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Turns out ISIL was the smartest group in the room.

I wouldn’t have thought so. I felt like the media banter about how slick ISIL was seemed more like media propaganda to prop up a story that wasn’t really that important to me. This isn’t the first group to run rampant through the thousand or so mile stretch of the middle east. No, what made these guys special was a handful of crafty dudes with an Adobe package or just straight up iMovie and some rudimentary film making skills. Jihadi John raised the stakes a bit before succumbing to the age old American trap of becoming the storyline for an episode of a TV Drama (this time it was Madam Secretary instead of Law and Order or even Scandal). All of the things the group was doing felt more like an infant’s flailing about than any sort of coordinated plan.

How wrong we were.

See, the first wave let us know they were there and had potential. The second wave showed us they had the military prowess to wage a legitimate ground campaign against the Syrian army. The third wave is the one that really matters. The third wave is happening now. The group has staged a staccato flurry of highly visible terror attacks designed, primarily, to wake up the countries that were hit and force them to take action. Why? Why rile up everyone around you to start beating the war drums and eventually beat your ass? Well, here is the truly devious part: They did it because they wanted everyone to start swinging at them.

Follow me here: So, you set off a bunch of nations to start attacking you. Eventually those nations run afoul of each other and someone gets hurt in the process. What happens then? Well those nations that were about attacking you are suddenly looking at each other as a larger and more present threat. Sadly, it worked. Recently the Turkish Air Force shot down a Russian fighter plane. The Russian pilots were reportedly murdered as they floated to the ground on parachutes. In a perfect world there would be apologies and a renewed interest in working together against a common foe, but this is Putin we are talking about. There will be justice before long.

So, now we need to wait for the other show to drop and see what will become of the coalition of the willing as we confront a battle that might be quickly spiraling out of control. In fights like these the only people who win are the ones who want chaos. In other words, the only people that win are ISIL.

On a night of horrendous football (hey, ref you stop the clock when the player goes out of bounds inside of two minutes. It doesn’t matter if he crawls there. This isn’t college…) I can reflect on the enormous value of time to yourself. I sat here at home grading and watching football and cleaning my garage and binge watching Jessica Jones (more on that later) and playing video games. Notice I didn’t say writing. Given the hectic nature of the month (novelvember, nanowrimo, write your ass off month) it felt good to step back and not do that for  day and to instead let the creative juices collect as I unwound.

Unwinding is a gift unto itself. I was really surprised at how rarely it actually happens for any extended period. Finding time to oneself is nearly impossible in this world. So I was especially pleased to be able to have it and to not squander it by trying to do too much and getting all worked up about it. Thats a problem too. Once we have a moment it is all too easy to waste it on things we know ‘need to get done’. I did spend an hour cleaning the garage, but that was super fun. I listened to an audiobook and sorted and threw away stuff and found all the xmas stuff that needs to go up at some point here.

So all in all it was a great day to reflect on life and love and the pursuit of happiness. I learned from the experience. I learned that there are a lot of things in life that make me happy, and having time to do those things is extremely important. In other words, I can’t be good to other people if I am not truly being good to myself.

Some Thoughts:

1. 4 months till I’m 41. I last thought about that four months ago.
2. I’m not ready for 41. I’m in terrible shape for it in fact.

I stumbled into K-pop. I know how it happened. I was researching for a project I’m writing and was curious about J-pop, K-pop and the differences between them. I tumbled very quickly into the slippery world of Babymetal, 2NE1, Crush, Exo, Arashi, and Perfume. I was utterly surprised by Crush and Zion T.  Before long I was way down the rabbit hole and looking back up at the world with a different point of view.

It started with Mamamoo. The all-girl group borrows heavily from girl groups of the 90’s all the way through Destiny’s Child. Only, these girls do it better. The difference is that with these K-pop (and to a lesser extent, J-pop) groups, they know exactly what they are and remain unrepentant about that. I’m stuck in a musical realm where the level of scrutiny and judgement flares outward from the artists themselves to an often discerning audience who expects artists to reach beyond themselves and be more. This doesn’t seem to be the case in K-pop where the musicians are often striving to be the best version of themselves that they can be. They are also incredibly talented.

