4-9-22 Brass

 The 21st Anniversary.

The "Thank God she didn't die last year" Anniversary.

Yeah. 

Very short version: Ivy almost died from COVID-19 last December. But she survived (Thank God) and she came home on New Year's Eve. It's been a long recovery, and she's got a long way to go.

But today, we celebrate.

Thousand yard stare

I feel like I died a long time ago. The Steven of the 20s, the smart one, the successful one. I remember writing that I had no hope.

And I feel like I died again two years ago, when I took two jobs.
When I began rationalizing "I have to take care of the moneymaker." When I accepted that my contribution to the family was reduced to 💰, even if it was large amounts of money.

And I died again during the holiday season, when my schedule didn't change - both jobs on my birthday (let's not talk about birthdays), both jobs on Christmas. It's not a holiday if I don't truly celebrate it, if I have to ration my waking hours for the evening and night of work.
And once again, I hate the holiday season - the cheap fake Hallmark, the chase of the gift, and a terribly unsatisfying payoff.

4/27/2019: " I am not worried about Atlas shrugging
I'm worried that someday poor Atlas will just drop dead."

5/6/2019: "Anyone else wonder how in the hell you got from where you were 15 years ago to where you are now?"

7/19/2019: "Something has to change."

8/27/2019: " I feel like I need to get back into the game. I don't know if there's room, and I don't know if I can make it work. But..."

8/27/2019: "Trying to properly set my sleep schedule based on my totally screwed up work schedule sometimes goes sideways, and I'm awake when I need to be sleeping, and..."

9/22/2019: "The problem with being a overworked isolated reticent introvert
Is that you'd never be able to tell if I was giving you the silent treatment."

1/1/2020: "Just busy giving life the ol' John Henry."
(Yeah. Compared my life to the black folk hero who worked himself to death.)

1/22/2020: "It 's easy when you're ¾ dead and numb on the inside."
(And again and again)

1/24/2020: "I have learned how much I can endure.
I haven't yet learned how long I can endure it."
(Ha!)

2/12/2020: "So much work.
There is no rest until death."

Bland, boring, flexible.

You keep changing what you like...
You don't care about anything anymore...
You are impossible to shop for at Christmas...

And I'm trying to figure out how much of that is the Bland setting in with the Busy.

I have been known to download apps on my phone, play them for a while, and once they get too hard or too addictive or too demanding, just delete them
(Candy Crush, FIFA among others)

Sports...see other blog.

TV... while my FB feed was full of people looking forward to the next ep of Game of Boobs, I was trying to finish watching Star Trek: Deep Space 9. And now I'm picking from some of the better episodes of the original Star trek series. I have a TV in my bedroom, I never turn it on.
 I usually watch Netflix in the living room.
 There's a cable TV app for my cable provider where I can watch any of the channels we have, I never use it except when my wife wants me to figure out why it's not working.

My wife is mad that there's so little I deeply care about. I'm trying to figure out how much of that is a safety mechanism, realizing how busy I am and how I have to be FLEXIBLE...

That's the word of the decade. Flexible. Being able to find employment based on everyone else's needs.

Night shift. Work from home. Not taking the job when it outsourced 37 miles away. Second shift. Grocery runs in the middle of delivery runs.

I occasionally ask Ivy how she would feel if I got a six-figure job (which is more than we've ever made combined right now) where I had to be at my desk from 8 to 5, 30 to 50 miles away in the big city. To her that's a nightmare.

Rambling, but I guess I'm thinking about both the bland and the flexible and how they relate, how I'm bent ten different ways like a pipe cleaner.

I tried to imagine what I would do with a massive windfall. And after all the essentials, I drew a blank. Besides generic "success" / having enough for everyone else to do what they want...

Except...I keep coming back to Julia Roberts' character with Eggs Benedict...

Playing ball without me

I think I've hit the point where I follow sports only to have intelligent conversation at the water cooler.

The two biggest KC games in the last year: MLS Sporting KC conference final, second leg (11/29/18, L 2-3)
NFL KC Chiefs conference final (1/20/19, L 31-37 OT)

I drove to pick up my daughter during the first game.
I watched the first half, then went to bed for the second half and overtime of the second game.

