Ripping My Life

Ripping My Life

I’m not into material possessions, except when it comes to my music, movie and book collections and maybe my Dukes of Hazard lunchbox. I cherish those collections, especially my music collection. 

While I was in college I would, from time to time, have to sell some of my c.d.’s to afford some Ramen noodles and gas. It was always stuff I bought for one song and the rest of the c.d. was awful; Sugar Ray, Smashmouth, Korn, you get the idea. Over the years I have repurchased some of those c.d.’s to try to complete the soundtrack of my life. I like owning them. I never listen to them, but I like to have them near me. 

I have fought tooth and nail with the digital age of music. I swore I would never trade my physical music collection in for a digital one. But here I have been the last couple of weeks ripping my music onto itunes. 

I have a canvas bag of c.d.’s sitting next to my desk to take to half-priced books tomorrow. It hurts. It fucking hurts. Some of these c.d.’s are over twenty years old. I don’t mean the music is twenty years old. I mean I bought the c.d. twenty years ago. C.D.’s that withstood numerous purging in college so I could eat and get around. C.D.’s I haven’t listened to in almost twenty years. I own Natural Selection. Who owns that c.d. besides me? NO ONE and I’m sad that I’m getting rid of it. This canvas bag full of c.d.‘s sitting next to me right now contains the soundtrack to various parts of my life and I’m gonna sell it for $30, $40 if I’m lucky. 

This is the second bag in as many weeks that I’ve taken to sell. At least the next time we move I should only have three boxes of music to pack now. 

Pressed Between Pages

“…I was devastated when we were through. I didn’t know how to live without you…
…I’ve moved on. We’re over now, I know that…
…I’m with someone else now. He’s better than you. He’s more successful than you. He’s bigger and much better in bed than you…”

My mouth dropped open as I sat there reading the letter. I couldn’t believe what I was reading. This note went on for three pages and was written ten years prior to me first reading it.

In 2003 I was sitting at Charlie Brown’s, a little dive restaurant slash coffee house on campus. The décor had not been updated since the late 80’s early 90’s Kerouac poetry coffee house era. The lighting was dim, the seating was crowded, and the stage now was host to extra chairs. The one update to the place was they served food. Very bad food. The only redeeming quality about the place was the thousands of books that lined the walls of this little restaurant. Old, obscure books that most people probably never had heard of. A lot of these books came from the University’s library, as the University library stamp made that obvious. The books were probably purchased or donated from the library when they moved to the new upscale location.

My friend and I were selecting random books off the wall while we waited for our food to come. I stood on my seat to reach books higher up on the wall. I pulled one off the shelf and sat down. I don’t remember anything in particular about the book itself. It was what I found inside the book, pressed between the pages, was a three page letter to Jeff from Monica written in May 1993.

The first paragraph of this post are excerpts taken from the letter. The ones I remember anyway. It was unclear what Jeff did to deserve such a “screw you” type letter, but I’m sure Monica felt better after writing it.

As a person who had been on the receiving end of such type of letter, I must say, I had never been given one written so well and painful to read. This letter, Monica’s letter, shot daggers through my heart. I read it as what every girl who had ever delivered their letter to me intended to say to me but could not quite put the words together as well as Monica had.

By the time I had read Monica’s letter, I had written one such letter myself. I never gave it to the person. I knew whatever I had to say was just a reaction. I had things I wanted to say, things to get off of my chest, but my words would not make a difference to the intended recipient of my letter. So, I kept the letter. That is until I read Monica’s.

I’m guessing Monica felt the same way as I did. She just had to get everything out of her mind, but knew she could never give Jeff the letter. That kind of stuff is permanent. It’s hard to erase. So, Monica wrote her letter and didn’t want to keep it. Everything she wanted to say was out of her mind, now she wanted the letter out of her life.

I was able to picture Monica taking the letter out of her pocket, randomly choosing a book off the shelf, placing her folded three page letter inside the book, returning said book to the shelf and walking off without looking back.

I wanted that type of closure.

I took my letter and did what Monica did, pressed it between pages of some old, obscure book that maybe ten years from then someone would pick up.

I don’t really have a moral to this story. The memory of Monica’s letter popped into my mind this morning. I haven’t thought about Monica’s letter or the one I wrote in a very long time. I know I haven’t thought about it since before I got married. I guess my desired outcome of getting rid of the letter worked.

Now I write on this blog. I don’t get extremely personal on here. There are times when I want to, because I always have stuff on my mind that I want to dump somewhere. I would really like to sometimes. There are things I want to say to certain people if for no other reason than to appease my desire to put a fine point on it. But I don’t.

