I'm 44 now. I think I've stumbled upon why old men get grumpy. Patience and tolerance wanes, and often gives way to being unreasonable. I never understood that. I think I do now.
I've reached a point where the culture has diverged far enough from anything I understand as logical and reasonable that I'm really, really tired of having to cater to it. Where I once met opposition to my thinking with spirited debate, I've now had to swear off that, because it's just not healthy for me and gains nothing.
Now, when I run into this stuff, my instinct is to, well, grump. I'm just fed up and tired. I'm literally too old for this crap. I do not see this improving as my life goes on.
My issue is my faith. There's a certain amount of kindness and love I'm to show everyone. Calling them an asshat and other choice words isn't usually listed under 'kindness and love'. Some of this is in my new nature under Christ, in that I feel bad after going off on someone. The rest is just guilt that I'm being a 'bad witness' and generally representing Christ in a lousy light.
I have to tell you, though, I'm just entirely done with some concepts and phrases.
'Privilege'.
'Rape culture'.
'Cultural appropriation'.
'Cis-gendered'.
And the old standby, 'homophobia'.
There are a bunch of others, but those are really jabbing me in the soft and tenders lately.
I'll continue to resist becoming unreasonable. My father was an incredibly unreasonable and illogical man, and I won't fall prey to that. I'll continue to have hard-thought reasoning behind my beliefs.
However, I'm not making any promises about being patient with those who want to inflict this nonsense on me. I'm officially a grumpy old man, and you kids should get the hell off my lawn.
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
Sunday, February 02, 2014
Never question the victim
Something over on Facebook and Twitter has stirred up an old memory. It's not the kind of thing I usually put here, but it just feels like I'd be splashing ancient drama on my Facebook timeline if I put it there.
A long, long time ago I was dating someone I had no business dating. She was substantially younger than me, but I was lonely, stupid, naive, and still pretty young myself. This would best be described as the very early gestational stages of my 'Stupid Years'.
She was decidedly more attractive than any girl who'd ever paid attention to me, and she was paying attention. In spades. Came out of nowhere.
So we dated. Lots of making out. She was aggressive, I was willing, etc.
But, I didn't want to have sex. I still hadn't had sex, and was still under the thinking that I should wait. (I was already engaging in all kinds of sexual activity, but not sex itself, so that seemed like a good thing...did I mention I was stupid?)
We were only together for a few days. During that time, there was a compelling reason not to get involved below the belt.
Once that circumstance cleared itself up, I found her with a reason to spend the night at my house. Turns out it was entirely manufactured, but I trusted her, so she was on the sofa. I lived with my parents at the time, so we didn't exactly have much privacy, and there was no way she was going to be sleeping in my room.
That said, we still fooled around. I kept wanting to go to bed, she'd drag me back. It became clear she wanted to go all the way. I kept dodging. Finally, my dad got up for work and I went to bed, exhausted from pulling an all-nighter canoodling.
Next day comes, she goes home, and there's drama because of that manufactured reason for having to stay with us. She was grounded or whatever, that was that.
Sometime soon after (days, not sure) I find out via mutual friends that she's accused me, to them, of 'trying something sexual' with her in my front yard that night, and it was only when she screamed and woke my dad that I stopped and let her go.
My reaction was to laugh. For one thing, the truth of the night was that she wouldn't leave ME alone, we were in my living room the whole time, and I never forced a thing on anyone in my entire life. At that point I'd only kissed four people, I hadn't exactly had a lot of opportunity to do much of anything.
Also, the story was pathetic. We were outdoors? Why? Against a tree? Huh? And my dad woke up? My dad could have slept through a nuclear explosion, my mom is a very light sleeper. She didn't even know us well enough to know that pretty common information. My mom would have been outside telling us to quiet down if we'd just been talking normally!
So none of the facts of the accusation even passed a basic sniff test. Add to it her history of lying (did I mention I was stupid to be with her at all?) and my history of being, well, a harmless lovable little fuzzball known to be WAY too trusting with women, and you've got a closed case.
But my friends believed her.
