9 posts tagged “life”

You know,

It's a little bit better.
My four month long vacation has come to an end - if only temporarily.  I'm actually thankful to be running around the city (or the country as I did today/tonight) rescuing grandmas, small biz owners, and myspace deprived teens from evil trojans, photo eating viruses, and misbehaving linksys devices.  I've not done any sort of system support for well over 10 years but it pretty much came back to me.  Thanks to a key reference, I got in with a rapidly growing 5 person company as a sub contractor.  My pay is 60% less than what my previous pay was - and comes with no benefits so maybe it is really an 80% pay cut.  Well actually, I've driven a company van to and from home both days so that's a nice bene I suppose.

This is much more
pleasant than meeting self aggrandizing suits, politicing sub-agency directors, and fat cat federal "consultants" in Crystal City or Georgetown.  How could I trade Greenwood or Fishers for Crystal City or Georgetown?  I couldn't, I wouldn't.  I received bigger, more sincere thanks for trivial home pc repairs than for the $3B deal that my former employer won last fall based largely on my technical design.

I mean, how
could I turn down the sweat lady that wanted her sewing machine in the basement to be able to connect to the laptop so she could download her patterns?  What, do you mean I can help someone make clothes or indulge in a lifelong hobby?  Or I could have been stuck in the Arlington VA Hyatt?  Or stuck in that damn circle in Georgetown on a Friday evening.

I was supposed
to go to Spokane on Mon/Tue/Wed for interview and familiarization for job - Followed by The Woodlands TX on Thu/Fri for pretty much the same with another company.  I canceled without going to either employer.  Man what was I thinking?  Did I really think that I was going to put more distance between Circle Face and I?  Of course Circle Face's mom was none to happy to find out that I 'turned down' jobs in TX or WA.  I just don't know what to think about Cherie being so eager for me to leave town - be away from our daughter for extended times.  Tonight, my anger over her attitude towards me and Becca's relationship pretty much boiled over.  I've never been so angry in my life - I was so angry that I called her a "bitch"  - something I never did even during the worst of times with her - but damn, I slipped.  Man was I angry.  I felt instantly like a big piece of shit for calling my daughter's mom something like that.  I know alot of people think that calling people a bitch isn't a big deal but it was (and is) to me.  I'm an alcoholic, an addict, and a failed husband but just not a person that would call my wife/ex-wife/daughter's mom a bitch.  Of course Cherie will never accept my apology and will now use it against me at every turn.  Man, those words just won't go back in my mouth.

Write your own Wikipedia entry for yourself (or share the link if you already have one).

Hmmmm - I thought you weren't supposed to write your own article on Wikipedia.  Anyway that would be so vain wouldn't it?

Vox should remove this QotD since it might encourage some knuckleheads to actually write their own entry.

Show us what you're thankful for.

Which person from your past, who you've lost touch with, do you wonder about the most? 
Submitted by ancora impara.

Oh, yes this one is easy.  I grew up living near a girl name Twyla.  She and I became friends from around age 8 or so.  My parents divorced and we moved away when were 10 or so to Florida...  then moved again, then moved again, etc etc.  Anyway, at around age 12, I was once again at yet another new school in Battle Ground, Indiana - so was she.  I ran into Twyla again at my locker!  Ermmm her locker?  As the two new students our lockers were right next to each other.  Wow.  What's more is that she lived a couple blocks away from me.

I'd say that during the 8th grade I developed my first crush which of course was Twyla.  We started running around with the same friends in the neighborhood.  Needless to say our of group 4 were inseparable for the next 2 years.  I moved again suddenly.

I moved back to my original school in Delphi Indiana.  Well um, she moved the same summer back to our original school too - because of divorce I think.  Our friendship became more of an acquaintance though.  I haven't seen or heard from her since May 27th 1989 - graduation day.  Its coming up on 20 years.  I searched for her a few years ago but I wasn't able to track down her current residence.  I'd love to catch up.

// rambling again //

Not a week goes by that
I don't wish that I could walk away from technology.  There is very little that is fun about this job anymore.  After 17 years, my industry is now more full - of people looking for a quick buck that have no qualifications, questionable experience, and don't know jack about basic theory - than ever.  My industry needs a license or something - like doctors and lawyers.  We need to weed out the unqualified people asap.  Since corporate America will never allow that to happen (because it would drive up labor costs) then I'm beginning to look for my exit.

So why have I stayed in IT?
Money!  It's not financially feasible to start over in another career - or is it?  The current collapsing of my financial house of cards might provide an out for me.  As my teens all approach graduation, thankfully I have their college mostly covered - thanks to the Indian 529 program.  What isn't covered they are going to have cover on their own!  I insist.  With circle face only being three years old I have plenty of time to regain my footing and provide for her schooling as well.  Even with the divorce, my overhead is coming way down in the next 2 years.  Hmmmm.

So if I took this route
then what would I do?  Hmmm ...  Might be a fun problem to have.  I was thinking about the things that I wanted to do when I was a young boy.  Let's see:

• Trash Man - I wanted to hang off the back of that truck and run that compactor.  I used to follow the trash truck in my neighborhood on my bike every Tuesday.
• Street Sweeper Guy - If it wasn't the trash truck that I was following then it was the street sweeper.  What a cool vehicle with it's rear wheel steering and all.  As kids we used to collect the metal bristles that would come off of the sweeper as the guy drove by.
  
• Fireman - What little boy didn't want to be a fireman?  I remember all of kids having stickers on our bedroom windows that served to identify this room as a containing children so that the firemen knew where to go for a fire rescue.  I understand those stickers are now used by kidnapper and child molesters to identify targets.  Times are different.

