Tag Archives: ramblings

Papillon

When I was a young boy, back in the late ‘70s, I would sometimes get to stay up late and watch television with my grandfather.  I was seven or eight years old, so staying up late for me might not have been as late as I’ve pictured it in my mind all these years.  The two-car garage had been converted to a den many years before.  It was large room with a couch, two recliners, an antique rocking chair, liquor cabinet, and a safe hidden in the wall above the two recliners.  The safe had a picture frame cover, but to my knowledge, never had a picture in it.  I have some wonderful memories from my childhood of that house, specifically that room. 

We watched many episodes of Baa Baa Black Sheep, sports, news, and sometimes he’d give up his rights to the television and we’d watch Wonderful World of Disney.  Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom was always a favorite.  But one movie we stayed up late to watch one night that has been stuck in my head for more than 40 years was Papillon.  Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman, 1973.  Maybe because it was supposedly based on a true story and, as a child, I found that fascinating.  A true story of a French prison and how the convicted survived and one eventually escaped to write about it.  For whatever reason, I loved that movie.  I don’t think I’ve seen it since I was eight or nine years old. 

Grandpa would sit in his recliner smoking a pipe or cigar.  I would be laid out on the couch, often times falling asleep during our TV time.  I remember grandma occasionally sitting in her recliner crocheting.  I don’t remember if she was interested in what we were watching, unless it was basketball.  She was a huge basketball fan.  She played in her younger years, I heard she was very good. 

The reason for this flood of childhood memories is that I recently found Papillon in the free On-demand section of my cable subscription.  Just seeing the title brought back details of my grandparent’s den.  The lighting, the smell of pipe tobacco, the texture of the carpet, the sliding glass door that lead to the driveway, the utility room where the washer and dryer sat, the rear door which exited to the back patio and wonderful back yard.  And of course, the shows we used to watch.  I wonder where the old rocking chair is.  I would have loved to have that. 

I made some pizza rolls and opened a beer.  Then I started the movie.  Some of what I remember from it 40+ years ago was exactly correct.  But that wasn’t very much.  I only remembered parts of a few of the scenes.  Watching it again brought a whole new appreciation for an absolutely spectacular movie.  McQueen and Hoffman were incredible.  They made their characters seem real, believable.  No special effects, no computer-generated imaging.  Just great actors perfecting their craft; something that has been lost in film today. 

In watching Papillon in present day, I am certain the movie was edited for television when I watched it with grandpa way back when. 

One of the scenes I remember visually, I had no recollection of the context because I couldn’t remember what was said.  It was a dream sequence where Papillon (McQueen) walks towards his judge.  The judge was flanked on each side by six men wearing black.  In their exchange, Papillon continues to claim he was framed for his accused crime of murder.  The judge admits that to be true, but adds that he is in fact guilty of a far worse crime, the worst crime any human can commit. Papillon asks what that could be.  The judge says, “I accuse you of a wasted life!”  Papillon agrees, hangs his head, then walks away.

I would have been too young to understand the context of that conversation at the time, perhaps that’s why I don’t remember it.  But now, nearing 50 years old, that spoke to me as I watched again.  I know I’ve wasted time.  I’ve wasted money.  I’ve wasted food, words, energy, and so much more if I am completely honest examining my past.  But one thing I am certain of, I can never be accused of a wasted life.  There are many things I should have done differently in my life.  There are things I regret, both things I did and things I didn’t do.  But as I look back and see where I am today, what I’ve survived, what I’ve overcome, I say confidently, that mine is not a wasted life. 

Only you can examine your life and decide if you wasted it.  Only you know exactly what you’ve been through and how you got to where you are currently.  Your mistakes do not define you.  At some point you move on from them and, if necessary, start over.  Some of my mistakes consumed me to the point of feeling like a failure, like a complete waste.  There were multiple occasions in my life I would have hung my head and walked away as Papillon did.  Not anymore. 

Life goes on.  And life is good.  And I’m not wasting it.  I hope you don’t either.  Thanks for stopping by today.  Good day, God bless.

Dave

I’ll Do My Best

I finish many of my conversations by saying “I’ll do my best.” Usually when someone tells me to have a good day, sleep well, have fun, or some other well-wishing suggestion, I respond with, “I’ll do my best.” And I mean it. It is a misnomer of sorts, in that I can’t always achieve my best, but I try and that’s the point. Sometimes my best is pretty good and sometimes it falls way short. I think “my best” can be characterized as an ultraviolet light wave. It goes up and down; and depending on where I’m at in the wave cycle depends on what “my best” will be at any given time or circumstance. And, like the ultraviolet light waves, it’s invisible to the naked eye. Sometimes I don’t even know what “my best” will be until it’s time to find out.

