Good, Bad, I'm the guy with the gun.

Gather ye sparkplugs, for tomorrow we drive

2009-05-04T09:50:00.003-05:00

About a year and a half ago, I bought my car. It is a 2006 black, Honda Element and I love it. LOVE it. It's fun, gets decent gas mileage, and big enough for what I want to do. It is a REALLY well thought-out car. I had a friend's kid completely hark in the back seat. 30 minutes and a rest-stop hose later and we were vomit-free and wondering about what was for lunch...

But over the last 18 months, a little bit of the shine has worn off. I still love the car, but I don't baby it as I used to. A new scratch isn't met with fretting. If I go an extra week without washing the car, or an extra month without changing the oil, so be it.

I remember my old car, my 1996 Dodge Stratus. I LOVED that car. I still miss it some days. By the end, it was a real POS, but it was MY POS and as long as it lived, I still wanted it to be the thing that got me places. But there were things that were just straight-up broken on that car. The bumper never got 100% fixed after that time I got pulled out of a snow drift. The CD player would work sometimes... if the temperature was just right. And the cruise control, well, that was just a crap-shoot. But I'll be damned if I didn't shed a tear the day I traded it in for Ellie.

I've been wondering a lot about people being "broken." I hear it a lot, especially with the pappy cliche crap that gets thrown around, especially in my Baylor circle of friends. It's an idea that we're all "broken people" and imperfect, rought with sin and vice.

But no one ever talks about being "fixed." Christianity doesn't make us "fixed."

I think that if you live long enough, you're going to get some scratches and you're going to have some things about you that are "broken." But do you ever get them fixed?

I know some people who are pretty hard on themselves. They know they're broken and they judge and hurt and wallow in their brokeness. They cut themselves off because they don't want anyone else to have to sit through a drive with them without a CD Player. Or they don't want someone to make the trip from Waco to Galveston without a cruise-control.

But maybe they're wrong. Maybe being happy isn't getting "fixed" but rather understanding that some of the greatest conversations I've ever had, were in that Stratus because we had no music to distract us from talking and that there were nights where using the cruise control during the 2AM drive in the middle of nowhere would have gotten me killed. I would have fallen asleep.

I'm just saying that, in life, we have bruises and hurts and neuroses and problems. And some of them necessitate help, some of them necessitate time, and I honestly believe some of them necessitate forgiveness.

We're all broken. Some of us much more than others. But happiness isn't being "fixed." Maybe it's merely knowing your dents, scratches and faulty parts are part of who you are, your charm, what someone will love about you and learning to have a conversation instead of singing along to Beyonce.

I know that life is short and expensive. Who has time to sit in a driveway, wishing you were perfect, when you've got places to go and adventures to have? I've loved cars before, and I'll probably love more, but I know a good thing when I've got it. And I have it now.

Love the now, for yesterday is gone, and tomorrow may never come.

Love Now, broken pieces and all.

The Stork neither Twitters nor Tweets.

2009-03-18T10:13:00.002-05:00

"I didn't have kids to make friends!" is a quote my mother is very famous for saying to strangers as they gawked at a woman holding a screaming baby while simultaneously keeping my brother and me from killing each other (we had a thing for throwing cans) in the middle of a discount food store.

I often wonder if my mother would have Twittered if she could have while we were growing up. I feel like the thing about twittering that makes it so addictive to me is that it gives me a chance to express myself and what is going on in my life. Like screaming into a pillow, I need to tell someone, let someone know what's going on.

For instance, when I'm texting Sam, I don't really twitter.

And I can't imagine anyone more desperate for a release valve than a young parent.

I love kids. I LOVE them. They're precocious and funny and innocent and, most charmingly, simple. They have the simple blessing of being the emotional basic tool set from Wal-Mart. They don't need the socket-wrench when all you do is poop, eat, sleep and cry.

That being said, I'm not a huge fan of infants. They're cute, but the interaction is rather limited. They're basically a miniature great-grand-parent only they don't smell like cats/frustration and hide their racism better.

For my money, I like the 18-month olds and up. Right when they're talking and they're still a little fun to play with. They're walking and learning every curse you can slip out of your mouth. Kind of like writing in ink and hoping you don't sneeze. Its exciting!

We all hit that age where people start getting married and everyone comments: "Oh, they're rather young, aren't they?" And then, somewhere after undergrad and the end of grad school you hear the comments about upcoming nuptuals shift from "Oh that's so nice!!" to "Well, damn, its about time" to "Dang, I thought he was gay."

And then finally, your peers begin to have babies.

I don't have any idea how to process that thought.

I love my parents. They are wonderful, beautiful, charming, loving, kind and good. But as I begin to pop the pills of perspective that life prescribes for me, I see through dilated eyes more than I have before who my parents are. My dad is awesome, but he has a temper and oftentimes lets it cloud his judgment. My mother is one of the most brilliant women on earth, but she forgets to put both socks on sometimes.

And they have four children.

I often wonder where people get off having children. I think it takes a special kind of arrogance/confidence (or both) to think you have the ability to raise children in a world rife with drugs and peer pressure and money problems and cancer and Enron and rapists and heartbreak and the Twilight books.

And that's assuming you are a good parent. My parents were a tag team and perhaps the biggest reason for any success I've had or ever will have.

Their unconditional love, wisdom and contumacious insistence on putting my needs before theirs are my biggest blessing in my life.

