I'm just throwing this out there to get a response from a community of individuals that I have come to respect and listen to because well...damnit, you people are smart and cool.
The following is an e-mail I just sent to my bro-in-law/best friend from way back (I introduced him to my sister in the early '90's) who also happens to be a republican that actually voted for Obama. Yippee...there is still hope, thank Gawd.
Anyways...with the proliferation of diaries that should actually be long comments I am actually posting a diary. It is personal...it is a rant of sorts and it contains no links. It is just me being me.
Feel free to tip, flame and comment in your unique fashion. I wouldn't have it any other way.
The following is an e-mail. The subsequent letter was written to my dad.
Subject: Ok man....pretend we're back in Whiting Woods smoking a joint and passing a bottle of Jack Daniel's...
What were our dreams? What were our nightmares? What did we care about? Things change, people move on and shit happens. Lady Jane's closed. The bowling alley is gone. CVHS is now another victim of politcal correctness gone wild. Tobacco Road is but a fading memory. Aaahhh....the good times.
I did a lot of shit that I'm not proud of. I stole from my family for cocaine and speed. I hurt Ace a lot and I know that. I betrayed a trust and for that I am eternally sorry and there is no way to make up for that. I have problems...don't we all?
I am now a 42 year-old man who has a beautiful, supportive wife and an intelligent, fiesty little daughter who is so much like her daddy that it is scary. I love these two people more than my life itself which I now realize will probably be significantly shortened due to my drug and alcohol use the last 25 years. I have high blood pressure which needs medication. I have stomach problems that need acid reducers at least. More recently, after consulting WebMd, I realize that I have some symptoms of cirrhosis of the liver, including bloating, cramping and a pain in my right side that is bad some days and better when I drink. I am dying. I may live 30 more years if I quit drinking and stick to a healthy regimen with the right diet, exercise and lifestyle changes....I may die tomorrow. One thing I know for sure, I have fucked myself up pretty good and only fate, time and a Univeral Creator will determine the exact day that my life on this planet, this time around will end. I'm kinda scared but not completely. The way I see it, either the good guy that I've always been will be rewarded with some sort of cool afterlife or I will become wormfood. The hell I've already lived through on this earth is enough and I WILL NOT be spending eternity in some sort of fanciful lake of fire in agonizing torment and pain. I don't believe in that "God", I never will and anybody with a functioning brain agrees with me...period.
I really don't know what caused me to write this e-mail. I'm not saying "poor, poor pitiful me". I'm not asking for money. I just feel like these last few years as I've realized what I'm really about...liberal, progressive and always a dirty fucking hippie...that my family and friends in La Crescenta haved pulled away even more. When I Ieft in June of '93 to go to Santa Barbara to "get sober" I guess I was still pretending to "toe the Christian line" and go along to get along. I subsequently have realized that the "God" that my mom forced down my throat while my dad sat idly by wearing his skirt like a good pussy-whipped male would during her own years of self-discovery and self-esteem issues(she couldn't continue to be the "nurse" to everyone around her) to destroy any independent thought or aspiration that I may have had does not exist...never has and never will. I don't know what your beliefs are but I know that a lot of what is considered good is really evil and vice versa. The evidence in favor of this position is too overwhelming. Right now 500 pound bombs are falling on children in the Israel/Gaza Strip because two competing religions think their way is right. That is fucking crazy....period. Organized Religion has caused more death, destruction and suffering than anything and everything else combined in the entire history of this world. That is a fact. Perceived ethnic superiority is a close second (backed up by a particular religious doctrine enforced by men) and you are a witness to that particular atrocity. I will never downgrade or belittle your experience as a youth in Romania. I know too much now. The atrocities perpetrated on the "common man" by the powers that be using nationalism, religion and a sense of entitlement will be the "good intentions" that pave their particular road to hell. I am not a part of that and I never will be. I am a pacifist, a conscientious objector to all forms of violence and oppression to achieve the ends of one particular class of people.