Doing my best isn’t always easy. And sometimes I fake it, or I realize during an event that I need to not lose my cool and adjust to a situation. That happened a couple of times last month. First, I was rear-ended on the job. I stopped at a red light, the young lady behind me did not stop in time. It was very minor, barely worth mentioning, but since I was in a city truck for work, a police report had to be made. I watched in the rearview mirror as smoke rose from the road because she locked up her brakes and the tires screeched. I prepared for impact. It ended up being just enough of a jolt to shake my truck. I was momentarily enraged. I’ve written many times here that traffic and driving are a trigger for my PTSD. But by the time we pulled off the road I calmed myself and handled the situation well.

More recently, as I had laid down one night to go to bed, I heard a commotion outside in the parking lot of the condo complex I live at. After about five minutes of listening to the yelling, I decided to go outside and see what was going on. I wasn’t happy about this. When I got outside I saw a young man holding a baseball bat and two young ladies walking away from him. At that point I went from being not happy to thinking I might have to take the bat from that guy and beat him with it. And in my mind as I saw him, I had already disabled the threat. I walked straight up to the guy staring at him the whole time. Two steps away from him, he dropped the bat and put his hands up by his shoulders. He continued to yell until the cops arrived despite my suggestions that he shut up and go back to his condo. Right before the cops showed up he bent down to pick up the bat. I was very calm and clear, but firm and direct in both tone and language, when I told him what the consequences would be if he picked it back up. Fortunately, especially for him, it didn’t come to that.

In both of those instances I did my best. I had to work on it very hard in a very short amount of time. I had only a few seconds each time to realize where my mindset was going and change course. I did good for the most part. But here’s the side effects of doing my best sometimes when I’m not ready to. After the minor wreck and all the waiting and paperwork was over, I had a splitting headache the rest of the day. Forcing myself to calm down in that situation created a lot of stress and anxiety that I carried the rest of the day. I handled the event well, but the rest of my day was horrible. As far as the baseball bat incident goes, I kept my cool enough to not harm that guy even when he bent over to pick up the bat again. After the cops interviewed me about what I saw, I filled out a police report as requested, and was free to go back to bed. The problem was I couldn’t fall asleep. My adrenaline was still going until 1 a.m. I kept replaying it all in my mind, even the part about pulverizing the guy which never even happened. I only got about four hours of sleep before I had to be back at work.

I understand why I dealt with those two events the way I did and had “side effects” afterwards. That’s how I, and many others, dealt with things at war. Focus, get the job done, keep your cool, don’t go crazy, know your surroundings, know all the rules of engagement. But when an incident or attack happens we end up with loads of energy and adrenaline spikes coupled with not knowing the outcome of a situation as it’s happening or having to be prepared to fight at any given time, whether we’re needed or not. It’s stressful. Unlike the two things that happened last month where I could process the events shortly after they happened, I waited until coming home from Afghanistan to process it all. That was dangerous, but I hardly had a choice. And the side effects of waiting until I got back from war were catastrophic. Failed suicide attempt, diagnosed with PTSD, depression, anxiety, unsociable, jumpy, anger issues. The list could go on and on.

Some days are harder than others, but I’m getting there. And I’ll end here as I do many of my conversations, I’ll do my best. Thanks for stopping by. Good day, God bless.

Dave

Welcome Home

His eyebrows sagged and his countenance fell. His lips tightened as he went into a blank stare. He wiped a tear from his eye. He was somewhere else in the world right then, a different place, a different time. He had come back from that place years ago, probably before I was born. He had to come back from it again during our conversation sitting at the bar. I wondered how many times he’s had to come back from there in the last 45 years or more.

During my last trip to Ft Jackson, I stayed for a week instead of the usual weekend. When I’m there for only my army reserve weekend, I have a routine I generally follow. I get to town on Friday, check into the hotel, then go to Sonic. And why not? They’ve gotten my order right 3 out of the last 5 times now, getting better. Saturday is usually blur, and Sunday afternoon I head back to Florida. But when I’m there for a week at a time, I usually go to a couple different restaurants instead of eating drive-thru food for a whole week.

One particular night I went to a place I’ve enjoyed a few times before. It’s a sports bar with a killer burger. Not only is it good, but it might kill you, too, at half a pound of beef. Hence, a killer burger. But I’ll take my chances. The beer is cold, there’s sports on the TVs, and the people are nice. That’s where I met Chuck.

