POSTSECRET = GENIUS

The above pretty much sums up  the last 4 years of my life.  

I must give a few "cheap pops" for POSTSECRET

I stumbled upon the site by accident, but I am hooked

(Also PISSED OFF that I didn't think of the concept first)

anyway - go to

http://www.postsecretcommunity.com/news-faq/mail-secrets

for more information

HUXLEY

-from Aldous Huxley's Heaven and Hell

Like the earth a hundred years ago, our mind still has its darkest Africas, it's unmapped Borneos and Amazonian Basins.

In relation to the fauna of these regions, we are not yet zoologists, we are mere naturalists & collectors of specimens

The fact is unfortunate but we have to accept it, we have to make the best of it.

However lowly, the work of the collector must be done before we can proceed to the higher scientific tasks of classification, analysis, experiment, & theory making

Some people never consciously discover their antipodes.

Others make an occasional landing.  

Yet others (but they are few) 

find it easy to come and go as they please

Aldous Huxley was a British novelist who wrote Brave New World (1932), and was a grandson of ‘Darwin’s Bulldog’, T.H. Huxley. He was also the brother of the leading atheistic evolutionist Sir Julian Huxley (see quotes: Humanism as religion and Human soul and religion are just the product of religion), and died the same day as Christian apologist C.S. Lewis (see his quotes Materialistic Thoughts and Science began with belief in a Lawmaker), and the assassination of JFK (22 Nov. 1963). Aldous Huxley made this frank admission about his anti-theistic motivation:

‘I had motive for not wanting the world to have a meaning; consequently assumed that it had none, and was able without any difficulty to find satisfying reasons for this assumption. The philosopher who finds no meaning in the world is not concerned exclusively with a problem in pure metaphysics, he is also concerned to prove that there is no valid reason why he personally should not do as he wants to do, or why his friends should not seize political power and govern in the way that they find most advantageous to themselves. … For myself, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation, sexual and political.’
Reference

Huxley, A., Ends and Means, pp. 270 ff.

What should I write?

SADNESS

ANGER

FEAR

CONTROL

MANIPULATION

LOVE

HAPPINESS

CONFUSION

BETRAYAL

ANXIETY

COMPULSION

RELIEF

RELEASE

TRIGGER

    OUTBURST

       FIST

           RAGE

SELF LOATHING

SELF LOVE

SELF PRESERVATION

past, present, future clusterfuck

I loved Pop and Poppy more than anything or anyone in the entire world. As their only grandchild, I was doted on since birth. I had a fabulous childhood. in my mind I return to childhood often just to remind myself of the truth. I often think of days spent with Poppy. Going into town,with her - shopping for furniture, yellow skirts with crazy designs, belts, jellies (shoes), the church library, the Archives at the historical society, etc.

Also memories of being not quite school age and spending the entire day with her at “the farm” She told me that it would all be mine one day - she said this many times, but I recall that the first time she said it we were in the side yard in between the patio fountain, the clothesline, and the greenhouse. I remember this distinctly because it was the first time it occurred to me that someday there would be a time in my life that I would be without her. Being the observant child that I was (and continue to be) I took that realization and transitively applied it to pop, granny, mom, dad, etc.... This was quite the hefty thought for a 4 year old.

I never once thought that “the farm”, their house, the log house, or any of it would be off limits to me.

Funny- I was less scared then that I am now.

My entire life I was shielded from adversity by Pop and Poppy, (as the first line of defense...) and my mother and father. I am unable to recall a perceived wrong or an actual wrong done to me that was not taken care of by someone other than myself (prior to my 25th birthday). While this may have helped maximize my idyllic childhood, It also unfairly extended my being a child by at least a decade. Information regarding any financial arrangements for my future, assets that were put in my name, etc.... were (according to Pop and Poppy) NEVER any of my business or concern. Thus they kept everything a big Goddamned secret.

The presumption that I was a child plus the fear that if I was aware that I had some money (like a trust, etc...) that I would be irresponsible and spend it (even though the trust and partnership had built in restrictions, age limits, and other people (trustees, other limited partners and Pop and Poppy as general partners) controlling any management, disbursement or distribution of funds. Disclosure of information to me wouldn’t have really made any real difference since I wouldn’t have direct access to any money. I might have been able to call bullshit on Uncle Gadfly McGreedy’s dastardly scheme to abscond with the entire estate.

Now Pop and Poppy are gone 

I feel like an apt pupil that studied for the wrong test 

I am far from stupid, but find myself nevertheless unprepared.

