10 Minute Rule

I get mad (like really sad and mad) about my eldest stepson because he doesn’t do anything. I make excuses (maybe he’s in the wrong city–I know I am), I hope and dream, but every day is the same. He sits on the couch or stands in front of his playstation in his room. That’s it. What I am coming to accept is twofold: first, he doesn’t have a lot of options or properly modeled behaviours, and more importantly: It is his choice, not mine.

I don’t do a lot either. I watch shows and play upwords every single day. I write. I walk a mile. Those are the things. I’m rarely out at night taking in sights or clubs or adventures. Sure, we do go on adventures–quite a few to be honest– but the day to day is sedentary. There is nothing in my daily life so wildly different from his daily life as to promote a healthier and more active lifestyle. That is what makes me the angriest. I am not doing much more than he is. The difference is he’s accepted it as a way of life and I have decided that I am being held prisoner by circumstance, weather, and weariness.

All that being said: who cares? The role of a father is to model and encourage and prepare. I am meant to get him to a point where he is self sufficient and can design for himself a life he is satisfied with. My satisfaction or dissatisfaction was never ever the point. Oddly enough, I came to this realization while listening to Numb by Linkin Park (the original recording–not the Emily Armstrong version)…

I don’t know what you’re expecting of me
Put under the pressure of walking in your shoes

Every step that I take is another mistake to you

~Chester Bennington

Yeah.. If I want to call myself a good father, I need to embrace and support the choices he makes–they all make–in life even while arguing that there are better choices to be made. They are not me. They aren’t supposed to be.

How quickly we forget the invention of CAP. It was nearly a decade ago that Trump became famous for lying and using all caps to claim he was not lying. Thus CAP was born. Now his stupid dance is taking over the world of sports.

Stupid. But that is kind of how memes work, y’know? It is a lot of stupidity reformatted in order to make a language of sorts for the handful of individuals who understand it and then those who think they do, but don’t. Finally it graduates to their parents and thus to the world at large as something cool. This happens cyclically with any number of incoherent moments. From Jordan in tears to Tyson in… whatever the heck Tyson was doing in the fifth round (that will make the rounds soon).

More importantly, this is not tantamount to political support for a party platform. We all need to get that clear. People can like the idea of Trump and not like the Project 2025 Agenda or the Trump Agenda or, honestly, even know anything about it. Most individuals are not political with any real depth. We vote on a handful of issues at best. So, stop using this meme as a tacit approval of whatever Trump does. It just isn’t that deep.

I need to build myself up again, because I got knocked down.

It took a while. It took the world a while to knock me down, and they did it from the inside out. They did it insidiously. They did it with small comments and lowered expectations. They took from me what was my core faith in self. They made me feel like I was a bad parent because the choices the people I love made weren’t the choices I felt were right for them, and I stewed in those choices. I stewed in the disdain and distaste the people closest to me felt for me. I breathed in the gaslighting of it being the other way.

Then, I let my environment set the tone. I allowed myself to believe the world was going to continue to move me in the right direction, because it did that for me thirty years ago. This is not the same world it was, and I am not the same person I was. In fact, I’ve started to forget who I am in the face of letting everyone else determine who I should be–both to them and to myself.

I had an extremely tough conversation with my youngest this morning. A kid he knew, and used to play football with died over the weekend over some nonsense. He was riding around (in a stolen car I might add) with another kid my boy knows and they mixed it up with some other kids wandering around in the middle of the night. The two got into an altercation with the much larger group over a weed pen. Now a kid is dead. He didn’t need to die. It was stupid upon stupid, because not one of the other kids called the ambulance. Nobody intervened — not even the kid he was with– over a few hours while he lay bleeding in the street in the middle of a community purported to be wealthy and safe. Yet until I’d heard the details myself I still was left wondering if my kid was involved in some way. Why? Because I know I’ve failed on many levels. I know I haven’t been the father to any of these boys that I need to be. I know that my eldest stepson is spiraling through an empty existence and I take responsibility for that every single day. Every single day I do little more than listen to that emptiness and let it define the culture of our shared home.

I’ve been knocked down. I see that now. I see who I am. Now I need to figure out who I want to be.

You know what’s odd to me? How people’s perspective and point of view–as limited as it honestly must be–becomes worldview. Call it a tide of circumstance, better airtime, what have you. We, as a race of humans, flock towards popularity and that in turn creates popular opinion. We are influenced by influencers. This is as it has always been. Joan of Arc, a 5’2 inch fireball of a peasant girl, who may have been clinically insane, became one of the most important figures of her age by sheer perspective and point of view. You see it everywhere. We, as individuals, often misinterpret the power such things have and whom they have power over.

Last week a Drake football teammate of my son make national news because he did the ‘Trump Dance’ as a football celebration and credited the dance to Trump. Last night Jon Jones did the same thing. This dance, wildly criticized by the media as evidence of the once and future president’s mental decay, has become a celebration that is catching hold.

