The Long Road Out

 How many “worst days of my life” do most people have to experience until their trauma recedes? I’sms guess I’m at around 20?  A third in 2012, and the remainder in 2023 and 3024.  Time will tell.  No one will know the ultimate answer except me and my fellow depressives. If you haven’t lived here, you are among the group who thinks going out for a run makes you feel better.  Those people become life coaches and condescend to those who know the truth.  I know the truth and I know you are unqualified to have an opinion. You can’t afford to hire me so don’t bother trying.

 I sold my home today. Had to go to settle a divorce thing.  Soon strangers will be wandering around the spaces that protected me, felt loving, and provided so many smiles Tryst another “worst day of my life.” Yeah, I know, I’m wracking those up at the rate of one a month recently. Still.  I unceremoniously dumped the asset in life that means the most to me. My cats are spectacular, my home was deep, and my marriage was a mediocre piece of shit from start to insulting finish.   My mute sociopath life partner. I mean, really. No help coming from that quarter, as we all knew. My parents refused to stay under her roof. They preferred to leave our parties at 2 am and take a three-hour Bolt bus home. Wise folk, my parents. I miss both of them on this lonely sad dreadful eternal day, very very much. I’m 70. Feels like this show is over.  Meanwhile, a lifetime of repressed feeling is pouring out, so signing off my home is working. I want to stand in this honored space ...

Over the course of 28 years, I was subjected to systematic harassment and abuse.  Though these patterns were only physical twice (and in both cases I struck back), they have left me permanently traumatized and in need of regular mental health care. I am currently medicated for trauma- induced depression.  I have not been able to engage in hobbies and my work performance is inadequate. The only reason I haven't been fired is that I own the company, and I have an amazing group of managers and employees who are rooting for me to keep my head above water. My CEO has probably saved my life.  My abuser employed the standard battery of tools of the narcissist variety, including: Gaslighting ("That didn't happen!", "I've always been a lesbian!") Public humiliation and laughing in my face when I asked her to stop or "walk back" particularly abusive statements (all victims learn to shut up after a few of these painful episodes, I believe. ...

I have experienced low points in the multitudes these last three years. This current version has some new angles. The pain is more acute. I feel nauseous. I can't get my clothing organized. My focus is missing. Sleep, please. I just want to escape from this. Today’s event is completing the contract to sell my beloved home in NYC. I’ve lived in that apartment for 28 years, and it brought me more happiness than my wife did during that long stretch. (One time my wife illegally locked me out—and threatened. She also threatened to kill herself either our kitchen knives pretty regularly. Her sense of justice felt skewed to me.) The demise of my beautiful home is a disaster. All those good memories and not a peep.  She’s not an empath—whew…understatement!  No purpose reaching out to her—she’s ghosted me for three years now. I spent half that time in this apartment since then, most of it unable to get off one of the couches. I spent six major three day holidays there by myself, not ...

 I have never had a partner in life who helped me.  The most recent one claimed I was difficult to help.  That may be correct, but her opinion is not valid.  She was always absent, generally with other lovers, whenever I got into trouble.   This time, like every other time, I scream and cry to myself when I'm alone.  I beg that my parents would show up and give me a hug.  I'm 70!   I empathize with myself for this pain.  When I've screamed for help, no one close to me arrived.  Ever.    My ex actually had legal responsibility to do so.  Is her behavior a civil or criminal crime?  She can press charges on herself when the thought dawns on her that she should experience penance and shame and guilt.   Don't hold your breath.  This one's the queen of Lala land.  She don't do shit.  Fuck your sorry ass, honey.  I know you won't lift a finger, as always, but I've got you blocked anyway, so I don't h...