 It is funny - The very people that “made everything all better” my entire life and their need to use $ as leverage PLUS denial of their own mortality and fear of letting go/losing control over My father, Uncle Gadfly McGreedy, and myself (even in death) were the same people that ended up ultimately causing me the greatest hurt, heartache, emotional/psychological trauma, anger, resentment, expense, and LEGAL/TAX PROBLEMS.
At first this seemed more than I could bear. Uncle Gadfly McGreedy (under a Durable Power of Attorney that no one was aware of) blatantly exerted undue influence over Pop after Poppy died. I can’t even go into it all here because it is such a CLUSTERFUCK

To this day (it has been 18 months since we lost Pop) after kicking around the sequence of actions, the actions themselves, their consequences on my father and I, my grandfather, and then my uncle, and then examining what possible legal recourse my father and I have , under what claim, and then finding and pouring over case after case , sometimes I feel an “A-HA!” moment – like I have a solution. Then I ask myself – “”self, what is your answer?” The answer I have arrived at numerous times is to just tell my grandfather what my uncle has done, so he can fix it.

Of course, this is not possible, as my grandfather is dead, and it is his death and the years leading up to it that produced the current conundrum. But I do think that this conclusion of mine speaks volumes -

I NEVER EVER HAD TO TAKE CARE OF MY OWN PROBLEMS. 

POP ALWAYS DEALT WITH BAD SITUATIONS AND PROBLEMS FOR ME.

 Either because I was perceived as being “incapable” or because I was “just a kid”

Or because they were trying to protect me from the cold cruel world. Who knows.

They certainly did me a disservice.

I don't know how to explain something that you just don't know how to understand (part 2)

...Or when I tell you that I need your help with a plan for your daughter and how to deal with some of the problems that have been going on for months now.

we agreed that I was not supposed to have to be the one to have to dole out punishments or fucking have to be the ONLY one who asks the basic parent questions

you get mad because she doesn't do what you & I ask her to do

LET ME ASK YOU THIS - WHAT IN THE WORLD HAS BEEN DONE AT ALL TO KEEP IT FROM GETTING THIS FAR

I don't know how to explain something that you just don't know how to understand (part 1)

YOU DON'T FUCKING GET IT

YOU really DO NOT FUCKING GET IT

I know you are not that simple

some of the things I love most about you 

ARE the underlying problem 

right now

Communication, Responsibility,

 planning, business,

 legal, moral, social, ethical, 

( Certainly NOT) 

optimal acceptible??  

REALLY?

you tune me out

i discuss one thing with you

you agree - no, maybe you are just nodding your head 

Yes, that is it - but I I didn't realize that until just this minute - 

You nod affirmatively and repeat 3 or 4 of the words I said

because apparently you DO NOT WANT TO LISTEN

and 

YOU DON"T WANT TO TALK

I don't get it - 

Here is my assesment/breakdown  of what is going on

YOU UNDERSTAND THAT THERE IS A PROBLEM

thus

-The problem that does in fact exist

Anyway...

You tune me out

I try and discuss one thing with you

You appear to agree

but as soon as the conversation ends

everything discussed somehow gets purged from your memory

At some later time, I "remind you" of what we discussed

I try and reiterate the importance of implementation

and execution of discussed actions

Nothing

I wait and see if you will follow through

you go to work and leave me hanging

We re-discuss - you say you will take care of it "LATER"

I don't know how to get on the same page with you again

I don't know how we got off kilter in the first place

I never planned to be like this

YOU HAVE TO UNDERSTAND THAT 

I AM TRYING

But it always seems like you don't hear me

sometimes i wish i could just go away

 so you can be happy again 

if i were more like you i wouldn't be me

I know you are not happy 

it seems like you don't like me very much anymore

I never lied to you about who I am

or 

what I feel

or

WHY

but communicating this to you

Annoys You

It interrupts your TV show

You tune me out

you turn up the volume 

or make a phone call in the middle of what I am saying

you tell me that you thought I was done talking, and that you were thinking about something else, and you are tired, and 

oh yeah

you just remembered you have to pee

and that you are sorry

I know you are lying

because if you were being forthright

you wouldn't really need to offer up 6 different reasons why you were ignoring me

I have told you for years that when someone gives more than one excuse 

it lessens the credibility of their argument

CAN YOU HONESTLY TELL ME

that given everything that I have been through 

for years

 with my grandfather/uncle/dad

that you REALLY don't see where I am coming from

REMEMBER how

NOTHING WAS EVER MY BUSINESS...

ESPECIALLY business

I have been trying to handle everything with Robert 

so that you could have custody of your daughter

Making strategic suggestions as to how to properly leverage information to create the most optimal (and unrebuttable) outcome 

with your less than reasonable

unpredictable

passive aggressive

irrational 

psycho ex wife

  

 

(who the hell leaves a note for their 16 year old daughter that says this...(incorporated into the collage above)

Seriously - 

the damn thing was stuck on my stepchild's dresser mirror at her mom's

I took it with me the day I picked stepdaughter up to come and live with us

in case there is any doubt - the thing says:

Ashley

Take Slimquick

Love Rory (new puppy)

and Pray