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I took the time to listen to an entire Trump stump speech. I had to. I have to fully believe I am making the right choice with my vote. Now I am certain. I cannot in good faith vote for Donald Trump because he has no plan or any real expectation of forming a plan that supports and promotes what I see as American values.

This is not about Clinton. I know exactly what Clinton offers. I saw and later reviewed her history as a first lady, a senator, and most recently Secretary of State. That last roll is what has her in hot water with voters. The ’email scandal’ is born out of a failed effort to pin the ‘Benghazi scandal’ square on the shoulders of Clinton. In one of many many many hearings and probes the email server was discovered and that became the new scandal–the new dog whistle for the party loyal. Here is what it really boils down to: Even they know the candidate their party chose is not someone they can stand behind. SO they made it about ‘how corrupt she is’.

So I listened and I waited to see him say something of value; waited for words that indicated a political strategy that could survive the rigors of congress. Nope. Not a real thing. He did nothing over the course of the speech but spit hate at Clinton and blame the media for, well, everything. While hate is sustainable it is not productive in the political realm. It is not what we need leading our nation through what looks to be headed towards being a tough and delicate time in our history.

Right now we need someone a bit smarter.

Recently someone tried to hack my facebook. I don’t know why. It isn’t as if I am the cornerstone of a major social network that, with the proper entry, can help someone uncover the darkest patterns in the world’s buying habits…

Clearly my creativity is not entirely dead. Instead it goes into these patterns of hibernation, awakening, bear-like at the first sign of literary opportunity. Turns out opportunity is there so long as I slog through the load of random emails teeming in my inbox. I gotta get a better system of clearing out that stuff, because I missed out on a number of solid writing opportunities purely through the inability to successfully navigate a google inbox.

No, tech has not passed me by, nor has responsibility overwhelmed me. I just pick and choose the focal things and lately the filters are not doing me any favors.

So what now? Back to basics. I tune up this weekend for the coming NanoWrimo and hammer out a cavalcade of words that jumpstart me back into the writer’s life. Desmond Tutu once said, “If you want to be a good writer, you are not going to become one by always going to the movies and eating bonbons. You have to sit down and write, which can be very frustrating, and yet without that you would not get that good result.”

There are many things in life that frustrate me. One in particular sits on my prefrontal cortex wreaking a certain kind of havoc–the havoc of wanting and not having. Still, it is a wonderful opportunity to learn how to separate pain from suffering. One does not, in fact, have to lead to the other. Likewise, a life in which you focus on being good to your kids doesn’t have to be entirely about your kids. There ought to be time for you in there too.

All of this randomness. Thus go the inner workings of the writer’ brain.

 

There are a great many things that people do to occupy their time. Less and less, I study football player metrics in order to determine the best fantasy lineup for a given week. you can tell I’ve been at it less, because I am losing ‘big league’ in my solo league. The league is a Two-QB league and my Qb’s are trash. I have Big Ben (O), Brian Hoyer (IR), Russel Wilson, and Paxton Lynch. In other words I have one actual starting QB for the rest of the regular fantasy season. My league is gangster and the other teams are offering junk for my best players, just because they know I need a QB. My record is 2-5 and looks like it is about to get worse.

Given that information, why would anyone take my advice on players to pick. Well, that is why I stopped offering it. Still, I have a pretty good handle on teams. Save for a total misread of the Cardinals v. Seahawks game, I’ve been decently accurate about such things. Lets see if that trend continues in future weeks. I’ll only give you the facts this week. No color commentary. No summation. Just the facts.

The Facts:

TEN over JAX
CIN over WAS
NE over BUF
ARI over CAR
NYJ over CLE
DET over HOU
KC over IND
SEA over NO
OAK over TB
SD over DEN
GB over ATL
DAL over PHI
MIN over CHI

Any good writer will tell you there are at least three rules to being a good writer.

1. You gotta write a lot in order to be a good writer. Of course, writing a lot in of itself doesn’t make you good. Bad writers can hammer out the same swill over and over again, never improving one iota; never moving the dial an inch, because they don’t have the context of how to do that. No, they need our second rule.
2. You gotta read a lot in order to be a good writer. This includes reading things that are not necessarily in your wheelhouse. Good writing is just flat out good writing. Please read heavily from your chosen genre, but please also develop a reading habit around books that are flat out and notably good.
3. Goals make great writers. If you are not writing with purpose then most of the best ideas are overlooked or flat out tossed in the trash for lack of inspiration.

Those are the three that carry you as you move forward.

I’m not entirely sure how to start this one. I wanted to write something positive–perhaps about writing itself–but that emotion is not finding me today. Instead I’m typing against the background chorus of hundreds of fingers drumming out their own ten minute rule in the first ten minutes of my English class.

I started teaching with the one for one idea. I expected to find someone to replace me, figuring that if I could find one person with the passion to teach then they would not only succeed me, but they would elevate the teaching to the next level. It became my passion for a time. I found this really incredible girl named Rachel who was writer material as well as teacher material. We fell out of touch, so I never learned if she was ‘the one’. I did stumble across another student at a writing conference three years ago who had turned to the profession. She officially serves as ‘the one’ meaning I did my job here. I’ve replaced myself. What happens once you’ve been replaced? I find that I think about that in all aspects of my life.

I think that idea of replacement and of finding a path, purpose, challenge, point is weighing pretty heavy on my heart these days. Recently I had a deep and meaningful conversation that caused me to reflect on who I am and what I have done with my life. The results of that conversation both shocked and dismayed me. Over half way through my life arc I have not reached a point where I can say I replaced myself–three kids and a replacement teacher.

