Yes, I need to write more. I have posted once since February and that was a fuckin' re-post. Whenever I'm asked why I'm not really writing anything, I always explain that nothing's really happening in my life. Well, the same may be true now, but why does everything have to be solely about me? I mean, there's other shit going on in the world, right?
Saturday: I'm watching a college football game, and in the postgame interview, I shed a tear. In my 34 years, 2 months on this planet, this has never happened concerning a sporting event. Did my favorite player break a longstanding record? Did my precious UNH Wildcats upset a powerhouse? No and no. To be honest, I don't know one player on either team, but both teams know Jasper Howard, and they're both playing for him that afternoon. Honestly, neither team really cares who wins the game, because Jasper Howard is the only thing on their minds.
After a win over Louisville the Saturday before, Howard opted to spend his Saturday night going to a dance. Standing outside the student union, Howard suffered a stab wound to the abdomen and was pronounced dead on his way to the hospital. He wasn't trolling the streets and it wasn't 3 AM. It was a University sanctioned event, for Christ's sake! Is there anything more benign than a college dance?
So often, you hear about athletes that survived in tough surroundings in their adolescence, only to go to college locally and stick around with the same shitheads that made their life more challenging in the first place. Ultimately, these guys move onto the pros and terrorize other people (see Jones, Popeye and Artest, Ron) or animals (see Vick, Michael). Well, Howard grew up in Little Haiti, a borough of Miami. Now, I've never been there, but I don't think a white guy from New Hampshire would survive long. As difficult as it was, Howard opted to move far away from home, leaving his mother and sisters behind. His plan, after being the first in his family to go to college, was to work diligently, enabling him a career in pro football and a way to get his family out of Miami. This was all he wanted.
I wasn't there. I don't know what happened. Maybe Jasper Howard reverted to his roots and started the skirmish. Maybe he said something that would qualify as threatening. And maybe, just maybe, the knife wielding assailant will proclaim that he was defending himself, and maybe he was. None of that matters now. Jasper Howard is an example of what we should be. He took his lot and tried to squeeze everything he could out of it. On the Saturday following his death, the University of Connecticut was playing a road game at West Virginia and nobody cared. Everyone in the stadium was more interested in letting Howard know they were thinking of him.
Jasper Howard was imperfect. It's what he was dealt. But we should all have a little of him in us.
Jasper Howard (1989-2009)
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Friday, September 11, 2009
September 11, 2001
Eight years ago today, the world completely turned upside down. I was a bartender during the time that it happened, so, of course, I was sleeping. After the 5th call of the morning, I decided to turn over and see what was going on. I remember thinking to myself, "somebody better be dead or dying for me to be woken up by this." I also recall regretting those words instantly. Jeremy Forest told me to turn the TV on, and I spent the entire day watching coverage, like everyone else. Was it an inexperienced pilot on a two-seater? Was it a failed engine? It never entered anyone's mind that it was a plotted, calculated terrorist attack. There were a million different opinions as to what happened, but a terrorist attack wasn't one of them.
Shortly after the plane crashed into the first building, yet another crashed into the second building, followed by news that the Pentagon had been hit, and attention quickly turned to "Where is the President? Have they hit the White House?" and P.O.T.U.S. was being whisked away, but it was to an undetermined location. In a matter of a couple of hours, the incidents of the day had turned from tragic accident to hostile, unabated attack.
I was sitting in my apartment with an extreme uneasiness about my safety in this world, as if the terrorists were targeting me in Portsmouth, NH to prove a point to the world. As I thought more about it, though, it came to my attention that I had been taking for granted the blanketing safety provided by my countrymen for my entire life to that point. We can shit on this nation for a number of things. Our healthcare is substandard, our areas of poverty are being neglected, and our leaders can't be trusted, but only once in my 32 years of life have I felt completely exposed. In a country this big, that's unbelievable.
