Now That I'm Forty...

Saturday, December 27, 2003

I've Been Busy...
...looking for a new format. I found it. If anyone was here earlier, I hope you like it.

Me at 12/27/2003 11:36:00 PM

Return Of The King
(From my post at a message board on Christmas Day).

"Finally saw it today. Happy to say I am one of those who loved every bit of this film.

"I'm also glad to say that I saw it alone, because my buddies would never have let me live my tears down. Add to that, I'm glad I didn't cry as much as I could have.

"There were so many good relationship dimensions in this film that I'm surprised there were any dry eyes left in the house. We were given the exploration of love in leader/people, father/daughter (two cases), brother/brother, friend/friend, obsessed/object, powermonger/power, husband/wife, and shepherd-king-wizard/flock. I heard noses blowing and hiccup-sniffling all around me.

"What I think touches we fanboys the deepest is the friend/friend aspect. The loyalty that goes beyond community. It isn't the kind of love that makes you crave a friend like Samwise, but the kind that makes you want to BE a friend like him. While watching, I thought of all the buddies I miss and am so distant from right now. Some I've left in Missouri, and some I'm yearning to rejoin in NYC. Then there will be some I leave here in New Jersey. In every scene of Samwise's efforts and sacrifice, I wished I could fall on the neck of a friend and tell them how much they've meant to me over the years. How I wished I could be the kind of guy in their life who would do just about anything for them. How I wished we could count on each other for the rest of our lives no matter what happened.

"I swear, sometimes, I am convinced that friends are more important than a spouse. Marriage and similar relationships seem to be in it for the mutual benefit--what I can get from her life, what she can get from mine. How to keep this other person happy so they continue to meet my needs.

"True friendship doesn't ask that of each other. Whatever the bonds are, they exist without conditions. Affection is there because of common hobbies, likeness in humor, comfort zones that mesh. You find friends in the arena of things you enjoy, not things you need.

"The bond between Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin was childlike and founded in innocence. Their joy in each other was full. Their loyalty to each other was ceaseless. Their anger at each other was white-hot but brief. Who would not want friends like this? Who in your life once met, or continues to meet those characteristics? And how much do you miss them right now?

"Why I'm glad I didn't totally lose my mind with crying (tonight)--because watching the love between friends didn't cause me to despair for my own life. I must have realized that I DO have friends that I love, and that I'm NOT alone and lonely. That isn't something I've known always, but it's good beyond belief to know that I realize it now. Having lost most of those other relationships that I mentioned earlier, I realize that I've still got--and will always have, friends...

"...Anyone feel me on this, or am I a simpering wuss?"

Me at 12/27/2003 04:59:00 PM

Objects of Desire
The obsession of my blind client extends into the realm of the romantic. He wants a girlfriend/wife so badly that we spend 1/3 of my time with him discussing methods/tactics of getting a girl. Make that 2/3s. He's so obsessed that he doesn't take into account how I myself am almost forty and have never been married.

Sometimes he's childlike in his desire and I can really feel for him. Sometimes I'm sick to death of discussing something for him that I can't even get my own crap together about. Most times I dispense advice that pertains to him only and his own personality problems and why I think that may be a hindrance to his relationships.

Mind you, I only get paid to wash his underwear and clean his house.

But I try to get him to focus off relationships because that's all I can really do for him right now. That's how the solution to a lot of my problems have come. I mean, I have HAD a few relationships in the past. Marriage was discussed in three of them, including my latest. A ring was even given once. But it's called Risk vs. Reward. Is the payoff for having a relationship worth the challenge of getting and keeping one? So far, for me, it hasn't been. I might not even be EQUIPPED to see it any other way.

Hello, I'm almost Forty, see title! I don't want rest of my life spent fighting the same battles I fought during the first half of it. I can't function without my piece of mind. Now, before you call me a selfish pig, I going to post my reflections on "The Return Of The King" because I learned something on Christmas Day and I think I deserve a little credit.

Me at 12/27/2003 04:36:00 PM

T-minus 7 Days and Counting...
...until I'm making the final move. Today is such a beautiful day in New Jersey, and so was last Saturday. It makes me want to bite the head off a chicken because I'm not moving until next week. It'd be nice if the Saturday weather-trend continued, but at least I AM moving so the complaining needs to stop.

I work a second job in New Brunswick as a personal aide for a blind guy. I've been trying to quit it for two months now. He keeps putting pressure on me to stay, but I miss my weekends. I haven't had them for a year now. Always getting up first thing on a Saturday and speeding up Route 1 to meet him at his house and read his mail.

He's a nice enough fellow, but he has some quirks which are not fun to deal with when you're tired. For one, he's obessive. There's a perfectly reasonable explanation for it. He does a great deal of things independently and thus has to have order to the world which he navigates through. Everything has to be in its place in order for him to find it. People have to meet deadlines when he's expecting them. Transportation has to come to the agreed minute/second that he arranged. His sense of well-being and security hinges on these things, since he has no sight to depend on. That system has taken him very far towards his goals. He's not very tolerant of disappointments or delays (or at least delays without good reason). Unfortunately, that system also has weeded out any trace of a long-term friend in his life. I've only known him to communicate mostly with acquaintences and relatives. To that end, he's a pretty lonely guy. Most people have a hard time befriending someone who may have persistant needs to fill. Imagine that combined with temper tantrums.

Still, knowing that he needs someone makes it hard to trade him away for a Saturday morning. I can't even use my move to New York City as an excuse because I can park my car in New Brunswick over the weekends as long as I'm working for him and save myself the parking hassle.

However. Let him re-arrange his desk for ten solid minutes just because I swiveled the monitor a fraction of a degree to the left one. MORE. TIME.

Me at 12/27/2003 04:06:00 PM