What about those of us not blessed so? In the course of my job and life I've met souls from homes I can't fathom. Angry split parents playing "gotcha" on the battlefield of their children's hearts. Parents who insist on being their child's best friend when they need someone to give them structure. Parents who say hurtful things and judge too harshly. Parents who try to live vicariously through their children. Or even worse, parents who treat their children as though they were new Fendi bag that goes out of style all too soon.

Octo-mom.

Growing up you think of parents as perfect shelters. It is quite the shock when you realize that parents are really a lot like people. Imperfect and broken. So where do we get off having children?

Are they the consumation of love between two people as I was raised to believe? Are we lonely and just want someone who has to depend on us? Are they your chance at finally achieving some sort of glory on the football field/golf course/chess team? Or are they the miraculous result of sugary drinks with exotic names hidden behind cute umbrellas and veil of deniability? Sometimes I just refer to them as "proof of sex."

Or maybe all or even none of the above?

I want children someday. Maybe. I think. But when I say that, its like me talking about the dog I've wanted for the last 3 years but, upon a moment's reflection realize that I have a hard enough time making it back to my own bathroom without crapping my pants (it comes on me quick, friends) without trying to manage something else's poop schedule.

It's one of those things in which the goodness sounded in theory doesn't echo so much in practice. Like wearing the "Green Man" suit to a bar in a hot Texas summer... especially when you sweat more in some areas than others.

But then again, Children are a fad with staying power. People have been doing it for a while and it is definitely not stopping anytime soon. One is born every 5 seconds and in every country in the world. Can't beat that for popularity.

Its a scary idea. But for every Hitler, Mozart, Curie, Einstein, Khan and Piccard, there's a million "normal" people. People raised by people raised by people. Loving, wanting, hurting and living.

Maybe children are what the cliche's say they are. Maybe they are a chance, a shot in the dark that they can be a little something better than we are. I love the idea of being so in love with someone that I want to place a bet that the potential bad in me could be mitigated by the good in her in our progeny. That, and there'd be proof I had sex at least once.

At the very least, I'd have an excuse to Twitter more often.

In Trust we God.

2009-03-09T15:47:00.005-05:00

Everyone needs something. Fish need water. Birds need sky. Dogs need butts to sniff. People need people.

Sometimes the water is dirty. Sometimes the sky is cloudy. Sometimes the butts belong to mannequins, devoid of interesting scent. Sometimes people are assholes.

But people need people.

I am a trusting person. I am one of the most upbeat, positive and optimistic people you will ever meet. I am curious. I always want to see the other side of a thing. I am always thinking. I believe in love.

I have an awesome, but very demanding, job that allows me to talk to and get to know and invest in very interesting, questioning, young men and women in need of a hand-up or a little bit of perspective. I am needed every day. It is a great thing to be needed; to be respected and relied upon.

But one thing about the nature of my job, I run Residence Life for Texas A&M's campus in Galveston, is that I very often get called upon to manage the very best or worst things that happen on this campus. It's a game of minimum's and maximums. It's a series of hills and valleys.

I have my trust violated often, my hopes dashed regularly, and my love goes unrequited as often as not. I tend to live and die with the successes and failures of my students... which means I get hurt a lot.

When I love, I tend to go to the hilt, head over heels, unquestionably on tilt, like Quixote towards his Giants.

Why? Why do we do this? Why did God make me this way?

One of the big questions I hope I get answered in the big "day-after-crossword puzzle-check-to-see-how-many-you-got-right" session with St. Peter or God or Buddha or whomever when I die is "what does God mean when he said he created us in 'his own image'?" Did he make us sentient like him? Did me mean it literally? That there's some really old dude out in space somewhere, white robes and flowing white beard?

I think it makes most sense to look at the common things about us all. And I think the answer is obvious. We all need love. Even God, in his omnipotence and wisdom, wasn't complete without others to love and love him in return.

So maybe my trusting nature is a good thing. Maybe being a Pollyanna ain't so bad.

I trust that I will love. I trust that I will get hurt. I trust that I will have my heart broken. But I also trust that there are some lessons that only experience can teach me. I know that when the skin is cut or a bone is broken, scars form to strengthen the cut and the break, leaving the mend even stronger than it was previously.

So I trust that my heart, when broken, will heal stronger at the break.

When I hear about a student who doesn't like me, I usually just assume its because they really don't know me. I'm a pretty likable guy.

Though I am the only commonality in every failed relationship I've ever had, I've never once felt a break-up was my fault or any kind of judgment on me as a person or a being. It's not that I was too self-centered, or too fat, or too crazy or too Catholic, it was always that I wasn't what the person who passed on me wanted. Just like every time I've dumped someone wasn't because they were bad people. They just weren't what I wanted. And we all need to push for what we want.

Happy people aren't happy because they ended up with the best in show, but because they ended up with someone whose crazy matches their own crazy; whose baggage be it heavy or light, colorful or bland, expensive or cheap, worn or new, matched their own.

I think God has some baggage. I believe his heart is scarred a million times from all the hurt. But he trusts in us, whether we deserve it or not. Maybe that's what love really is.

I've been told I make "Pollyanna look like a sarcastic bitch." But that is something I really love about myself. Maybe being so trusting will wear me down, fade the colors in my soul and dull the point of my whit, til I am naught but the stubby end of a chewed #2 pencil. Or maybe my "you have to be in it, to win it" strategy towards life will pick me the lucky numbers in the lottery of Love and Life.

Either way, I'm going to figure it out.

Trust me.

Plus by Minus.

2009-03-05T15:51:00.003-06:00

"Lent is a time for you to punch yourself in the crotch every time you get a boner." - SeaNomad

This was a quote one of my favorite people in the world, and you know, after a week of Lent, I don't think she is completely off base.

