Morning tasks complete, lunch devoured, and am ready to take Flat Stanley down to the Mall for his final DC photo junket before getting shipped off back to Georgia for my nephew’s presentation to his class. If I have time we’ll make a quick stop at the stadium even though there’s no game going on. Because 7 year olds are way more impressed by baseball than the White House. But we’ll have to see…
But first, I feel the need to clarify something. If I think you’re a terrible person it’s not because you screwed up once and I’m a big, bad meanie who can’t forgive. No, no, no, your pattern of poor behavior has to be protracted, usually over a few years, before I bestow the crown of “terrible in my estimation.” Then there’s the other little thing that pushes the “oops, I messed up” over the wall into the “I’m a raging sociopath.” There are people in my life that I’ve known quite literally my entire life and they’ve screwed up, and so have I, as regards our relationships. Sometimes quite dramatically and seemingly unforgivably, on both sides. But the difference is all in how you handle it and how you handle future interaction. One sincere apology — or dang, even just the slightest inkling that you feel bad for being such an incredible jerk — tends to go a long way. And then a sincere effort not to harm again, acknowledging of course that sometimes good people, people you love, hurt you. Only they really can after all. But you, my friend, have never let your mind wander to the idea that you have ever done anything wrong because you got what you wanted and so, in your version of morality, what you did was right. And you certainly never apologized if, in your quest to be King God Lord Selfish, people got hurt or abused. And you MOST certainly never stopped the abuse if it meant you couldn’t get whatever someone like you might be after. And those qualities, in my estimation, are terrible. And not just because they lack a human element, but because they require no thought and contain no nuance, and therefore no beauty. And you embody them. Deal with it.
Or, alternatively, you could apologize.
Okay moving on from that, my friend Colleen had this to say about the Marine Corps Marathon this weekend and I thought it was beautiful:
While I admire all the Achilles athletes, there’s something a little extra special about their Freedom Team Two members of which are featured here). Running a 10K or marathon is impressive, but running one after your limbs have been blown off by an IED adds a whole different level of mad respect. Spent last MCM with these guys so met up with some of them at the hotel yesterday & while they were stoked by their accomplishment, they were more concerned about making sure their teammate made it since she hadn’t really trained for the full. Awesome guys all the way around…
This is the opposite of that other nonsense I wrote about above.
Good stuff here on the Buddha. A more intriguing figure with each passing year.
A great piece from my friend Caleb as he negotiates the waters of entrepreneurship. I’m sure my dad had similar feelings. I know he did actually.
On the subject of This Town — which I have to reiterate is a really fun read. I just don’t want to be too harsh for some reason. — this is kind of how I feel about it as well. Death has a way of bringing things into focus.
I’ve written about the ghost in my Aunt Dorothy’s house here before but my Aunt Chong was uncomfortable in my grandparents house a few thousand feet down river. So I thought the part about Asian culture was pretty interesting.
Missouri’s looking really good, but anything can still happen. We have Florida Saturday. The world’s largest cocktail party. I swear the boys will have aneurisms if we lose and I won’t be able to save them all.
A friend posted some photos from his hike here this weekend. It’s now officially on my list of places to go as soon as possible. I actually love a good cold-weather hike.
Huh. A bracelet that essentially tells your whiny little butt to chill out (or warm up, as it were). Marvelous.
Compare these two quotes:
That deep emotional conviction of the presence of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea of God.
~ Albert Einstein
Faith: not wanting to know what is true.
~ Friedrich Nietzsche
A person’s affinity for one or the other is pretty useful in deciding who you want to be around.
I love my pink coat, too. Can’t wait to wear it this winter…
Now, random track. But I do still love her.
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