Random Thought Blog Post
F
I may, or may not, post this blog post. If you are reading this message, it is because I clicked on the button marked 'Publish Post'.
I haven't made a blog post in quite some time. Or, at least, not a blog post of any significance.
I have a lot of random thoughts flitting through my mind and if I post this post at all it will be a post that is random, incoherent, disorienting, and fueled by a six pack of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. I'm not sure if this is a good start to things....
So, some random thoughts. Sara Palin is an idiot. If she thought she could concentrate on her political career by resigning from her political position, well, she is a fool. She is dead; over; and remains nothing more than a joke for late night comedians. She has entered the realm of the late career Michael Jackson and all that is left is her bizarre eulogy to come.
I have been listening to a lot of paranormal podcasts lately. Some of them have been entertaining, some of them have been frustrating, and some simply boring.
Sometimes I just want to scream, like my own personal Rodney King, 'Can't we all just get along?'
I feel like I need to give some advice, some therapy, to all of the people I listen to in paranormal land.
Some might ask, why am I interested in the paranormal? To those people, I ask, why aren't you? The normal can get pretty boring after all. It's the paranormal where things get interesting; especially whenever and wherever the paranormal intersects with consensus reality.
Now, don't get me started on consensus reality. We will have a long night if I get going there...
If you are new to things, I strongly recommend you read the collective writings of Robert Anton Wilson. If you haven't read his work, well, really, how can we even begin this discussion together?
Digressing further....
Have I ever told this blog about my first true love?
Apparently I have not...
I suppose it is because I play a cat and mouse game with my blog; trying to to keep it personal while at the same time realizing that a diverse audience of disinterested people may, or may not, read it. Nevertheless, I do realize that it injects itself into the bloodstream of the Google search engine and leads a life of its own over time.
Anyway, who really cares?
Well, I will tell this personal story in short form.
When I was young...and were we not all young once? When I was young, when I first left home and went away to college, I formed a romantic relationship with an 'older woman'. Just how much older was this older woman? Not that much older really, maybe like two whole years. However, at that time in my life, given her life experience (she was far more exotic and sophisticated than myself. She had traveled the world, was born in another country, and spoke at least two languages) she seemed much older indeed. As well, she was attractive, brilliant, and complex.
We formed a very brief, and intense, romantic relationship that did not last for very long. Of course it made quite an impression on me, since it was my first, but in the end it did not last long at all. This relationship, over time, transformed into one that transcended its origin and ultimately formed what I felt was a deeply spiritual and profound relationship. This friendship continued for a number of years until, through time and transition, it was lost.
It actually wasn't entirely 'lost' it was snuffed out. I met a woman and I was married. It's not entirely unusual, unexpected, or unreasonable, that the woman I married felt a little bit jealous of a former female friendship that I was still trying to maintain. I made a choice, a poor choice in retrospect, and ended my phone conversations and continued contact with this dear friend from my past.
Years passed. Many years passed. And I found that, this woman I had married, became the woman I divorced. Once I was divorced I began to reexamine my life, and try to rediscover who and what I was as a human being. In the past I was an artist, a fool, and a great explorer but I had given all of that up for something false. I tried to regain those qualities in my life. Over time I met a new woman in my life, a woman I today call my 'permanent wife'. I told her about some of the things which I had lost over the years, and that story included the loss of my friendship with my first significant female friend.
Instead of jealousy, or resentment, she encouraged me to try to reconnect with this long lost friend. I tried a variety of search techniques but, realize that this was the pre-Internet days, I met with utter failure. I even went so far as to hire a personal search firm who guaranteed that they could find any long lost friend you might hope to connect with. I paid my fee and waited. As weeks went by they failed to provide any information, just excuses. I began to feel as though I had been ripped off by a scam artist. I can't recall how this all transpired but I even ended up having the local news send out an investigative reporter to cover my story to expose the fraud. Then things got nasty. The personal search firm threatened everyone with litigation, including the news station and they dropped the story. Needing no more grief in my life, and considering the fact that I was about to leave on my Honeymoon with my new, lemon freshened, and most permanent wife, I dropped the entire thing.
As I pause, at this point in my story, I remember an important detail that I forgot to mention. Obviously I wasn't trying to reconnect with my old friend to rekindle some sort of unrequited love, nor was I trying to satisfy idle curiosity. Over the course of many years I had recurring dreams in which this friend had passed away and, in those dreams, I felt the most intense regret at never having been able to explain to her why I had lost contact. These dreams haunted me to no end and all I wanted to know was that she was alive, well, and happy in her life.