(Yeah, I should probably turn in my fan card now)

I'm already priced out of going to the stadium, buying jerseys and major merch (for the record, I have a SKC keychain... somewhere, and a Chiefs lanyard that I keep my keys on so I don't lock myself out of my car)

Part of it is the irregular schedule. I've been working 50+ hours for 18 months now. I have to make choices.

And part of it is ... (See other blog)

I'm not shaming people who enjoy major league sports or go to the stadium or buy jerseys.

I'm just saying that I don't fit.

When I dream of old Missouri

Got a letter in the mail.
Alumni directory.

I called to update my information.

And then the questions started coming, what is your current career headline?

(I could say customer service expert, which doesn't say much, or say computer programmer but I haven't done that in 8 years)

837: Let's leave that blank

What's your current occupation

(Driving Chinese making $17 an hour and stocking overnight at Price Chopper...
But do I want to put that in a college directory)

Let's leave that one blank for now

...

well we have a beautiful directory with this perk that perk and the other perk, for a tax-deductible contribution of $25 and 2 easy payments of $169

*click*

Seriously, I think I could do quite well not thinking about my college degree.

Everyone asks, why aren't you in the computer field... Life happens and some of my skills are in programming languages and tools that are two decades-old.

I graduated summa cum laude from my college in the class of 2000, and now I'm making more doing two jobs and none of them require even a high school degree, than I ever did as a computer programmer working 40 hours a week with occasional business trips.

I occasionally toyed with the idea of pointing out to the computer science math and physics department of my college that one of their alumni is a occasional contributor to a feature on one of the world's most popular blogs. https://fivethirtyeight.com/?s=Steven+pratt

But then there'd be conversations like the one at the top of this page to make me go, nah.

The glory days are gone.

Just Another Day

Anniversary (11)
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Thanksgiving (0)

Birthday (7½)
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Christmas Eve (13½)
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Christmas Day (5)
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New Year's Eve (16½)
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New Year's Day '19 (11½)
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Most of the time, people give a really weird look when you say "It's Just Another Day" but looking at the big days of 2018, I'm just continuing to march on the treadmill.

Two real days off in the second half of '18 - one sick day and one holiday.

On the one hand, the one constant of this decade has been change... I'm on jobs 8 and 9 this decade. But on the other hand I don't see anything changing or any pressure being relieved from the situation.

Bill still come due and they got to be paid somehow.

Lord Jesus give me strength.

Abernathy

Eight years, eleven months. Then nine more months.

I've spent a quarter of my life, and half of my career working at the last building on the right, before one crosses the bridge over the Missouri River into Missouri from Leavenworth, KS.

I worked as a simulation programmer on the third floor, then we moved to the first floor. Years later, I trained as a call center representative for a bank on the first floor, then made it back to the third floor.

One of those jobs was my highest paying job. The other was my favorite job - and my shortest commute for a full time job.

But, everything changes. The contract for the war game finally expired. The bank outsourced the call center to another company in Lawrence and St. Joseph.
And now, the building has been sold.
And the new owners are going to convert the building into... Apartments.

It's yet another chapter closing, another landmark transforming.  Nothing lasts forever.

Sigh.

Double duty

I had a day circled on my calendar. The day I'd go from (job + seasonal part time job) to (job + once a week paper route)

My full-time job is overnight stocker at a grocery store. It's the same one that my wife and daughter have worked at for several months.

My part-time job is "costumed sign waver". That job is exactly what it says on the tin.  And with the nature of the business, that job ends on-or-about April 17.

But... There's car repairs. And bills I'm getting caught up on... Slowly.

And *another* offer to be a sign waver. (Didn't see that coming)

I'm not in a position where I can, like one republic says, be not counting dollars now I'm counting stars...
I might take that offer.

I'm not sure which bothers me most
• I have a bachelor's degree in computer science and I'm stocking shelves and waving signs
• ‎I'm working 60-70 hours a week, which leaves little time with wife, children, or grandbaby
• ‎I'm working 60-70 hours a week, wife is working 50-55 hours a week, and I'm not swimming in money a la McDuck's Money Bin

Hi and bye

This song seemed to get a lot of play in the fall of 2000, even to the point where I heard someone playing it on the piano at a church getaway...


Reminds me of being away from my girl and only seeing her now and again...