We are, after all all equal. We may not all have the same talents, abilities and intelligence but we should all be treated with the same respect. Regardless of how our mainstream media dumbfucks like to portray people we all have a heart, a mind and a desire to be accepted and loved. That's part of the human and animal spirit in all of us. Right now I guess I'm asking to be accepted, loved and...most importantly, understood.
At this point I could keep going but it would only start to get redundant. I would really appreciate it if you would share this with Ace at least. I guess what I'm doing here is reaching out. I think you know what I'm about and what I'm trying to say. If you need more clarification on my positions on any number of issues I will be more than glad to expound...just ask. I would like to conclude this rambling by pasting a copy of the letter I just sent to my dad with a Christmas card. Yeah, I know...I'm kind of a downer but, then again....there's just way too much to be down about right now.
Take care man and smoke a joint for me in remembrance of Whiting Woods and our youthful naivete. I'm shedding a tear right now wishing things could be as simple as they used to be. Those days are gone. May they and us rest in peace.
In the end that's all we can ask for.
As Always...Peace and Love ;-)>
Dear Dad, (12-15-08)
I don’t know where to begin so I guess I’ll start with what is on my mind right now and then go from there.
I am very scared right now. I don’t know that the future holds for Stacy, Starla and myself. I have never been through a recession...I was too young to really feel the effects of the one in the early ‘80’s. This current economic crisis seems especially troubling and I have been paying close attention to all of the developing news regarding Wall St., foreclosures, tumbling stocks and the rich man’s scam called credit default swaps that have put this country behind the eight-ball, so to speak.
As you are well aware by now I have become very politically active and consider myself a progressive, liberal-minded man. A little over two years ago I joined the blogsite DailyKos and it has been nothing but one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. It has opened my eyes to an entire world full of problems and possibilities, evil deeds and loving people, despair and hope.
I have come to care deeply about girls in Afghanistan who have acid thrown in their face for daring to get an education in defiance of their silly religious doctrines. I recoil in horror when reading about another teenage girl being stoned to death in Iraq, an "honor killing" for daring to talk to a boy she might have a harmless, adolescent crush on. I get angry when I read another case of one of the 47 million medically-uninsured in this country (count Stacy and I among them) who is driven to bankruptcy or worse-having their life shortened simply due to lack of preventative care. Everytime I hear another story about some rich asshole screwing some less-than-rich person just to buy that second yacht or that 12th house or that 20th car I feel nothing less than blind rage.
I have a purpose in life, other than to take care of Stacy and Starla. I hope to pursue that purpose somehow and make a living doing it, in either the non-profit or public sector. I want to take my talents, skills and experience and use them to help the "little guy" in one way or another.
Right now I am just one of millions of victims of the current "economic downturn". We haven’t communicated much in the last several years but I hope you remember that I was working at a box factory inspecting finished product and doing process audits on company procedures to assure that we were up to international standards of quality, in order to maintain our ISO 9000/2001 certification. Well, that job and many others at the plant went away and being one of the more recent hires (a lot of the people I worked with had been there 10-15 years at least) I was one of the first to go. In fact they are still considering doing away with the entire 3rd shift, something they swore they’d never have to do in the company’s 35 year history. I was working that 3rd shift, 11pm-7am and actually enjoyed it, despite it’s many obvious drawbacks. In my 25 years in the workforce I have never had to worry about my attendance, I am not an attendance problem. However, this place had an extremely right-wing, authoritarian viewpoint on all matters regarding employee conduct and their "Attendance Policy" was especially draconian, something even the senior girl in payroll spoke out about and almost got herself in serious trouble for, if not fired. I called in 4 times in 15 months there and it was this fourth call-in that got me fired. Flat-out, straight-up...no consideration for how well I got along with everyone I worked with, how well I did my job (V.P. of Quality called me his most diligent auditor), and the obvious potential I had to be a very productive, long-term employee in a variety of ways. (Oh yeah...a little aside. I actually had 20.5 hours of sick time accrued. Now, tell me that makes sense.) Suffice it to say, when the V.P of Human Resources called me in to "discuss my attendance" I had no idea what would transpire but was truly shocked when he simply stated that I had reached the "termination stage" with a smirk on his face and my last check in his hand. I’ll never forget the three words out of my mouth at that moment: "Are you serious?" I had never even met the man and his obvious disregard for me as anything other than a number on a piece of paper was appalling, to say the least but was something that, in retrospect is not surprising at all considering his obvious, overbearingly authoritarian nature...something that seemed to be a prerequisite for anybody in senior management at this company.