Years passed. Many more years. Over time the Internet grew and I would try to do searches on her name, but with no results. Then, one day, an idea occurred to me that was brilliant in its simplicity. We had both attended college together, that was where we had met, and the University managed to continue to send me catalogs and requests for donations. Perhaps, the University had her contact information as well??
I sent a rather odd letter to the alumni association of the University and, to my surprise, I received a positive response. They did have a record of my friend, but could not give me her personal information.
However, they said the would forward a letter if I sent it to them. After many years of waiting this was one of my greatest nagging hopes realized. I wrote a letter that explained my basic concerns, asking the question, was she well, apologized for losing contact, and sent it off.
Weeks later I received a personal reply. My hopes were high. Could we rekindle a friendship which, at one time, had been intense and deeply personal (almost spiritual in its intensity) that had encompassed lengthy phone conversations and shared experiences? The note was short and to the point. Yes, she was alive. And, yes, she was well. However, in her case, rather than remembering the years of deep friendship we had fostered she also remembered some things she best wished to forget. I was a memory in her life that she would best leave as part of her past and would I please honor her wishes and not contact her again.
I tried my best to respect this. (We are now talking going back over 14 years ago.) I did not write her after that. The good news was that the bad dreams went away and it was, has been, and continues to be a great relief to know that she is well and happy in her life.
Nevertheless, I always wondered....how can you be entirely invisible over the Internet? Over the course of 14 years I would, occasionally, do a search on her name. I found out, once I received that one letter, that she had changed her name and this was why I had such great difficulty ever locating her in the first place. For years she was invisible in all of cyberspace. No email, no facebook, no myspace page, no forum postings, nothing.
A few years ago I finally found a lonely link on the Internet that referenced her in an article. And, then, just a few months ago, I found out that she finally started a blog. And, just today, I posted a comment reply to a post on her blog, which she approved.
What a long, strange, bizarre trip it has been trying to slowly reconnect with someone who, at one time, was the most important person in my life.............................
I may, or may not, post this blog post. If you are reading this message, it is because I clicked on the button marked 'Publish Post'.
I haven't made a blog post in quite some time. Or, at least, not a blog post of any significance.
I have a lot of random thoughts flitting through my mind and if I post this post at all it will be a post that is random, incoherent, disorienting, and fueled by a six pack of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. I'm not sure if this is a good start to things....
So, some random thoughts. Sara Palin is an idiot. If she thought she could concentrate on her political career by resigning from her political position, well, she is a fool. She is dead; over; and remains nothing more than a joke for late night comedians. She has entered the realm of the late career Michael Jackson and all that is left is her bizarre eulogy to come.
I have been listening to a lot of paranormal podcasts lately. Some of them have been entertaining, some of them have been frustrating, and some simply boring.
Sometimes I just want to scream, like my own personal Rodney King, 'Can't we all just get along?'
I feel like I need to give some advice, some therapy, to all of the people I listen to in paranormal land.
Some might ask, why am I interested in the paranormal? To those people, I ask, why aren't you? The normal can get pretty boring after all. It's the paranormal where things get interesting; especially whenever and wherever the paranormal intersects with consensus reality.
Now, don't get me started on consensus reality. We will have a long night if I get going there...
If you are new to things, I strongly recommend you read the collective writings of Robert Anton Wilson. If you haven't read his work, well, really, how can we even begin this discussion together?
Digressing further....
Have I ever told this blog about my first true love?
Apparently I have not...
I suppose it is because I play a cat and mouse game with my blog; trying to to keep it personal while at the same time realizing that a diverse audience of disinterested people may, or may not, read it. Nevertheless, I do realize that it injects itself into the bloodstream of the Google search engine and leads a life of its own over time.
Anyway, who really cares?
Well, I will tell this personal story in short form.
When I was young...and were we not all young once? When I was young, when I first left home and went away to college, I formed a romantic relationship with an 'older woman'. Just how much older was this older woman? Not that much older really, maybe like two whole years. However, at that time in my life, given her life experience (she was far more exotic and sophisticated than myself. She had traveled the world, was born in another country, and spoke at least two languages) she seemed much older indeed. As well, she was attractive, brilliant, and complex.