MM#111
Richard Marx
Wherever You Go


Oceans apart day after day
And I slowly go insane
I hear your voice on the line
But it doesn't stop the pain

If I see you next to never
How can we say forever

Wherever you go
Whatever you do
I will be right here waiting for you
Whatever it takes
Or how my heart breaks
I will be right here waiting for you

I took for granted, all the times
That I thought would last somehow
I hear the laughter, I taste the tears
But I can't get near you now


Oh, can't you see it baby
You've got me going crazy


Wherever you go
Whatever you do
I will be right here waiting for you
Whatever it takes
Or how my heart breaks
I will be right here waiting for you

I wonder how we can survive
This romance
But in the end if I'm with you
I'll take the chance

Oh, can't you see it baby
You've got me going crazy


Wherever you go
Whatever you do
I will be right here waiting for you
Whatever it takes
Or how my heart breaks
I will be right here waiting for you
Waiting for you



Happy #29, Mrs G.

Since commuting to State Street

MM#110

Work Song

Corbin & Hammer

 

Well it's Monday seven o'clock in the morning
Drink my coffee hurry up got to got to got to get to work on time
Hear the whistle whoop whoop whoop whoop
And the train goin' down the track see you later hurry back
Out of my way hey got to get to work on time
Got to get to work on time
I got to hustle oh my muscles gettin' big
Ain't it hot hot sweatin' like a pig
Got to hurry scurry got to get to work on time
I got to go pack a lunch workin' overtime
After taxes taxes barely make a dime
Punch a clock can't talk got to get to work on time
Got to get to work on time

Friday I'll pick up my baby we'll go out on the town yeah
Sunday drive in the country no one else around
Well it's Monday seven o'clock...
 

Hear the foreman get it movin' get the lead out
Monday mornin' head hurts wish he wouldn't shout
But yes sir yes boss got to get to work on time
Hear the whistle whoop whoop...
I got to hustle...
Got to get to work on time got to get to work on time

Working my butt off.

Apologies for having went silent on the blogs.  But anywhere where I actually string together more than 20 words (besides the car driving home)...yeah, that's not happening.

At the start of January, I had a temp job that had become part-time.  That job ended early in January.  I picked up a temp job as a "costumed sign waver" - the job I thought would be extra cash turned out to be my only job.

So, the day after I first started waving a sign dressed up as an American landmark, I'm driving down to Ivy's job when I get this message.

2017-01-15 16:37 Wanna work 10p-6a

What?!?!

I'd worked 14 months as overnight stocker/janitorial at Wal-Mart already.  And I was very glad to get out of there, away from overnight, and back to something local and days.

However...an opening at the store my wife and daughter work at...
The magic word might have been "permanent"

Having an end date on your assignment sucks.  Trust me.

So...by now, the end of January, I'm working 70 hours a week.

WORKING.

None of this sit-on-my-butt stuff chatting with fellow contractors like I did supporting wargames in 05, 06, 08.

None of this taking calls from shoppers like the week I put in  60 hours call-center-from-home.

A 40 hour job of stocking and facing
And (right now) a 30 hour job of dancing with a sign for a tax shop.  (Yeah, that one).

I'm burning calories like crazy!

The one job is seasonal, and when tax day comes and goes, so will that job.

But, for now, I'm hustling making the money.



I don't know how my Dad did it.

Really Big Christmas Tree

It was the Saturday after Thanksgiving.  I was driving back up the west side of the outside of the KC Metro on K-7.  I remembered that a particular sports player (Tim Melia, the brick wall in goal for Sporting KC) was going to be at a Christmas Tree Lighting at Legends - an outdoor mall in west Kansas City, Kansas. My lovely bride was with me - I'd just picked her up from work.  Finally, a Saturday night with us together.  Go home, relax, peace and quiet. But that player was going to be at Legends. Heck...Ivy loves Christmas.  Big time.  And that tree lighting is a nice thing... "Hey, baby, wanna go see the tree lighting at Legends tonight?" "What?  You really want to go see a tree lighting?" "Sure.  You.  Me.  Call it a date." Yeah, Mr. Grinch took Mrs. Claus on a Christmas Tree Lighting date. Found parking on top of the parking garage.  Complained about the cold weather.  Never found the soccer player.  Listened to live Christmas music.  Got Smores-on-a-stick and hot cocoa.  Missed the lighting while getting fries.  Got pictures in front of the tree. It was great. I don't hate everything about Christmas.  Honest.

