It was a very Good Year.

I dread change.  I welcome different seasons, I embrace gradual stepping into position, but sudden change?  Not happy about it.

I dread as well, my New Year's post.

Not because I hate the year change.  A day is a day is a day... to brutally misquote and plagiarize Gertrude Stein, but because this year, there was so much to change and adapt to that I simply didn't cope with it as well as I lead people to believe.

I like drama, not the stupid Hallmark Shows where the main character suffers insufferably (sic) for ages while realizing that "better things" will come and meanwhile is introduced to a series or pitfalls that simply would break anyone.  No, I mean drama as in acting, pretending showing different faces and characters.

Isn't that what we are though?  Characters in a never ending play  that is life?  In the words of the timeless bard:

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages.

This year I gained and I lost.  I lost my comfort zone on various levels, but I gained experience, friends and totally unexpectedly, Family.  I am grateful for said changes, who am I grateful to?  WHO cares really.  I feel that change was needed and while it definitely was more than I bargained for, it is that way all the time, with life of course.  You choose a price and that price is paid in full, but whatever choice you made, you may have bargained for a better deal.

“I bargained with Life for a penny,
And Life would pay no more,
However I begged at evening
When I counted my scanty store;

For Life is just an employer,
He gives you what you ask,
But once you have set the wages,
Why, you must bear the task.

I worked for a menial's hire,
Only to learn, dismayed,
That any wage I had asked of Life,
Life would have paid.”

― Jessie B. Rittenhouse 

And even failing to ask for more, I was given more than needed, a wonderful family, ample time to enjoy it.  Great friends and a stable position in my current job.

Very important people were no longer with me by the middle point of the year, and others came and went as side-characters in the charade and performance which my own performance was employed, but others?  Others have been luminaries, the beacons of hope and preferred roads where the current story travels, as best described by their own actions and  selfless behavior in which I was involved and amazed by.

This evening I made a minor error when filling my daily soundtrack, the music that I choose to be an example of how I feel, and left a song there that blew open the floodgates of feelings and restraint I had, so far, been able to keep in check, it's a Duet, a weird one to be sure where Robbie Williams plays half an age and Frankie (the Chairman of the board no less!!) fills in for the later age.

 I am closer to 35 than to 21, and I feel that my life is fuller than expected.  A lot of chance occurrences have given me experiences worth mentioning, and tales to be yarned and composed still.

I look forward to being 35, I have plans and ideas, and means of change.  Do I want to be a catalyst for change?  

Let this year help me decide, for now my background performance in life seems to be stepping closer to the limelight, a more robust character in a performance that will culminate in whisper at the end. 

Question your sources, step back and never inherently trust pictures.

So, we're nearing the final months before elections take place, and people are ganging up on each other trying to sway the public opinion.  It's a great show of how democracy is being lauded as a positively proper system of government as long as your opinion is the same as mine otherwise you are an idiot that wants to kill the country, eat babies and destroy the environment.

Obviously this is an over exaggeration of how things are, except when it's not.
A lot of people are trying their best to ensure that those who are undecided suddenly hit enlightenment, and those who have more of a decision made shoot for clairvoyance status and can positively without a doubt SHOW how bad things will NOT suddenly happen once their candidate is elected.

When I was back in High-school I had a wonderful history teacher, he made classes fun (for me), hilarious debates (at least for me) and gave very good lessons for how to deal with History (as a subject) and life for us.

One thing that simply stuck with me, is this "never just trust a picture and ALWAYS question sources".

It's simple, lacking context, you can make a picture show anything you want.  

 Take the picture above as an example, I did a minor survey of the "what's going on there?" sort.
From the people I queried, I had various responses, one said "An African American struggling with a man on the floor", Another one said "She's protecting the man", and as far as we can tell neither is wrong.

The real situation is explained on this article, if you don't care about clicking, she's actually protecting him from getting beaten up by the mob, but FROM the picture we can't tell accurately what happened, except that there's a mob, a rally, and two people on the floor one CLEARLY worried.

BBC will help you get context of it, on that particular instance.

Now, in my country, people are putting pictures with no context as clear examples of an "evil" thing candidates may have done or how badly they upheld their public positions or other stuff.

Pictures lack context, this one is an example:

The argument is, that the municipality did a lousy job of cleaning the city, and that this is a clear example of lack of public office follow through.

