I'D RATHER BE SWIMMING...

Fifty Years Younger

If this were to be the case, then I would be 22, the year would be 1969 and I would be leaving College and entering the military, specifically the US Navy and more importantly the US Navy Reserves where my contract was referred to as a 2 by 4...  meaning, 2 years active duty, 4 years in the reserves...  and actually, I only spent 21 months on active duty because I was awarded a 3 month early out to return to College...  looking back, active duty was a piece-of-cake and not because I only spent 21 months on active duty but because I was in the reserves for a year before I went on active duty so instead of boarding the ship as an E-1, I boarded the ship as an E-4 and was considered RATED....  this meant a couple of things, I was a Petty Officer, I could not be assigned grunt work if I was to get EMI which I did several times, and I did not have to spend any time working in the galley like all the other newbies did...

EMI - was Extra Military Instruction - this was assigned not just if you screwed up but if you broke or bent the rules...  For example, I was in communications so when we were in port, we had to go on message runs several times a day to pick up our messages.  One time, after picking up the messages we decided to go drink our lunch and did not get back to the ship until quitting time...  We were both awarded EMI...  but since we were both rated, our EMI had to be done in our field so we were told to burn old de-classified messages...  We decided to have some fun so we found some coat hangers and stole some hotdogs out of the galley and roasted them while burning...  The Communications Officer just shook his head but said and did nothing.

But, back to the point...
If I were fifty years younger, this is what I would be doing...

WANNA BE LIKE MONKEYS...

Depression leaves me confused sometimes...

I'LL DRINK TO THAT...

My Mental Outlook

Married but Alone

I was married to a nice lady from NC for 23 years before we got a divorce and had one daughter together who is now in her late 40's.  My second marriage took place after living together for 5 years in the hopes of getting to know each other better and while, at the time we thought that was a good idea, looking back living together makes no difference at all because pretend continues to be played out on both sides until the actual marriage takes place.  We too have been married almost 23 years and I feel like this marriage has just about run its course as well...

Married but Alone is an appropriate title because I have had no network of support for 30 years...  my parents (before they died), my sister, and my brother live in NC and NY respectively and my daughter lives in China with no plans to ever return to the USA.  My wife's friends (with whom I had nothing in common no matter how hard I tried) accepted and tolerated me because of her.  Therefore, my life revolved completely around her without providing me any kind of release.

Another really big issue was:  EDUCATION...  I have a Masters Degree whereas all she has is a high school diploma and has the vocabulary and grammar of an 8th grader who virtually has no awareness of knowledge of history, geography, mathematics, science, philosophy, biology, English, the operation of government/Congress, or religion even though she considers herself to be a "born again" Southern Baptist Christian.

You might be asking yourself...  what exactly brought us together?

Easy answer:  we had both just gotten a divorce and SEX

What exactly am I leading up to here?

… BORED AND DEPRESSED …

I have been retired for 5 years with nothing to do except listen to my wife (who is also retired) tell me how stupid I am...  how lazy I am...  how I don't care about the house...  how I cannot be trusted...  how I should perform plumbing, electricity, and carpentry projects at home even though I do not have a technical aptitude for any of that.

Not too long ago, she told me that she told a married man at the Church she attends that "she should have left me years ago..."

With that said, she expects me to celebrate our anniversary as if nothing is wrong...

Here's the problem:
I am 72 years old with memory loss and showing signs of poor driving skills
I am being treated for two cancers, both of which could be life threatening
I might have prostate cancer as well
I have heart disease and suffered a triple bypass heart attack 12 years ago
I have no other friends to drive me to or from the hospital
I have no other friends to drive me to the grocery store and back
I have no other friends to drive me to doctor's appointments
If we got a divorce and split our assets 50/50, I would not have enough to pay my bills for 20 years if I were to live that long

The more I think about this, the more depressed I get...