The bottom line is that I never would have been let go in the first place for such a blatantly manufactured reason if times were at least normal. This happened on 10/09/08 and they have subsequently laid off 6 or 7 more people on 3rd shift and the latest rumor is that they may, in fact, have to stop 3rd shift altogether and put another 50+ people out of work.
I could go on and on about the rage and hurt that I felt due to this travesty of justice but it gets even better. I am now in the process of appealing my denial of unemployment benefits because, of course they are fighting it, trying to claim that I didn’t call-in properly the last time...an obvious load of shit and an attempt to help their bottom line during these bad economic times.
Right now Stacy and I are on cash-aid and food stamps and dreading what we have to tell the landlords...a sweet, older couple who have been very tolerant of the ups and downs we have been going through since Duracite down-sized due to the housing market downturn and now this latest gigantic bump in the road.
So I have come full circle back to what I said in the beginning of this letter...I am scared.
I guess what I would like is some advice. You know what it’s like to be the man of the family, the sole "bread-winner". When Starla enters kindergarten next fall the plan is for both of us to be working full-time...that is just a reality we have faced and we simply have no choice.
Right now there truly are no jobs to be had in this area. Ok, maybe a few, but in areas that I am not qualified for or, in a sad irony, in areas I am way over-qualified for. If I win my unemployment appeal it would make no sense for me to take anything less than a $12-an-hour job...my unemployment would pay more than that for at least 6 months. I was making $15.81-an-hour at my last job and we were barely scraping by on that.
What I am not writing this letter for is to ask for some sort of hand-out. I am done begging in my life. I have the ability and the experience to make a decent living, or at least I used to until the price of everything went through the roof while middle-class wages remained stagnant under Bush and his criminal gang. Regardless of what "some people" may say in response to my situation I did not put myself here due to bad choices on my part. I am here largely due to other people’s bad and criminal choices that have put millions of people out of work, out of a home and basically shit-out-of-luck. I loathe these people who continue to "go to the bank" with their sacks of cash made on the backs of hard-working folks like me who just ask for a little fairness and equality in a system that has become very unfair and extremely unequal. Only a fool or a beneficiary of said inequality would think otherwise. Fools can be educated but the top 5% who continue to keep the rest of us down will have their judgment day, you can count on that.
I guess at this point I will try to conclude this little tirade. Consider this last paragraph a wish for a happy holiday season regardless of how things are going in the world. I really just had to get this off of my chest and I wanted to update my family in La Crescenta on my present situation. I expect nothing in return except for maybe a little sympathy, a little empathy and a return wish for a decent holiday season, all things considered. Starla is still going to have a Christmas, both from us and from Santa. We will survive...it’s what I do. I really do hope things are going ok for you and Mom and I hope her health is holding up. While I may be scared for my future and what will happen to us I am sure that you also have ample reasons to be worried, to be anxious and to want to live every moment to the fullest. I guess that’s all any of us can do on this spinning blue rock in this vast universe that us humans call home.
Peace and goodwill towards all of mankind and may the god of your chosing continue to comfort and bless you and yours. I really do love you guys.
As Always...Peace & Love,
Scotty a.k.a. Rogerdaddy