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Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Velociraptor: A Haiku

Fun Fact: My friends are better than yours, sorry. Introducing MJC III's brilliant Haiku, Velociraptor:


Swift, sleek, cunning 
Goddamn scientists, adding feathers 
Ruins my badass image 

To put this in context, let us examine a feathered Velociraptor....
Image courtesy of Wikipedia (whether they know it or not).

Decidedly less threatening than our previous perception of the little guys.  I mean, what ever happened to those scary critters we all knew and grew up with from Jurassic Park?! What was so wrong with them that scientists felt the need to go and change the immortal image of a dinosaur that can't even defend itself in a public forum. Despicable, so called scientific advancement.

I also found this gem while Googling Velociraptor...

Image borrowed from http://sugarshacksouthie.com/?cat=5 (I don't know anything else about this website than this awesome drawing).

Now THAT is a guy I want to hang out with on the weekends. Another Fun Fact: the Velociraptor is riding a Velocipede, an early version of the modern bicycle. Notice the pedals on the front wheel. One of the first designs of this was aptly nicknamed the "Boneshaker." You're welcome for that tid bit of minutia (Plug: Go visit your local National Parks).

With that being stated: The creative genius is definitely there for this little Social Experiment, so let's participate, eh? If not, that's cool. It turns out to be less work for me. If you're not sure what I'm referring to, see the my last blog towards the end and get caught up! 


Beyond those things, I'm pretty much fresh out of blog ideas after detailing 22 years of nonsense into four blogs.  From this point on I plan on using "The Blog" (I've decided its earned this infamy after receiving over 600 views to this point...thank you!) for comedic reflections on life. A lot like Seinfield. But hopefully my Pop will approve of these quips and not hold the same disdain as he does for a certain 90s TV show... Sorry Jerry. 

To continue with this thought, I work out pretty much everyday. I never used to up until this summer, and it was pretty obvious. I was a scrawny kid, and up until I was 12, my Mum was fairly certain I was going to be no taller than 5'4" (currently I'm 6'2" according to the last pool that I stood on the bottom of while flailing for air). At the gym I go to, for the moment, there is a particular woman who attends on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays during the same time which I do. Now I know many of you are thinking, "Oh geez, he's one of THOSE guys. Creep." Wrong, well maybe I am, but it's purely unintentional. I'm just awkward. Back to the point: this woman sees this fitness institution as a personal dating service and social club. She occupies a piece of equipment (place appropriate "That's what she said" reference here), for what seems to be hours on end while talking with her legion of old creepy muscle bound "friends."  This is offensive enough in my personal court of judgment, but wait, it gets worse.

She cackles. Does not simply laugh, but this woman cackles.  A good friend of mine, quite correctly, noted that "A cackle a day keeps the cankles away!"  But why?! My ears are routinely assaulted with the piercing shrill of this modern day Wicked Witch of the West.  I wait for the day when I see Dorthy running on the track with Toto as this woman chases them cackling while maintaining slender ankles. So this is my plea, please... pretty please... if you wish to use a gym as a dating establishment, don't cackle. A good chuckle or chortle are justified to the highest degree but a cackle is punishable by a throw of the two pound dumb bell I'm curling to preserve my girlish figure.

Conclusion: I, being the ever so dedicated blogger for you, Google Image searched "Cackle." Two of the first five images were of Hillary Clinton. I'll allow you to draw your own thoughts of that.

Hope everyone is well! Sorry for the long delay and absence in blogging. I now work and no longer a bumm so I have significantly less time.  We can change this fairly easily if we make my blog popular enough to merit advertisers, and I could get paid for my ever so inspiring words..... Just a thought.

Friday, October 14, 2011

The Social Experiment: The not so successful blockbuster (read to towards the bottom)

Fun Fact: I write a decent amount of stuff. Now I won't go down on record and say a superfluous amount, yet I wouldn't say that it's on par with a majority of people. 

True Story: To bring this blog full circle at last, I wrote my first entry shortly after taking my Pop to a hospital one night, or super early morning depending on one's outlook.  The thought of this blog came to me then for whatever reason, and I decided to act on it because I needed something to do.