My daughter and I don't talk
My sister and I don't talk and don't want to talk
My brother and I don't talk even though I have reached out several times
Both our parents are dead

SOMETIMES, I think the best course of action for me to take is to die...  that is not to say suicide since I do not believe in that...  but just hoping that my cancers take me sooner than later...

What an ungrateful way for my life to end...

Waiting For YOU...

Living with bipolar disorder

This is exactly what it feels like...

If You Had Not Guessed It...

I am bipolar

My daughter is bipolar

My mother was probably bipolar but was never tested

It is terrible to live with this condition regardless of whether or not you take meds for it because it ruins your entire personality...

too positively

or

too negatively

People want to be around you when you are high but they do not want to be around you when you are low, and what makes that worse is that these people cannot differentiate that you have a problem nor do they want to be tolerant of this problem if they do recognize it because it is a hassle and it is also unpredictable.

I do not take any meds for my condition and my wife has decided to treat me as if I am constantly low and therefore never sees any improvement in my behavior...  I could say that this is due to her ignorance or lack of understanding or desire not to understand at all...  but, what difference would any of that make...  She is basing her behavior on me and my behavior rather than taking responsibility for her own behavior...

THIS IS HOW MANY PEOPLE REACT...

She is not unusual...  she is the NORM...

SO...  all of this begs the question...

Why am I not taking meds?

Because my bipolar is not severe enough for meds according to my doctor and I should learn to control my behavior better knowing that I suffer from this disease...

HOWEVER...  that is easier said than done!!!

Check this out...

Are you bipolar... click on the link below...

bipolar self test

bipolar questionaire

Nothing for which to live...

Today...  after another disagreement with the wife concerning what she is ordering me to do when living in her house (which actually is OUR house the last time I looked), I waited about 4 hours and then asked her the following question:  "Have you ever thought about what I have to live for?"  She turned her head towards me with a look of incredulity and said nothing...  to which I replied, "I mean, my parents are dead, I don't connect with any religion (even though I have faith), my brother, sister, and daughter want nothing to do with me, I have had no friends for the last 30 years, and you have not just told me but others at Church that you should have left me years ago...  so, you tell me what do I have to live for?"  She was sustaining her look of incredulity listening with defiance, saying nothing until I walked away, then she unmuted the TV and continued watching her show...

While my life, up to this point...  that is to say the point of retirement, has not been spectacular or financially comforting, I have experienced many things that the average American can only dream about; BUT, once I retired, I soon discovered that there was absolutely nothing that I wanted to do to pass the time...  this is probably why many people don't ever retire...

This is an absurd statement...

I tried teaching night classes in Business for a local University but quickly found that not only was doing that not challenging at all, but that teaching these students who did not really want to learn was actually wasting my time, even though I had plenty of time to waste.

I did not want to spend my days working in the yard because quite frankly my wife demanded that I work in the yard each day at least as long as she did...  and, if she had to run an errand or two and was gone an hour she expected me to work in her absence and actually checked my work to see if I had followed her instructions.

Her demands were more demotivating and demoralizing than they were an attempt to create joy in retirement.

Does this even pertain to this article?

In any event...  what was the point of my continued life...  I thought to myself?  I'm being treated for two cancers...   I had a serious heart attack and was advised to get a triple bypass...  I may now have prostate cancer...  and, I am complete without a network of support...  We have saved enough money already to pay my wife's expenses, if I were to die today, for the next 30 years or until she turns 97, so there are no more financial demands on me...  my daughter lives in China and does not send me a birthday card, a father's day card, or any kind of gift at Christmas...

He would miss me...

Don't get me wrong...  this has absolutely nothing to do with SUICIDE...  no matter how depressed I got, I would not do that...  I'd rather sleep all day, not shave, and waste my time than to commit SUICIDE...   SUICIDE is for LOSERS and those who are UNDISCIPLINED...  I am not a LOSER, I just spent my whole life FAILING...                                                                       

SO...  I put my thoughts on paper...  I have created 4 blogs - all tied together and write what is on my mind whether it may be interesting to the reader or not...  I do this not because I am an asshole which I am anyway, but because I have nothing better to do with me time...  PISSER for both you and me...