Tango Whiskey Charlie

The one constant in the universe...is change.

Someone once asked...where do you see yourself in 5 years.  When I think about that question, I laugh a painful laugh.

I have no idea what things will be like in 5 years.

Going back, there has always been something changing.  The only rather stable 5-year span in my life was April 2004 to October 2010 - same job, same family size, same church, same address... and that had its own amount of chaos.

I haven't had the same job on back-to-back 4th of July since 2009-2010 working as a programmer for an Army contractor.  Since then...'11 & '12 unemployed. '13 call center from home. '14 Wal-Mart. '15 call center for a bank. '16 Home Depot. '17 unemployed.  (Now with Hallmark since the day of the eclipse)

I can argue that the two most tumultuous years in my life were 1986 (new brother, new school, new church, moved back to Leavenworth) and 2013 (new job, changed churches 3 times, moved back to Leavenworth, and other things).  Don't remember much about 1986.  But 2013...that year was...I ended that year with this on Facebook

"I started this year quoting a conversation between two characters about to go over a waterfall. And I thought things were challenging then...
This has to go down as the worst year in my life, so far. Good riddance to '13.
And yet, despite everything, more than most of y'all know, I cannot escape the truth of Romans 8:37-39."

So...where will I be in five years?  God only knows.

Only by the grace of God

I keep having to remember the same lesson.
Once upon a time, I knew that God knew better,
and that He cared about me.
And once upon a time, I walked on my porch
and knew that I hadn't gotten myself in the good place I was
- and it was a good place.

And I'm often frustrated
That I need divine assistance
Divine grace
Divine wisdom
And that the brains He gave me in '80
and the brawn
and the guts
and the good looks (ha!)
aren't enough to get me through,
that I need His help, almost daily.

And then I remember the times when I moved without Him
When I took control
and made choices
and screwed everything up so badly
(almost everything bad about my personal great tribulation
is entirely my fault
and the deliverance
I can take no credit for.)

And I'm in the best place in my life
and I wouldn't trade it for any other position so far
although I think I'd do better if I had another chance
except some things I couldn't fix

----------------

MM#98
"I Need Thee Every Hour", Annie Hawks

I need Thee every hour, most gracious Lord;
No tender voice like Thine can peace afford.

I need Thee every hour, stay Thou nearby;
Temptations lose their power when Thou art nigh.

I need Thee every hour, in joy or pain;
Come quickly and abide, or life is in vain.

I need Thee every hour; teach me Thy will;
And Thy rich promises in me fulfill.

I need Thee every hour, most Holy One;
O make me Thine indeed, Thou blessèd Son.

    I need Thee, O I need Thee;
    Every hour I need Thee;
    O bless me now, my Savior,
    I come to Thee.

-----------------
 MM#99
"Jesus, Take The Wheel", Carrie Underwood

She was driving last Friday on her way to Cincinnati
On a snow white Christmas Eve
Going home to see her Mama and her Daddy
With the baby in the backseat

Fifty miles to go and she was running low
On faith and gasoline
It'd been a long hard year

She had a lot on her mind and she didn't pay attention
She was going way too fast
Before she knew it she was spinning
On a thin black sheet of glass

She saw both their lives flash before her eyes
She didn't even have time to cry
She was so scared
She threw her hands up in the air

    Jesus, take the wheel
    Take it from my hands
    Cause I can't do this on my own
  
    I'm letting go
    So give me one more chance
    To save me from this road I'm on
    Jesus, take the wheel

It was still getting colder when she made it to the shoulder
And the car came to a stop
She cried when she saw that baby in the backseat
Sleeping like a rock

And for the first time in a long time
She bowed her head to pray
She said I'm sorry for the way
I've been living my life

I know I've got to change
So from now on tonight

    Jesus, take the wheel
    Take it from my hands
    Cause I can't do this on my own

    I'm letting go
    So give me one more chance
    To save me from this road I'm on

    Oh Jesus, take the wheel
    Oh, I'm letting go

    So give me one more chance
    Save me from this road I'm on
    From this road I'm on
    Jesus, take the wheel
    Oh, take it, take it from me
    Oh, why, ooh

Random thoughts

I go from mega-blogging, to not blogging at all, back to mega-blogging, to just bits here and there.  Such is my life.