While that may be the case, I see a ton of trash on the street that was clearly put there by citizens living (or working) on that particular block.  I see a lack of civility or neighbourly duty as well in regards to how to deal with solid wastes.

Other than that, I don't know if the truck was just about to pick it up, if the collections department was on strike, if the trash had been there for more than a minute or, which is the case A LOT of the time when dealing with political parties, this picture was staged.

But lacking context, I can't use that picture as an example of who NOT to vote for, there are plenty of BETTER examples out there right now, should people care to read, but this picture?  Not really useful at all.

Lacking this context, or information making a valued (and valuable decision) is quite nigh on impossible, so please, IF you decide to vote, cast a ballot and participate in a democratic exercise:

Again that's just my opinion, I could be wrong...

(that last line, I stole from Dennis Miller :P)

Paternal preconceptions and normality as apathic behavior

As some of you may be aware, I am a dad (still working on making it Dad with capital D, but it's all in the cards).

My son is the most wonderful gift I have been given, and quite an example for me of interest, growth and self drive, he does however have certain "particulars" which make it hard for him to relate to other kids, and adults alike.

Years ago we found out that he had, what at the time was diagnosed as "Asperger's Syndrome", back then, it was considered by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, as a separate Syndrome, now it's just part of the Autistic Spectrum Disorder and is qualified as one of many areas on the severity scale.

In simple terms, he has a hard time socializing and interacting.

So, we take good care of what he does, and how he reacts, a few days ago, he came home with a note, he punched somebody and bloodied their lip.

Of course, as concerned parents we worried about the situation, he told us that yes he had punched them and that was about it.
So we apologized to the kid's parent's and told the teacher about our work-plan to make it better.

Yesterday at therapy we took up the subject again with the Therapist (lovely woman that I recommend highly), and I expanded on it from what Jr told me had happened, apparently he punched the kid because they were teasing and otherwise mistreating another infant.

The therapist said "that's totally expected, kid's with this type of syndrome, do not deal well with injustice, and they will react explosively".

That made me think hard, and well, should we ALL not react the same way?  You know maybe not punching people, but interfering and acting so that the action, injustice or otherwise abuse is stopped?

We're dealing with Jr's acts a step at a time, but really, is standing by and letting others be trampled on, and abused the norm now?  Are we so far disconnected from our fellow people that it's "normal" to let them be?

In my case, I rather not walk away, and do something, I remember my grand-dad telling me we should always step in and act fairly and ensure that others are not oppressed or abused, that the little ones, be them children or defenseless people, NEED us to step in.

I was reminded of course of a passage in "Ender's Game", where Ender is bullied and reacts accordingly.  As kids are about to gang up on him, he makes a decision to fight in such a way and defend himself so that others will really think long and hard before bullying him again:

  Can't think of anything to answer. Anything I say will make it worse. So will saying nothing.
 
  "Hey, Third, hey, turd, you flunked out, huh? Thought you were better than us, but you lost your little birdie, Thirdie, got a bandaid on your neck."
 
  "Are you going to let me through?" Ender asked.
 
  "Are we going to let him through? Should we let him through?" They all laughed. "Sure we'll let you through. First we'll let your arm through, then your butt through, then maybe a piece of your knee."
 
  The others chimed in now. "Lost your birdie, Thirdie.  Lost your birdie, Thirdie."
 
  Stilson began pushing him with one hand, someone behind him then pushed him toward Stilson.
 
  "See-saw, marjorie daw," somebody said.
 
  "Tennis!"
 
  "Ping-pong!"
 
  This would not have a happy ending. So Ender decided that he'd rather not be the unhappiest at the end. The next time Stilson's arm came out to push him, Ender grabbed at it. He missed.
 
  "Oh, gonna fight me, huh? Gonna fight me, Thirdie?"
 
  The people behind Ender grabbed at him, to hold him.
 
  Ender did not feel like laughing, but he laughed. "You mean it takes this many of you to fight one Third?"
 
  "We're people, not Thirds, turd face. You're about as strong as a fart!"
 
  But they let go of him. And as soon as they did, Ender kicked out high and hard, catching Stilson square in the breastbone. He dropped. It took Ender by surprise he hadn't thought to put Stilson on the ground with one kick. It didn't occur to him that Stilson didn't take a fight like this seriously, that he wasn't prepared for a truly desperate blow.
 