Trouble in paradise...

It does not take long at all for two people to be at each other's throats when being forced to live together 24/7 without taking any kind of break away from each other.  It is even more difficult when both parties are alpha and have no desire to turn loose of that personality in order to keep the peace...
And...  once the words and the comments are made, there is no way in hell that they will ever be taken back or forgotten and will unanimously be brought to the surface in future arguments...

This couple is now DEAD IN THE WATER.

We have been retired together for 3 years now and to be quite honest with you, this last year has been rather hateful...  She wants me to work as hard as she works, even though I am 5 years older than her and am undergoing treatment for 2 cancers and have ongoing back problems...  She does not think that is a problem because first, she does not believe that I really have back problems and two, if she had back problems she would take a pain pill and continue.

We are COMPLETELY DIFFERENT.

The final issue is that she does not RESPECT me in anything that I do, in anything that I say, or in anything that I believe...  I am always wrong and she is always right...  that said, she never apologizes and never says that I am sorry.  Not only does she not have respect for me, but she has no respect for my brother, sister, parents, or my daughter...  I remember her telling me one time that, "no wonder your parents hated you so much."

All my friends also treat her bad whereas all her friends treat me perfectly...

Her main complaint is that she refuses to let me control her while at the same time, she spends all her efforts trying to control me by:

• telling me what clothes to wear
• telling me how to mow the yard
• telling me how to talk to people
• telling me how to drive the car
• telling me how to empty the cat litter box
• telling me how to feed the cats
• telling me when I should get a haircut
• telling me where we are going on vacation (denying all my ideas)

Does this sound like a supportive wife?

It's only me... I'm home from the sea...

I am 72 year old, born in 1947 on Halloween and I am sure that I was a scary surprise for my mother as well as my father who might have had a inkling as to what raising a son like me would be like...  but, if they did, it did not do them any good.

BASICALLY, I was a pain-in-the-ass child to say the least...

I am sure they were both glad to be rid of me when they died, but that is just speculation...  but, my sister and my brother were their pride and joys and they never hesitated in letting me know that.

My writing on this blog is not done because I have to but because I want to.  I have absolutely no idea what you might gain from reading what I write, but that does not really matter to me because I am going to write whether I have any visitors or not...

WHY?

Because I am retired and have nothing better to do...  NOTHING BETTER...

This is my second marriage (where did that though come from???) and after 25 years, my wife told me that she should have left me years ago...   I suppose that was either said to boost my ego or my motivation, not sure because she is always asking me to do something that I don't want to do, as if she is my mother, but I keep telling her that not even my frigging mother could get me to do that.

I guess that makes me an ASSHOLE...                                            

But, that too is ok....

Why?

Because AH are my initials...

I'd rather be...

The first time I saw the posted sign, it read:  "I'd rather be fishing."

While it was somewhat funny at the time, given that none of us who saw the sign really wanted to be working, I personally did not like to fish and still don't like to fish...  Fishing reminds me of major league baseball...  slow and boring...

However, when my parents had an ocean front cottage on the Outer Banks of NC, I recall numerous times where vehicles would be parked all over the side of the road and in driveways because the "blues were running..."

Apparently, when the big blue fish are running, it is not just really easy to catch a bunch of them quickly, but they push smaller fish in towards the shore, making it really easy to catch them with one's hands or a net, like flounder.

I remember one man who was fishing right in front of our cottage, had filled up two coolers with flounder and had a tarp where half a dozen of more 200 pound blue fish were laying in less than an hour...

This kind of fishing is definitely not slow and boring...

Being Bipolar

Taking a break...

What is depression?

A New Day

There is always a new day for me, even though I know that one day my luck will end...  although, I have been told that "luck favors the prepared," and while that does not really apply here, it is still nonetheless a clever phrase.