No, they aren’t giving me something I’ve never seen before. Yes, it often feels like a rendition of something I vaguely remember from the past, but it is a reflection of the now that echoes the then. It isn’t special, but these artists are especially good at what they do. I won’t wear their tee shirts, but their songs and videos make me happy.

My kids did not fail. They excelled in fact. I will admit to a significant amount of doubt. It felt like we were trapped in a cycle of plays centered around one kid. It was clear that the other team knew it and would aim to knock him out of the game, which they did for a time. It wasn’t enough. Our boys played some of the best football they’ve played this season and they did it for all four quarters. The end result was a championship trophy and a swell of happy children.

I haven’t forgotten about the words I wrote the other day. I think these kids were put too much at risk at times and the ball only touched the hands of 4 kids this game–which is far too few for as much talent as we have. Still, I get that it was far too late in the season to change course. We finished with the horse we rode in on, but we finished strong.

Now I want to spend a few minutes talking about Drake. Ever since Hotline Bling I have started to really think about this dude as the male version of Taylor Swift (and her as a middling modern version of Alanis Morrisette). I went back through his history in albums and mix tapes and found that, basically, he gets dumped a lot and writes songs about it. Sounds like Taylor Swift to me.

Let’s review the history: The dude wrote songs (and often entire playlists) about Cece and Bria following break ups. This newest song seems to hint at the relationship between Drake and a young lady named Nebby who he broke up with in 2009. Check her instagram feed and you’ll find a girl with 40k followers and a photo of a cake shaped like her own butt. She’s special. About as special as the song. Still, its not even the first song he’s written about her, or the other girls, or Rhianna, or Nikki Minaj… In short, he’s a break up junkie masquerading as a sensitive dude.

That is so very Degrassi of him.

I was planning to sit down and write a ten minute review of Netflix’s Jessica Jones, but I failed to watch it. That led to a philosophical moment, which in turn led me to wax here on the idea of failure. In short, failure is a construct. We talk about failing as an act–a moment in time in which something we wished to happen did not. We speak about failure in more lasting terms. Failure is alternately defined as the “omission of expected or required action.” That definition sits at the heart of the point I’m squeezing into 10 minutes and some untold number of words. Basically, we use failure as a social reinforcement tool. We hold it over others and ourselves as a motivator–the stick that moves us through the unwanted chores and hard moments of life. In that sense, I think failure is a terrible idea to hold on to. I think there is a better way.

There’s a good chance my kids will fail tomorrow. I watched the practices and came to the conclusion that we are going to do exactly what we have done against this team the previous two times. This is bad, because I also have it on good authority that the team spent the week not practicing but watching game film of us doing the things we always do and recognizing it so they can stop it. So, my kids could fail. The beauty of that is they will move right along from that failure to the immediate question of, “Can we get a drink from Quiktrip?” This doesn’t mean that they don’t care. It means they don’t hold on to failure the way we are taught to as life accumulates on us like so much unwanted baggage. For them, failure is still a moment. They learn from the moment, consider how to better handle similar moments (because the exact moments never happen twice) and move on.

This is a natural thing that I feel like I’ve been trained out of over the years. I hold on to failures in writing, work, love, and sports and let the lessons weigh on me and warn me off on future endeavors. Failure shrinks ones ability to take risks and life is nothing if not a series of incalculable risks. So, I say we don’t hold on to failure. We simply fail, or succeed, and then we do something else.

By now you’ve already heard me ranting here and on Facebook about the Paris situation. I applied my wry cynicism to the situation and try to show a side of the equation that I feel is overlooked. This doesn’t mean I don’t grieve for the people in Paris and in Russia and Beirut (the list does truly go on–ISIL has been active). Well, this morning as I eat my pancakes in the safe womb of the American Empire, I’m left to question what is really going on. Most Islamic terrorist actions seem to have a central target or idea that propels them forward. In some ways the actions seem militaristic. They generally feel like a way to lash out at an otherwise unbeatable enemy. ISIL attacks do not feel this way. In truth these attacks on, well, everybody, seem like a way to clearly define the lines between those of a specific islamic faith and everyone else. As I look closer into this situation I am starting to form a picture of an enemy collective that just wants to see the world burn.

