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The Friendship Map

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The Friendship Map.

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Free music

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Its been a long time coming to pass, but got a full album ready to hand over to you.  Free, even.  How cool is that?  The themes are prayer, hope, God, joy, life, wisdom, forgiveness.   Go get your free copy at noisetrade today.  Feel free to tip OR leave feedback.  Thank you and God bless

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introvert/extrovert/reverted

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At the time my wife and I met, I had a very gregarious personality.  She describes it frequently as “larger than life” and I can’t see it.  Took forever to open up and become one with my personality.  I know I was an extreme introvert up til that time.

For some reason, I must have simply adopted an outfit of an extrovert for that season.  It paid off well, years and four kids later.  But, nowadays, i’m reverted back to being an introvert.  Only very rarely do I don the wardrobe expected of an extrovert.  Mostly around campfires and my long time friends.

Here is a particularly odd challenge im facing because of this.  My music is suffering.  I’m playing out more than I ever have but i’m intensely disliking it.  The words freeze in my throat and they come out as murmurs or stammerings or gross misinterpretation of the original lyrics.  I’ve had to step back from performing and try to find a different alternative.

For some reason, that cape of extroversion is no longer available to me at this season.

I could give up and call it quits, I could shop for others to perform my songs or I could find solution(s).  I am going to go with the third option.  There is the internet and Youtube and various other outposts I can engage in without fear or fright or extreme nervousness around people.  Still trying to figure out what triggered this reversion?

Its tough to make art.  Its even tougher to present it well.  The thing I’ve had trouble with even more than anything is figuring out a way to make a living doing my art.  I know that when I can wear that cape of “invincibility” I can move a whole crowd of people to foot tapping and clapping and dancing.  But, that cape isn’t an at will thing (yet).

Which brings me back to you the reader.  What stands in your way that you have to reimagine or embrace differently to make it work for you?  Do you suffer from stagefright?  Do you have trouble throwing on the introversion cape?  Extroversion?  Meeting people?  Strange situations?  Do you present your art without fear but notice it appears elsewhere in your work/life/love?  do you like orange juice?  That last one is just for funzies.

I’d like to know if I am alone in this reversion or others face it as well.  Daily, it seems, I would like to be reminded by the vast world, that I am not as peculiar as I once thought.  A sense of belonging, maybe as I am sure we all long for that.  “Til then I walk alone,” Boulevard of broken dreams by Green Day

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Interacting with freedom

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Been listening to a great many audio books dealing with the theme of freedom.

Freedom to love, live, travel, learn, grow, face hard decisions with less than stellar results.

But mostly freedom of religion. I have always found it curious that America’s founding fathers did not say freedom from religion.  My basic belief?  That there was to be a thought about something larger than ourselves.

If people could get past the stigma of that humbling statement, the world would be better.

Better here, better there, better pretty much everywhere.

When man becomes arrogant about his arrogance and place in this life is when it gets all messed up and awry.  By that I mean simply this.  It does not matter to a person who views themselves as better in every way than anything ever created, they no longer have that humility that makes great men (women).

“Early man walked away
As modern man took control
There mind’s weren’t all the same
(And) To conquer was their goal
So he built his great empire
And he slaughtered his own kind
(And) He died a confused man
(He) Killed himself in his own mind”

Sublimes cover of We’re only gonna die for our arrogance.  can’t remember who did it originally and kind of feeling lazy after my paperroute this morning.  Its not a lmgtfy day.  Let me Google that for you, to clarify.

So, freedom.

Sometimes mistaken with freedom to do whatever pops into ones mind.  Murder, rape, incest, theft, greed, gluttony…

That is arrogance speaking loudly.  The kind not controlled by societal norms or religious boundaries or moral guidelines.  Not all mind you.  There is many atheists and Wiccans that frankly do better jobs of being moral or upright without a belief.  They put many Christians or Christ followers to shame.  Or, what about Buddhists, who do not kill bugs even.  They speak volumes about their place in the world and their acknowledgement of that.  So, i’m not going to generalize.  The arrogant have their place as well.

They teach the rest of us more about humility than we care to admit.  It is heady, the brew they concoct.  The power they seem to indulge in and lust and chase and pant after.  It makes us regular people want power too.  But, we choose instead to chase and retain wisdom.  For power will fade and lusts never get fulfilled, but wisdom remains.

So, our arrogance as human beings.  Not really freedom but free from.

Freedom.  Braveheart. America’s founding principle.

Freedom  as a verb.  Not a changing document.  Too many politicians and lawyers and doctors and gurus thinking of themselves as higher than their fellow man (woman).  that arrogance I refer to.

I miss the days where because freedom existed, one could post cartoons of Muslim religious figures without shootings.  That freedom then was a rare thing.  Where there ws a mutual respect for human life and liberty and individuals mattered.

The point im trying to get at eludes me, so I keep hinting at it.  Hoping that I will jog that part of my brains function to sort this mess out.  Its not crossing from the thinking to the being able to get it onto this page.  I humbly apologize.  its a rabbit hole… I’ve already indulged too much in my own arrogance.

Lets all take these snapshot paragraphs and see what blends and sticks?
some shoobey blues

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Carsick

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I never used to get carsick. First night I ran papers for my new means, I got carsick. Not just a little bit either. But, full on chunks right out the window. Gross right? Sorry for such an introduction

I think my first reaction, is how could this be? I’ve never ever had this problem before?