We formed a very brief, and intense, romantic relationship that did not last for very long. Of course it made quite an impression on me, since it was my first, but in the end it did not last long at all. This relationship, over time, transformed into one that transcended its origin and ultimately formed what I felt was a deeply spiritual and profound relationship. This friendship continued for a number of years until, through time and transition, it was lost.
It actually wasn't entirely 'lost' it was snuffed out. I met a woman and I was married. It's not entirely unusual, unexpected, or unreasonable, that the woman I married felt a little bit jealous of a former female friendship that I was still trying to maintain. I made a choice, a poor choice in retrospect, and ended my phone conversations and continued contact with this dear friend from my past.
Years passed. Many years passed. And I found that, this woman I had married, became the woman I divorced. Once I was divorced I began to reexamine my life, and try to rediscover who and what I was as a human being. In the past I was an artist, a fool, and a great explorer but I had given all of that up for something false. I tried to regain those qualities in my life. Over time I met a new woman in my life, a woman I today call my 'permanent wife'. I told her about some of the things which I had lost over the years, and that story included the loss of my friendship with my first significant female friend.
Instead of jealousy, or resentment, she encouraged me to try to reconnect with this long lost friend. I tried a variety of search techniques but, realize that this was the pre-Internet days, I met with utter failure. I even went so far as to hire a personal search firm who guaranteed that they could find any long lost friend you might hope to connect with. I paid my fee and waited. As weeks went by they failed to provide any information, just excuses. I began to feel as though I had been ripped off by a scam artist. I can't recall how this all transpired but I even ended up having the local news send out an investigative reporter to cover my story to expose the fraud. Then things got nasty. The personal search firm threatened everyone with litigation, including the news station and they dropped the story. Needing no more grief in my life, and considering the fact that I was about to leave on my Honeymoon with my new, lemon freshened, and most permanent wife, I dropped the entire thing.
As I pause, at this point in my story, I remember an important detail that I forgot to mention. Obviously I wasn't trying to reconnect with my old friend to rekindle some sort of unrequited love, nor was I trying to satisfy idle curiosity. Over the course of many years I had recurring dreams in which this friend had passed away and, in those dreams, I felt the most intense regret at never having been able to explain to her why I had lost contact. These dreams haunted me to no end and all I wanted to know was that she was alive, well, and happy in her life.
Years passed. Many more years. Over time the Internet grew and I would try to do searches on her name, but with no results. Then, one day, an idea occurred to me that was brilliant in its simplicity. We had both attended college together, that was where we had met, and the University managed to continue to send me catalogs and requests for donations. Perhaps, the University had her contact information as well??
I sent a rather odd letter to the alumni association of the University and, to my surprise, I received a positive response. They did have a record of my friend, but could not give me her personal information.
However, they said the would forward a letter if I sent it to them. After many years of waiting this was one of my greatest nagging hopes realized. I wrote a letter that explained my basic concerns, asking the question, was she well, apologized for losing contact, and sent it off.
Weeks later I received a personal reply. My hopes were high. Could we rekindle a friendship which, at one time, had been intense and deeply personal (almost spiritual in its intensity) that had encompassed lengthy phone conversations and shared experiences? The note was short and to the point. Yes, she was alive. And, yes, she was well. However, in her case, rather than remembering the years of deep friendship we had fostered she also remembered some things she best wished to forget. I was a memory in her life that she would best leave as part of her past and would I please honor her wishes and not contact her again.
I tried my best to respect this. (We are now talking going back over 14 years ago.) I did not write her after that. The good news was that the bad dreams went away and it was, has been, and continues to be a great relief to know that she is well and happy in her life.
Nevertheless, I always wondered....how can you be entirely invisible over the Internet? Over the course of 14 years I would, occasionally, do a search on her name. I found out, once I received that one letter, that she had changed her name and this was why I had such great difficulty ever locating her in the first place. For years she was invisible in all of cyberspace. No email, no facebook, no myspace page, no forum postings, nothing.
A few years ago I finally found a lonely link on the Internet that referenced her in an article. And, then, just a few months ago, I found out that she finally started a blog. And, just today, I posted a comment reply to a post on her blog, which she approved.
What a long, strange, bizarre trip it has been trying to slowly reconnect with someone who, at one time, was the most important person in my life.............................
Comments