The reasons for writing have changed over the years but the intent for it has remained essentially the same. Synthesize those thoughts and feelings which I keep, admittedly, to myself and get them out of my mind and onto some sort of medium.  In high school I wrote prolifically and terribly, but that's to be expected I think.  When I got to college the writing slowed and essentially became non existent. Well that's not entirely true. I wrote a lot, but it was always a paper on something of absolutely no relevance (I'm looking at you paper concerning my internship experiences, or you discourse on The Cave (and sadly no, not the Mumford & Sons song)).

Then came the summer following my sophomore year in school when I went to some military training in the lovely states of Alabama and Mississippi, in the middle of July and August. Communication during that time was limited to one form and one form only: written letters. Yes kids, there do exist times and places where one cannot have cell phones, computers with internet, or smoke signals and we can refer to this place as purgatory (you Catholics may need to look this one up... only kidding, slightly).  While I was at this training, my Mum wrote to me dutifully and with love daily. Yes, daily. I've entered her into the "Best Mother Ever" competition being held by some yet to be determined corporate sponsor.  I, in return, took my 30 minutes of free time each night to reconnect with writing and wrote what I could to those back home.  After repenting my sins and being released it didn't matter, I was hooked. 

Since then I've used writing as an outlet for all of those things which I pent up inside my mind. It's a release very intimate to who I am and what I feel.  This is mainly because I've always kept  a majority people at greater than arm's distance for one reason or another during my life.  As you may have noticed, I've shed this mentality while at the same time embracing it by creating this blog (ha, take that moral conundrum!).  So here you all have it, an unobstructed look into my life.

All this talk has me wondering, who enjoys writing these days?  I propose a little social experiment: write something, anything. It can be a letter, prose, poetry or heck even a drawing. Leave me a little comment on the blog here saying you'd like to partake in this experiment and your email, then I'll send you an email which will have an address you can reach me at and send me your writing/art. I'll then take that and forwarded onto someone else participating.
Let me break it down for you: You create a piece---> You tell me you want to participate and provide email address---> I send you an address---> You mail your piece---> You later receive someone else's piece.

Fun Fact: Everybody likes receiving letters that aren't bills (that isn't scientifically supported, just a hunch).

This little project may be a bust, I don't know, but it is entirely dependent on viewer interaction! So get to writing whatever it is that you'd like. Motivational letters, short stories about insomnia, hiakus on velociraptors, or a pencil drawing of someone feeding pigeons in the park. Anything that strikes your fancy. It doesn't need to be long or need an author attached to it.

Hope everyone has been doing well and gearing up for Halloween! Take care everyone and thanks for reading!

drh

Saturday, October 8, 2011

College: The Rough and Tumble Times

Fun Fact: When you grow up things tend to become expensive.


True Story: I've worked pretty much since the time I could legally hold a job, and haven't really looked back since. Watching my Pop while growing up, I saw how much pride and joy he took in his work. Being able to accomplish something with his hands or his actions, and being able to provide for my family provided him with a sense of purpose. I've embraced that whether it be knowingly or not, and it has been playing into my thoughts and feelings while being here at home. 


My first job I got when I turned 14, and worked as an assistant to a luthier, one who makes or repairs stringed instruments.  Needless to say it was amazing. By the time I was 16, I was running a professional trade shop on my own some days, responsible for performing repairs on violins, violas, etc. and assisting customers purchase instruments. Have I mentioned it was an amazing job?  I worked there throughout high school, and took great pride on being able to physically make something happen with my hands and knowledge which I got from my wonderful boss. The money which I made then went entirely to whatever the heck I wanted, which for a high school student is absolutely anything which has no long term value. 


When I left for college, I still moonlighted at the luthier's shop, but naturally got caught up in other things while at school. That being school, ROTC, and life.  I'll be the first to admit that growing up I've often acted irrationally and immature. Not immature in the sense that I find fart jokes funny (though if done correctly, one cane be hilarious), but in the sense that I never quite knew how to own up to my mistakes and when to admit I was wrong. By the time I was a sophomore in college, I was working as a tutor in a multi-discipline program, and absolutely enjoying teaching and mentoring.  Now I'd like to say that I had grown up significantly and was a perfect gentleman, but I'd be lying. 