I can't remember ever feeling that way before or, thankfully, since. Helplessness, rage...just the embodiment of injustice. It was WRONG.
And they didn't care.
Ended those friendships for a little while, to say the least. Sometime after my accuser finally got what what wanted, we reconnected. Turns out she'd been going from older guy to older guy trying to get knocked up so she'd have a way out of her house and have someone to take care of her. She accomplished that mission with the guy after me, and that was that.
Look, I understand the drive behind the statement 'don't question the victim'. For way too many years, as a culture, we refused to listen to claims of abuse, especially from women and girls. That was a travesty...and it's over now. If it happens now, it's not due to some patriarchal societal prejudice, no matter what modern feminism tells you. If it happens now, it's isolated, and God help the people who ignored the claims if it's later found that they're true. The only people we consider lower than the abuser are those who allow the abuser to continue their dark work out of malice or foolishness.
What we have now is the opposite: it's not, 'never question the victim', it's 'never believe the accused'. As the great Maha Rushie says, it's the seriousness of the charges, not the weight of the evidence.
We cannot continue to exist as a culture unless we adhere to the most basic tenet of justice: innocent until proven guilty by evidence brought forth in open court. It's a sad, simple fact that sexual abuse often leaves absolutely no physical evidence. Because of this, many abusers get away with their crimes.
However, that's not to say that evidence doesn't exist. When it's a 'he said, she said' case you have to look at everything surrounding the accuser and the accused. Their past, testimony of others who have come in contact with them, etc.
Listen to me here: people who force sexual contact on other people do not do it one time and then stop. They do not succeed the first time without continuing. They rarely succeed the first time at all, but rather have several hesitant attempts to work up to what they seek. To force sexual contact on another human being, you have to have a very specific set of mental pathologies. Things wrong with how your brain works that keep you from behaving like everyone else.
This is why we have non-offending pedophiles. They may have the attraction, but they'd never force themselves on other people. That's also why we have sexual offenders against children who aren't pedophiles. Their pathology drives them to force themselves onto others, and it doesn't matter if they're sexually attracted to their victim or not. Ever wonder, as George Carlin did, why you hear about 85-year-old women being raped by young guys? That's why.
Either way, people who force themselves on others simply have things that drive them to do it, to overcome personal morality, cultural norms, societal repercussions, risk of legal punishment, and nature itself. It is no small thing to violate another human sexually. It isn't casual, simple, or easy unless you are profoundly broken. And if you are, it is no small matter to appear normal to everyone in your life.
Because of this, we can corroborate independent accusations of abuse by looking at patterns of behavior, finding previous victims, and seeking psychological evidence of abnormal pathology.
In short: offenders look and act like offenders, even if it is in very subtle ways. And if they don't, if there's no evidence at all, not even circumstantial...a simple accusation just isn't enough. That means sometimes bad guys get away with it. But it means that every time, if it works right, innocent men walk free.
We HAVE to adhere to this. It's the foundation of order in our culture. When we allow emotion and our own prejudices to break down this most basic logical function, we're destroying what allows us to be free. We can look back at witch hunts of the past, and we see them as times of great injustice, ignorance, and tragedy...and yet we're entering a time when the world shouts via social media 'burn the witch' and everyone starts looking for kindling and matches.
I can only encourage you, as someone who has been falsely accused, to THINK. Don't feel, THINK. Examine more than testimony and claims. Look at facts, evidence, and patterns. Apply Occam's Razor at every turn. Ask yourself: what do I have to believe, in order to believe this claim? What do I have to believe to disbelieve it? Critical, analytical thinking, devoid of emotion beyond the passion to do the right thing.
And yes, ALWAYS question the victim. Question the victim, the accuser, and everything surrounding them. Question everything, or the next one accused might be you.
A long, long time ago I was dating someone I had no business dating. She was substantially younger than me, but I was lonely, stupid, naive, and still pretty young myself. This would best be described as the very early gestational stages of my 'Stupid Years'.
She was decidedly more attractive than any girl who'd ever paid attention to me, and she was paying attention. In spades. Came out of nowhere.