I have performed calculations a dozen times to make sure that I have no overlooked anything...  and if... I were to die today, there is enough money saved (not included the value of our home) to pay my wife's bills for 25 years...   that would take her to age 92 since she is currently 67...  and if, she needs another 5 years, the value of our home would cover that, leaving 80 grand or so as an inheritance to our survivors...

Knowing this...  leaves me with a sense of relief, in that there is nothing more that I need to do if my life needed to be forfeit.  That is not to say that I want to die, but that I can die without regrets at the end like so many tend to have.

Lives and experiences are always relative...

WHY... Why... why?

GUESS WHAT?

I was born on October 31, 1947

Yes...  a Halloween baby, but with the horoscope of a Scorpion...

Interestingly for some, but not always for me, I have been tested 3 times and my personality has always revealed that I am a solid...

                             INTJ

What is an INTJ?
INTJ personality type is one of the rarest in the Myers-Briggs classification. ... There are 16 different types, one of the rarest is INTJ personality type, with INTJ's forming just 2% of the population.

INTJs are very driven individuals, who enjoy setting goals and working hard to accomplish them. INTJs males have very specific desires in life, and will often pull away from the things that don’t inspire growth. Here are a few important things that you should know about the INTJ male, especially if you are interested in dating one.

They Are Focused On Growth

INTJs are extremely focused on growth, and this is something that mixes into all aspects of their lives. The INTJ male wants to find ways to grow as a person, and dislikes the idea of being held back by a lack of knowledge. They will often spend their time researching new topics until they feel like they have learned as much as they can about that subject. They want to understand the world around them, and dislike ignorance more than anything else.

INTJ males also carry this hunger for growth into their relationships, wanting to constantly be improving things. If an INTJ feels like they are stuck in a stagnant relationship, they will certainly not want things to progress. They will often analyze the situation before getting too deep into a relationship with someone. They will take the time to be sure that the person they are committing to is right for them, especially since they take their commitments very seriously. 

The INTJ wants to be able to grow with the person they are with- they want to see their relationship make them stronger and help them become better in many ways. Once they find someone who challenges them, they will certainly be willing to commit to that person long term. For the INTJ male relationships are rarely flighty things, they often will not waste their time and energy with someone who they cannot see improving their lives. 

They also want to be sure that they can improve the lives of those around them, and they work very hard to do this. The INTJ will spend time researching those closest to them in order to understand them as much as they possibly can. They want to be able to find ways to improve their lives and help them grow. There is nothing worse than staying stagnant for an INTJ, and they will often see it as a life completely wasted.

Estranged

My brother and sister do not get along and I am not sure if we ever did get along.  My sister is 4 years older than me so she was in college when I started high school, and my brother is 8 years younger than me, 12 years younger than my sister, so he essentially grew up as an only child.  I was in college when he was in the 5th grade.

Recently, he told me that we had nothing in common...  why did he tell me that?  I suggested that we get together once or twice a year, do things as brothers and get to know each other...  that was his comment.

I am 72, he is 64 and when I am 80, he will be 72...

Putting the issue of age aside, my sister and I have nothing in common either, other than our parents; in fact, we are complete opposites on many issues.  She likes to spend money while I like to save it for later.  She wants to be a socialite while I don't give a damn about that kind of social status.  My brother is a billionaire and does not believe that he needs to financially help out his brother or sister since we could have become like him if we had really wanted it as bad as he did...  of course, that is BS...

Our parents sent him to an expensive PREP SCHOOL which put him in the middle of multi-millionaires and billionaires which led him to Harvard which lead him into investment banking which led him into the world of venture capital, leveraged buyouts, and flipping multi-million dollar companies like one might flip a residential house.

He offered to send my daughter to Harvard and pay all of her tuition and while I wanted to decline, she was actually the one who turned down his offer because she wanted to make it on her own, but with MY help not HIS.

And then the divorce came, and my daughter blamed me for everything and we get along about as well as my brother and sister do.

It is really difficult to understand me and be my friend...

A Day In The Life...

