being an individual at the peak developmental phase for mean girls is not an easy road. Daddy’s answer is to choke them out, Legend does not agree, what we agree in is empowering our children to stand up for themselves and others, speak their mind and that the most important choices we make are the ones we make when no one is watching.

The Gracie family has been around for years since before UFC, Pride, or even Ken Shamrock. Confidence is key in life, if you don’t know how to instill that trait in your children, that is ok, find someone to help you. You ask Legend, I don’t know everything and am fast learning i can’t do it all my way, to many cracks in my foundation at an early age, and the mortar only covered them up, not filled them in. Don’t rest on the complacency a 60 inch tv can bring you, engage with your children, love them empower them, and find help somewhere besides Dr. Spock, he was wrong and our children today are paying that price.

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Letting Go

So about three years ago I lost a great friend. He was 3-4 years younger than me and, came back from a PT run with his Marines, and died of a heart attack. His Facebook page is memorialized, so every now and then I go and visit him say hi, tell him a joke, or remind him of a memory, but just because honestly I don’t know how to let go. I’ve lost others in the past, some permanent, some by choice, and I’ve caused loss, some permanent by choice. But for some reason it doesn’t seem real when I think of him being gone.

He and I met in our first unit 20 years ago, both non-rates of any value but we worked hard, played hard, and drank hard together, then we both transferred, him overseas, and me back to the Navy, 3 years later we ran into each other on board the chicken of the sea. We picked up where we left off; older, wiser, him still single, and me on the fast track to a divorce. We had an incredible journey.  We Drank a Bar out of its native beer, stopped a revolution, paid a HUGE bar tab by playing spades, rescued the USS Cole and celebrated my 30th birthday on a tropical beach that a few years later would be decimated by one of the worst tsunamis the world has ever known.

We took my “little” brother all over Hawaii, and got in trouble for walking on the reef. We raced an entire Indianapolis 500 on an x-box, oh and for the record, it takes as long on the game as it does in real life. We kept in touch through email and a couple of times in person, I had gotten hurt on our deployment so I decided to take my bell bottoms and go home. He found the love of his life and they went on to see the world together, and have what, knowing him, had to have been phenomenal adventures.

As I missed him the other day, I checked out his page and found that his wife has moved on and has had a beautiful Baby girl, though not remarried she looks happy. It struck me, “he just died, why so soon?” the fact was it was more than three years, and that one thing in my life had slowed to such a trickle of existence it didn’t seem possible.

Thinking of mine and legends relationship, I don’t think I could let go, even after three years, I just don’t know that that part of me lets go of those that mean the most to me.  My grandparents all died within 9 months of each other, and no more than 5 months between the couples, they couldn’t let go either.

I don’t know how to accept a loss I’m not willing to lose, and am envious of those who can move forward after one, If Legend were to leave me through time or need, I know that would be the start of my being alone forever, because I’m no good at letting go.

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what happens when we find we are fallible

So many times in our lives we feel as if we aren’t good enough, and that is fine. I believe it pushes us to try harder, to dig deeper, to fight longer and set bigger goals. Unfortunately what we get hung on is, the fact they we didn’t reach those goals. Setting the goal is easy, like getting all A’s on our next report card, but then where is the plan to earn those A’s? The world could care less about your plans, God and Buddha, didn’t ask before they set your world in motion, they put you here to realize a few things. At this moment, right now you are where you are supposed to be, the task you completed today and the tasks you didn’t complete today were exactly done the way they were supposed to. The only way it could have been better was if someone else did them perfectly to your specifications, or that you built a solid enough plan, and followed to get everything done that this day had deemed important.

SeatedBuddhaGandhara2ndCentury

SeatedBuddhaGandhara2ndCentury (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I watched Legend find she wasn’t perfect for the first time ever in her life last week. I’m sure it was the first time because I recognized the lost look in her eyes, the fact that at that moment she seemed shorter than her normal “can’t meet the clown’s arm” height, and the sound of despair coming haltingly from her lips. I love her, how do you help someone when they found out they are normal? that as smart as we strive to be, the books we read, the moral compass we adjust to our perfection throughout our lives, sometimes regardless of these efforts we are still imperfect humans despite our best efforts.