“…I’m sorry. I didn’t mean anything I said. I’m hurt. I love you. I still love you. I will always love you, but I know we will never be together again. Goodbye, Monica”

I guess if there is a moral to this it would be, don’t piss Monica off. She can write a really nasty letter that will sting you to the core.

The truth is, I don’t know how Monica’s letter got in that book. I don’t know if she put it there intentionally. It might have been Jeff. Who knows? But, I like to think it happened the way I tell the story. It brought me peace of mind when I needed it the most.

Anthony Wiggle Is A Prick

There’s a controversy of apocalyptic proportions happening in Australia right now. Of course, we parents, here in the U.S. are slow to hear of this scandalous tragedy.

The Wiggles have shit canned Sam (the yellow wiggle) for the old yellow Wiggle, Greg.

Five years ago Greg left the Children’s group, The Wiggles, with an undisclosed serious illness that he needed to deal with. This left Anthony (blue wiggle), Murray (red Wiggle) and Jeff (purple Wiggle) with an empty shirt to fill. So they turned to one of the background singer/dancers, Sam, to put on the yellow shirt and “lead” the group to years of multi-million dollar CD, DVD and concert sells. 

Greg is feeling better now and wants to come back to the group.

Reportedly, The Wiggles gave very little to no warning to Sam of this announcement before they went public with the news of Greg replacing him.

Anthony, Jeff and Greg appeared on The Today Show in Australia to talk about Greg’s return to the group. However, it was clear that Anthony did not really want to talk about Sam or had given him a second thought since his firing. Also, you could tell that he was beside himself with giddiness that his old pal Greg was back in the band.

Here is a youtube clip of Anthony’s part of this awkward interview




You can watch the interview with the three Wiggles in its entirety on The Today Show’s website. At the bottom of the video you will see a short goodbye video from Sam and the edited clip of Anthony’s awkwardness.

I for one will miss Sam. I’ve seen some old clips of Greg, and he just didn’t have the friendliness of Sam.

Who do you prefer, Sam or Greg? Or could you care less as long as the kids are occupied entertained?

Edit: I first heard about this from Glowless at Where's My Glow?.

Why My Social Influence Sucks

I’m back from my vacation away from the blog and social media. It’s been a great two months away. I’ve learned a lot about this thing called blogging and social media --- in particular I’ve learned a lot about my social influence. I was doing it entirely wrong.

I was trying to gain social influence by engaging people on twitter, facebook, Google Plus, Klout, blog commenting platforms and all the latest “tools” introduced for social media, but all I really needed to do was to turn my head away from the computer. When I did that there were two smiling faces wanting to put together a puzzle with me, their daddy.

I know this is going to sound cheesy and cliché, but the only social influence that I should give a damn about is my kids. In the last two months I have worked on my social influence with my kids. It was hard to do. My social influence sucked. When things got tough I wanted to run to my laptop to hide and involve myself with the latest twitter happenings. But with a little patience, not just from myself but patience from my kids as well, the three of us have been able to influence each other. It’s a work in progress, but I’d rather be doing this than sitting on my ass on twitter trying to be witty with a bunch of people I don’t know or should care about all that much.

Please understand I do plan on using twitter in the future and I have met people through twitter that I have an interest in and care about (you know who you all are. There‘s only about a dozen of you). I’m just done using twitter as a means to beg people to “please, read my latest crap blog post”.

Lesson 1: Social influence starts at home

I’m also done reading all the arbitrary “how to be a better blogger” posts. Who the hell made up these rules anyway? All of these posts are the same shit, different blogger trying to get traffic from new bloggers trying to learn how to make it rich by blogging about themselves.

Here’s a list of what you will learn from every single “how to blog” article.

Write good content - No shit! Really? I thought I could write drivel that everyone else is writing about and make it big….oh wait…never mind.

Engage on twitter. 
Comment on other blogger blog posts. 
Respond to comments on your blog. 
Blah, blah, blah…what the other blogger said.

Lesson 2: You don’t have to follow the rules to blogging, BECAUSE THEY ARE MADE UP.

Here’s some advice you won’t find on those shitty “how to blog” posts, write as if no one is reading.

It’s like the saying, “sing/dance as if no one is watching you”. Write as if no one is reading what you’re writing. Meaning, if you don’t think anyone is watching/listening/reading, then your true self will show. If you write for yourself and no one else, your writing will be more truthful, thoughtful and meaningful. In turn you will enjoy what you’re doing and that my friend will show through to the people that are watching/listening/reading and they will enjoy what you’re doing just as much as you are.