So we dated. Lots of making out. She was aggressive, I was willing, etc.
But, I didn't want to have sex. I still hadn't had sex, and was still under the thinking that I should wait. (I was already engaging in all kinds of sexual activity, but not sex itself, so that seemed like a good thing...did I mention I was stupid?)
We were only together for a few days. During that time, there was a compelling reason not to get involved below the belt.
Once that circumstance cleared itself up, I found her with a reason to spend the night at my house. Turns out it was entirely manufactured, but I trusted her, so she was on the sofa. I lived with my parents at the time, so we didn't exactly have much privacy, and there was no way she was going to be sleeping in my room.
That said, we still fooled around. I kept wanting to go to bed, she'd drag me back. It became clear she wanted to go all the way. I kept dodging. Finally, my dad got up for work and I went to bed, exhausted from pulling an all-nighter canoodling.
Next day comes, she goes home, and there's drama because of that manufactured reason for having to stay with us. She was grounded or whatever, that was that.
Sometime soon after (days, not sure) I find out via mutual friends that she's accused me, to them, of 'trying something sexual' with her in my front yard that night, and it was only when she screamed and woke my dad that I stopped and let her go.
My reaction was to laugh. For one thing, the truth of the night was that she wouldn't leave ME alone, we were in my living room the whole time, and I never forced a thing on anyone in my entire life. At that point I'd only kissed four people, I hadn't exactly had a lot of opportunity to do much of anything.
Also, the story was pathetic. We were outdoors? Why? Against a tree? Huh? And my dad woke up? My dad could have slept through a nuclear explosion, my mom is a very light sleeper. She didn't even know us well enough to know that pretty common information. My mom would have been outside telling us to quiet down if we'd just been talking normally!
So none of the facts of the accusation even passed a basic sniff test. Add to it her history of lying (did I mention I was stupid to be with her at all?) and my history of being, well, a harmless lovable little fuzzball known to be WAY too trusting with women, and you've got a closed case.
But my friends believed her.
I can't remember ever feeling that way before or, thankfully, since. Helplessness, rage...just the embodiment of injustice. It was WRONG.
And they didn't care.
Ended those friendships for a little while, to say the least. Sometime after my accuser finally got what what wanted, we reconnected. Turns out she'd been going from older guy to older guy trying to get knocked up so she'd have a way out of her house and have someone to take care of her. She accomplished that mission with the guy after me, and that was that.
Look, I understand the drive behind the statement 'don't question the victim'. For way too many years, as a culture, we refused to listen to claims of abuse, especially from women and girls. That was a travesty...and it's over now. If it happens now, it's not due to some patriarchal societal prejudice, no matter what modern feminism tells you. If it happens now, it's isolated, and God help the people who ignored the claims if it's later found that they're true. The only people we consider lower than the abuser are those who allow the abuser to continue their dark work out of malice or foolishness.
What we have now is the opposite: it's not, 'never question the victim', it's 'never believe the accused'. As the great Maha Rushie says, it's the seriousness of the charges, not the weight of the evidence.
We cannot continue to exist as a culture unless we adhere to the most basic tenet of justice: innocent until proven guilty by evidence brought forth in open court. It's a sad, simple fact that sexual abuse often leaves absolutely no physical evidence. Because of this, many abusers get away with their crimes.
However, that's not to say that evidence doesn't exist. When it's a 'he said, she said' case you have to look at everything surrounding the accuser and the accused. Their past, testimony of others who have come in contact with them, etc.
Listen to me here: people who force sexual contact on other people do not do it one time and then stop. They do not succeed the first time without continuing. They rarely succeed the first time at all, but rather have several hesitant attempts to work up to what they seek. To force sexual contact on another human being, you have to have a very specific set of mental pathologies. Things wrong with how your brain works that keep you from behaving like everyone else.