 Recently my ex is fading from view. She wasn’t notable, she’s less so now, and she’s mean. Good riddance as she often said to me.  Today’s fun.  Change of pace on the boringly slow slog through grief, anger, pTSd and depression. Healing. God, that’s a concept for losers and has-beens. Like me! Today:rage!!!  I hate the fucking bitch. What a relief. Something new, like the first crocus of the spring.  I already held space for your mediocrity for 30 years. Thank god I never waited for you to hold space for me. Or anyone else. Because you can’t. You’re a narcissist. You don’t care. 3:48 am:  woke up from a terrible nightmare. The rage continues at an evil flat affect cartoon character who has taken over my home with some version of a lesbian telemarketing company. Everyone has laundry and knitting all over the place and none of them know my ex doesn’t like any of them.  To her they’re all the same as I am—meaningless tools to prop up her missing ego....

 I don’t. Don the Troll Face does!  It’s black people!!!  And something about people with no limbs in wheelchairs?  I didn’t quite catch that. Yup. Make America great again. Just like the KKK promised in the 1920’s, before their leaders were convicted of biting women. If you voted for this version of the White Republic thing, try not to leave teeth marks this time.  Here’s something I agree with you on:  no civilization can live on a milk-toast liberal agenda.  It’s violent, militaristic, paternalistic, and it offers no benefits to citizens.   But nearly every other country with social democrat leadership, even those currently under the sway of morons like Trump, outpaces the US.  In every category. Breaking things in childish pouts doesn’t work.  Has anyone noted that Trump hasn’t stopped the daily murder in the Ukraine and Gaza as he promised?  He’s already been completely outmaneuvered by Putin, Netananyu, and Musk.  And Can...

I learned that line after 10 years of therapy. It's never been as true. I am living my dad's life now. After my mom died he gave up. Me too. You’re going to the UK?  Visiting with what used to be my family too?  Or pushing psychedelics on unqualified users? Either way.  You made me give up. I don’t believe it’s wise to claim you’re impervious to gaslighting and intentionally harmful sociopathy. I certainly am not that strong and I never desired to be.  I always walked home from any workout with you where you got out of control. It was a rule and I never cheated myself by not observing it. And man you used to lose your shit when I did that. I’m so proud of myself, far more from trying to get away from you when you were a rude shit than for being a sensitive caring partner. You took the later as cheap gifts—but you could not take “fuck you” any more than any regular, socialized adult. You are so much weaker than any woman I ever met. (And let’s not talk about sex. ...

Amidst the violence that owns humanity's soul, the lack of love and care and kindness evidenced by ex-wife is irrelevant. That's why she is too. She could have been a real person. Instead she has the empathetic bandwidth of the 2 x 4 she swings at everyone who disrespects her narrative. Anyway, I left her in better financial condition than anyone I know. I bet she'll send me a thank you card one day! Not that she sent me any during the 29 years she gaslit and trash talked me and her other victims.  None of us deserved you—nor does any other good person. You’re getting $2.9 million more dollars from me in a month. Only a million left. You have one job in the midst of all this transactional disaster. To pick up a coffee table and 12 dinner utensils. Your response?  “I’m out of the country.”  Cancel your stupid trip and get you spoons!  You are such a useless tone-deaf troll! You have no conceivable standing as a coach, a healer, or a mental health expert, and I ...

 I’ve learned so much about myself recently.  How much I respect and love my parents. That I am capable of truly helping my brother. That I experienced shame, guilt and grieving at a routine human level until I got my first big F in life—my marriage.  I don’t know my ex anymore, and the only narrative that’s survived our merciless and brutal demise is to shine my light on her trash talking genetic narcissism. We survived as a couple—a terrible dynamic for me—because I put up, shut up,and avoided public humiliation at all costs. It’s costing me $4.4 million to get rid of her and it’s the best money I’ve ever spent. My only resentment from the divorce process is that she’s so lacking in lawyering savvy that we reached settlement terms in a 3 1/2 hour mediation, and then I had to waste $220,000 more getting the nine terms of agreement into the court-required documents. My ex has never held a job—and friends who could easily have helped her never reached out a hand.  Wha...