A lot had changed in my life by the time I entered my second year, and I often would freak out over situations in my life. My solution? Shut down. There were times during my sophomore year when I would distance myself from everyone, and internalize my thoughts and feelings until I believed they were tamed.  What I didn't take into account was that by doing so I had actually effectively drawn out the process of "returning to normal."  Now some people who may read this blog that knew me then will think that I regret isolating myself and burning bridges.  That isn't the case, and I won't provide any apologies for my actions then. If I've alienated you from my life there's a reason for having done so, but I do apologizes that things came to that. 


My maturing became a point of contention my junior and senior year of college, and forced my hand on the matter.  Just before I left to attend military training before my junior year my Pop came down with Vertigo, a disease which effects the inner ear canal and causes extreme dizziness.  By the time I started school in August he had fallen and broken his right ankle. He was told he could not put any weight on it for eight weeks. Coincidentally eight weeks after he broke his right ankle, he broke the left ankle and was told the same thing: no weight for eight weeks.  During this time my Pop was put on short term and then long term disability (these accidents only compounded the other medical conditions which he already had), and when he was finally medically cleared to return to work in January, he was released from his job.


We tried to rally around my Pop, my Mum and I, and still try to to this day.  He suffers from a lose of purpose.  That meaning and intent which drives one to get out of bed in the morning and push through the day.  My Pop is the strongest man I know because, not only has he worked for nearly 30 years after being deemed 100% disabled, he's handled a terrible situation to the best of his abilities, and my Mum is a woman of rare and unsurpassed character to keep plodding through the situations we've been dealt.


Shortly after my Pop was released from his job, my Mum found out that her Breast Cancer had returned, but not in the traditional manner.  Eight years after her original diagnosis, her breast cancer had metastasized in her bone marrow and was effecting the production of her Red Blood cells and platelets. She was short of breath and tired. But she never stopped, not even for a bit. My Mum was working as a special needs aide for a local elementary school, and would take one day off a week on Tuesday so she could make her chemotherapy treatments.  She never complained about working when she shouldn't have, and she certainly made no apologies for carrying on with life the same way the best she could. 


It took me until my last year of college to realized that life was larger than myself.  I had held an Ayn Rand mentality of selfishness for a great part of my life, believing that by doing the best I could for myself I was doing the best for others by not settling (this is significantly watered down and if you're curious I recommend The Fountainhead if you're really interested). Life became more complicated, and I took on responsibilities of ensuring that my parents were taken care of when I could be there. Doctors's appointments, grocery runs, laundry, changing the cat litter, and others became things which I made myself concerned with so they wouldn't have to be. I did this because I saw how my community, the same one which for a majority of my life I've counted down the days until I could leave, picked up my parent's cause and looked after them together.  Strangers would deliver dinners to my parents when they couldn't cook themselves, money was donated to help pay medical expenses and needs, and people were there to offer a laugh and a hug of hope. 


Since I was a kid I've wanted to leave Cincinnati since it's a bubble with an inward focus, but I've come to realize that those things are what makes it great.  The West side takes care of its own because its the right thing to do, and makes no excuses for itself for doing so. I've never had an opportunity to thank those people who looked after my family when I couldn't while attending school, but if any of you happen to read this just know how immensely humbled and thankful I am for all which you have done for them and me. 


I'm now graduated and living back at home. Since being that sophomore tutor, I've been a park guide at a National Park and now laborer working on industrial equipment on my way to assuming my responsibilities as an officer in the military.  My Pop has filed for disability and preoccupying his time with random historical conversations with me.  My Mum has since left the elementary school she left due to the uncertainty of her treatments and our families ever bizarre situations.  Both are doing well and in reasonably good health considering their conditions.  Growing up can suck, a lot, but we all need to do it.  Here's to hoping that the transition is gradual and smooth.


Hope everyone has a great weekend, and if you're in the Cincinnati area get outside and enjoy this weather! 

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

High School: What to do with My Life

Fun Fact: Many strategists believed that if the Cold War was going to develop into a "hot" war, it would occur over Canada.