This is why we have non-offending pedophiles. They may have the attraction, but they'd never force themselves on other people. That's also why we have sexual offenders against children who aren't pedophiles. Their pathology drives them to force themselves onto others, and it doesn't matter if they're sexually attracted to their victim or not. Ever wonder, as George Carlin did, why you hear about 85-year-old women being raped by young guys? That's why.
Either way, people who force themselves on others simply have things that drive them to do it, to overcome personal morality, cultural norms, societal repercussions, risk of legal punishment, and nature itself. It is no small thing to violate another human sexually. It isn't casual, simple, or easy unless you are profoundly broken. And if you are, it is no small matter to appear normal to everyone in your life.
Because of this, we can corroborate independent accusations of abuse by looking at patterns of behavior, finding previous victims, and seeking psychological evidence of abnormal pathology.
In short: offenders look and act like offenders, even if it is in very subtle ways. And if they don't, if there's no evidence at all, not even circumstantial...a simple accusation just isn't enough. That means sometimes bad guys get away with it. But it means that every time, if it works right, innocent men walk free.
We HAVE to adhere to this. It's the foundation of order in our culture. When we allow emotion and our own prejudices to break down this most basic logical function, we're destroying what allows us to be free. We can look back at witch hunts of the past, and we see them as times of great injustice, ignorance, and tragedy...and yet we're entering a time when the world shouts via social media 'burn the witch' and everyone starts looking for kindling and matches.
I can only encourage you, as someone who has been falsely accused, to THINK. Don't feel, THINK. Examine more than testimony and claims. Look at facts, evidence, and patterns. Apply Occam's Razor at every turn. Ask yourself: what do I have to believe, in order to believe this claim? What do I have to believe to disbelieve it? Critical, analytical thinking, devoid of emotion beyond the passion to do the right thing.
And yes, ALWAYS question the victim. Question the victim, the accuser, and everything surrounding them. Question everything, or the next one accused might be you.
Saturday, December 21, 2013
A Paradox
Something hit me today.
Transgenders say that genetics do not define their sexuality.
Homosexuals say that genetics define their sexuality.
I'm a bigot if I disagree with either.
Um...which is it? Can we actually have it both ways?
Transgenders say that genetics do not define their sexuality.
Homosexuals say that genetics define their sexuality.
I'm a bigot if I disagree with either.
Um...which is it? Can we actually have it both ways?
Monday, July 29, 2013
Idle Threats
The world DESPERATELY needs to realize that threats are just that: they aren't actions. The vast majority of threats running around out there are only threats in the perception of the terrified masses who choose to live in fear. Empty threats are just words.
You can track the vast majority of today's problems to people living in fear and reacting to threats that don't warrant any concern at all.
Everything from the TSA (no, nobody has ever even attempted to bomb a plane with a bottle of hand sanitizer BUT WE MUST TAKE THEM ALL BECAUSE OF THE THREAT!) to trash talk over video games (the Carter kid, STILL jailed over a 'lol j/k' FB post, Phil Fish quitting the game industry over 'abuse', the Black Ops backlash over 'nerfing') are suffering this issue.
Folks, I used to joust with the KKK on one of their BBS' back in the day. (Long story how I wound up there. Hint: not because I was looking to join.) I was threatened with everything you could imagine, by people from a group with a history of violence, who had a copy of my photo ID with my name, address, etc. Not 'internet tough guys', these were people who lived within easy driving distance. (My personal favorite: 'I'm gonna rape you with a posthole digger, you n***er-lover!')
What happened?
Nothing.
Cowards make threats. Dangerous people just do things. They don't send you a lovely message detailing what they're about to do, they just show up and do it.
I'm just tired of it. It all falls back to everyone taking everything and themselves just incredibly seriously. If someone threatens to rape and murder my wife over some trifle in a video game, is that okay? Of course not. But should I get all butthurt, call authorities, and buy a handgun? Of course not. People who say such things, by the very act of saying them, announce their impotence and cowardice. Actual rapist/murderers don't get on the internet and threaten it, they just go rape and murder.