The conversation at the bar had to the with the heat that day. Then Chuck started talking to me, saying something about a “dry heat” like in Arizona or something. I told him that only works until it gets to a certain point. I told him it was a dry heat where I was in Iraq, but once the temperature got over 110 degrees, it was just hot. Dry or not, it was hot. Side note. For the record, I took a picture of the thermometer outside our Preventive Medicine office at my base in Iraq. It was at 146 degrees. But it was a dry heat. LOL.

Then Chuck told me he had been to the two worst places in the world. The first place being Detroit during the riots in 1967. The second place was Saigon, 1968. He was a Vietnam Veteran. He told me how he went from Detroit to the jungle. Then he told me that of all the men on the plane that took him to Vietnam, only 4 came home. That’s when he retreated into his mind for a minute. I imagine he was taking a moment to remember each of them. I believe he could see them in his mind, maybe as they sat next to him on the plane or maybe as they drew their last breath, I didn’t ask. Either way, he needed a minute.

When he returned to reality, we changed the subject of our conversation to sports. But in only two minutes before that, I knew his pain. I had a sense of his war stories. I could tell where he had been in some respects. His face spoke it all very clearly. Sports brought a completely different face to Chuck. His sports stories were amazing and fascinating. The sports figures that he met over the years, the autographs he told me about, the memorabilia he said he has in his sports room. It all had me in awe. And he was happy talking sports. It’s his life now, and his job.

Everyone I went with to Iraq and Afghanistan came home. I personally knew a few people that died serving, but everyone I went with both times came home. I can’t imagine what goes through Chuck’s mind when he thinks about being only one of four surviving members of the group on the plane that took him to Vietnam. The only inkling I have of what he goes through is what I saw in his face while he revisited the fallen in his memories.

I have my moments where I get triggered to memories of war. On occasion I get jumpy because of unexpected noises. Being in traffic is hard for me. I battle anxiety and depression all the time. I’m still figuring out a lot of this since coming home from my last deployment. I don’t know his stories, but I can very much relate to how Chuck reacted when taken back to 1968. I also do that from time to time. And I wonder if years from now I’ll still have my moments like that. We’ll see.

I’ll say again what I told Chuck the other night. Thank you for leading the way with your service. And Welcome home. I’m glad you’re one of the four that came back.

Thank you all for stopping by this week. Good day, God bless.

Dave

Walk It Off

I saw a meme on Facebook that said, “Telling someone with PTSD to get over it is like telling someone who is deaf to listen up.” I guess the same thing could be said that someone with a compound fracture of the leg should just walk it off. Or that someone with a stutter should speak clearly. Maybe we could tell a blind person to look closely. None of this works that easily. There is some truth to that meme. But there are also some things we can do to better ourselves.

I will never “get over” this thing called PTSD that I was diagnosed with in 2015. I will likely have to deal with the symptoms for the rest of my life. Just this week, I had a mild PTSD moment at work, for about a minute or so. And I happened to be working with the only other army veteran in my department at the time. Yeah, he gave me shit, but he was also understanding and helped me out. I have explained to most of my coworkers at my new job how sometimes I might need a minute to regroup in certain situations. In five weeks at my new job, that’s only happened the one time, for that one or two minutes. I’m nowhere near the bad place I was three years ago. I’m not as trapped in the darkness of my mind as I used to be. I feel better now than I have in years, many years. Some of it coincidence of fortunate events, some it is that I’m making decisions to be better.

Other PTSD moments->  https://storyofmylife.blog/2017/03/18/ptsd-moments/

I do, however, still have some issues. I slept on my couch three nights in a row last week because I didn’t feel like taking my sheets out of the dryer and making my bed. Funny thing is, there are two beds in the guest room, made and ready to go. I still have trouble occasionally with sleep and dreams, even with the medications from the VA. I’m also lacking motivation. Especially with my writing, as can be evidenced with the fact that I haven’t posted here in a month. Depression is an ongoing issue, although I deal with it much better now than I have in the past. I’m continuing to learn how to deal with all this. It’s a process.