From 1962-1966, I lived in the Digla community about 20 outside of Cairo, Egypt and attended Cairo American College (High School) in Maadi which was adjacent to Digla.  Since foreigners could not work in Cairo, we, as students, had no choice but to travel through Europe during the summer months...  I know this sound horrible but someone had to do it...  lol

I graduated in 1966 and there were 28 students in my senior class from about 18 different nationalities.  The Valedictorian of our senior class was a Hungarian Communist...  who would have ever thought that...

There was no cafeteria at the school, so we brought our lunch each day and since Friday was the Islamic Sabbath, we did not go to school on Friday, but did go to school on Saturday which seemed a little "OFF" to me...  Monday through Thursday, we could have added 90 minutes and had a three day weekend...

Anyway...  those were good days for me...  and, it was not until I graduated high school that my bipolar disorder really kicked in...

My first two and half years in college were miserable for me...

Stay protected

Because of fighting cancer for over 12 years with monthly infusions of chemo (over 150 to date), radiation treatment, and immunotherapy drugs, my body has a "no shit" loss of an immune system to fight off any type of virus...  therefore, I must severely limit my contact with the outside world (that being outside my home) with the exception of previously scheduled doctor appointment and my regular monthly infusion treatments.  When I do leave home, I am wearing a face mask and gloves...

I don't give a rat's ass what people think of me...

Time Passes Quickly

Sometimes...  I tell people that I never have a bad day because the day passes by so quickly for me now...  sadly enough, I did not appreciate that knowledge when I was younger and when I had bad days, I could not wait for them to end.

Don't remember much about my days before traveling to Egypt and going to high school, but I certainly remember most of them afterwards for some reason...

I remember traveling in the summers with my parents and having very specific foods to eat for breakfast each day, but none of the details of a happy family life...  just a life a being forced to do this or that by my parents.  We had to attend Church every Sunday regardless of the weather and any health concerns that we might have; we even had to attend Church when on vacation, so it was not really any kind of vacation for me, as I think I recall.

I know that I got in trouble with the police several times but I don't recall the specifics of any of it as it might have transpired.  Is this age issues or something else like selective memories because I don't want to remember...  who knows?

So, today, I am 72 and my last 60 years has really passed by incredibly quickly and now that I am retired, I don't miss working at all.  Work for me was terrible because there were so many bosses for which I had to work that were not just STUPID but INCOMPETENT and yet they had risen to supervisory ranks which made me question the intelligence of management.

Was all management like the ones that I had experienced?

HOPE FOR THE BEST BUT EXPECT THE WORST

This philosophy, right or wrong, has over-shadowed my life and amazingly has keep me EVEN throughout my life or at least my life after high school which is when all this shit started for me...  I still get highs and lows but hoping for the best seems to be for me, self-healing at times.  At night, what puts me asleep is dreaming/fantasizing about living a different life and as I think through all the details of this or that actually happening to me, I fall asleep.

However, the next morning when I awake, I realize that what I was dreaming about will actually never become a reality for me...

Sometimes, I wonder why I am so stupid to think otherwise.

After 72 years of life, I have finally realized that whatever happens to you or does not happen to you is exactly how life was supposed to be for you.  It does not matter what you actually do or don't do, your life will become what it was intended to become.  Is this FATE?

Not sure if I believe in FATE...

BUT, everyone's life starts at birth...  a birth that none of us ever wanted...  in short, we were given birth without our permission...

How did this happen and why to us???

There are millions of US, all of whom did not ask to be born and yet here we are...  so, who or what controls our lives...

Even my parents did not know that they would give birth to ME...

SO...  who or what planned than out for ME?

And, after coming to terms with that notion, one can easily see that one's life is not one's own just as one's birth was not one's own...

Each of us have a path to take...  a journey if you will...  taking us into different directions...  under the direction of someone else's control, even though we MAKE OUR OWN CHOICES...  those choices are already known...

It is always something...

Today...

much like every other day...

started out the way it usually does...

with me sleeping in past nine...

and then...