If you look at all of the (over) publicized acts of violence in recent days, none of them had any warning. None of the mass shootings had threatened their targets. (ONE guy who basically failed at his mass shooting attempt appears to have gone on 4chan and said, effectively, 'gonna shoot up a mall tomorrow, should be lulz'. The fact that he did this on 4chan should explain why he didn't even manage to kill anyone.)
As far as I can tell, the number of times someone actually tracked a victim down over the internet as part of a rage/threat incident can be counted on one hand.
Is it a problem? Sure, in that we have an ocean of people, mostly young males, who think it's fine to say this stuff behind the wall of anonymity. That's a huge sign of major moral decay in society. People who respect other humans and human life in general don't threaten someone's family over a few milliseconds shaved off the firing time of a rifle in a video game. That's a character flaw of massive proportions.
That being said, our reaction to said threats is a sign of a breakdown on our part. Are we raising a generation of sociopaths? Looks like it. Are we positively reinforcing that behavior by treating it as noteworthy and effective? Absolutely.
So the next time someone says something horrible to you online, blow it off. Realize that the truth is that person is well beneath your notice. Act based on actions, not words.
You can track the vast majority of today's problems to people living in fear and reacting to threats that don't warrant any concern at all.
Everything from the TSA (no, nobody has ever even attempted to bomb a plane with a bottle of hand sanitizer BUT WE MUST TAKE THEM ALL BECAUSE OF THE THREAT!) to trash talk over video games (the Carter kid, STILL jailed over a 'lol j/k' FB post, Phil Fish quitting the game industry over 'abuse', the Black Ops backlash over 'nerfing') are suffering this issue.
Folks, I used to joust with the KKK on one of their BBS' back in the day. (Long story how I wound up there. Hint: not because I was looking to join.) I was threatened with everything you could imagine, by people from a group with a history of violence, who had a copy of my photo ID with my name, address, etc. Not 'internet tough guys', these were people who lived within easy driving distance. (My personal favorite: 'I'm gonna rape you with a posthole digger, you n***er-lover!')
What happened?
Nothing.
Cowards make threats. Dangerous people just do things. They don't send you a lovely message detailing what they're about to do, they just show up and do it.
I'm just tired of it. It all falls back to everyone taking everything and themselves just incredibly seriously. If someone threatens to rape and murder my wife over some trifle in a video game, is that okay? Of course not. But should I get all butthurt, call authorities, and buy a handgun? Of course not. People who say such things, by the very act of saying them, announce their impotence and cowardice. Actual rapist/murderers don't get on the internet and threaten it, they just go rape and murder.
If you look at all of the (over) publicized acts of violence in recent days, none of them had any warning. None of the mass shootings had threatened their targets. (ONE guy who basically failed at his mass shooting attempt appears to have gone on 4chan and said, effectively, 'gonna shoot up a mall tomorrow, should be lulz'. The fact that he did this on 4chan should explain why he didn't even manage to kill anyone.)
As far as I can tell, the number of times someone actually tracked a victim down over the internet as part of a rage/threat incident can be counted on one hand.
Is it a problem? Sure, in that we have an ocean of people, mostly young males, who think it's fine to say this stuff behind the wall of anonymity. That's a huge sign of major moral decay in society. People who respect other humans and human life in general don't threaten someone's family over a few milliseconds shaved off the firing time of a rifle in a video game. That's a character flaw of massive proportions.
That being said, our reaction to said threats is a sign of a breakdown on our part. Are we raising a generation of sociopaths? Looks like it. Are we positively reinforcing that behavior by treating it as noteworthy and effective? Absolutely.
So the next time someone says something horrible to you online, blow it off. Realize that the truth is that person is well beneath your notice. Act based on actions, not words.
Sunday, July 07, 2013
The World Has Moved On
I think I know what King meant when he used that phrase frequently in the Tower saga.
I wonder if what I've been feeling lately happens to all men when they reach certain age, or a stage in life?
I feel like the world has moved on. Things have spiraled completely out of control to the point that they no long make anything resembling sense. Public behavior has become something alien to me. It's easy to write it off as generational, things 'kids these days' do that shocks old fuddy duddy me, but I don't think it's that simple.
