Vicodin Brain Fog Musings

 How old is too old?

I think lately I’ve been feeling my mortality. An underlying anxiety about the future and my place in it. Concerns of taking care of aging parents and my wife. Of course the political polarization since the 2000 election hasn’t helped much. Now we have rising Fed interest rates, simply out of control spending, rampant inflation, border crises, politicizing the DoJ to pursue political enemies, and a POTUS with dementia who got lost three times on stage last week.  But this week, I think this feeling was brought to the foreground by the death of an acquaintance I’d only met once. 

Early in the double-00s, I began running again. To supplement this I joined an online running forum hosted by the venerable “Runner’s World” magazine. Several years later this group moved to a private server, which is now defunct. I got to know a number of members in person and have made some friends there. It was a pretty tight knit community.

One of the members, Tim O’Brien, I met at a trail race in Georgia. The Twisted Ankle, which was organized by Becky Finger as a fundraiser for The Sloppy Floyd State Park. The first year was 2005 and only a handful attended. I think I met Tim in 2010, when we shared a cabin. Didn’t get to know him well that weekend, but over the years through Facebook, we became somewhat well acquainted. 

Tim was, to my reckoning, a fairly soft spoken man. Dedicated to his wife and children. And he was a dedicated runner. Hard core, any weather. He was also a semi-competitive runner at Boston. Online he was kind and encouraging. He’d had some tragedy in his life.  His wife committed suicide a number of years ago. He married a young widow who he met through a widow/widower support group and ended up with five children (three his and two step).

I went looking for Tim on Facebook a couple weeks ago, I don’t remember why. It was shocking to find his obituary. Last November, either during or right after a race, Tim had a heart attack and died immediately. He was only 50 years old, rather unusual for a man of his athletic ability and age.  I will not speculate as to the cause of the heart attack, vis-a-vis vaccinations, that is not my purpose here. 

Tim was seven years younger than me. I guess today, I’m thinking of a few people I’ve known from high school who have passed.  Steve Jay, 54, cancer. Tony Luyet, 39, aneurysm. Larry Schlesselman, (47), suicide. Terry Borman (19), motorcycle. All younger than me, though the same age at death. 

Perhaps what is bothering me is a loss of a sense of purpose.  I think I used to have one, but it seems to have been lost by the wayside and I do not recall what it was. I used to have somewhat of an academic bent, but that seems to have gone. What am I doing with my life and where should I go on from here? (Cue the BtVS musical). I have given thought to another advanced degree (probably history) but the ROI is not there at my age. I’ve wanted a small observatory, perhaps to make some small contribution, but that will require somewhere with fewer lights. I’ve thought of some English classes at the local university and possibly trying my hand at some writing. 

I joined the Writer Dojo (a FB group), which I thought would be for aspiring writers of various types. But it seems everyone is publishing or has published a half dozen books, minimum. I’m not certain that is for me.  And then, what would I write? Have I had appropriate experiences to weave into a believable story? Have I had a life worth living?  Well, yes, but is it one to create a fake life to write about?

Perhaps also driving these musings…I had a minor surgery today. Finally got a deviated septum repaired in the hopes of being able to more easily breathe.  Vicodin for pain.  The blood is seeping from my nostrils as much as the words are flowing. Is it the meds? Wasn’t Hemingway a lush? Is that the key?

What did I want?

“What did I want?

I wanted a Roc’s egg. I wanted a harem loaded with lovely odalisques less than the dust beneath my chariot wheels, the rust that never stained my sword. I wanted raw red gold in nuggets the size of your fist and feed that lousy claim jumper to the huskies! I wanted to get you feeling brisk and go out and break some lances, then pick a like wench for my droit du seigneur–I wanted to stand up to the Baron and dare him to touch my wench! I wanted to hear the purple water chuckling against the skin of the Nancy Lee in the cool of the morning watch and not another sound, nor any movement save the slow tilting of the wings of the albatross that had been pacing us the last thousand miles.I wanted the hurtling moons of Barsoom. I wanted Storisende and Poictesme, and Holmes shaking me awake to tell me, “The game’s afoot!” I wanted to float down the Mississippi on a raft and elude a mob in company with the Duke of Bilgewater and the Lost Dauphin.