I love Lent. I feel it helps me, more than any season in the Church's calendar, to grow within my relationship with my God. Something I'll never completely understand.

But I love talking about Lent even more. Especially to non-believers, it's a crazy time of self-flagellation, self-denial and religious pratter. And I get that. Give up meat one day a week? WTF? With all the trendy vegan places everywhere, that's as arbitrary as it is sacrificial. Giving something up? "I give up giving stuff up... har-har-har." And abstaining? Don't even get me started on that.

But still, I love Lent. Why?

To me, Lent is Spring-Training for the year. Lent is when we clear the slate and start working on the basics. Giving up meat on Fridays is the spiritual equivalent of wind sprints. During this Spring Training, is when we work on our swing for the new year. It's when we take an honest look at our game film from the last year, look for holes in our swing and try, through repetition-repetition-repetition-repetition to work out the kinks.

Having trouble hitting that inside curve? Work on opening your stance.

Falling for the high heat? Work on shortening up your swing to give you more time to decide on the pitch.

So it goes with Lent.

There's a lot that more that goes into the season: increased prayer, maintaining a sense of introspection (did you know Catholics are not to say "hallelujah" during Lent?) and much more doctrinal minutiae. But I think my favorite part of Lent comes in the choosing one item or activity to remove from your life.

On its face it smacks of capricious self-flagellation. But me say its a device that renders the whole more than the sum of its parts. Let me explain.

What is it to be a Christian or a member of any other religion? When you really break it down from a purely objective standpoint, being a Christian means living your life as closely as you can to a sort of code of Christian code of conduct. There is a line to be walked. Things you do that you wouldn't normally, and things that you don't that you usually would.

Well giving up something during the Lenten season is sort of like that in a a 47 day period in preparation for the rest of the year. By removing something from your life that you would usually do and enjoy, you're supposed to examine the effect of the vacuum of that thing in your life.

Giving up coffee, getting past the headaches, twitchiness, irritability and grouchiness created by the absense of that, one is free to imagine what they will drink instead. What will they discuss things over? What will they spend $4 a day on? What will they get on their breaks?

Its not the act of giving something up that matters, its what you with the space left by it that matters. It doesn't do you any good to let go of hating your father if you only replace it with hatred for your brother. Lent is a time for us to work out those kinks.

Lent is a time of addition by subraction. We grow by examining the space left by what we've lost.

So yeah maybe it's not exactly punching yourself in the crotch whenever you get a boner at all.

I just thought it was a funny quote.

Message in a bottle

2009-02-19T14:11:00.003-06:00

What do we do when the lights are too bright and the sirens are too loud?

We close our eyes and plug our ears.

I've stopped writing over the last 6 months because I think I've been the guy struggling so hard down that last mile of a marathon he doesn't realize his running shorts split 100 yards ago, and... well... let's just say he'll bring a whole new definition to "flopping across the finish line."

Yeah, suck that image in...

I love my job. College can be such a transformative time for someone primed for learning. It truly is the crossroads in many of our lives. And I feel like I'm the guy whose job it is to hand out maps and put up the "dead end" signs. It's so fulfilling and I'm damn good at it.

It has its ups and downs, just like any job. I have to be the creepy old guy living on campus... on purpose. But I do get really really cheap rent. Most of the people I know are 18. But then again I never have to look far for someone to play a wicked game of Wii.

Worst thing about living on campus? Having to hear from every asshole douche I meet "heh-heh... I bet you tag all those 18 year-old girls... heh-heh." "No, [ya schmuck], I aim for older chicks. They're more desperate and less clingy."

But the best part of my job is feeling that what I'm doing is important. If it was always easy, they wouldn't have to pay me. -Which they technically do.

But the last 6 months...

The Wednesday before the storm, our campus closed at 5pm and evacuated up to College Station for Hurricaine Ike. They needed a staff member to move up there so I, being the young, single, unattached one, volunteered. I was happy to. I would have been insulted if they would have let anyone else. It was really cool to go up to College Station with its sprawling campus and enormous staff, navigate the beaurocracy and hand out my dusty business cards and arrange meal plans for our students evacuated up there.

But after we made the full move and the storm hit, things changed. We had to move 1200+ students into an already saturated college town bursting at the seams from its own 48,000 students. We had to do things that had only been talked about in theory, much less ever attempted anywhere in the history of the world.

Dealing with limited resources varying in quality to a greater number of people with limited guidance is something to see. It's heartbreaking. I watched normally rational, giving and generous people turn into starving Hyenas fighting over a fresh carcass, gorging themselves while others go hungry. Heartbreaking.

While in College Station, I was daily: lied to, mislead, chewed out, yelled at, demeaned, forced to see every weakness exposed, corrected constantly (thank-God), shut off from family and friends and all with little thanks. It was pretty emotionally bruising.

On top of it all, friends and new family left and right had lost their homes, nearly all their posessions, and dealing with loss. And I was shut off. We were all working 12-14 hour days, 5-6 days a week because if we didn't, someone might go without a meal plan or a warm bed or internet access required for homework.

And I was cut off from them. I shut off my emotions. I couldn't let myself feel hurt because I didn't lose anything. Not really. How dare I complain about loss or stress when my home is fine and I didn't lose a thing when Mikey and Addrienne got 4 feet of water, lost the deck they had just christened two months earlier and had the roof of their kick-ass shop cave in? How dare I complain about stress when Will lost thousands -literally- THOUSANDS of comic books when his storage unit was flooded?

No. I sucked it up.