What I’ve done outside of self-replication is another matter entirely. It is the question that keeps me up at night.

Take a look at a blog from two years ago and you’ll find me in more or less in the same space I am now. Perhaps worse. The difference is a thunderous awareness of what is holding me back and, honestly, who I have been over the last twenty years or so. I think I had my own flashpoint back in college when I made choices that took me one direction as opposed to the other, and along the chosen path I sacrificed a lot of the passion I have for the important things in life.

Such as?

That is a post for another day, and a conversation that I need to develop more in order to determine how to move forward.

Some Thoughts:

1. Darelle Revis is having the worst year of his HOF football career. He has been horrible in coverage and worse as a tackler, both hallmarks of his game. 80% of balls thrown his way are completed passes. He’s given up short routes, first down routes, deep routes… He ought to give back his cleats.
2. If likes are the bellweather of the attention one gets online then I have received 0 attention since October 15th. I don’t always check these things and clearly don’t measure whether or not I write or what I write based on likes, but as a feeling human, it does suck.
3. As a writer, I have thick enough skin to deal.
4. We are on our way to the Semi-finals of the AZ-AYF Mighty Mite Youth Football Playoffs. That is a mouthful. We face the West Valley Bandits, last year’s national champions and the odds on favorite to do big things again this year. However, we have the better team. So long as we manage our players and stay healthy, we got this.

Who speaks for us? The question is not one of politics per say, but about identifying the voice that resonates across a generation. Morrison and Ellis created a comic book character that was meant to be the living embodiment of a generation. Now in terms of music there is not really one overall artist but it can be said that there is one per genre. Only one Micheal Jackson exists, only one Bob Dylan, etc.

So I say again, who speaks for us? Who is the voice that encompasses the latest generation? I feel like we’ve fallen into comedy in a special way again. The way that a generation grew up around Richard Pryor is the same way a generation grew up around Jon Stewart. I miss Stewart, but I’m not sure he is the voice.

I am not sure who is.

Some Thoughts:

1. John Oliver? Yes, please.
2. First week of playoffs and we got a win.

My middle kid just quit soccer. It was a snap reaction to my choice not to let the kids do youth sports for the next few months. He was planning to play club soccer on a developmental team, prepping himself for tougher league play. His brothers were about to do a club flag football season and I pulled them as well. I needed the break. It is the first of many steps to redefine (read: create) my life. Sports have been the largest part of our lives for as long as they’ve been able to play. The break affords us an opportunity to figure out what we really want to do outside of sports.

I’m guessing it involves more outdoor stuff and more running and playing and jumping off of dangerous things. Just on our timetable this time.

Some Thoughts:

1. I applaud Chicago Fire for its portrayal of women. The women are strong and forceful and remain completely feminine in what is traditionally viewed as a masculine world.
2. I believe that Minecraft–games in general get a bad rap. A recent article on screen time explained new recommendations from doctors on how much screen time a young person should get. It leads to a larger conversation about how we interact with each other and how digital tech continues to change that. Minecraft is legos writ large. I could be playing with legos and be seen as just as much of a nerd and time waster, but your waste of time is my meditation–my safe space.

You ever hit that point where every love song seems to be about you? haven’t felt that way since college, but here we are again in that same space but with considerably less swagger… and hair. It points to a mindset–being receptive to what the universe is spinning in your direction. Lately the universe has been thumping out the cadence of ‘change or die’. That or the algorithms that govern my digital interactions have picked up on something and are steadily reinforcing that message.

Funny thing is, both options are equally possible. It is not a stretch to believe in God. It is not a stretch to believe in a higher electronic power either–one which gently nudges the complex codes that govern what we see on the web in order to tell us a message we would otherwise overlook. Perhaps it is even more simple. Perhaps said algorithms pickup on your surfing and viewing habits, painting a picture of the type of content you are unconsciously pushing towards and delivers that content, reinforcing the emotions that lie below the surface of our understanding.

Whatever it is, Pandora is all up in my head.

Some Thoughts:

1. Self-confidence is the sexiest thing on the planet.
2. I always wanted a daughter. I would have named her Patience and required quite a bit of it myself.
3. I want my own personal AI. My experiences with Siri, Alexa, and even the GPS in my car lead me to believe a cross platform AI would be supremely beneficial.
4. Yeah, I got the Echo dot. Yeah, it is that dope.

It can be of value to lose yourself in something meaningless at least for a moment. I’m taking advantage of this moment to talk football. I have not been doing very well in my solo leagues. My partner team is outstanding, which largely falls on the shoulder of my partner. I, on the other hand, have lost a great deal of the thread of what I am talking about when it comes to the sport. Still, I’ll give it another go. After all, I was right about the Giants.

GB over CHI
Even without a legit run game I give the Packers line credit for holding of the CHI rush long enough to make it count.

NYG over LA
This is my early morning game. I love it. The Giants overseas against a LA team that still has not gotten it together. Maybe the line gets it together this week. Maybe.

CIN over CLE
Really, why ask?

DET over WAS
I’m not a WAS believer. In fact I think the magical glow from beating NYC has worn completely off. They rubbed out the last of it beating the Eagles.

OAK over JAX
Maybe next year Jax will be relevant. Lots of young talent.

KC over NO
NO is over for a while.

BUF over Miami
No shady worries me, but Gillesie and Bush ought to team up for some fireworks.

MIN ove PHI
Hello, Philly losing streak.

I’m done here.