Next Saturday is a very important day to me, and I'll post another blog then.

The last time I had "a full-time job that wasn't a temp job and didn't have announced layoffs in the future" was January 2015.  And the last time I had the same job on the 4th of July in consecutive years...was 2009-2010.  Growl.

Pick a controversy, any controversy

I wrote this before I went block-happy on Facebook, so it's not quite as applicable as previously.

Perusing my social media feeds, I often see people retweeting or reposting comments or memes about recent events. And sometimes I see other pictures, tweets or memes which basically say, 'if you threw a fit about situation A, but didn't throw a fit about situation B, you're screwed up in the head."

Which is why sometimes I want to create a filtering App for News and social media. So I can ignore anything about the Kardashians, or whichever presidential candidate I've decided I'm never ever ever ever ever voting for, etcetera. Or maybe find a way to ignore the flood of comments about the latest sports idiot doing something mildly idiotic. Just wait a week, there will be a new idiot.

And often I question the relevance and importance of the news.  Which events really matter? Do acts of violence hundreds or thousands of miles away affect me? Do the minor awareness efforts of minor celebrities matter? Do I need anymore information about the candidates to make an over informed decision on my ballot? (which I'm voting early, this month)

Or do I have to endure it because my neighbors care, and I need to be informed when it comes up at the water cooler?

Scourge of Zuck / What Friends

Didn't expect to have a reason to combine two of my posts this Saturday.. But then I saw this on the bottom of my New Feed.

Add Friends to See More Stories

You'll have more stories in News Feed if you add more friends.

And so I combined two blogs.

---

Scourge of Zuck
Currently I am currently running an experiment on my Facebook newsfeed. I have decided to block most of the meme Pages, partisan news pages, and pretty much any page that you are likely to see a picture and share it with everybody.

Which means, when this is complete, all I will see is posts that my friends actually posted, links my friends share, and Facebook ads - although I'm fixing that too to just the ones I'm more interested in.

Which reminds me again how meager the feed of original content on social media is, especially original content from people I actually care about, or at least am even friends with on Facebook, currently somewhere around a hundred and forty people.

There used to be a lot more people using the notes feature on Facebook, but I'm just not really comfortable with posting all this stuff on Facebook. Perhaps a bit crazy, because sometimes I wish people would listen to me and what do I have to say... but I really don't want to get into a political argument about why none of the names on the ballot are getting my vote for president.

********************

Although I respond to some people's FB posts...I don't post that much.

---

What Friends
"The people of Odyssey have taught me a valuable lesson.  Nothing lasts forever."  - J. Whitaker, "Recollections"

"I miss having a bunch of pals.
Aaron and Andy and Joe S and Joe T and Richie and Ryan and Shane
Carolyn and Cassie and busy Lizzy and Sonia and Rachel" - May 01, 2007

I wanted to believe the one song, "friends are friends forever..."
but I can't.

I had some friends once. Went from folks at church who sat across from us at Sunday School, to invited to a Super Bowl party, to phase 10 card games, watching movies..I was a groomsman at their wedding.

You can guess what happened. We both changed churches, both moved. We're friends on Facebook, but barely.

As mentioned before, I generally don't keep in touch with coworkers when jobs change.  And I may talk with them, but not about the big stuff. Never the big stuff.

I may have 140 friends on Facebook... But it's really 4 close friends, a lot of family - some of whom are as close as these close friends, and a lot of people who I barely talk to anymore.

I'm seeing a pattern where I say less and less, assume no one wants to hear what I say, and I shut up even more.

Don't text messages go both ways?

A songwriter once wrote "friends are friends forever..." But I can no longer believe that. Time heals everything, but sometimes like continental drift, it pulls people away. Even the close friends, even ones under the same roof.

Don't believe me? The church I was baptized in.  The school I got my associate's from. The school I got my bachelor's from. The four clubs I was a part of. The men of dorm B-216. Either employment at Abernathy building.  The pothole in K-120 known as Severance.  The church I got married in.  The greatest blogging website ever.
Dust in the wind.  I knew hundreds of people from those places...