But anyone who has ever tried to hold it in when you have to pee knows that if you let it out even a little, the dam will break. So I held it in.

I plugged my ears and I shut my eyes.

We were all going on adrenaline, keeping our smiles on, living for anything that can cheer us up. Rejoicing at every small victory. But you can only go on adrenline for so long. Eventually you have to pay the piper.

And that, gentle readers, is where I'm at. I've found my leaping out of bed to go to work in the mornings has turned to hitting the "snooze" for an hour and a half. Things that would have never have gotten to me before all of a sudden require "state of the union" -type adresses.

I'm quicker to anger that's slower and slower to recede. I get frustrated at the smallest things and I find it easier and easier to justify to myself that skipping work is okay. Its getting harder and harder to invest in anyone new. And that's what I've always done best.

And, perhaps scariest of all, its been harder and harder for me to get deep with myself and contemplate my thoughts, motiviations and feelings. My self-awareness has been slipping because its been neglected; a muscle atrophied.

So I'm turning a leaf. I'm pushing on. I'm letting go.

Can anyone spare a dime? Because I definitely can use some change.

Things have got to change.

If I don't have time for my own words, maybe I can find the time for others?

2009-01-07T13:56:00.002-06:00

I'm blatantly stealing this post from someone else. But I thought it was pretty cute. Maybe if I give Jessica from www.farmfreshiowa.blogspot.com props she won't mind it. Check it out.

24 THINGS ABOUT TO BECOME EXTINCT IN AMERICA

http://farmfreshiowa.blogspot.com/2009/01/24-things-about-to-become-extinct-in.html

24. Yellow Pages This year will be pivotal for the global Yellow Pages industry. Much like newspapers, print Yellow Pages will continue to bleed dollars to their various digital counterparts, from Internet Yellow Pages (IYPs), to local search engines and combination search/listing services like Reach Local and Yodle Factors like an acceleration of the print 'fade rate' and the looming recession will contribute to the onslaught. One research firm predicts the falloff in usage of newspapers and print Yellow Pages could even reach 10% this year -- much higher than the 2%-3% fade rate seen in past years.

23. Classified Ads The Internet has made so many things obsolete that newspaper classified ads might sound like just another trivial item on a long list. But this is one of those harbingers of the future that could signal the end of civilization as we know it. The argument is that if newspaper classifieds are replaced by free online listings at sites like Craigslist.org and Google Base, then newspapers are not far behind them.

22. Movie Rental Stores While Netflix is looking up at the moment, Blockbuster keeps closing store locations by the hundreds. It still has about 6,000 left across the world, but those keep dwindling and the stock is down considerably in 2008, especially since the company gave up a quest of Circuit City . Movie Gallery, which owned the Hollywood Video brand, closed up shop earlier this year. Countless small video chains and mom-and-po p stores have given up th e ghost already.

21. Dial-up Internet Access Dial-up connections have fallen from 40% in 2001 to 10% in 2008. The combination of an infrastructure to accommodate affordable high speed Internet connections and the disappearing home phone have all but pounded the final nail in the coffin of dial-up Internet access.

20. Phone Landlines According to a survey from the National Center for Health Statistics, at the end of 2007, nearly one in six homes was cell-only and, of those homes that had landlines, one in eight only received calls on their cells.

19. Chesapeake Bay Blue Crabs Maryland 's icon, the blue crab, has been fading away in Chesapeake Bay . Last year Maryland saw the lowest harvest (22 million pounds) since 1945. Just four decades ago the bay produced 96 million pounds. The population is down 70% since 1990, when they first did a formal count. There are only about 120 million crabs in the bay and they think they need 200 million for a sustainable population. Overfishing, pollution, invasive species and global warming get the blame.

18. VCRs For the better part of three decades, the VCR was a best-seller and staple in every American household until being completely decimated by the DVD, and now the Digital Video Recorder (DVR). In fact, the only remnants of the VHS age at your local Wal-Mart or Radio Shack are blank VHS tapes these days. Pre-recorded VHS tapes are largely gone and VHS decks are practically nowhere to be found. They served us so well.

17. Ash Trees In the late 1990s, a pretty, iridescent green species of beetle, now known as the emerald ash borer, hitched a ride to North America with ash wood products imported from eastern Asia . In less than a decade, i ts larvae have killed millions of trees in the Midwest, and continue to spread. They've killed more than 30 million ash trees in southeastern Michigan alone, with tens of millions more lost in Ohio and Indiana . More than 7.5 billion ash trees are currently at risk.

16. Ham Radio Amateur radio operators enjoy personal (and often worldwide) wireless communications with each other and are able to support their communities with emergency and disaster communications if necessary, while increasing their personal knowledge of electronics and radio theory. However, proliferation of the Internet and its popularity among youth has caused the decline of amateur radio. In the past five years alone, the number of people holding active ham radio licenses has dropped by 50,000, even though Morse Code is no longer a requirement.

15. The Swimming Hole Thanks to our litigious society, swimming holes are becoming a thing of the past. '20/20' reports that swimming hole owners, like Robert Every in High Falls, N.Y., are shutting them down out of worry that if someone gets hurt they'll sue. And that's exactly what happened in Seattle . The city of Bellingham was sued by Katie Hofstetter who was paralyzed in a fall at a popular swimming hole in Whatcom Falls Park . As injuries occur and lawsuits follow, expect more swimming holes to post 'Keep out!' signs.