So, as the buildings began tumbling down like a neighborhood of playing cards, hoards of noble, honorable, sacrificing men and women walked into the rubble as everyone else was trying to get out of it. With full knowledge that the collapse of the first two buildings had compromised the structural integrity of the others around them, these uncommon citizens marched forward in their search for any survivors, unsure of what they'd find, if anything, but feeling that it was their duty to look.
2750 people died at Ground Zero, including 450 firemen, police officers, and port authority employees, who went into the wreckage to save a grand total of 20 people. If the events of September 11th, 2001 have shown us anything, it's the resolve of America and Americans. Please take a few moments out of every day to think about those that go to work every day to risk their lives, so we don't have to risk ours. Heroes aren't found on basketball courts or football fields, and they're not found on movie screens or TV sets. Ironically, true heroes in this country would rather go unnoticed and lay under the radar. Yet another thing that makes them true heroes.
Yes, today is a great day to acknowledge the public service folk that lay it on the line daily in the name of safety, given the anniversary of their most recognizable performance. However, maybe it would be more important to acknowledge these people for less recognizable performances, for this is when they truly earn it.
Shortly after the plane crashed into the first building, yet another crashed into the second building, followed by news that the Pentagon had been hit, and attention quickly turned to "Where is the President? Have they hit the White House?" and P.O.T.U.S. was being whisked away, but it was to an undetermined location. In a matter of a couple of hours, the incidents of the day had turned from tragic accident to hostile, unabated attack.
I was sitting in my apartment with an extreme uneasiness about my safety in this world, as if the terrorists were targeting me in Portsmouth, NH to prove a point to the world. As I thought more about it, though, it came to my attention that I had been taking for granted the blanketing safety provided by my countrymen for my entire life to that point. We can shit on this nation for a number of things. Our healthcare is substandard, our areas of poverty are being neglected, and our leaders can't be trusted, but only once in my 32 years of life have I felt completely exposed. In a country this big, that's unbelievable.
So, as the buildings began tumbling down like a neighborhood of playing cards, hoards of noble, honorable, sacrificing men and women walked into the rubble as everyone else was trying to get out of it. With full knowledge that the collapse of the first two buildings had compromised the structural integrity of the others around them, these uncommon citizens marched forward in their search for any survivors, unsure of what they'd find, if anything, but feeling that it was their duty to look.
2750 people died at Ground Zero, including 450 firemen, police officers, and port authority employees, who went into the wreckage to save a grand total of 20 people. If the events of September 11th, 2001 have shown us anything, it's the resolve of America and Americans. Please take a few moments out of every day to think about those that go to work every day to risk their lives, so we don't have to risk ours. Heroes aren't found on basketball courts or football fields, and they're not found on movie screens or TV sets. Ironically, true heroes in this country would rather go unnoticed and lay under the radar. Yet another thing that makes them true heroes.
Yes, today is a great day to acknowledge the public service folk that lay it on the line daily in the name of safety, given the anniversary of their most recognizable performance. However, maybe it would be more important to acknowledge these people for less recognizable performances, for this is when they truly earn it.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Eli's Coming...
It has been 5 months since I last wrote, and I honestly couldn't say why. There have been customary ups and customary downs and plenty of things blog worthy, I suppose, but I just haven't put together words for public consumption. I've been promising a few of you that I'd spit something out, but it was an empty promise because life has been wildly systematic and rudimentary lately.
Then somebody's bombshell became part of my problem. A higher up in our office was let go and, of course, it has adversely affected his wife who just happens to be my direct superior and a good friend of mine. Yes, these things happen, and they happen with more frequency than anyone would like, especially in this trying economic time. He's an incredibly bright man and a natural leader and I'm confident his climate will be minimally affected. But the reason nobody minds when the snow globe is shaken is because nobody lives in the snow globe. They live outside of it. Right now, my boss and her husband are in the globe.
I've had a very shitty couple of days. There are a couple of people within the walls of my office whose dignity I'm reliant upon, because it continually reminds me that the shit on the outside doesn't touch the bliss on the inside. Since I've known them, they've acted with integrity, morality, and a level of decency that all would love to boast they carry, yet most fall short. They fall short because the universe can be a wretched, unforgiving place and because a guy may disrespect another guy today, and that other guy is a douche to a gal tomorrow due to a sense of entitlement. This happens everywhere. Seemingly, everywhere but our office. Until yesterday.
