Entry date: 8-22-2023 – A Story about a Time – Letters to My Friends

Dear Friends,

For a while now, I’ve been struggling with going into a deep, but usually brief, funk. It’s true that I miss my wife a lot. That fuels my funk. I’m also in a weird, in-between kind of place creatively, so that doesn’t help, and my body is firmly getting into the swing of being middle-aged. Things don’t work like they should sometimes. In short, at times, I throw myself a pity party.

I usually avoid those parties. I’ve never been one to dwell on stuff for too long. Instead, I talk to someone I trust or whose opinion can help, or I have always just sort of figured things out on my own. Right now, though, I’m not finding those options to be super helpful because I have a hard time articulating myself when the funk hits.

There is no “way with words” when the funk hits. The words just seem to escape. On Sunday night, I was a dick to Rhondi, and I couldn’t really explain why. I still can’t. There wasn’t really any particular thing that set me off. I just went into dick mode.

I hate being a dick to people. I used to be very patient with other people, maybe too patient a lot of the time, but any more, my patience is wearing thin. There was a time when I could grin and bear it and take someone else’s stupidity. Not anymore.

Some would say this is a better way to live. Suffer no fools, right? Sometimes, though, fools actually do mean well. Some of the sweetest people I know are also prone to making what I would call “stupid” decisions. I don’t love them any less. I try to help when I can and get out of their way when I can’t. It’s a balance, maybe.

Many years ago, I had a friend who was always just shooting themselves in the foot. You probably have friends like this, too. No matter what they seemed to do, it was always a day late and a dollar short, or just bad decision making. This dude was the type of guy who would pick a fight with the biggest, meanest looking person to try and make himself look cool.

It never worked out well for him. It didn’t look cool. The black eyes and split lips and bruises were never cool. He’d go up to a pretty girl and be obnoxious, even when you could tell she might give him the time of day if he just shut the fuck up and be nice and “normal” (whatever that means).

He would bogart a joint, too. Huge party foul. When you would finally get it from him, it would be all wet and feel like it had been dunked in a glass of water. It’s silly that I remember this shit but it’s true. He’s a cop now, or at least he was a cop in the early part of the 2000s. There is something that tells me that he didn’t last on the force. I hope he didn’t really shoot himself in the foot.

I was patient with him for a few years, though. I would give him chance after chance. He was good friends, with a buddy of mine that I really liked. They had grown up together and he also knew the dude’s backstory better than I did. Mr. Fuck Up came from a pretty rough home.

I can forgive people for doing things because of their trauma. I can empathize with them and I can, like I said earlier, either help or get out of the way. Eventually, though, you have to put a little distance between yourself and a fuck up because if you don’t, they’re going to get their fucked-up shit on you.

When I go into a funk, I think my biggest fear is getting my fucked-up shit on other people. I need to get over that. I know that some of you reading this are there and it’s more than appreciated. I am thankful to the bottom of my being.

See you on the bright side, where the grass is greener, and the children aren’t meaner, tomorrow.

I love this picture. Michael S. is lighting the guys ass on fire. You can't see it, but he is. I also love Alex's expression here. The one and only Son of Crackpipe show.