Here's my current breakdown based on my understanding of our tax filings and assets.  Feel free to add any insights.  BTW, the top 7 now have assets equal to the entire bottom 50% of the global population combined.  Seven equals 4 billion in our wonderful generous world.     

The lead actor in The Endless Summer died two days ago.  I mourn the loss of the utopian raised-consciousness view of the human experience that led him and the film crews to the perfect right hand curl in South Africa back in '61.  Now we have capital.  Seven huge piles of it. And then a bunch of billionaires groveling to hang on to the coattails.  Sad folk.  Ugly.  Watch Mark Zuckerberg kiss up to Brett Kavanaugh. Why is he one of the seven piles? How did he finally find a fraternity that would admit his sorry ass?  Why would he devalue himself by being seen in photos with a tool like Kavanaugh?   Because he figured out how to get people to click on paid advertisements.  That’s why. He monetized more of us than almost anyone. Seems like the karma is even worse today…not the fault of the seven "aligned" planets.   We humans are fully capable of self-administering punishment… as so much of the art and literature...

I am getting stronger after my three year descent into depression.  It's rewarding…though I know I'll never match the false plateau I lived on from my 20's until my late 60's when I faced the bloody incisors of trauma full frontal. But now I can see my village and it looks a bit like Dresden, or what I imagine Gaza looks like after the pummeling my country financed.  My village needs creative solutions and maybe I can settle myself in Truckee and help others? My brother.  Bipolar and overwhelming.  Bring him close? Get him back on skis, which he used to love?  Janice? My home.  An expansion project?  Add a bedroom and a bath and a large common room? Diana—lifetime longest friend, without a single asset at age 70.  Myself… owning the strength and power I possess and need more than ever.  And marveling with joy that at 70 I can still kick small-scale butt. Lucretia—cash her out, give her freedom, and also maintain partial own...

Pete Hegesdeath is some sort of wingnut fundamentalist Christian. Ho hum.   I can’t imagine basing a belief system on the Bible.  Like all multi-authored translated and censored works, it’s terrible literature. Anyone who reads that shit and enjoys it has no serious reading history outside of what their mommy or daddy told them to read.  What a rich world they miss, and what a crime when these deeply scarred and impaired parents pass the same brainwashing on to their own children.  As if it was a gift they personally received from little baby Jesus. (Jesus just ordered that schlock on Amazon—your guiding principles were delivered via Jeff Bezos by the delivery people who will soon be deported.) Then, there’s the US Constitution!  Don't get me started.  Just another hodgepodge of committee work, written in the blood of millions, most dramatically in our Civil War—1860 to ongoing.  More blood to come from that piece of crap.   I wouldn’t care about ...

Some part skin yo skin every moment we weren't fighting. Then I needed to protect myself far on the edge of the bed. Do you ever touch me back? Or, as I recall, you never recoiled but you never one moved closer. You held your space and allowed proximity. Did you even notice or feel anything? It's impossible to imagine you did. You seemed numb between your legs and your kisses were devoid of love.

I hope this isn't a trend—restless nights. Sleeping has been my salvation and best skill during my crises period. So why have I been awake since midnight, three and a half hours ago? Many animated topics are charging up my mind: 1. The surreal nature of the Musk/Trump peace and isolation movement. Fascism believing it's worthy of the Nobel Peace Prize. 2. I have a broke 70 year old roommate who has no place to live and I can't figure out how to get her safely established without being ridiculously damaging to my own future. I have a history of hurting myself by being more generous than I can emotionally afford. 3. Similarly, my bi polar brother. 4. I'm working harder on new project at my company. We have AI, software development, governance, ERP, product roadmapping and premium customer engagement projects going on and they're fun and challenging. But why? I have no heirs. 5. My therapy work with Yael and my friendship discussions wit...