I’m really done trusting promoted perspectives. Most talking heads don’t have a bleeding clue what they are talking about.

Some Thoughts:

1. Drake lost. It was a terribly lackluster performance by the offense that truly hid the fact that my boy had his best game ever. He gets another shot to shine next week and I really hope he can show out.
2. I’m feeling lackluster myself these last few weeks. I am not getting enough sleep and that is dimming my awareness and my energy level. At least I’m walking a mile almost every day.

Well, Drake fell apart.

It was only a matter of time before the wheels fell off that offense. When you play a good defense and, on the other side, you don’t get the calls it puts you in a bad position. Drake is now in a very bad position. By losing this game they are now a one loss team in the PFL. A win against Stetson on the road still guarantees a PFL championship and an Automatic Qualification to the FCS Tournament. The problem is, again, the offense. These guys have to get a flow going again. They don’t have it. They are struggling with it a bit in all phases (a missed field goal –that may not have been a missed field goal– early in the game was the literal reason they lost).

Draining. Watching them is draining. Caring is draining. I am drained. Well, at least Colo won–convincingly at that. On to the next week.

Some Thoughts:

1. I need some real alone time. I don’t live in a space where I get that. There is always someone around. I want some real time. Real quiet. Not a bunch. Just a few hours to really reset and get my mind right. I’m tired of feeling that someone is waiting on me, either to do stuff or to get out the way. I just need a moment to be still.

I am writing this in quick draft mode because I just updated to the newest version of wordpress, and that is not working out too well. I felt it when I hit update. I read the thing about backing stuff up, didn’t, and knew immediately things were about to go sideways. Not like USA 2026-7 sideways, but sideways nevertheless.

So here I am in this small quick draft window trying to put a Friday blog in place before the Tyson fight. Funny how priorities shift in life. I should be building up to a moment of writing and not trying to get it done so I can watch something on the telly. I’d argue that device and the smaller cellular versions have created a wealth of ills in our society or, at the very least, exacerbated them.

This was going to be a post about this idea of the imaginary LEFT and how anyone not a card carrying Republican is being morphed into the enemy. I’ll write that one eventually. I think it requires a tad more research. I think a lot of things anymore, first and foremost being that I need to get my priorities back in whack. The truth of this blog is that I am blessed with the opportunity to even have this blog, and in that I have all the chances in the world to tell stories and spread the way I think and feel about the world. It is a pleasure. It is a freedom. It isn’t a burden or a thing to get through before the fight. It is what I need to dedicate time towards–yes ten minutes, but also want to be here in this chair all ten minutes doing this. If I can do that for the blog the way I know I can, I can do this for my other writing… The way I know I should be able to, but haven’t with any real regularity for the last, let’s be honest, thirty plus years.

It is habits of mind. It is focus. It is desire. It is what I need to work on the most.

I have to admit, when Trump won my first inclination was to say, “I’m out.” But then I realized that it made me like all the other fair-weather people who want to run when it doesn’t go their way. I mean, after all, how bad can it get? I realized days later it can get pretty bad. There was the nomination of Anti-vaccine pundit Robert F Kennedy to lead Health and Human Services. This is a man who thinks and advances the notion that vaccines cause autism. Furthermore, he isn’t quite sure that Herd Immunity is a real thing. So, we have a Health guy favoring feelings over science. We have a Attorney General nominee in Matt Gaetz who was recently under investigation for sex trafficking along with a host of other ethics violations. Then, he nominated a Fox News pundit with limited military experience (and then as part of the national guard) as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Fortunately, his power is limited to being able to “transmit communications to the commanders of the combatant commands from the President and Secretary of Defense but does not exercise military command over any combatant forces.”

I feel like every day is another step towards WTF. The plan remains to begin deporting 11 million plus illegal immigrants day one and follow that up by slashing 2 trillion from the government’s budget with the help of Elon Musk and co. It is as if the human cost of these actions isn’t even being considered–let alone the financial repercussions. Consider this: most of the so-called cuts are likely to be people. He plans to revive his 2020 Schedule F executive order on day one. The plan is to shrink the government by reducing jobs at near Roman decimation levels. This doesn’t sound workable to me. What happens if all those people–who have families and lives and shop and contribute to the economy–lose their jobs? Short term? They go on unemployment and overburden that broken system to the point where Elon’s Team DOGE decides to tear it down as well.

I haven’t even started in on the Project 2025 stuff.

Here’s the truth: I want to stay. I want to document. I want to avoid a long future of Americans being gaslit by the power of media such as Fox News. I don’t know if I can. Some of the fundamental freedom’s I enjoy are being put to question in a government that has no checks or balances. The GOP controls every phase of national governance. They are going to remake this country as they see fit. They won. It is their prerogative. It is mine to decide if I want to still be here.