I wanted Prestor John, and Excalibur held by a moon-white arm out of a silent lake. I wanted to sail with Ulysses and with Tros of Samothrace and eat the lotus in a land that seemed always afternoon.

I wanted the feeling of romance and the sense of wonder I had known as a kid. I wanted the world to be what they had promised me it was going to be–instead of the tawdry, lousy, fouled-up mess it is.” 

– Robert A. Heinlein, Glory Road

Just Past the First Day of Summer

The problem with slow blogging, as I’ve been doing here, is that I forget where I was or where I want to go. I keep a handwritten journal also, which is primarily for me to refer to events at a particular date. 

The last couple of days have certainly been interesting.  

Yesterday, the United States Supreme Court issued an opinion affirming the Second Amendment as an individual RIGHT, striking down the onerous concealed carry law in New York.  This effectively strikes down every “may issue” jurisdiction in the country.  

This was followed by calls from the left for dissolving the court (Leftist Keith Olberman).  The idiot Governor Hochul of New York said she was willing to “go back to muskets.”  What a tool! How has the education system failed so badly?  How do these morons get elected or in to positions of influence?

Today the Court issued an opinion effectively reversing Roe v. Wade. Good, it was bad law to begin with.  Maxine Waters, once again, is calling for violence on the steps of the court.  She sounds almost…insurrectiony… Why is she not in shackles? 

The wailing and gnashing of teeth from the Left is amazing.  And sweet. 

Will we have another summer like 2020? 

Weston Bluffs Trail Kona Rove

Sun trapped

 

Snownami?

 Two years into “15 days to flatten the curve,” COVID finally made an appearance at my home.  First Pam was a bit sick and then me a couple days later (now a week ago). Hopefully we got Mom out of the house in time.  We both came back positive on a PCR test, prompting a call from the State.  I called back and the person wanted me to help them fill out a form.  She had no good answer when I asked “Why do you think I want to help you do that?”  Statists gonna State. 

I’ve had cases of the flu—actual influenza—that were much, much worse.  A week later, I’m mostly just congested and extremely tired. Fortunately, we were able to have my sister pick up the elderly parent for a few days relocation. This could have been much worse.

We had snow overnight.  Originally forecast for 1-3 inches, there is over six in the back yard.  And it is coming down sideways, which is always nice. 

 

Fox 4 reported that this was a record snowfall for KCI.  Several places around the metro are reporting up to 10 inches. It appears to be all but over.  I really wish we’d had more of a winter this year, but Monday and Tuesday are forecast for the 60s.  Ah, well. 

Blue Springs Milk Cartons

 The local news just reported that today, the Blue Spring, Missouri school district went on “lockdown” for fear of “shots fired.”  The Blue Springs police responded. The news report did not say how long the lockdown lasted. Though I imagine it was probably several hours.

Apparently the “shots fired” was merely a milk carton popping. 

How have we come to this?

My father was a young man, really a boy, when he joined the Army in 1944. Underage, at 14 he had his “growth” in already as the Appalachian denizens would have put it.  He told me of changing his birth certificate with ink eradicator and enlisting.  Of course, he was discovered a year later and sent home, but that really isn’t the point.  

The World War 2 generation is only one removed from some of us.  I was born in 1965, so the first of Gen X, not really a Boomer, but I believe I think more like a Boomer.  One generation, possibly two, from the men that stormed Point du Hoc and fought in the Pacific at places like Pielelu and Iwo Jima. 

 A milk carton.

The late Rush Limbaugh referred to this type of cowardice as the “new castrati.”

I think he was right.