Great session this morning. Made me think that most of my healing efforts are time- rather than distance-based. So, for instance, I have sat staring at the blank wall of a person who hurt me very badly. My strategy has been to wait for the wall to fall down or become permeable. My therapist pointed out that in her country people have been staring at a wall for 2000 years and the problems are still there. On the other hand, if you pull back, say to 20,000 feet, that wall becomes a small part of a collage that's always changing. It's dynamic. Yes, the empty parts draw attention to themselves, but you can always edit. Time heals. Distance heals. Maybe distance offers more bang for the buck today. That's what I'm thinking about.

 I am injured because of you.  It would be the best thing in my whole life if I could ignore you and people like you forever. I try so hard.  I hate you further for the space you suck up. I am a kind smart lover, and I would do good if I could steal that huge wasted part of me back.  I try so hard.  I empathize with the hatred of the Palestinians for the Zionists. I empathize with Black Lives Matter. I empathize with women in this violent culture. I do not empathize with narcissists and gaslighters and liars.  So, I don’t want to forget you or I will potentially get betrayed again by your type. There are so many of you.  Gazan’s will never forget. Nor will their children’s children. You don’t forget when you are dunned for services you were denied. And then violated. At least I prefer to not forget. I witnessed most of your crimes.   And they can’t make a full life after trauma any more than I can.  You did not satisfy a single part of being ...

When you ended up in the hospital, people came to help.  You wrote about toothbrush deliveries from "friends."   When I needed help, you did not come.  You told me you would "never" come.  Instead, you campaigned against me, and then your toothbrush deliverers wouldn't show up for me (those who did have faced permanent expulsion).   That's why I take comfort that I'm not alone in this regard.  It's not me.  It's you.   Your parents…PTSD their entire adult life while you dumped on them and ignored them.   Your grandparents.  Two died while you were in their homes, and, according to you, you panicked.  In any case, you did nothing to save them.   Doron.   Diti when Jon left.  You two both seem to have forgotten that I was the one who showed up for her, even though she was pretty mean and selfish.  I even tried to show up for you, even though you define selfishness.  It's the core ...

My ex-wife just sent me an invoice from mountain Alarm. Two years since the divorce and these morons still can't sort out their billing system. Highly NOT recommended. Trump is taking office this moment and you send me a $124 invoice with no comments. What the fuck are you Mina? What kind of abuser? What kind of monster? Go coronate your own sorry loser ass, you bitch. Empowerment on the backs of your family. Unable to love anything other than your own self-creation. Disgusting. 🤮 LEAVE ME ALONE!

 Black armbands.  Fuck ignorance.  If your life is devoid of values, you are home now. Bask in your diarrhea.   Trump launched his own cryptocurrency $Trump on Friday. $12 billion moved out of dollar based markets.  Does anyone see sedition or a conflict? If not, are you gaslighting me?  You can’t ge this stupid, can you?  This asshole has his name on a cybercrime that benefits when things go poorly with the dollar or the stock markets?  Like, his job is to protect us from schemers like himself? Like, fuck off Don. Fuck you too if you bought $TRUMP.  Brownshirt. 

I turn my back on the king and his many Rasputins and soon-to-be Giuliani’s. The Trusk dynasty begins. I am not part of it and I offer antipathy and disdain as welcome gifts. And the hope that the murders in the Middle East have stopped. If Trusk is responsible somehow for the ceasefire, which I begged for since day 1, I respect that. We shall see. I'm a pacifist. I'd like to believe Ghandi had a better approach to peace than these intellectual and emotional toddlers, but then a million people died during the India/Pakistan partition. As of Day 1, Trump's ahead. I woke from a long nightmare. Familiar neighbors were living in a haunted house and capturing and controlling everyone. Like Vampires. I don't know if that mirrors the coronation or the fact that I've lost my entire community over the last two years to my ex-wife's campaign of slander and hatred. (She's some sort of life coach so obviously a fraud. Preacher, look into your own fragile soul f...