I can't think of a word for it outside of 'decay'. Things have decayed. Logic, reason, simple common sense...driven to ground like a hunted animal. Not just ignored, but openly targeted by the forces of ignorance and stupidity. Orwellian stuff: 2+2 doesn't = 4, because someone says so.
Reality is what it is...but more and more I see active, aggressive attempts to redefine it based on perception. Schrodinger's Cat nonsense. (In case you missed the boat on that one, if you put a cat in the box, IT'S STILL IN THE DAMN BOX unless someone took it out...your ability to observe it doesn't change a thing because you're not some all-powerful deity whose sense of sight dictates what does and doesn't exist.)
I'm at a loss as to how to approach such things. I can't abide by them. I mean, I can't pretend to go along with the insanity. Real is still real, logic is still logical, reason still rules the world. But society and culture continue the march of the fool, so what am I to do about it?
I used to think commentating on it would help, but that's been disproved by many years of failure. All platforms available to me to speak my viewpoint and attempt to educate are, effectively, karaoke: everyone comes to sing, nobody comes to listen. I used to think, hey, if I did an audio show, or a video show, or some other media...but I know full well that won't change a thing.
Is this how it always is when you get old and wisdom finally catches up to you? Did my forefathers also look out on their worlds as they aged and see madness? Or is it really, truly getting worse?
I wonder if what I've been feeling lately happens to all men when they reach certain age, or a stage in life?
I feel like the world has moved on. Things have spiraled completely out of control to the point that they no long make anything resembling sense. Public behavior has become something alien to me. It's easy to write it off as generational, things 'kids these days' do that shocks old fuddy duddy me, but I don't think it's that simple.
I can't think of a word for it outside of 'decay'. Things have decayed. Logic, reason, simple common sense...driven to ground like a hunted animal. Not just ignored, but openly targeted by the forces of ignorance and stupidity. Orwellian stuff: 2+2 doesn't = 4, because someone says so.
Reality is what it is...but more and more I see active, aggressive attempts to redefine it based on perception. Schrodinger's Cat nonsense. (In case you missed the boat on that one, if you put a cat in the box, IT'S STILL IN THE DAMN BOX unless someone took it out...your ability to observe it doesn't change a thing because you're not some all-powerful deity whose sense of sight dictates what does and doesn't exist.)
I'm at a loss as to how to approach such things. I can't abide by them. I mean, I can't pretend to go along with the insanity. Real is still real, logic is still logical, reason still rules the world. But society and culture continue the march of the fool, so what am I to do about it?
I used to think commentating on it would help, but that's been disproved by many years of failure. All platforms available to me to speak my viewpoint and attempt to educate are, effectively, karaoke: everyone comes to sing, nobody comes to listen. I used to think, hey, if I did an audio show, or a video show, or some other media...but I know full well that won't change a thing.
Is this how it always is when you get old and wisdom finally catches up to you? Did my forefathers also look out on their worlds as they aged and see madness? Or is it really, truly getting worse?
Friday, June 07, 2013
Another word we're abusing
This has been said elsewhere, but people still refuse to knock it off.
We're beating the crap out of the word 'assault' when used in the phrase 'assault rifle' specifically.
There's no such animal as an 'assault rifle' and there's no such thing as a rifle that's not used for assaults.
People are ignorant. They just don't understand. I get that. Let me help, in the hope that someone who needs to read this actually reads this.
When you think 'assault rifle' you are likely thinking of movies and TV. Black, ugly-looking weapons spitting out bullets. Synonymous with 'machine gun'.
Automatic weapons (the kind that shoot lots of bullets by holding down the trigger) have been illegal to citizens in the US since the early 20th century. If that's what you think of when you think 'assault rifle' you're already off in the weeds and making fools of yourselves when you discuss this issue.
What we have in the US are semi-automatic rifles. You pull the trigger and one bullet comes out.
Now, you'll notice I used a blanket statement there: rifles. Not assault rifles, hunting rifles, etc. Rifles are rifles. If the rifle is made with black metal and plastic, has a pistol grip, and some fancy collapsing stock, that does not make it more dangerous, or specifically designed for killing humans. It makes it lighter, gives it a certain look, and makes it more durable for some uses.