Years of experience in any job, where you have the chance to become the old man, makes you appear to others as if you’ve got it all together. The truth is you have simply survived long enough to keep a mental catalog of all of your life and job “not-to-do” list. So I may look like I’m a mind reader, the truth is, 20 years ago I tried the same dumb crap, with the same foreseeable results and am simply still around to save others from themselves. This fact of my life gives me a pleasurable pause and hope. The hope is that in 20 more years of marriage, maybe I’ll have the right answers, other than “yes dear” the hope that maybe I won’t break my children and I will be a good dad, the hope that as this chapter of my life grows closer to ending, graduation is looming closer in the future, maybe there is hope for all of us.

Today I went for a bike ride, just a touch over 20 miles, the weather was awesome, 70 degrees, a little breeze little traffic (rural Tennessee isn’t to bicycle friendly) and I just rode. As I rode past some stables today I saw very few people out and about; One in particular caught my eye. A woman about my age, close to my height and weight jogging, there was no joy, just determination, as I rode up to her, I told her ” You are AWESOME!! Keep it up!” that true joy that came across her face was worth the pain I feel sitting here.

I have an idea, it has nothing to do with the shut down, the war, crappy school lunch programs, or gas prices, but something I now will work. Lets put in our time, work hard, lift others up like Haley Joel did in Pay it forward, and see if we can’t make our world a better place from the inside out, just like I know I am trying every day and I hope you are too.

God the Father 04

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Black and white.

I’m just ranting on for a bit to line this out bear with me. But if your child wants to do something you say yes or no, and if questioned answer, not because I told you so or because I’m the mommy, but this is how we teach our children the difference between white and wrong. “Don’t eat that, you’ll get fat” as you stuff your third krispy kreme down your suck hole, is probably not teaching them anything other than your superiority through poor moral decisions or food choice, “because I’m the mommy” is only teaching your children to lie. Do parents have guilty pleasures, sure? but flaunting those parental exceptions causes resentment, disrespect, and sneaking behavior. If you don’t want them to do it, let them be honest about it. “Would you like to eat cake?” ” no, thank you i would not like to eat cake” is better and easier swallowed than “would you like to eat cake?” “i don’t feel good, i need to go home”

Why bother? just be upfront, teach your children to be up front. It’s hard for you and them early on because most other parents are concerned  morevwith perception and acceptance than with moral fiber and the ability to read. (Monkey head had all but the last Harry Potter book read before 3rd grade, but her friends saw all the movies, that’s pretty much the same thing right?”

I also know how hard it is to be honest and still be “wrong”. When legend and I started dating I had been seeing another woman, we’ll call her “psycho” for short, anyway because we lived more than 3 hours apart, I worked full-time and went to school full-time, there was a lot of phone tag. Once I finally was able to get ahold of her, Legend was at my apartment, I told psycho I had met someone else and that I wished to discontinue or “relationship” (adult “relations” and dinner 3 times isn’t really a relationship, is it?) in order to see how Legend and I would work out. The first thing out of her mouth was, I was a liar, and I was making her (Legend) up, I told her I had far better things to do with my life than lie to her. I then proceeded to get a pretty good earful for being a liar and other colorful adjectives, to which all I could say was “look, I’m trying to be honest with you, if you don’t want to take that, that’s  fine, but if you can’t handle my honesty that is on you, but she’s (legend) right here if you want to talk to her. that ended and I still feel that if I’m honest and outright, and respect you or anyone enough to tell you the truth, your reaction is your problem, not mine.

Listen I get the need for omission; ” is it bad?”, “no, no its ok we’ll be ok”. Beats the hell out of “HFS! Godzilla has a Uzi flamethrower and is coming through our front door” sometimes that little white lie is necessary. Do you crush your child’s belief of Santa Clause at three because they don’t clean their room? Do you continue on the tradition of Santa until they are 13-14 to share a tradition you hope to pass to your grandchildren? But where is the tolerance level set, now when they are young and are developing into the human they will be in the future, or later via a counselor in the youth home?

I don’t know it all, but I know what I learned and how I’ve had to re-learn better more productive ways to positively influence my children and life in a disciplined and productive manner that won’t make my kids into 5 o’clock news stories, I just believe the white lie will come eventually, why install it to early?

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