My ex didn't value me as a romantic partner…not in the way I deserved or wanted to be valued.   I thought we were lifelong friends, however.  I thought she was my best friend.   Whew.  All it took was some chick in Quebec saying "you're cute" and the whole thing came down.  And then instead of friendship I got what all the leftovers get—you're too angry, you're too drunk, I won't respond to you ever again, good riddance.   Ouch.  Some best friend I chose for my life.  Thirty years of putting her first—and then the nuclear option she used on so many others.   My best friend was one sick puppy!  A gaslight gal.    David Foster, Chair BVR  M: 917-741-3853 www.bvresources.com  

I like the pattern of waking up in the early morning and writing to myself. I was having another dream that I lost all my clothes and was foraging for free stuff. Some wool socks with devil faces on them. A blue shirt with pinstripes on one shoulder that I didn't really like. I stole sone brown pants from a display but the owner chased me and wanted to make me repay with work. He said I ruined the hem of the pants so I'd have to work with his daughters both of whom were topless. I left and it started snowing. I couldn't find my keys to my empty apartment—a friend had stayed there and stolen everything. I think it was Andrew Rubin. It took my forty five minutes to get my own shirt on because I was wet so I was late for school and had to drop out. I had done enough school anyway and kept failing the science test. I don't know the first thing about formulas and could not imagine an answer to a single question. Then I woke up in the dark night and listened to Ceci ...

I woke up yesterday with a weird thought—that now was the right time to delete my Facebook account. No real reason. But when I thought about it, I couldn't think of a single thing that really mattered to me from the posts. Some funny atheist quotes? But I'm already pretty good at those. So I started the process—and realized Facebook will do anything to prevent users from exiting. They hide the location. They requires a 30 day holding period. And they try repeatedly to push "deactivation" rather than deletion. Now I knew I was doing the best thing for me. Any digital platform that makes it harder to cancel than to subscribe is benefitting more than the customer. It took me 30 minutes and a bunch of YouTube videos to delete, and I have 29 days until I disappear. I can't wait! I prefer my own lonely company to reels and posts. I don't need to be found. Goodbye universe. Hello David.

Is there a chance that, levered by Musk's apparent ability to shut down global communication, the Trusk junta just called Ben Netananyu (the Qatari diplomatic team may have been using their landlines to help) and said "OK, that's enough.  You're going to stop this shit now."    And that this global loser discovered he had no choice.  His cell phone no longer worked.   I don't know, but is there also a chance that the daily 100 murders of Palestinians in tents ceased…two days worth.  200 lives saved.  Two hundred families filled with less hate for seven generations.   46,000 dead, not counting the innocent animals—the pets alone destroy my heart when I think of them dying in fear.  Less than the 100,000 Iraqis the US killed in response to 9-11.  We are still the worst nation on the planet when it comes to calculating eye for an eye natural law (the math never works, and law and justice are never observed when this is ho...

I've trained myself to wake up during the middle of the night filled with anger toward my ex, who seems increasingly abusive the farther into the memory hole she falls. Alice in Nowheresville. Alice in the Blank Wall. This is not a good habit, but it is a good case study of how habit controls emotion.  It's almost like the automatic physical reaction of a drink of alcohol or the pleasure of intimacy.  In this case, it's the shock of recognizing an asshole. The startling trauma of her flaws.  Her unattractiveness inside and out.  Her own well-refined habit of betrayal. I also see myself.  I see my trauma,and how I would rather stay on the couch all day alone than respond to texts or interact.  I don’t need to leave the house any,o get, and imalways surprising myself when I do.  I have no energy most of the time. I've been introduced to various techniques, some of them from the world of addiction management, to resist bad habits and form bett...