True Story: During the Cold War, the United States believed that the USSR would send its bomber fleet during the 1950's and early 1960's over the Arctic Circle, and positioned several Air Force installations in the northern states of the Union. Glamorous places like Alaska, Montana, North Dakota, and Minnesota became hotbeds of activity.  The Air Force established several interceptor squadrons at those northern bases and armed them, rather conveniently, with nuclear tipped missiles.  Their job was to scream up to the Arctic Circle and intercept the vast fleets of Soviet Bombers coming to bomb the US (of A), and shoot a (nuclear tipped) missile into the middle of the formation of bombers to knock them out of the sky.  Now, if you're wondering "Now wait a second, wouldn't that mean that this would all take place over Canada?", you'd be correct. Needless to say, the Canadians were none to happy about the perception of a Nuclear World War III.


Does that have any relevance on the rest of my blog? I guess, but not too much other than the fact that I'm pretty much a hopeless history geek with lots of pointless stories and quips.  In high school I held, for the better part of three years, the idea that I'd go to college for biochemistry or biochemical engineering.  I ended up going to school for history.  During high school I had a laden hope and desire to eventually continue on and becoming a doctor of some sort because I believed that's what successful people did. Three different things culminated in dislodging me from that presumption and launched me into a field which I enjoyed rather than thought was profitable. 


The first of these events was my Advanced Placement United States History class that I took my junior year.  As cliche it may be at this point to say that certain people and classes change your life, this one truly did for me.  That class overcame a tragedy which to this day effects the West side of Cincinnati, and brought those of us in the class together in a very unique way. I cannot talk about this class though without mentioning the teacher who made that experience endurable, positive, and refused to neglect the events which happened.  This man inspired me and mentored me through some of those moments in my life which I had to grow up quickly and painfully.  For him, I'm forever grateful and appreciative of his impact.


Second in this list was a moment that has been imprinted in my mind since the moment it happened. For the greater part of my life, I've always thought or dreamed of joining the military, and then there was September 11, 2001.  Many people describe this as the defining moment of a generation, of geopolitical relations, and of human history.  For me, and the days which followed, it embedded a sense of duty which I already felt having growing up in such a tradition already.  One morning while my Pop drove me to school (mind you I was in the seventh grade), I quite frankly told him that after high school I wanted to join the military. He rather eloquently said, "To hell you are."  The discussion ended with him relenting that if I still felt that way when I was 18, we could discuss the issue further then.  I started high school and it quickly became evident to me that college wasn't an option but the expectation for me, so to pursue the military had to be framed within that context.  Having talked to my Pop again when I was older we discovered that ROTC was an alternative I could follow, and some would say the rest is "history."


The third thing which swayed my interest from becoming a doctor of any kind was the life which I  lived while growing up.  By the time I was 18, I was a seasoned pro of emergency rooms, intensive care units, and telemetry floors of so many different Greater Cincinnati hospitals, that I knew nurses and doctors by name (and they knew mine). Becoming a doctor loses its allure when you've played an amateur MD during your childhood.  I often startle med students, residents, nurses and doctors alike when I chip into the medical consultation from the corner of chair in an ER room.  After so many years, you become tired of such things  because even if it isn't someone you're immediately connected to as the patient, it often resembles or reminds you of your own life.


So here I am, with a BA in history and a commission in the military with the intent of providing that which I've received so much of during my life: mentoring.  Responsibility is not only defined by what one's tasks are to be completed, but doing the right thing to ensure that the task can be completed each time it needs to be. That can be extrapolated to mean that plans are left to follow for the next time, or making sure that someone who works for or with you has the opportunity to attend training, attend to their families, or attend to their personal needs, so that they can perform the task next time.  Responsibility is cyclical and should be viewed as such, and that is what I didn't understand fully until recently.


Next blog will capture about how I've slowly realized and endured the harsh realities that growing up needs to take place, and that responsibilities cannot be shirked or ignored because they make one uncomfortable.


Thank you everyone for the positive response so far everyone! I appreciate your feedback in any form it comes. Hope everyone in the Cincy area is enjoying the beautiful weather and that you all have had a great start to the week!


drh





Sunday, October 2, 2011

The Beginning: In so many words


I got this idea recently while driving to a hospital ER at 3:00AM on a Monday in the middle of a record downpour in Cincinnati. That idea was why not start a blog to tell and show people the things I was doing and thinking while I'm home?


With that, let me back up and explain who I am and the current situation my life is in to date.  My name is Dan, and I'm a recent college graduate and commissioned officer in the military.  Shortly after graduating, I had expected to enter active duty and travel across the country to perform my job.  Coincidentally, the United States' economy (much like the world's) saw it fit to tank recently, leaving no money to send little ol' me to service.