Momentous Wednesday! I won a game in my $$$ league. Yeah, it is only one. CMac returned to score less points than who I benched to play him. Honestly, I think it was just my time to get a W. Now the real work begins… Not really. I’m totally cooked in that league. A 1-9 start with four or five weeks left to the playoffs leaves me no chance to come back. I feel like the Jets right now. Still, I’ll try to make a run of it and spoil everyone else’s season. I beat a 6 win team last week and I expect to do the same this week. Out of 12 teams, exactly half are above .500. Hold my beer…

The $$ league is not my only Yahoo-based league. When I won two years ago I realized all the champions are moved up to a free entry prize league where you can compete for serious cash. To that end I have joined a H2H league with hopes of getting into the show. I am second in that league at 6-3 with a decent shot of getting to the ‘ship.

Meanwhile in the family league I’ve changed my name from Comeback Season to Dogpoo season. This is a more appropriate name for someone with a 2-8 record. I’ve lost 7 of the last 8 in an absolute free fall. This has to stop. Hopefully a move to Brock Purdy at QB helps me the way it has the Niners. The big decision is whether or not to start Goedert, Bowers, or Andrews at TE this week…

The biggest news is what I’ve been on about all week. The Morehead State game. Speedy WR Nate Garnett will be the matchup I’m watching for against my boy. Garnett, a sophomore with 4.35 speed, already has two 88 yard TD receptions this season. Expect a battle all the way downfield.

I’m on a plane! That generally means it is time to spend some time gathering up…

Some Thoughts:

1. Wedding bells are ringing for the Talis-family. I’m entirely stressed out about it because the moment is big and I want the moment to be right… and I have no idea what that means—not for me or us or any of the handful of people who’ll be in attendance. It has to be beautiful and outdoors. The moment should be wonderful. The pictures leading up to it ought to be amazing. I have thoughts of shots at a garden, in the woods, at the X-Mansion… All of that needs to happen. Where I get fuzzy is about where the actual event occurs and, more to the point, what happens after in terms of a celebration for the family and how we do that without all of the work falling on her and I as the Matriarch and Patriarch respectively.  I will get past the stress. I just need to do that faster.
2. The football stuff is becoming more and more of a daily interaction for me. Call it excitement. My football career was measured in numbers of practices… and losses. There was no real sense of having a chance to do something on a national level like my Drake kid is experiencing. I am happy for him on so many different levels. Let’s recap: He had four head coaches in four years of high school, receiving consistent position coaching for two of those years. Most notably he was forced to change to safety due to a lack of people able to do the job his senior year, further degrading his chance to get a scholarship. He winds up at Drake as a 17 yr old kid competing with 5^th year seniors. He is now one of two freshmen playing at all at his position and considered to be the #1 or #2 cover corner on the squad. Saturday’s game vs. Morehead St. represents a chance to be AQ for the 24 team national championship tourney.
3. Finally had a chance to closely observe someone ‘raw dogging’ a plane ride. For those who do not know the term, let me preface this by telling you it is stupid. In fact, stop reading now if you don’t want to be infected by stupidity…
4. No, you’re gonna keep going? Okay. To raw dog means to spend the entirety of the flight watching the digital readout of where the plane is presently located. In other words, you’re watching a digital version of the plane minutely creep across a map… like an idiot. My guy kept switching between the close up and wide view, as if this was at all relevant to his current situation. Mostly it is not. Once in a sardine-like plane, you’re committed. Watching the dang thing on a screen is a useless redundancy that merely reflects on how absorbed you are with memes and internet culture; not in the academic sense, but in the ‘give me purpose, meaning, and activity’ sense. Sad. Humanity is really not going to make it past this planet, are we?
5.  

Not a lot to lock in on, so I will regale you with…

Some Thoughts:

1. The hardest thing about a trip is coming home. You always hope to come home to a house as nice or nicer than the way you left it. This is rarely the case. Tomorrow we return to a home left to the mercy of the first born male, an adult who is not much on the cleaning. It hasn’t been many days but I suspect an evening’s worth of cleaning to be my prize upon return.
2. This is the exciting part of the FCS season for me. The D1 Football Championship Subdivision has a 24 team tourney at the end of the season. If my Son’s Drake Bulldogs win over Moorhead State next Saturday they will make the 24 as an automatic qualifier. Presently they are listed as #30 in the league according to one measurement and 24 according to another. Neither seem to matter all that much to the voters who decide the tourney. According to current tourney rules, the top 8 teams get a by and the matchups for the rest are determined by proximity–400 miles away at the farthest. This suggests that Drake will play Illinois State in round one. Get your popcorn ready!
3. Getting to the end of another Shadowrun project. It may be time to finally write a bit of that fantasy stuff I keep going on about…