I understood Al Qaeda. I’m not talking about the post 9/11 group that spun out of control to encompass virtually every terrorist organization operating in or near that region. I’m talking about the actual group that existed and was pretty well scouted by the CIA up to the day before 9/11. The government (used to?) host a site similar to the CIA’s world fact book that listed and described terrorist organizations. That Al Qaeda, the one born out of the blowback of our involvement in Russia’s war in Afghanistan, was driven to hurt America for 1) involving itself in the governing of Afghanistan in order to pave the way for American corporate interests and (2) as a proof that its leadership (read: Bin Laden) was not a puppet of the American regime that armed and trained its fighters. In other words, they had what they felt was legitimate beef. Furthermore, they chose a single target and executed a bold attack on that target and continued efforts to destabilize that target (America).

ISIL is going after everyone and while they are doing so they are fighting a war in parts of Syria and Iraq, attempting to create a country all of their own. In other words they are fighting a war on so many fronts that it is impossible to see any other outcome than an entire world ready to rise up and punch them in the mouth. In recent weeks the group has managed to piss off NATO, Russia, and China. That’s the three biggest military groupings in the world. That is also three groups who are traditionally at each others throats (from a distance, of course). If I didn’t know better I’d think ISIL was a subversive effort to ally the world’s largest military forces against a common enemy.

I’m sure that isn’t real… is it?

The countdown is almost over. Thursday my kids have tackle practice and Saturday they play their last game of the year. I’m excited. We started the season as a team that hadn’t lost a game since being created, tearing through the spring season in games that were hardly close. We started the fall season by losing to a team we thought we’d walk all over. It led to a series of reflections and conversations about how things might go this season. By the end of game two those conversations had manifested into a great deal of negativity, especially from me. I watched the team reduced to 2-3 ball carriers, with the offense really being centered around the coaches’ son. In truth, the offense was about all the coaches’ sons. If you touched the ball you were the son of a coach. We did have a receiver who got the occasional pass thrown his way (save for the one game where he was a huge focus–catching four of five passes thrown his way), but for the most part it was the old boys network.

I can live with that. I can fool myself into thinking the other players needed to earn their touches through work on the field. I recognized right away that this was completely false, but I could lie to myself and my boys that it was about that. What made it especially hard was watching the way coaches respond to injuries. I watched kids get knocked out of games, leave the field in tears or limping, or even carried off and then expected to come back the next play. I remember in a recent game watching our superstar coaches’ kid QB get his ankle banged up so bad that the EMT told him not to go back into the game. His mother responded by reminding the EMT that it wasn’t the EMT’s call to say that.

Well, it should be.

I learned this season that tackle football–youth sports in general–are just games kids play to have fun. When we allow it to mean so much more we take away their agency. We become the people we once made fun of as they stalked the sidelines screaming about the importance of a boy catching a ball or dropping one. We turn into coaches that make everything about the control and the win and remove the joy for the majority of the kids on the team.

My kids still want to win a championship, but above all else they just want a chance to touch the ball. Next season I’m going to find a way to make that happen–even if it means going somewhere else.

It is an odd feeling to wake up near 7 AM and realize that your opportunity to write for the day is basically already gone. It departed, without you, two hours prior on the double humped back of the inspiration camel, which is now somewhere in the Arizona desert shuffling through cold sand towards oblivion.

It sounds a lot worse (and weirder) than it actually is. The truth is that I’ve been behind on a great many things and have convinced myself that if I don’t start early enough or don’t stay up late enough then I’m never going to get the work done. I have the sunken eyes to prove it. I also have the three boys with bows and video games and football practice and friends and energy and needs to prove the earlier point of not being able to get anything done, at least not while they remain conscious.

That is merely an excuse.

If I’ve learned anything it is that I can find the time to do the things I care most about. If I can find the hour to watch The Walking Dead, and find the three hours to straight veg out and watch the Giants collapse against the Patriots, then I can find the time to write.