14. Answering Machines The increasing disappearance of answering machines is directly tied to No 20 our list -- the decline of landlines. According to USA Today, the number of homes that only use cell phones jumped 159% between 2004 and 2007. It has been particularly bad in New York ; since 2000, landline usage has dropped 55%. It's logical that as cell phones rise, many of them replacing traditional landlines, that there will be fewer answering machines.

13 . Cameras That Use Film It doesn't require a statistician to prove the rapid disappearance of the film camera in America . Just look to companies like Nikon, the professional's choice for quality camera equipment. In 2006, it announced that it would stop making film cameras, pointing to the shrinking market -- only 3% of its sales in 2005, compared to 75% of sales from digital cameras and equipment.

12. Incandescent Bulbs Before a few years ago, the standard 60-watt (or, yikes, 100-watt) bulb was the mainstay of every U.S. home. With the green movement and all-things-sustainable-energy crowd, the Compact Fluorescent Lightbulb (CFL) is largely replacing the older, Edison-era incandescent bulb. The EPA reports that 2007 sales for Energy Star CFLs nearly doubled from 2006, and these sales accounted for approximately 20 percent of the U.S. light bulb market. And according to USA Toda y, a new energy bill plans to phase out incandescent bulbs in the next four to 12 years.

11. Stand-Alone Bowling Alleys BowlingBalls.US claims there are still 60 million Americans who bowl at least once a year, but many are not bowling in stand-alone bowling alleys. Today most new bowling alleys are part of facilities for all types or recreation including laser tag, go-karts, bumper cars, video game arcades, climbing walls and glow miniature golf. Bowling lanes also have been added to many non-traditional venues such as adult communities, hotels and resorts, and gambling casinos.

10. The Milkman According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, in 1950, over half of the milk delivered was to the home in quart bottles, by 1963, it was about a third and by 2001, it represented only 0 .4% percent. Nowadays most milk is sold th rough supermarkets in gallon jugs. The steady decline in home-delivered milk is blamed, of course, on the rise of the supermarket, better home refrigeration and longer-lasting milk. Although some milkmen still make the rounds in pockets of the U.S. , they are certainly a dying breed.

9 Hand-Written Letters In 2006, the Radicati Group estimated that, worldwide, 183 billion e-mails were sent each day. Two million each second. By November of 2007, an estimated 3.3 billion Earthlings owned cell phones, and 80% of the world's population had access to cell phone coverage. In 2004, half-a-trillion text messages were sent, and the number has no doubt increased exponentially since then. So where amongst this gorge of gabble is there room for the elegant, polite hand-written letter?

8. Wild Horses ; It is estimated that 100 years ago, as many as two million horses were roaming free within the United States . In 2001, National Geographic News estimated that the wild horse population had decreased to about 50,000 head. Currently, the National Wild Horse and Burro Advisory board states that there are 32,000 free roaming horses in ten Western states, with half of them residing in Nevada . The Bureau of Land Management is seeking to reduce the total number of free range horses to 27,000, possibly by selective euthanasia.

7. Personal Checks According to an American Bankers Assoc. report, a net 23% of consumers plan to decrease their use of checks over the next two years, while a net 14% plan to increase their use of PIN debit. Bill payment remains the last stronghold of paper-based pa yments -- for the time being. Checks continue to be the most commonly used bill payment method, with 71% of c onsumers paying at least one recurring bill per month by writing a check. However, on a bill-by-bill basis, checks account for only 49% of consumers' recurring bill payments (down from 72% in 2001 and 60% in 2003).

6. Drive-in Theaters During the peak in 1958, there were more than 4,000 drive-in theaters in this country, but in 2007 only 405 drive-ins were still operating. Exactly zero new drive-ins have been built since 2005. Only one reopened in 2005 and five reopened in 2006, so there isn't much of a movement toward reviving the closed ones.

5 Mumps & Measles Despite what's been in the news lately, the measles and mumps actually, truly are disappearing from the United States . In 1964, 212,000 cases of mumps were reported in the U.S. By 1983, this figure had dropped to 3,000, thanks to a vigorous vaccination program. Prior to the introduction of the measles vaccine, approximately half a million cases of measles were reported in the U.S. annually, resulting in 450 deaths. In 2005, only 66 cases were recorded.

4. Honey Bees Perhaps nothing on our list of disappearing America is so dire; plummeting so enormously; and so necessary to the survival of our food supply as the honey bee. Very scary. 'Colony Collapse Disorder,' or CCD, has spread throughout the U.S and Europe over the past few years, wiping out 50% to 90% of the c olonies of many beekeepers -- and along with it, their livelihood.

3. News Magazines and TV News While the TV evening newscasts haven't gone anywhere over the last several decades, their audiences have. In 1984, in a story about the diminishing returns of the evening news, the New York Times reported that all three network evening-news programs combined had only 40.9 million viewers. Fast forward to 2008, and what they have today is half that.

2. Analog TV According to the Consumer Electronics Association, 85% of homes in the U.S. get their television programming through cable or satellite providers. For the remaining 15% -- or 13 million individuals -- who are using rabbit ears or a large outdoor antenna to get their local stations, change is in the air. If you are one of these people you'l l need to get a new TV or a converter box in order to get the new stations which will only be broadcast in digital.

1. The Family Farm Since the 1930s, the number of family farms has been declining rapidly. According to the USDA, 5.3 million farms dotted the nation in 1950, but this number had declined to 2.1 million by the 2003 farm census (data from the 2007 census hasn't yet been published). Ninety-one percent of the U.S.farms are small family farms.

Pack rats win the race?

2009-01-07T13:45:00.004-06:00

Found this and thought it was incredible.