  For a moment, the others backed away and Stilson lay motionless. They were all wondering if he was dead. Ender, however, was trying to figure out a way to forestall vengeance. To keep them from taking him in a pack tomorrow. I have to win this now, and for all time, or I'll fight it every day and it will get worse and worse.

I am sure the execution wasn't the best possible scenario, we will definitely make sure that he tones it down accordingly, but I can't really fault Jr for stepping in, maybe if we all did, life would be different for those being bullied.

Presidential Postulates and Pricing in the Periphery.

So, as I posted on FB a few Days ago, election season and political fever have invaded my usually peaceful neck of the universe.

In the tiniest part of the spiral Galaxy I live in, people's fervor towards certain rituals is unregulated and spontaneous, mostly because "freedom", so everyone has an opinion (mostly the same as a lot of others, but NEVER call them sheeple) and the sanctimonious impetus they have when sharing it is deafening at times.

Just like astrology, finding the best political candidate takes a lot of guesswork (it really shouldn't but you would not be able to see this from the way some people react and apply their feelings into what, should be a mathematical postulate at times (not always though).

So, from my limited stay on this here third rock, I have come to identify various ways in which people choose a candidate of their liking:

• Hereditary, these are the people that just vote for whoever their parent's taught them to vote
• Utterly and illogically biased, these are those that have no clue who to vote for, yet decide to exercise the right to select the next president of the country based on "he's cute", "she's a woman", "he's the one with the TV show" etc.
• Gut feeling, having never really studied politics, these wondrous and adventurous individuals just trust their gut "feels right" is something you hear a lot here
• Self identification, the candidate reminds me of something I once liked in the past and I'll just go with that
• Scholarly voters are pretty much people that DO NOT adhere to a single party, but will study, review, understand and SELECT the choice that best applies to what they believe the future of the country should be

There may be one or two more categories, but I feel those above cover most of what I've seen.

People in Latin America like a 'people' person, we're very outgoing (mostly), talkative (sometimes), grounded (this is really being eroded lately) and having someone that feels like he's "people" and not just a figure head is what a lot of the citizens want.

So, it's not surprising when two days ago, a lot of the opinions towards the selection of the next president seems to be based off knowing or not, how much groceries cost in the open market.

I read a story once, Assimov's "The Franchise".  In the FAR FAR away future of 2008, indirect voting was taken to the extreme, you had a "Voter of the Year", and ONE person decided who the president would be.

From Wikipedia:

In the future, the United States has converted to an "electronic democracy" where the computer Multivac selects a single person to answer a number of questions. Multivac will then use the answers and other data to determine what the results of an election would be, avoiding the need for an actual election to be held.

I left those links there in case anyone wants to learn more about democracy and elections.

The funny part is, the actual questions that Norman Answers, have to do with cost of food, cost of living, and stuff like that, but the this one stuck to me pretty solidly, as it was well, here's the line from the book:

"The one question Norman could remember at the moment was an incongruously gossipy: "What do you think of the price of eggs?""

 

That's precisely what a lot of people are basing decisions on, if a candidate knew or not the price of groceries.

 

There being millions of factors you could abide by to choose a person to lead the country, the biggest news now, is basically Gossip.

 

I am not defending the ignorance of any particular candidate (most didn't know and one decided NOT to answer a single question), but seriously?  This is what a lot of people want for our country's future?  

 

We have, at the moment a female president and  NO ONE is asking out there why there are no female candidates at this point.

 

We do have a younger candidate, among the miriad of rehashed past hopefuls, and one or two newcomers that were dropped into the position after a circus fanfare to rival Roman Coliseums shows.

 

But we really are not looking for a proper president, we seem to be looking for whether or not he's "one of us".

 

 

Turn, turn, turn... Or how people don't live the moment but await the date.

When I was an itty-bitty baby, like 3 or so, my mom took me to the amusement park.  She took me lots of times afterwards but THIS one stuck on my mind (and 30 years is quite a memory marker), so I want to share with all of you.

So, we're at the Amusement Park, and we go through the gate, this is not like Disney World or anything, back then it was like (for you outside CR) a VERY big state fair that never went away.  EVER.

So, they had all these rides for children and some for grown ups, it was (back then) mostly for the kids.