Never mind"my best life," I'm not even leading an adequate life any more. I got damaged by the 12-15 year demise of my marriage. I'm still in shock at the level of disregard I experienced. Love rarely appears and disappears quickly. I understand. But my ex is special. She leaves ruined carcasses behind her. I've joined that club…limping, sobbing, dazed. "Honey badger don't give a damn." She's on to life coaching and finding her next victim via women's empowerment. So 1970's. Easy way to steal from women who self-identify as not empowered. This will be shooting fish in a barrel for my ex.

Imagine if your dad was alive and witnessed the way you managed your collaborative law firm. They knew so little about collaboration,lawyering, and business, and they showed that you don't either. I'm not talking about clearly unfit lawyers like my brother. It's not that bad. But, recall, he got disbarred. And he's bi polar. He lost $300,OOO in his divorce and had $8000 in legal bills. You cost me $220,000 in legal bills plus whatever you need to pay ( hopefully less than $8000…or you got ripped off). From where I sit, you and Glenn are compatriots in matrimonial case management, and you got the same result. I believe your dad would agree with me. He would have respected the judge I hired to mediate far more than he respected your non-actions. He would have kept both parties in the room until the job was done, and seen your counsel as uncooperative. You would have avoided his derision, if your dad was still alive. You would have explained to him that ...

I loved you still, but I never trusted you again. My survival strategy was, as I often said, to get smaller. What I meant was to be less of a target for your gaslighting. To never interrupt your performances with my own needs or thoughts, or, even worse, talk about myself on the way home in the Uber! To protect myself from the pain of knowing I lived with a being who was capable of neither romance nor shame.  To know that if I expressed myself, retribution, generally in public, was certain. That there would always be hell to pay.    Now I am alone. I can't stop talking about you. Time to be large again. For my sweet loving self.

I forget her name now. She only met me once. After my ex left me, I fell into deep depression. Post-trauma. I was in terrible shape and alone. Since my ex ghosted me while she joined her new polyamorous community, I felt entitled to harass her with texts and emails. The friend—kind of like Trump's cast-offs—repeated the party line. "Good riddance," she all-capped. A response like that would qualify you for Secretary of Defense in the US—for a few months anyway. Are you still in Mina's circle? Or are you out here with me yet? Call me! I could use a lot of care, and you appear to need lessons in civility. Win-win?

This guy bought his way into my part of the information industry. Within a year we knew he was an asshole and we ostracized him.  We should have had him arrested. Look what he's done since he started pissing on his next victims.  I'm surprised he isn't Trump's nominee to run the SEC!!!  You can do that from Federal prison if you wear a MAGA hat.   https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2024-12-02/us-fertility-clinics-helped-a-disgraced-billionaire-deceive-women

The spectacle!  Watching timid people you’ll never hear from again support Trump by certifying a media guy whose only management and accountability experience is to bankrupt a seven person non-profit (the staff spent most of their short period working for him trying to keep his hands off their breasts) is breathtakingly familiar. Anyone who has been the victim of a narcissist is triggered by watching this, I imagine. I am. When you know the gaslighting and pain you will suffer if you raise you hand, you eventually bow your shoulders and keep your eyes on the floor. You keep your mouth shut.  You smirk only when told to smirk.    This is our entire nation. This is what it's like to be married to a narcissist. This is what it's like when the emperor has ALL the clothes, including the servant's attire you're wearing today. You look stupid in that outfit because you are. Your rags aren't even your size, and your hair needs a shampoo. Are you eating anything healt...

I watched the occultation of Mars last night on an old telescope I purchased in Vermont in the 1990's. The pinprick of the nearby planet raced into a 48 minute disappearance behind the full Wolf Moon, which filled the range of vision. If the bright moon were the face of a clock, Mars moved from the lower right to the top left, disappearing by the 8 and exiting at 12:30. And then the two bodies hurdled to separation—a brilliant clear white face leaving opposition, and Mars launching away at inconceivable distance and velocity on its own ellipsis. Iron oxide red saying fairwell to intimacy with its lunar playmate. What courage both celestial bodies displayed. To hold your path. To not halt. To acknowledge that the next full moon occultation will be in 2042. Los Angeles is burning below me. There are candles lit on my dining room table. A forgotten lamp I bought at Sundance with a 25 watt bulb offers warm light to a small circle across my small living room. I offer no illumin...