I get all of the objections. Writing is active and watching is passive. You need time to rev up the brain and to build to the good writing, because the first hundred or so words are bound to be crap. We make rituals out of writing. Once, I thought it would be cool to meditate in the shower and then harness all those good thoughts, post shower, into a strong bit of writing. Another time I decided that I needed tea and cookies set out on a tray to get me ‘there’. All of it was and continues to be window dressing for what is essentially a simple process.

If you want it bad enough, you sit down at a table and write. Use whatever tool you need. Delete all the distractions, turn off the wi-fi and just do what you are born to.

I am a huge fan of American soldiers. While not all are the strong men and women we think of as fighting the good fight for our nation, enough of them are the selfless, valiant individuals that we can honestly feel good about soldiers as a whole. The military on the other hand is a steaming mess of corruption and mismanagement. Still, at the end of the day we are held responsible not for the mess that is the military, but for the image of power our soldiers project. This is the condition that leads to us being held responsible, and often believing we are responsible for what is happening in the Middle East.

To recognize the corrupt and outright mismanaged state of the U.S. military, look no further than the $43 million dollar gas station we built for cars that don’t even exist. The best part is that a similar station cost the Pakistani government only $500,000 to build. No, wait, the best part is that the military can’t find anyone to answer how or where the other 42.5 million was spent.

We dump so many lives and resources into the region that you would think we would have made some form of progress in forming a lasting positive relationship in the areas we do the most spending and fighting. Wrong again. In truth, these regions are the same regions where ISIL is gaining the most ground. Now, in the wake of the Paris attacks, a great deal of the blame is being placed on the shoulders of President Obama and his rhetoric about ISIL. That, I believe, is the fault of American Military exceptionalism. Because we feel our might is beyond match and question, we also feel that it is our responsibility to use that might to control a region that hasn’t seen lasting peace since, well, ever.

Peter’s Uncle Ben would be proud.

Let’s face facts: Nobody can win a war in that region because there is no such thing as winning. Once you control one region, another flares up with the largely sectarian violence common to the region since its inception. This is not a problem we can fix with drones or soldiers. In fact, the latest reason we’ve been given for being there is to keep the battle from crossing our borders, as if the biggest threat on the planet is taking place in this tiny collection of countries. We’ve given the terrorists so much social power that no military officer or political figure can sneeze without running into someone who wants to know what they plan to do about terrorism.

Its a problem that needs a new solution. One solution might actually be to pull out of the region completely. Let them handle their own wars as they prefer. Only, we are too strong of a military to ever allow that.

I wrote the Some Thoughts first. I didn’t have anything else to say really. When emotionally drained I find that I have little to put on the page. I have to charge up. I have to get to feeling out the world and seeing what there is to speak on. Sometimes I find a hot topic or a thread I am so anxious to pull. Other times I find myself staring at the timer and hoping for a brief bit of solace in:

Some Thoughts:

1. I have this student who by all accounts has no business going to college at this point in his life. He’s obsessed with Rob Gronkowski. He knows that I’m a Giants fan and will find a way to strike up a conversation about Gronk as he does every week. He will do it with a certain level of smugness this week, comfortable in the knowledge that the Patriots stole one off the G-men today. Kudos for you, buddy. Kudos.
2. I’m not in a very writerly way today.
3. I was have convinced I should just drop these random thoughts, because that is all I could spool up once I started the timer, so I started with these in the hope something more would manifest.
4. Four minutes into the post and nothing has managed to manifest, save for 134 words of nothingness. Some days are like this in the writer’s life. Some days are far more prolific.
5. I have been thinking about the upcoming slate of kids sports. I’ve been thinking that I place way too much importance on such things, as if keeping them in sports is the only way to keep them off the couch. Perhaps it is the one way to keep me off the couch.
6. Four minutes left and I still find myself sliding deeper into the nothingness of drivel words; empty words meant to keep the fingers moving and the brain spooling up, but at this late hour there is little left to spool. I suppose I should, at this point, cut to the beginning and construct some form of excuse as to why things are the way they are