It’s not easy->  https://storyofmylife.blog/2017/09/02/harder-than-it-looks/

I took a new job last month. If you follow Story of My Life, you may remember that I left working at the restaurant in the airport for a new restaurant job. After two months at that job, I made another change, to what I hope will be my last job change. Here’s the thing. This new job is something I’ve never done before. Years ago, I had the self-confidence to do almost anything. Not so much the last few years. But I decided to make a complete career change. I built up enough confidence to take a chance and go to an interview for a job I had applied for. And to be honest, at the time, I couldn’t remember for which job I applied when they called me for the interview. But I accepted the interview. I had applied for a number of jobs late last year when I knew things at the airport weren’t going to work out. I knew it was time for a change.

https://storyofmylife.blog/2017/03/04/back-to-work/

At the interview I was asked, “Have you done this kind of work before?” Um, nope. I think I said, “Not exactly. But if you’ll teach me, I’m a fast learner, I work hard, and I show up on time.” In the last year and a half, I can count on one finger how many times I was late for work (not including the time I was subpoenaed for deposition last-minute or the time the VA took an hour and half to do something that should have taken 5 minutes). I was late clocking in one time, by one minute. And for the few of you that personally know me, you know that still bothers me. But my response to his question, along with me already having a commercial drivers license, got me in the door. On a side note, I’m glad I renewed my CDL a couple years ago even though I wasn’t using it at the time.

My newfound confidence paid off. I got the job. I’ve been there five weeks now. This confidence is something I’ve been rebuilding for a while now. It’s taken a long time. It’s not that I was able to “get over” having PTSD, it’s that I worked at it. I take my medications as prescribed. I go to my appointments. I work on staying calm in stressful situations, which doesn’t always happen, but it certainly works a lot better than it did just a few years ago. And I am open with people about what’s going on in my head. Believe it or not, that helps tremendously.

So, like a deaf person can learn sign language to communicate and function in the world, I can learn to deal with and overcome my PTSD. Yes, “my PTSD,” I own that shit. It’s mine, for life. And while the symptoms will always be there, I will continue to find ways to survive and function. It’s not always easy, but it is worth it. Just don’t tell me to get over it. It doesn’t work that way.

Thanks for visiting Story of My Life this week. Good day, God bless.

Dave

I’m Back

I’m back. Finally. I’ve missed y’all. It’s been three weeks since I’ve written or posted. I think that’s the longest break for me in at least the last two years. This month has been busy and it seems to be flying by. And while I feel pretty good about life lately, I’ve lacked the motivation to sit down and write. I keep some ideas in my head, but none of it seems to make it to the computer. There’s been a lot going on. Let me catch you up.

The inconsistent weather had me sick for a week. I think Mother Nature is drunk. Where I live in Florida it’s been pretty nice overall. But the occasional drastic drop in temperatures at night followed by days that require the air conditioner to be run had caused me to get sick. Not bad, mostly sinuses, allergies, and headaches. But my power bill has looked good the last couple months, only having to run the A/C or heat a few times. Dear Mother Nature, please get back on your meds, sincerely, all of us.

That week was followed by a week on orders at my army reserve unit. For those of you that serve or have served in the “One weekend a month, two weeks a year” reserves, you may have had to do that. Most units do the “two weeks” as a unit, usually a training mission designed to enhance and broaden the skills of the soldiers. I, however, am in an instructor unit. Each instructor does a separate training mission in support of a greater mission. Since I’m in the process of a Medical Evaluation Board, I don’t have any real missions. That would have been a perfect week for writing, sitting around the hotel each night bored out of my mind. Unfortunately, after sitting in front of a computer all day at the unit, I was disinclined to do so at the hotel in the evenings. But I did get to watch the Red Sox on TV beat the Yankees 2 out of 3 games. So, that was a good week.

Now to my current week. I feel good. My kids spent the night with me this week, on a school night. They don’t usually stay with me on school nights, so that was a treat. We went swimming, had hamburgers, and watched Big Bang Theory for two hours before bed. Nothing terribly exciting, but I had a wonderful day. I had a physical this week for a new job I will start on Monday. A little more money, better hours, benefits, and weekends off. Weekends off. I’ll get to see my kids more often. That makes me smile. I had to go to the VA for lab work and they didn’t piss me off. Actually, they took me in two hours early. I showed up hoping to get it out of the way and they accommodated me. Another good thing this week. I could get used this “good week” thing.

Ups and downs this month. But for right now I’m on a high note. And not because yesterday was 420, I don’t participate. LOL. I just feel good about things right now. And that feels good. I am tempering my excitement to an extent because I’m a realist. And because I’ve been here before. I know life will continue to go up and down and some of the downs can be pretty bad. I wonder if that’s why sometimes, some of us won’t let ourselves be as happy as we should be, because we know the high peaks won’t last. We know the rollercoaster called Life that we’re riding will go up and down, turning, looping, jarring from side to side, until it makes an abrupt stop. It may be a week, a month, or even tomorrow that something comes crashing down that forces me into a battle with depression. But for now, I’m enjoying this feeling of feeling of good. And I’m going to milk it for everything I can. Because it will be gone soon enough.

Find something good today and enjoy it while you can. Thanks for stopping by this week. Good day, God bless.

Dave