Our government, through Border Patrol and all its other militias targeting dark skinned people, is officially now arresting and incarcerating even more folks. Their crime? Buying gas and/or shopping at Home Depot. The Mexican government has supplied a free app that their citizens can use. It has one button: "I'm being arrested now." Their government, agencies, embassy, family and friends are immediately notified, reducing the chance that the individual (who has presumably already paid Chevron for the gasoline they'll never use) will be disappeared. These are civil, not criminal arrests. There is no due process. No on reads this private journal but when the fuck are white people going to learn to code shift. White people bust into government buildings and declare themselves heroes. 1150 black drivers were murdered by cops in routine traffic stops last year. Imagine if you were handcuffed and dragged to an unknown detention center while you were load...

I have one brother. He's a deep soul but bi-polar. I've had fantastic friends and a wonderful life but I'm being treated for depression. On the occasion of my 70th birthday today, I'd say my gene pool is closing out with a whimper. Look around you. We could have done so much better than our current procreative gene pool. Me me me. Take take take. Kill kill kill. Others.

I'm concerned to be writing this because paranoia has not been a common experience for me. Perhaps it should have been! This also concerns me during this period in my life and historically where losing control is so much part of our daily rhetoric and psychology. At this point in my life I hope to feel I can control my environment within the four walls of my downsized home. So…silverware is disappearing. Two months ago, eight salad forks disappeared. Sometime this week four dinner knives evaporated. I value this silverware. It makes me happy to use it. It can't be replaced. The factory in Italy is gone. I want my silverware back. I live alone. Wtf. Is someone sneaking in? See? I told you! Paranoia!!! Is it crazy that I'm now counting my soup spoons every time I put them back in their drawer??? Yikes.

I know no one is coming to rescue me. To aid me. Even more, I know that I won't be able to accept help from new friends, having become so traumatized by the pain of my past life. I know this. It's ok. I can fare-the-well alone from here, crippled and weak as I am. But so so full of love.

Does it ever occur to others that we are a species that never advances past infancy? We mock play confrontation and competition because we know we'd die if contributed with the real thing? We play at gender sexuality within such thin guardrails because we know that if we step near them everyone will desert us. We are unequipped to help others in crisis because we never forget that we've been helpless ourselves since birth, and before. We never get more than a step away from our mothers' wombs.

I got a one liner from my ex-life partner and ex-best friend this morning.  That's an infinite percent more than she's communicated with me in the last three years.  She didn't ask about me.  She didn't recognize me as an individual.  She hoped that I was celebrating. Enough about her.   Here's what I wish: 1. That she would go into serious intense talk therapy to address her contract with her parents.  She does all these modalities and coaching things to avoid confronting the fact the has an outdated family constellation structure than she's poisoning the world with. 2.  I'd like a four hour session alone with her to discuss the pain of our pathetic divorce experience.  I hemoragged cash and life vitality because our relationship fundamentals were so bad we got mutually fucked over by the legal profession.  We both have to confront and accept our pathetic natures on this one...singly, and as what once was an ineffective couple.   3. ...

Here are the symptoms of the epidemic I'm experiencing: 1. Extensive narratives justifying cruel behavior (I.e. telling others you're calling a vet to help your injured horse and not doing it for five days while the beautiful animal suffers). 2, Bad acts the minute you think no one is watching (I.e. another 100 killed in Gaza yesterday) 3. Performing politeness in business transactions and believing that you are a source of positive energy (I.e. my ex-wife) 4. Selling weapons to countries and militias that will use them on unarmed civilians (I.e. 30% of the US economy). 5. Lying about your own domestic violence, which is the most toxic form of gaslighting. I think of Beth and the J6 crew about to be set upon us like a plague again. 6'. Patriotic gore and nationalistic socialisms. Proud little boys gone wild. 7. Telling other humans their trusted advisors are wrong five minutes after you meet them, and then giving self-help blog post references to your own work...