If a rifle has a traditional stock, a traditional grip, and is made of wood...you can absolutely murder the crap out of someone with it. That 'hunting' rifle can kill a human just as efficiently as an 'assault' model.
Guns are guns. They are designed to put holes in things. Living things, in general. They are weapons.
Demonizing specific rifles because of how they look is just completely silly. There is no such thing as an assault rifle ban, because there's no such thing as an assault rifle, outside of the nonsense definition concocted by liberal politicians.
You can say you're against all guns, or none. You really don't have a logical leg to stand on beyond that. I know that annoying old constitution gets in your way and all, but if you think disarming people is a solution, go ahead and try. The guys in Boston used pressure cookers. Evil people will always find a way to accomplish what evil they wish to perform. Always. Nature of the beast.
Just please, stop saying it's the fault of 'assault rifles'. Hell, please stop using the term, because it's a plainly stupid, ignorant thing to say.
Friday, May 17, 2013
A Story and An Explanation
When I was a kid, maybe 11 or 12, I had a friend in the neighborhood. His name was Doug, he was a couple years younger than me. We weren't best friends or anything, he was a neighborhood kid, and we knew each other, played together, etc.
One day, out of nowhere, he comes around on his bike and just starts being incredibly mean to me. Calling me names, taunting me, just really nasty.
After a few minutes of this, he gets off his bike and picks up this really old Sunday newspaper that had been sitting in a neighbor's yard for a long time. It'd been wet many times, dried back up after, till it was a hard, crumbly mess.
He started hitting me with it as he rode past me. If I got out of the way, he'd throw it at me, then pick it up as I was recovering. It hurt, badly.
During all this, I tried to make him stop. I started by reasoning with him, asking him what was wrong, trying to find out why he was acting this way. Then rage took over, but I was fat and he was fast and on a bike, so I couldn't catch him to make him stop.
In the end, I just collapsed on my knees in my neighbor's yard, sobbing uncontrollably. Between the physical pain and the complete, unbridled frustration, I just collapsed inside and out.
I don't even remember what happened from there. How it ended.
Right now, I feel exactly the same way. No matter how much I try to do the right thing, or make things better, or help situations and people, I just keep taking the hits. I'm completely incapable of making it stop. And that's all I want at this point: I just want it to stop. I'm beyond reasoning with it, I'm no longer trying to salvage the relationship (pushing the metaphor to it's limits, but you get the picture) I just want to be left alone in my impotent, helpless misery.
Feeling sorry for myself? Yep. Someone should, may as well be me.
One day, out of nowhere, he comes around on his bike and just starts being incredibly mean to me. Calling me names, taunting me, just really nasty.
After a few minutes of this, he gets off his bike and picks up this really old Sunday newspaper that had been sitting in a neighbor's yard for a long time. It'd been wet many times, dried back up after, till it was a hard, crumbly mess.
He started hitting me with it as he rode past me. If I got out of the way, he'd throw it at me, then pick it up as I was recovering. It hurt, badly.
During all this, I tried to make him stop. I started by reasoning with him, asking him what was wrong, trying to find out why he was acting this way. Then rage took over, but I was fat and he was fast and on a bike, so I couldn't catch him to make him stop.
In the end, I just collapsed on my knees in my neighbor's yard, sobbing uncontrollably. Between the physical pain and the complete, unbridled frustration, I just collapsed inside and out.
I don't even remember what happened from there. How it ended.
Right now, I feel exactly the same way. No matter how much I try to do the right thing, or make things better, or help situations and people, I just keep taking the hits. I'm completely incapable of making it stop. And that's all I want at this point: I just want it to stop. I'm beyond reasoning with it, I'm no longer trying to salvage the relationship (pushing the metaphor to it's limits, but you get the picture) I just want to be left alone in my impotent, helpless misery.
Feeling sorry for myself? Yep. Someone should, may as well be me.
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