I realized that...

my thoughts were again, and totally focused on whether or not anyone had responded to my posts on FB regarding my search...

Did I really want this to happen, I thought to myself?
What if I get caught?
What if that leads to divorce?
What if my family will not support me?
What if I end up more alone than I already am?

Highs and Lows

Throughout my life, I have either been depressed or feeling good about myself, and never know when I am going to experience what behavior and for how long...  PISSER...

As I understand it, my daughter was diagnosed by a physician with being bi-polar and was put on medication.  The physician told her that she probably got it from me and that I probably got it from my mother...  although, there was no evidence of that because neither my mother or I went to a physician to have that theory checked out, even though we both displayed symptoms of being bi-polar.

My bi-polar condition really manifested itself in 1966 when I attended college as it turned on the depression side rather than the high side which was really needed.  As a result, I flunked out of college two and a half years later, still living inside my depression.

My highs caused me accomplish numerous things during my working career which looked good on a resume and got me promoted or into new jobs, but the lows caused me to lose my job 10 times also because of my actions.

OR...  is this just an excuse???

Who knows???

In retirement, it does not bother me as much but I can also see the difference in my behavior.  Recently, I was on a HIGH and wrote two and a half 300 page novels, then my LOW kicked in and right in the middle of my third novel...  I just stopped writing...

I did absolutely nothing for about a month except take showers and empty the cat litter and eat meals...  however, I did do a lot of sleeping about 10-15 hours each day...

It's not like anything you have ever experienced.

Self Quarantined

A few days ago, President Trump issued a National State-of-Emergency for the entire US and even though I live in a small town in East TN, two days later, all the grocery stores were basically empty of most of their food supplies, including toilet paper, alcohol, water, wine, milk, and most of their food supplies.

PEOPLE PANICKED EVERYWHERE

It makes us Americans look GREEDY and FOOLISH...

We purchased our toilet paper in bulk from SAMS and had just re-stocked about 2 weeks ago, leaving us with a supply for 4-6 months depending upon how much we use...  although, there is an endless supply of water in most showers that people fail to realize they can use to wash off afterwards...   and if, there is need for further cleaning then there is always bleach...

We love our convenience.

We also ordered a couple of shipments from Omaha Steaks several weeks ago, so we have plenty of meat.

We also keep a healthy stock of can goods for some reason...  more than just a weekly supply, so we are probably good to go there for about a month.

So, what do I do at home all day???

That's a reasonable question...

I spend time on social media:  LinkedIn and Facebook, I write in my diary, I work on my novels,  I watch the news, I look for interesting recipes for a low calorie diet, and I might update my three blogs.

Looking Back

My first bipolar episodes kicked in around Junior High School or 6th-7th-8th grades and it is also in that time period that I began to identify with hoodlums (as they were called) because, I suppose that I was tightly regulated at home, although I don't that for sure to be the case.  Me and my boys disrespected authority, our teachers in school, and some of the laws that society had placed on its citizens to protect the general welfare of everyone.  We were finally caught for 15 counts of breaking and entering, about 150 counts of grand theft auto, and 1 count of Grand Larceny.  However, the auto theft was not really theft as much as it was borrowing cars to impress females.  We washed them, cleaned them on the inside, and returned them with full tanks of gasoline.  We were finally caught and I was sentenced to 48 months in Reform School (or, all of my high school; but, my father had accepted a Diplomatic position at the American Embassy in Cairo, Egypt and my entire police record was destroyed by the Fairfax County Police Department.

AND...   this is where my story begins...

However, unknown to me at the time was the fact that my story had actually begun earlier when I was in the 3rd grade and a girl that I had a crush on and tried to kiss in the coat closet told me that I looked like a monkey.

ALSO, during the summer of my 3rd grade year and because I had staked up the tomato plants incorrectly, my father said the following to me:

"You are as useless as teats on a boar hog."

"You are not worth the powder and shells it would cost me to blow your ass to hell."

AND MY PERSONAL FAVORITE

"The best part of you ran down my leg."