Then as I grew older I wanted
to be a computer 'programmer' - ick ... that's too close to what I do now.  I also wanted to be a stock broker because I wanted to play with numbers and make money.  I don't know about the stock broker thing, it seems too close to the hustle that is IT.

Ultimately, I think I just might
need to find something that is not about figuring out how to cut costs or how to make someone else MORE money, or forces me to sit through anymore Steven Covey crap.  Yeah, I know - fat chance.

I leave myself
very few options.  Maybe I need to go out on my own and fail several times in order to shake this anti-corporate craziness from my mind.

or ... The Time Something Completely Off The Wall Lucky Happened.

The place - My hometown of Delphi Indiana - on the side of a road leading out of town.
The time - 11:30PM one summer night 1988, not sure what night.
Age - 18 between junior and senior year of high school

Cruising through town
with a girl whose name I don't remember now.  Well I do remember that she snuck out of her house to go cruising with me to Purdue.  She was a friend of a friend.  Well call her 'S'.  We ran into a classmate of mine that always had beer or pot.  We'll call him 'E'.  On this night he had beer - Little Kings to be exact.  I was going to buy his remaining stash of Little Kings for some amount of money that I'm sure was too much.  Inflation is kinda funny like that when you are buying beer underage.  We agreed to meet just outside of town near the base of a bridge and do the exchange.

The road was tree
lined on one side with a a steep embankment and mini-forest and a corn field on the other side.  A few minutes later and we were on the side of this road, lights dimmed, he popped his trunk, I pulled out my cash....

A blood curdling howl
came from the the wooded area.  E and I looked at each other and thought that people were partying or camping out in the woods.  We went back to our transaction.  Another scream - even more horrific.  This one was not from someone playing.  E decided that someone was being raped and that he was getting the hell out of here.  We heard it again - the person screamed for help.  I went down the embankment but it was too dark to see anything.  E moved his car sideways in the road and pointed his headlights down there.  We saw the back of a car wrapped up in some trees.  This car looked familiar.

As I approached the
driver's side window I saw another of my classmates, we'll call her 'C' laying across the seat in a contorted position.  She was barely coherent.  She asked for a cigarette.  With the smell of fuel in our noses, E and I decided that wasn't such a good idea.  I yelled up to E that it was C from school. We both instantaneously agreed that he should drive into town and get the police.  I saw E drive away back towards town - but then he stopped but side of the road and threw out the beer.

I remember trying to
comfort C while S was moving my car into position so that we had some light.  I was scared.  I remember helping to hold her up and I remember holding her hand.  Obviously, S and I were not going to make it the campus for cruising.

Not more that a couple
minutes passed before I heard sirens in the distance.  Then I saw flashing lights over the horizon.  The first cop arrived and ran down the embankment asked some questions that I don't remember - he used his walkie talkie to ask for all sorts of help - and then his car started rolling away on it's own.  Yeah he jumped out without putting it in park.  E caught up to it and put in park before it ran over the embankment and into the water.  More police arrived.  Firetrucks.  An ambulance.  They had to cut apart her car to get her out.

C credits me with saving
her life that night but this was obviously a lucky event that warrants no special accolades - we were buying beer on the side of a country road that summer night.  The police asked us some questions about how we found C and her crashed vehicle - as you couldn't see it from the road and the car had no lights.  Of course we told them that we were just flagging each other down to shoot the shit.  I think they determined that she had been there for at least an hour when we found her.

C survived
with a broken leg I think.  E never graduated.  S was never heard from again.  And Me?  I'm right here but something changed me that night.  I can't pin point what the change is/was but I know that my life was different from that night.

I emailed C a link to this post.  C - hopefully everything is where you want it to be these days.

An email from Joey to C.

I was thinking about writing about our friendship.  Do you remember what the date was on that dreaded night?  Oh yeah, I recently wrote about my own near death experience... 
http://indy.vox.com/library/post/ive-got-scars-video-included.html

The response from C.

You mean the night you saved my life?  I will always love you for it.  I still tell the story about my "hero".  It was June 4, 1988.  I will never forget it.

I stopped being a hoodlum that night - but for the record, she gives me too much credit.

Dear Mr. Frankfurt Indiana City Policeman, Badge #27:

You are a prick!

There was no weather,
no rain, no wind, no slick roads, no houses, and no kids nearby.  You were however, well hidden, in the dark, and between some trees. You put not only yourself, but most importantly the lives of my family in harms way.  When weighing whether to pull someone over or not you should take into account the relative safety of your actions vs the 'speeder's' actions.  You intentionally put us all in danger to collect a $150.  I was 100 yards or so from the 55 MPH sign - you know - the one you were parked in front of...  you know, yeah that one.  How do you feel about being minimized to the role of local tax collector - that is essentially what you are when you hide in the bushes and dispense tickets like Halloween candy.  Was your life worth 13 miles per hours over the limit?  How about the fact that I was a few feet away from only being 3 miles per hour over the limit?  Evidently, I place a greater value on my family's life than you do of your own.  All of this for $150?  Give me a fuckin' break!

Now for the really
pissed off part.  You scared the shit out of my 2 year old - the one that was balling in the back seat when you approached my window - yeah that one.  The one that was screaming, "bright light, bright light, I don't wike it".  To top it all off, you wouldn't even turn down your 44349 kazillion watt light that blasted into my truck - even after I asked very politely and kindly as a favor for my daughter.

You are one classy son of a bitch.  Fuck You, you life endangering tax collector.