Happier Place

A couple of recent posts of mine would seem to indicate that I am typing this post from beyond, while my beautiful corpse was rotting inside the Rubbermaid shed in my backyard (I'm a big Robin Williams fan). Not so, my friends! I have triumphantly overcome my sad place and turned it upside down into a happy place. The problem is that when I turned my sad place upside down, all the furniture got ruined in the process. Dammit! Well, I suppose a trip to IKEA might be in order. They say that Valhalla awaits those who die while assembling flat-pack Swedish furniture. I can't wait to meet Conan the Barbarian. I'm pretty sure he'll be blown away by my tales of putting tab "A" into tab "B" and twisting fasteners with just the right flick of the wrist. Don't worry that none of this made any sense. Just be happy for me that I feel good today.

 

Time for a rotate and balance

I've been feeling a bit paranoid today. Why am I feeling this way? Well, it probably has to do with the fact that I think that people are on to me. The thing is that I'm really not up to anything, but I have people that used to be closer to me drop out of my life. It's like they are picking up on a vibe and subconsciously distancing themselves from me. Or, maybe, I am withdrawing from them. Whatever greener pastures that I see them drifting off to in my paranoia, I am not exactly protesting; rather, I lament the growing distance.

Someday I could serve some kind of purpose for them: a reference point and an example to buttress their reality at my own expense. At what point do the hands of friends and family close? They don't, really, but I've seen mine become wobbly and reluctant when I could not accept the reality of another. That person is gone now.

I checked into that person's reality and found out why open arms only led back to the reasons for checking out in the first place. So, I go about my reality forming carefully now. I watch and see who is trending on me and who is flaking. What matters is who is sticking with me, regardless of where my life journey goes. Because, I can't settle for comfort or for salve. I cannot partake of prosperity served in a dog dish, either. But, I also do need to get over myself and lighten up.

It's a balance that I am after. It's becoming more aware of the Dharma in the world, but not forgetting I'm a white guy who loves Jesus and shooting clay pigeons. It's allowing people to be different from me and still love them. Mostly, though, it's about allowing myself to be different from those that I love and not hating myself.

A Moment of Ingratitude and Frustration

Sometimes I feel like I'm left holding the bag of my mother and father's inadequate parenting.  I have no idea what I am going to do about my older brother.  He is a mess in so many ways that it is absolutely breaking my heart.  I feel almost powerless to help him.  I already watched one of my sisters kill herself with alcohol.  My brother hasn't taken care of himself, is morbidly obese, can't even work a part-time job without physical and emotional issues.  I've pretty much resigned myself to being his caretaker for the rest of his/my life.  This will pretty much insure that I will have no progeny. It's hard to fix 'em when they're adults.  Somewhere along the line my parents just stopped looking for answers for my brother.  Oh, they wondered, but it never went as far as trying to get him help.  I think my mother probably just kept putting his name in the temple prayer rolls, hoping that Jesus would come down in his magic spaceship and fix him for her.  My dad did his best at never having meaningful interaction with him, only sporadic outbursts of aggressive demands and cut downs.  It blows my mind.  

F to the uck.