So again I go through the gate to this magical place and I see for the first time ever, all these rides, it was just amazing.

We had a Ferris Wheel, we had little "lady-bug" rides, a carrousel, a rollercoaster that was SCARY (the scariest thing is it is still running), and a whole bunch of other rides.

So I jumped in on the first one, and while I was riding the carrousel, I was looking at the next ride, joyfully awaiting the moment the carrousel stopped and I was able to run and queue up for the bumper cars; once on the bumper cars, same thing, I wanted to just finish fast so I could go to the ride-boats.

My mom took me aside of course (mostly because she didn't want to run from ride to ride, but also to give me one of the greatest lessons ever) and said "You aren't really enjoying yourself on the rides because you are waiting to jump on the next one, you're missing the MOMENT!"

Back then it really didn't mean much to me, it was just a "OK slow down and enjoy THIS ride, once off, I'll figure out what comes next", but little by little her words started to sink in and give me more context.

These days, I extrapolate a bit more.  Maybe it's just because I've grown older, but I highly doubt it.  Lately I see people (not just commerce) RUSHING towards the holidays, and by holidays I mean Christmas.

As far back as August I saw people on Facebook asking if it's too soon to start putting up ornaments because they "JUST LOVE Christmas". 

AUGUST guys, AUGUST.  FOUR months ahead. 

I've even heard of people Caroling already, you know singing Christmas Songs, in OCTOBER.

I hear some say that it's because in Latin America, we don't really have holidays between September and December (that said most of Central America Celebrates independence in September but I digress), but damn it people, by the time December comes your tree will be wilted, you will seriously want to murder someone for singing Carols, and the gifts will have probably got up and found a different family to be delivered to.

Yes, I LIKE Christmas, I enjoy Christmas, but things have a time, a place and a proper setting.

Enjoy your moments people, they don't come back, and once you fast forward to the places you "love" and miss those "less special", you are the only one to blame when you fail to grow from experiences, living ahead of your time, and enjoying none of it and this is precisely what you pass down to your children, a feeling of being at the wrong place at the wrong time, and not living IT.

Perfect Perception of Possible Scenarios.

As some of you may have noticed, that is you are there to notice (if a person blogs in the forest and there's no one to read it do people even notice?)... I have been writing a bit about me, how I feel and my parents.

It's therapeutic and it does shed some light on things that I see, and live daily.

That's not all there is though, I have been writing to find my centre, my precise spot of comfort, they say that the only way to get good at writing is to do it daily and often, hey no matter how lousy you are, if you can engage just ONE person, you can definitely make a difference; so I am making a habit of writing.

I also write in the off-chance that it will create some sort of enlightening circumstance in my day where something I put here, will actually make me write some more about different things.

Right now, it's mostly thoughts on "paper", I believe on this as a journal, so while I may not put life changing thoughts here, it is indeed a mind-dump of my personal life.

I write in order to make myself a better dad as well, I look back on my experiences with my parents, and I try to gain an insight on what it was that made them such great parents, at least according to my experience of course.

I do this, in order to really make a difference on my son as well.

As some of you may know, I am a first time parent, while I am 33, this whole experience of caring for a little human being is a completely alien and horrifying scenario at times.

So, I want to be better and more than that, the best I can be at it.

I read a few blogs a day, and today, I read this on the Art of Manliness about how "The Child is the Father to the Man", if you have a few minutes, go ahead and give it a read.

So, I've always thought that whatever upbringing you have, whatever choices your parents made, and how you learn to react to them, will mould the person and practical Grown human being you end up being.

With my son, my approach is that of a friendly father figure, I don't know the "stern driver" of a Dad doesn't quite suit with me.

We do things together, and I do things FOR him, while I teach (or try to) how and why I do things and take decisions.

He is 7 though, so following my train of thought is not always that straight forward (that may also be because sometimes I can't even follow where I started or ended up with the idea myself), but it's a fun exercise.

A few days ago, we had our Independence Day celebration, I am not the most nationalist person in this country.  BY FAR not the right person to teach how to love this country.  I like it, don't get me wrong, but I've been exposed to the fallacies of politics and the idiotic behaviour of steadfast nationalist bigots, to know that it's not in me to try and sell that to a child.

But it's also my civic duty to do so, and I may as well do things right for him and future generations.