H's & K's,
Neil Edward Golemo

courant.com/features/hc-webbaseballcard.artjan07,0,2557404.story

Courant.com

Surprise Find: A 139-Year-Old Baseball Card

By Mike Osegueda

McClatchy Newspapers

January 7, 2009

FRESNO, Calif.

She dug into a box and pulled out a baseball card. She stopped for a moment and admired the picture. "Red Stocking B.B. Club of Cincinnati," the card said, under a sepia tone photo of 10 men with their socks pulled up to their knees. The card itself was dirty and wrinkled in a few places.

It was definitely old, Gallego thought. As a collector and seller, it's her job to spot old items that might have value today, to find the gems among the junk.

It's what Bernice, 72, and her husband Al Gallego, 80, have been doing since 1974 at Collectique, their antiques store in the Fresno, Calif., Tower District full of old jukeboxes, slot machines and records.

This card, she figured, was worth selling on eBay.

She did what she does with most items: Took a picture, wrote a description and put it up for auction. She put a $10 price tag on it, deciding against $15 because it would have cost her an extra 20 cents.

Later that night she got a few odd inquiries — someone wanting to know whether the card was authentic, someone wanting her to end the auction and sell him the card immediately.

Hmm, she thought, this could be something special. It could be worth $50, or even $100.

Or, as Bernice Gallego came to find out in the following weeks, it could be worth a lot more.

The card is actually 139 years old. It, and a handful of others like it, are considered the first baseball cards. Sports card collectors call the find "extremely rare" and estimate the card could fetch five, or perhaps, six figures at auction.

And Bernice was worried about 20 cents.

Instead, just like that, she is the least likely protagonist ever for a rare-baseball card story.

"I didn't even know baseball existed that far back," Gallego says, between puffs on her cigarette. "I don't think that I've ever been to a baseball game."

Spooked with all the questions she was getting on eBay, she picked up the phone at 9:30 p.m. that night and called her good friend, George Huddleston, and asked his opinion.

"I never make phone calls after 8 o'clock at night," Gallego says. "My mother taught me never to do things like that."

Huddleston's answer was simple: End the auction now. Figure out what you have and what it's worth before selling it. Her husband Al agreed: "Get this thing off the Internet."

So the next morning — with no bids yet on the card — she canceled the auction. She wanted to find out more about the card.

Huddleston directed Gallego to a friend who would know what to do: Rick Mirigian, a local concert promoter and card trader who sold a rare basketball card in 2004 for $62,100.

In the meantime, Gallego didn't want the card to get lost, so she put it in a sandwich bag and push-pinned it to her laundry room wall.

"If it fell off the wall, the cat would have ate it," Gallego says. "Well, or the dog."

When she met with Mirigian she found out what the card was — an 1869 advertisement with a picture of the first professional baseball team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings.

"When I came to meet her and she took it out of a sandwich Baggie and she was smoking a cigarette, I almost fainted," Mirigian says.

"They've uncovered a piece of history that few people will ever be able to imagine or comprehend. And it comes out of Fresno," Mirigian says. "That card is history. It's like unearthing a Mona Lisa or a Picasso."

Mirigian's first question to Bernice was what you might expect: Where did you get this?

To this day, the details are sketchy.

"We really don't know where we got it," Gallego says. "We don't even know how long we owned this thing."

Makes sense when you consider the Gallegos are a couple of pack-rats who have been married 45 years and whose antique store overflows into their house.

The theory is that the card came out of a storage space they bought a few years back. It's not uncommon in their line of work to buy the entire contents of storage units, usually from a relative of a recently deceased person, for around $200.

That's what the Gallegos think happened here.

Before this, the Gallegos' biggest eBay sale was a John F. Kennedy autograph from 1939 that brought in $1,000.

Because baseball cards were new to them, Mirigian laid out a plan for the Gallegos. They had to get the card authenticated, store it in something better than a plastic bag and put it in a safe place.

So the Gallegos headed south to Los Angeles, bound for the headquarters of PSA, the leading sports card grading and authenticating company, which has graded 12 million items since 1991.

Most people mail their cards off to PSA. The Gallegos decided that for their almost 140-year-old card, they'd rather drive it down. They picked the one day a month that PSA opens its doors to the public, dropped the card off at 9 a.m. and picked it up at 3 p.m., encapsulated and authenticated.

It was all a little much for a dumbstruck Bernice who still says, "It's a little card I found in a bunch of stuff."

They chose not to have the card graded, the process of judging the mintness on a 1-10 scale. It's PSA's most popular service, but in the case of this card, being real and in one piece is the most important thing.

"It does have some pretty significant discoloration and creasing," says Joe Orlando, the president of PSA. "The good news is that the sepia tone photo that is mounted on the front is, relatively speaking, unscathed. The clarity of the photo is still there. If this were graded, it would be near the bottom. But even for a card that low on the grading scale, it does have some eye appeal to it. It still presents fairly well and that's the more important thing."

And perhaps even more important is the story it tells.

Before the Cincinnati Red Stockings there were no professional baseball teams.

Formed in 1868, the team set the foundation for what we know today as Major League Baseball.

"To borrow a term from rock 'n' roll, they were a kind of supergroup," says Tim Wiles, the director of research at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y.

"They brought in some of the best baseball players from around the country. They went around and challenged all comers. They barnstormed around the country and were undefeated."

The Red Stockings won games by as many as 30, 40 and 50 runs, Wiles says.

"They were kind of an all-star team before that concept really existed," he says. "In 1871, what the Red Stockings started would evolve into the first baseball league and the first sports league."