But maybe it didn't happen in our office yesterday. Maybe the higher ups made a conscious choice over $85 worth of Chinese food in a smoky board room, and this choice was made not because of nepotism, but because they honestly felt that their company would be better set up for success without this person in their plans than with him in them. If that's the case, then can I blame this company or the people that have made this calculated, thought out decision? If that's the case, then I can't. But I don't know what the truth is, so everyone has a question mark above their head right now.
But I have a friend. And she's in the fuckin' globe and she can't get out. And this becomes my problem because she's a better human being than the grand majority of those I've bumped into in my life, and the type of people that encapsulate her makeup are deserving of the best treatment from anyone. Today, she doesn't deserve this. If this were an open dialogue, you, reader, would tell me that although my passion is compelling, it's ultimately not my problem and life goes on. If that's what you were about to say, then you and I should have a cup of hot chocolate and catch up sometime. When the people that treat other people right are being treated wrongly and I'm standing on the side of he who treats wrongly, then I'm on the wrong side. I hate being on the wrong side. I'd rather be impoverished and fighting the good fight than cowering for the sake of safety. But I don't necessarily know that there's a wrong side right now. I just know that my friend is trapped in a globe and I wouldn't mind finding a way to shatter the son of a bitch. And I wouldn't mind knowing the truth so the possibility that my perfect world utopian scenario can still exist is alive and well. Sometimes a sliver is all you need.
Then somebody's bombshell became part of my problem. A higher up in our office was let go and, of course, it has adversely affected his wife who just happens to be my direct superior and a good friend of mine. Yes, these things happen, and they happen with more frequency than anyone would like, especially in this trying economic time. He's an incredibly bright man and a natural leader and I'm confident his climate will be minimally affected. But the reason nobody minds when the snow globe is shaken is because nobody lives in the snow globe. They live outside of it. Right now, my boss and her husband are in the globe.
I've had a very shitty couple of days. There are a couple of people within the walls of my office whose dignity I'm reliant upon, because it continually reminds me that the shit on the outside doesn't touch the bliss on the inside. Since I've known them, they've acted with integrity, morality, and a level of decency that all would love to boast they carry, yet most fall short. They fall short because the universe can be a wretched, unforgiving place and because a guy may disrespect another guy today, and that other guy is a douche to a gal tomorrow due to a sense of entitlement. This happens everywhere. Seemingly, everywhere but our office. Until yesterday.
But maybe it didn't happen in our office yesterday. Maybe the higher ups made a conscious choice over $85 worth of Chinese food in a smoky board room, and this choice was made not because of nepotism, but because they honestly felt that their company would be better set up for success without this person in their plans than with him in them. If that's the case, then can I blame this company or the people that have made this calculated, thought out decision? If that's the case, then I can't. But I don't know what the truth is, so everyone has a question mark above their head right now.
But I have a friend. And she's in the fuckin' globe and she can't get out. And this becomes my problem because she's a better human being than the grand majority of those I've bumped into in my life, and the type of people that encapsulate her makeup are deserving of the best treatment from anyone. Today, she doesn't deserve this. If this were an open dialogue, you, reader, would tell me that although my passion is compelling, it's ultimately not my problem and life goes on. If that's what you were about to say, then you and I should have a cup of hot chocolate and catch up sometime. When the people that treat other people right are being treated wrongly and I'm standing on the side of he who treats wrongly, then I'm on the wrong side. I hate being on the wrong side. I'd rather be impoverished and fighting the good fight than cowering for the sake of safety. But I don't necessarily know that there's a wrong side right now. I just know that my friend is trapped in a globe and I wouldn't mind finding a way to shatter the son of a bitch. And I wouldn't mind knowing the truth so the possibility that my perfect world utopian scenario can still exist is alive and well. Sometimes a sliver is all you need.
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