Second reaction. I gotta lay down and get out of this horrendous lurching vehicle.

Third thought, what can I do to calm my stomach if this is to be the norm? After all, a job is a means at the moment and i’d really like to give this an honest effort.

So I asked around and it was recommended to me to use peppermint. So, I bought a bunch of those starlight mints at a gas station for 2/$3 and went out the next night. Nothing. Felt urpy but was not blowing chunks or even near the limits. Cool, found something that works. Learned in other conversations as well that food in ones stomach seems to settle the urge too. Ok, two options and workable solutions. I’m in.

Lately there has been conflicting schedules. Wife works at 6 am and I’m still running papers on occasion at 6. Rather than get a babysitter, we just load them into the vehicle and they get to run the route with me. Well, twice we have done this anyway. Last week, one boy refused to eat breakfast or mints and horfed all over the new(to us) van and floor and seats. This week, same thing but both boys.

It kind of pissed me off because I handed them bags to puke into. Now, I don’t always have time to find a bucket or something either but dangit, its frustrating. So, the whole rest of the route we had to smell nasty, disgusting vomit before I could clean it up. Ewwww.

I had no reason to be pissed. I know that. But, things don’t always work as our head logic and our heart emotion war. I’ve been tired (no excuse), I’ve been struggling (no excuse), things keep breaking(no excuse), bills are overdue (no excuse), children being petty, selfish and whiny (no excuse). But, I became pissy. Mostly because I had to finish my route and it saddened me greatly that I had to put kids in a position to get sick. Mostly frustrated by the fact that they had eaten, I had given them peppermints and bags in case they needed them. It also could have been that for once, I would like to have a vehicle without stains or French fries on the seat or under it. I know all these things contribute on a daily basis to our stress levels, but I take full responsibility.

Funny thing was as soon as I got pissed and beat my newspapers on the steering wheel and screamed, not at the children, but the situation. I noticed one of my customers standing and watching me. changed my attitude real quick. the situation hadn’t changed just my view of it.

I learned something about myself in this moment. that it truly is embarrassing to be caught with ones proverbial pants down. Also, that resale value is not more important than lifelong character and restraint. there is a proper time to vent anger. That is made clear on a religious front by Jesus, “tossing them temple tables”. in the words of DC talk anyway.

SO, thanks to that man for changing my thinking in a sudden hurry. I would have stayed mad all day and grouchy. Instead, I realized once again (as almost daily) that my duty as a parent comes also with responsibility to clean up puke. Even if it disgusts me or leaves a stain. They are more important.

Grateful daily. Grateful that life always seems to find ways to renew our focus. Whether it is from someone watching or some random event, we are diverted at times most important. Trouble lies if we keep trying to refocus on the trouble causing event vs the intrusion that happened right in the middle of it.

What about you? What steps have you taken to not show the cumulative effects of stress as a parent? i’m all ears. or, eyes rather.

Blessings come.

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All at once

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Or nothing at all.  Feast or famine.  Waiting for full or running till empty.  I’m quite used to both.  I would like to post my opinion (for what its worth) on the whole death penalty at this time in America.

I’m against it.

That’s the starter to the argument im about to present.

First though, I would love to present to you the fact that I used to be for it.  Totally for it.  I thought it would save taxes (which it would after the appeals process), I thought it would make criminals less likely to want to wind up that way, also as a way to keep society in line.  So, yes, I used to be for it.

A couple of things changed my mind.

1. I can’t think of too many people in America in a government position that has morals enough to carry this out with good conscience for their own soul.

2. Upon reading more into the Bible, I’ve been trying to study if there ever was a death penalty?  I haven’t found one.  If there is, I am well open to discussion and searching into it. Moses, David, Elijah and Paul were all guilty of murder.

So, if the death penalty was practiced, chances are it didn’t apply to them.  That puts us on in a weird little spiritual spot.  The spot that says the God taught through the Bible and in real life picks and chooses with favor to individual.  I’m not real sure that is the case.  We are told repeatedly to not esteem one higher than another.  We are all equal and all that goes with it.

Well, if Moses and Paul (who had a hand in a multitude of murders and murderous parties, were not treated to a chair of electricity or a lethal needle, why?

The only plausible answer I could see is that God knew the ends better than humans and He wanted to show grace and mercy.

thoughts?

3.  This government should not have power to take its citizens lives.  Period and end of story.  I could get behind it a lot more with strong leaders who in good conscience would not have celebrated justice with cheering but been saddened by it immensely.  So, i’d just really rather not give rise to hand my life or anyone’s life over to a less than trustworthy batch of bloodthirsties.

4.  What is it going to solve?  its society that is the problem right now and our penal system reflects that.  So how do we fix society?  there are steps we could take.  Less dependence on a government for their well being and day to day living, for starters.  There are many and i’m not bright enough to engage more in those lofty matters.

5.  it feels wrong.  If a federal government overrides the will of its sovereign states, it makes me question why.  Why do they want to make an example of this one and not many others?

6. What about abortion, can we oppose abortion and support the death penalty or is that too much of a hypocrisy?

The abortion thing tripped me up for a long time because I knew people who had done it and I didn’t want to throw them under the bus.  But, that’s not up to me.  it feels wrong. All lives matter.  American, Canadian, European, Asian… police, paupers, ceo’s…

that’s all I got.  What is your take.  You for it against it or neutral like Switzerland?

Lets discuss at least like rational beings with morals regardless of belief system.