In 1869, the team's picture ended up on the front of a card advertising Peck & Snyder, a company that sold baseball equipment. Unlike modern baseball cards, the Peck & Snyder card was larger and focused on the whole team, not individual players.

"It really provides a time capsule for the game," says Orlando of PSA. "You look at the picture and the guys are wearing boots. They don't use gloves at that point. The classic uniforms. It was a completely different game at that time."

To Bernice — who, let's remember, has never been to a baseball game — it was the history, not the sport that meant something.

"Because I love history, the thing that really got to me was that it's a photo, a real photo of real people, basically taken right after the Civil War," Gallego says. "That's what got to me. I don't know much about them. Who are they? What are they thinking? Those kind of question go through my mind."

Next is the big question: How much is this card worth?

Mirigian says he expects six figures.

The Gallegos are content to put it on eBay and "let it fly."

Orlando offers: "The last one that I'm aware, it sold about a year to a year and a half ago and it sold for well into five figures. You have to let the market decide what it's worth when you're dealing with something this scarce, because there's just not the market history to determine it."

But who would pay that kind of money for a baseball card?

"A lot of people use sports memorabilia and sports cards as conversation pieces," Orlando says. "And what a conversation piece this is."

That could mean anybody from a businessman who's a baseball fan to a baseball executive. That's the kind of stuff that Mirigian and Gallego sit around talking about.

"You might have George Steinbrenner wanting to buy this," Mirigian told her one day, referring to the long time New York Yankees owner.

"Who's George Steinberg?" she asked.

Plans are to put the card back on eBay, though the auction is expected to draw a little more attention this time, thanks to Mirigian, who is already plotting marketing schemes and sales tactics. He'll get a percentage of the sale for his part.

"I find it so hard to believe that this little card is worth so much," Bernice says. "Neither one of us count chickens before they hatch. We don't want to expect the world out of this find. It's good enough that we've found it, and have been able to enjoy it and share it with a few of our friends. That for us is more of where it's at."

It's not the first time Bernice has unexpectedly walked into a windfall. She hit a $250,000 jackpot playing quarter slots at Harrah's in Lake Tahoe.

"She's a very lucky lady," Al Gallego says.

That was 10 years ago. Now this. Next? Who knows.

"We gotta live at least another 10 years for the next one," Bernice says.

Bernice Gallego sat down one day this summer, as she does pretty much every day, and began listing items on eBay.

Just saying...

2008-12-04T10:08:00.001-06:00

see famous look-a-like faces

The Four Chambers of a Home

2008-11-29T00:37:00.004-06:00

Thanksgiving is, perhaps, my favorite holiday of the year. And I love holidays! I love pretty much everything about them.

I love the mixed bag of gifts that is a family get-togethers. The uncouth cousins. The mothers who try too hard. The dad's who don't try at all. The uncles that get drunk. The tee-totaling aunts who try to make up for the drunkeness by being completely lacking in a sense of humor.

I honestly love it all.

Holidays are really important to me. They're the spice in the meat and potatoes of the year. They are the moments in our grinds where we stop and, for whatever reason, we take time to appreciate that which means most to us. Family. The reasons we work and grind and push and pull.

In the last 5 years, I've spent Thanksgiving in five different places. Five different families other than the one that raised me. Five different sets of drunk cousins and stuck-up brothers and crazy aunts and accommodating mothers and incontinent elderly family dogs, hovering with graying whiskers for the next piece of turkey or stuffing to fall from an overloaded plate to the floor.

Families are very sacred and real and utterly unchangeable (no matter how hard you try) type of things. So when a friend is willing to share that with someone else... its much like exposing yourself (unfortunate wording, but I liked it so much after I typed it I just kept it... you know what I meant anyway). You can't really lie about family. "Uncle Ted isn't a drunk, he's just had a stroke recently." Or "My cousin Andee isn't a bitch, she's just getting into character for a movie part... she's playing the lead in a sequel of 'Mommy Dearest'... no really!"

Like I said, these lies don't really work. And to be honest, we're usually so consigned to the ugly truths about it, that we don't even think to warn our friends. So when someone is willing to share that with you, expose their origins and lay their lives bare, it means a lot. And the fact that I've had 4 friends think highly enough of me share themselves like that... it means that either I'm doing something really right, I'm just REALLY pitiful.

I suspect its a little of column A and column B.

It hits me when I think about that. 5 years since I've had Thanksgiving at my Grandma's in Hamilton, Illinois. My back to the big picture window with a view of the Mississippi winding through the bluffs with Iowa beyond. I haven't enjoyed my favorite holiday with the family that made me love the day the most. I remember flying kites and having experiments with my Aunt Theresa and her friend, Jim... (and never wondering about them having one of the inexplicable and androgynous relationships I've ever seen).

It causes me to pause my typing mid-word to think about it.

I've been at the mercy of others for the last 5 years. I've been floating around for the last 5 years... maybe this explains a lot about me and where I am in life. I'm so desperate to put down roots. I had an amazing support system in Eric and Steve and Shiznit in Waco. Myles and my studies.

I'm really beginning to love and appreciate Galveston. I fought it. Then I gave in... and then I had to work at it. But my relationship with Galveston Island is strong. I have an amazing job with an even better group of co-workers and a boss that has become a dear friend and confidant. I have good friends in Brian and Kristen and Will. I'm getting to a place where I'm happy with my situation. Even after the fucking storm.