Stay engaged is the next lesson. Too many times on twitter I have seen a parent blogger (mostly I have seen this happen with Daddy bloggers) tweet that they are ______(insert fun activity here) with their kids.

No you’re not, dickhead. You’re fucking tweeting about it and then replying to the people replying to your tweet about all the fun you’re having with your kid.

What the hell did you do? Press pause on your kids to tweet about it. How did this thought process go?

You were wrestling around with little Timmy on the floor when all of a sudden the thought crossed your mind that the 1000 people who follow you on twitter would love to know how much fun you’re having with your kid wrestling. If you tweet about it they’ll know just how much you love your kid, how fun and great of a parent you are. And everyone will want to read your blog because you showed everyone how fucking cool you are by wrestling with your kid on the floor.  “Oh my god, this could be my break-out tweet that gets me noticed. Hang on Timmy. Daddy needs to tweet this. I’ll be right back.”

Lesson 3: If you’re playing with your kids, don’t stop to tweet about it. Your kids don’t care who follows you on twitter or whether or not @DaddyDoucheBag and @MommyIgnoresHerKids10HrsADay knows that you’re playing with them.

Welcome back. I got to go and feed the kids now.

Silent Sunday: Oh, Come on. I'm A Fungi

Photos by Kevin Westerman
Taken 08/11
© 2011

Silent Sunday: Split Personality

UK Arboretum 10/2011 Kevin Westerman ©

Pale Blue Dot

Carl  Sagan

Last week would have been Carl Sagan’s birthday. Carl said it is the conceit of humans to believe that the Universe was made for them, for us and that the Earth is the center of the Universe. And that their god made them in his image. And their belief that no other life could possibly exist in the vastness of space. That is the conceit of humans.

I mostly agree with what Carl had to say about life, the universe and religion. I differ in some opinions, but that is for a different post. I’ll leave you with a few of my favorite quotes of Carl’s.

“For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.” 

“Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence."

“There has been a long and painful history of erroneous claims which religions have made about the nature of the world…There is hardly an organized religion with a firm body of doctrine which has not at one time or another persecuted people for the crime of open inquiry.”

“But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.” 

“If we long to believe that the stars rise and set for us, that we are the reason there is a Universe, does science do us a disservice in deflating our conceits?”

“We've arranged a civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology.” 

“Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people.” 

- Ann Druyan, talking about her husband, Carl Sagan:

“When my husband died, because he was so famous & known for not being a believer, many people would come up to me — it still sometimes happens — & ask me if Carl changed at the end & converted to a belief in an afterlife. They also frequently ask me if I think I will see him again. Carl faced his death with unflagging courage & never sought refuge in illusions. The tragedy was that we knew we would never see each other again. I don’t ever expect to be reunited with Carl. But, the great thing is that when we were together, for nearly twenty years, we lived with a vivid appreciation of how brief & precious life is. We never trivialized the meaning of death by pretending it was anything other than a final parting. Every single moment that we were alive & we were together was miraculous — not miraculous in the sense of inexplicable or supernatural. We knew we were beneficiaries of chance… That pure chance could be so generous & so kind… That we could find each other, as Carl wrote so beautifully in Cosmos, you know, in the vastness of space & the immensity of time… That we could be together for twenty years. That is something which sustains me & it’s much more meaningful…

The way he treated me & the way I treated him, the way we took care of each other & our family, while he lived. That is so much more important than the idea I will see him someday. I don’t think I’ll ever see Carl again. But I saw him. We saw each other. We found each other in the cosmos, and that was wonderful." - Ann Druyan

Carl Sagan - Pale Blue Dot

Silent Sunday: Resting in the Woods

University of Kentucky Arboretum 10/11
Photo: Kevin Westerman © 2011

Summer of '91

The summer of 1991 was one of the best and most memorable summers of my life. I was fifteen, had a girlfriend from the city that my mom hated. I came into my own that summer.

The summer of 1991 arguably had some of the best music ever.

DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince
C + C Music Factory
Extreme
Boyz II Men
Scorpions
Rhythm Syndicate
Marc Cohn
Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch
Lenny Kravitz
Bryan Adams
Escape Club
The Black Crowes
Jesus Jones
Bonnie Raitt
LL Cool J
Color Me Badd
Tevin Campell
Siouxsie and the Banshees
REM
Damn Yankees
Firehouse
Guns n Roses
PM Dawn

And of course

Heavy D and The Boys

R.I.P. Heavy D (1967 - 2011)