1. She's never available unless there's an opportunity to perform in front of a third party. 2. Her offers to help show that she's unaware of how badly she's managed her part of our divorce, and of course every material transaction in the rest of her life. 3. Chirpy cheerful messages don't work for me when I have difficult, painful needs that are always ignored. 4. For the record, I know my ex to know that she never shows up for one on one conversations. She doesn't know how. She can only role play as part of scripted, transactional interactions. Often people seem to believe she's competent in unscripted situations. She's not. She falls apart and can barely speak.

During a meeting with my two realtors my ex may have said something like "this is emotional for me." My ex likes to share things like that in groups. I don't recall that she ever did one to one. We mostly fought about sex, or she was out of my voice range, so we weren't having a conversation. Very unsatisfying for me as I look back. I still hate sex (fortunately Zoloft has the side effect that I don't even think about it anymore, so who cares. I tested this with porn a few months ago and switched to Amazon—I needed some replacement kitchen utensils.) Why is she like this? I watched her do this with others for years and years. With social contacts she would dominate conversations. With anyone important she would fail to communicate, switch topics randomly, and recede into background noise. I think some of those people concluded she wasn't very smart, or could be easily manipulated. I don't know. I just witnessed her ineffectiveness with those who ...

Thanks to Chat GPT:   David Foster Wallace delivered his famous speech, "This Is Water," at the Kenyon College commencement in 2005. It has become one of the most celebrated and widely-read graduation speeches of all time for its profound insight into the nature of awareness, empathy, and the choices we make in daily life. Key Themes of "This Is Water" 1. Awareness and Perception Wallace begins with a parable about two young fish swimming along who encounter an older fish asking, "How's the water?" The younger fish don't understand the concept of water, symbolizing how humans often fail to recognize the "default settings" of their minds or the environment around them. 2. Default Settings and Self-Centeredness Wallace explains how people are naturally wired to see the world from their own perspective, often assuming they are the center of the universe. This self-centeredness can lead to frustra...

I do not know if I'm becoming a misanthrope but I do know I'm appreciating my pets and horses more and more every day. One catalyst for my uncertainty is the sake of the home I've lived in for thirty years. It's time to sell, but the process reminds me that humans can't stop themselves from defacing anything that's beautiful or precious. We satisfy ourselves with mediocrity or worse, accept the banal rather than aspiring for joy, and remain silent when we could lift ourselves and bring others along. Case in point from today's news—Rudy Giuliani, who destroyed and perjured and bankrupted himself by passing Trump's loyalty oath. Just another KKK initiation process. I laugh at Rudy Giuliani. He could not be more of a degraded cameo of a groveling troll, right? Degrading sexual images come to mind when we hear his name, at least for me. Maybe your sexuality is different than mine but I bet we agree—he's pretty close to the last human on th...

I taught first year writing at the University of Colorado for a bunch of years.  This would have been the best essay in the pile.  Look at the last summary sentence in particular.   Wyatt Earp (1848–1929) is one of the most famous figures in the American Old West, known for his role as a lawman, gambler, and gunfighter. His life and legacy have been heavily mythologized, particularly his involvement in the infamous Gunfight at the O.K. Corral .   Early Life   Wyatt Berry Stapp Earp was born on March 19, 1848, in Monmouth, Illinois. He came from a family of settlers, and after his father moved the family west, Earp lived in various places, including Iowa, Kansas, and Missouri. As a young man, he worked in various jobs, including as a farmer, a teamster, and a lawman. His early years were marked by a lack of formal education and a series of moves with his family.   Lawman Career   Earp's lawman career beg...