Daughter of Stella. Daughter of Barbara. Father of Julian. Father of Asher.

duck duck goose

So, I compared my family's expenses to the average family's expenses.
But I decided that any details would be unnecessarily transparent/security/yeah, you know.

And then I was going to discuss how what I keep hearing ends up on my blog.
You know, my rants about repentance, revival, end-times prophecy, and a month tweeting about state politics.

Or we could discuss the sort of things that don't make the blog.
There's some things that I can talk about, or my wife will talk about...but I won't blog about.  Something about "google Steven Pratt" that makes me nervous.

Then I was thinking about the "last normal day" in my life.
But, if I'm looking for a day since I got married when I had a good relationship with my mother, my wife wasn't severely depressed, I had a full-time job, the critical bills were paid, and I didn't have problems with DCF...
Strike that...
But, if I'm looking for a day when I had a good relationship with my mother, my wife wasn't severely depressed, I had a job , the critical bills were paid, and I didn't have problems with DCF...

Well, the last six months have been as close to perfect as I've been blessed with since I got married.

But, once you get your ducks in order, something always happens.  Not always a bad thing, but something always happens.

Honesty, the brutal kind

"I was once asked what my best characteristic was. My answer was 'I have none.' "

That answer surprised my wife (who answered "my desire to be a good father") and my pastor's wife (who commented that that answer was "just wrong"), but in my honest moments... That's my conclusion.

 It just hurts when I take a reasonable assessment of my life and realize how much I've wasted; too many opportunities I missed; how little I've improved, if improved is even an accurate verb to use. I probably didn't realize how spot on my warning to my friend was 15 years ago, don't marry a lesser man than me.  Some days, I conclude that I have no good qualities anymore.

My contribution to the family is approximately a paycheck smaller than my wife's, 20 fights a week,  and an amount of chores done that the four year old at church would exceed, more complaining that all four of my teenage children, less faith than any of them, and interests in politics, math, video games, it's all useless. Just like me.

I suppose there is some sort of rigorous routine of directed action that would mold me into the man I was supposed to be, the man I want to become something useful. But I don't know what I would have to do, and experience shows I don't have the endurance to carry it out three days, let alone 90 days or a lifetime.

Worthwhile

My blogs, tweets, and Facebook posts are few and far between not because my life is boring, but because I have a high (in  comparison to my cohort of American 30-somethings) threshold for whether I consider something worthy to host. Very high on Facebook, about as high on blog, a little lower on Twitter.  I don't post recipes, memes, or countdown until Christmas.

But, instead of hinting at what i could say.. I'll just say it.

I remember once having so many topics to write on that I had a link for upcoming attractions possibly as many as 15 ideas that turned into about a dozen blogs. And I'm only days ahead on my automatic posting of Monday Melody of my life feature although I know the songs that will bring me to the current by the end of the year.  Had trouble with a song by Montgomery Gentry I ended up scratching off the list.

Quick one about perspective and revival, etc.  In a nation that claims to be 70% Christian, but only 35% go to church weekly...
And is our internal definition of revival any different than our definition of political victory?  Christendom has its advantages... And disadvantages.

I like my job. It keeps me busy, I'm good at it, and I can provide excellent customer service.  I have some great co-workers, including my delivery team and service desk team. I would like to move to a full-time position, when the right one opens. (management knows, but most openings are part time or overnight) And that pumpkin headed Halloween decoration that we are selling really freaks me out.

If I had my choice, either Senator Cruz or Senator Rubio would be the GOP nominee. But I don't, and I'm not sure where my irrelevant POTUS vote (If KS goes blue, former SecState Clinton won in a landslide) is going. Johnson, write-in, blank, ???

Honestly, there's only name on the ballot that I know that I am marking, my friend and State Representative Tony Barton. Our family is on his campaign team #teamtony !!

Last Tuesday, August 30, we set our personal record for finishing our routes, throwing the last paper at 4:25pm.  Takes a lot of motivation, a couple teen-agers,  and a few gallons of gas to get it all done.

My younger daughter loves babies, and with our church with four pregnant women... She's looking forward to holding all the infants... But not all at once!
My wife commented that if we ever had another baby, we'd be there for the birth, and then Olivia would take care of her sibling for the next several years..

My next Saturday blog will begin,
"I was once asked what my best characteristic was. My answer was 'I have none.' "