So, this weekend we made a "farolito".  You know how you get fireworks commemorating the rockets and the fighting that the US went for on their fight for independence?  Well, here we actually make lanterns in remembrance of how hard it was back in the 1800s to get a message through the whole of Central America of independence.  People walked, rode horses, mules or whatever they could find with torches or lanterns to light their way.  So the WHOLE celebration has a runner with the Torch of Independence going through the country, and the kids, well the kids celebrate with their own version of it.

Over the years, it has gotten more and more elaborate, back when I was a child, it was good common place to just have a simple lantern with a candle inside, and we used to march through the street on the 14th of September with our lanterns and sing the national Anthem.

These days schools STILL ask us to make the lanterns (some are even ok with store bought though) and for the family to go to school and celebrate.

So, being the way I am, I dove into it wholeheartedly.  You know, for Jr.

Coffee, cutting mat and materials

Ideally, this would not have been a coffee fueled binge of creativity, but as luck would have it, I though Jr was going away for the weekend and that assistance WAS NOT mandatory.  I was wrong on both accounts and it was all for the better to be honest. 

Deep in the realms of Cutting on board...

I decided to go with an "adobe house" or what people believe was the custom here ages ago (about 192 years ago if you go by independence date).  I like making things with my hands, and I like to believe myself to be meticulous in the undertakings, so I did it to scale, 1:50.  Totally unnecessary as it was just supposed to be lighted up later, but I can't help it, I couldn't just build it haphazardly.

AS such though I didn't want to do it all alone, after all this is a family task, so Jr did the painting and colouring  bit messy, but all his!

Indeed we had a bit of fun on that (to be honest I cringed at the thought of it being less than perfect but I'm learning about this parenting thing as I go as I mentioned).

Light off final house

With our little "torch" light inside

In the end of course it was his face which lit the brightest, I still don't know if I am doing everything right, I actually think I am not going "by the book" on a lot of these things, but I am learning and pushing myself at it.

To do things with our hands is in reality what separates us from animals, our use of tools and our creative ability.  To squander that gift just because stores sell things, I believe is one of our gravest mistakes; and one I hope he doesn't make.  But this is definitely something I need to preach by example, only by doing can I show him the need and the satisfaction of it.

“What a man knows should find its expression in what he does. The value of superior knowledge is chiefly in that it leads to a performing manhood.” –Christian Nestell Bovee

So, if I want for my son to be a great father as a boy to himself as an adult, I must act and perform that way myself, as such he is also, as a boy, a father to me; in a way that I learn from him by performing, and doing myself, and hoping that "my best" is indeed good enough.

Presentable Paranoia and Simple misunderstandings

So, here's this thing, you know how sometimes you think there's nothing you can do to make amends, that is you messed up and things simply don't seem to get any better no matter what you say?

Well, I sometimes get that without saying or doing anything really, I just worry about what people will say or think over stuff I may have done which no one has complained about at all but still makes me worry.

Sometimes it's as simple as something I said that may be misunderstood, other times is the way I act which may be misconstrued at a different level and people will react to it in ways that are simply randomly selected out of their OWN messed up Psyche.

We all suffer from Paranoia a bit, we all worry needlessly over certain behaviours which could be left alone and no one would bat an eye, but sometimes we seek that final confirmation that we can make things better.

And, just like that, by asking; we make them all the worse.

See, if people didn't notice you saying something offensive, the reality is, that if you ASK about it, they will end up noticing it all the more.  If they were just acting like they didn't notice, well then, you JUST confirmed it to them.

So, which one is better, act the fool, or just come out and say things straight?  Depends on the outcome you want.  If you GENUINELY and unequivocally require to make amends, go for the kill and the question, but that may not fix anything at all.

Why do I go about this?

It's simple, while I was born in a Latin country, where Spanish is THE main form of communication, my use of it is haphazard at best.

I have been thinking and talking in English long enough that the 1st meaning of any word I utter, is the English variant and that leads to all sorts of weird outcomes when speaking with people that MAINLY use Spanish.  It's not at total lack of communication, but it does yield some impressive misunderstandings.

As is my nature, I ask about this, and more often than not, end up making a bigger thing out of something no one would have noticed.

It's fun sometimes though, I am separated from others by a common language and hilarity ensues.