So here I am, in Cincinnati, living with my parents for the first time really since leaving for college. As many of my friends will be able to tell you  I'm extremely open about my life when asked, but typically keep things to myself. Mainly I don't like to feel like I'm intruding on people's lives, so by writing it for people to read on their own accord people can read if they'd like or continue with their lives as they please. 


That being said (well written... well typed I suppose), I'll take the first couple of blogs to recap my life up to the present. This first one will pretty much cover up until high school, with the next one covering high school and college. 


Born and raised on the West side of Cincinnati, I grew up in what can undoubtedly be called a bubble.  Unless you grew up or have lived in the greater Cincinnati area for any extended amount of time, you don't quite have a full understand of what that entails.  I like to put it in this context: the West side of Cincinnati is predominately Catholic. By predominately, I of course mean that directions are dictated by what parish you need to hang the next left afterwards.  I grew up in a family in which we didn't attend a church, so growing up and to this day the whole "going to church on Sunday" thing is a bit foreign, and quite frankly frightening.  That's especially true when it seems like you're the only kid in the world who isn't going.  To quell any sort of creeping thoughts or suspicions, yes I'm religious (it's something I've gotten slowly more comfortable with over time).


Growing up though wasn't all too bad for me though, and I'll never make a claim that I had it difficult as a kid.  My parents are two of the most wonderful and upstanding people that anyone can have the pleasure of knowing.  To this day, despite a lot which has happen, my parents are my mentors, idols, and heroes.  My Pop is a brilliant man who is proud to a fault and would give the shirt off of his back to help anyone who may need it.  He served in the military much like his father before him had and many in my family had in previous generations (it's a bit of a trend). Unfortunately his military career was struck short when he was diagnosed with Crohn's Disease which causes tears in the tissue of the small and large intestine.  Needless to say it isn't pleasant, and was deemed to be 100% disabled and released from the military.  Despite the condition that was set before him, he has labored over the last 30 plus years to provide for not just himself but my Mum and I, and has asked nothing in return.  Humble and diligent, that's the kind of man I can only hope to become so I can achieve half of what he has.


God love my Mum. I tell people when talking about my mother that I don't know how she does it, and by "it" I mean put up with my Pop and I on any given day.  She can be described no better than the glue (and I'm about to start saying the epoxy) which holds our family, and honestly each of us together.  She was a dietitian by trade, but stopped working to support me and my endless list of shenanigans growing up.  Many parents funnel their kids into different activities to focus the efforts of their children. Mine let me go which ever the wind may be blowing that day, and asked no questions.  I played soccer and hockey before baseball finally prevailed. Sport games and practices, check. In the first grade of the elementary school I attended we could begin playing an instrument. I chose the viola, so that meant lessons, rehearsals and concerts, check.  Oh, and because I lived in an area which the public schools weren't the best, my parents sent me to a private school 20 miles from my home. Trips to and from school each day, check.  Every practice, lesson, game, concert, and school event my Mum was there, and more often than not my Pop too. If you can't tell, I like to brag about my parents a lot like parents like to brag about their children.


So to fill some back story in quick order.  My Pop's health since I've been alive has always been what I'd say "questionable." Crohn's Disease is the tip of the iceberg with nearly 30 other medical conditions contributing at this point (no, the 30 is not an exaggeration). Significant contributors include diabetes, an aneurysm of the ascending Aorta, vertigo, broken ankles, and broken fibula and tibia have meant that I am quite familiar with the emergency rooms of the greater Cincinnati area. My Mum had a clean bill of health up until 2001, at which point she was diagnosed with Breast Cancer.  It goes without saying I despise going to a doctor for myself.


I grew up in a context where it was my parents and I, with what seemed like all improbable random odds against us.  We "kept on keeping on" and random incidents and maladies managed to find their ways to us.  Growing up I found my escape from these things in baseball, viola, school and working. Now with these same things facing me, I'm no longer sure where to find my retreat and sanctuary. So here I am blogging.


We'll see how this goes whole experiment goes for a couple of blogs. This didn't quite cover everything which I hoped, but I don't want to make these all to extensive or wordy. Hope everyone is doing well and had a phenomenal weekend!


drh