I had a really good time time this Thanksgiving with Amanda and her family. Her mother, Melinda is sweet as the day is long and bent over backwards to make me feel welcome. She tried her hardest to embarrass Amanda for Amanda's sake. Turns out Amanda was too big a wuss to really misbehave growing up. Amanda's father, Barry, is incredibly laid-back. Seriously an incredibly accommodating and guy. He's done as much to make me feel comfortable as anyone. I got to meet Amanda's brother, Tyler and his wife Shari. Really cool young couple. I'm guessing they've been married 2-3 years. They have a beautiful son, 10 month old Kane. Seriously, two of the biggest, most lovable brown eyes I've ever seen. And I'm a sucker for the eyes.

And Amanda. She was a pro about the whole thing. I'm not sure if she actually wanted me around but she was cool as hell. As she almost always is.

I'm really thankful for her influence in my life. She's more than my best friend. She's sort of a lifeline into the world at outside of mine. She's smart and strong and while I think we share a sense of humor, I don't know anyone who provides a better counter-point to my point of view of the world. She's really fun to hang out with. And I defy you to spend time with her without laughing.

Besides that, she's off-the-charts hot. That don't hurt none. Like I've said. I never punch my weight.

But back to the point. I talk all this mean game about how much I love it back home, but I know that if I were to go back, I would hardly be able to spend a week without wondering why I would ever bother stepping foot in the city's limits. And even so, I've only just gotten to the point where I'm interested in seeing anyone besides my family members when I do go back.

I guess what I'm saying is that home is where the four chambers of your heart is. Wherever my mom and dad live will be home. Whether that's in Illinois or El Paso or wherever they're talking about moving.

Wherever I can go and say my stupid jokes and get laughs and people telling me I'm not nearly as funny as I think I am, will be home. (so thanks, Amanda)

Wherever I can go and feel loved, and just as importantly, known, will always be home.

So home is where my heart is. And as long as it's with those who would hold a piece of it, maybe I don't need to worry so much about roots. I'm leaving cuttings of myself wherever I go!

Four chambers of a home. A heart indeed.

TAMUG news!

2008-09-15T14:19:00.001-05:00

TO EVERYONE I TAGGED IN THIS NOTE -
Please share this information with your fellow Sea Aggies. Thank you!
Originally Posted 6:30 p.m., Sunday, September 14, 2008

The current situation: TAMUG officials were granted limited access to the Mitchell Campus on Pelican Island and the Fort Crockett campus on Sunday. Initial reports are that our campuses fared well during Hurricane Ike; however, we will be sending assessment teams of engineers and facility specialists from College Station to conduct a building-by-building analysis over the next two days. On the Mitchell Campus, there is some damage, but it appears to be repairable at this point.
We know that the roadway leading to the bridge to campus has eroded and is impassable at the current time. The roof to Mariner Hall has been partially damaged, as has the roof to the Sea Aggie Center. The academic buildings appear to have made it through the storm relatively unscathed, other than some broken glass. There is no evidence of the storm surge reaching these buildings.At Fort Crockett, one of the highest points on Galveston Island, we did not see any visible structural or water damage. We have not been able to access the Teichman campus as of Sunday afternoon.The key point to emphasize is that the City of Galveston’s infrastructure has been severely damaged, according to preliminary reports. This means that we are unsure as to when the island will have basic services such as electricity, water, sewer and telecommunications.

In addition, the approaches to the causeway from the mainland to Galveston Island have been compromised by debris. Public access is prohibited at this time.Our current plans:Our campus will remain closed throughout this week. Our next steps depend greatly upon the campus facility assessments, as well as the availability of basic services on Galveston Island.Be assured that the Aggie Spirit is alive and well, and we have begun implementing our contingency plan for the continuation of the fall semester at Texas A&M University in College Station. We will be able to share much more information about this implementation over the next two days.

The next update: Please continue to monitor www.tamug.edu for the latest official information from our administration. We are working to have our plans for the fall semester finalized by Wednesday, and provide several days’ notice for our faculty, staff and students.

I know how the Fires of Hell taste...

2008-08-19T14:56:00.002-05:00

I was originally going to send this to Amanda in text form... but balked for obvious reasons. Enjoy:

I'm going to blog about this later, but I thought you might enjoy a story of how my doe-eyed trusting nature screwed me once again.

So Danielle, an anime/manga freak of a student worker whose only discernible skill is avoiding work, starts giggling and bickering with her boyfriend, Guy another student worker. Naturally, I eavesdrop. They're debating whether "Neil will try it or not."

So I walk up.

"Oh hey Neil!" Danielle says through eyes devoid of conscience, "want to try this hot sauce? It's really spice but REALLY good."

"Sure," I say, "I like spicey stuff."

"Great!" Danielle, that succubus of innocence, exclaims. "I saved you a chicken tender. Go to town."

So I dip a healthy dallop of the dark-dark red sauce and took a bite.

Now in retrospect, perhaps I should have noticed the relatively TINY size of the container of supposed "Hot Sauce" compared to the gallon containers of ranch that this girl USUALLY subjects her food to. Or maybe perhaps I should have noticed how Guy's eyes grew to the point where they could have doubled for rims on Shaq's Bentley...

But alas, I noticed nothing until I started to chew.

My mouth was aflame. I can only honestly describe the feeling as a cross between a Rampage Jackson hay-maker to the mouth and a passionate make-out session with the rusty tailpipe of a overheated '69 Chevelle.

But I'm a man, and this wasn't my first rodeo. I soldier up, for the sake of the troops, and swallow. (yes, I'm fighting the use of a "that's what SHE said" joke as well).

I'm cool for the most part. No tears. But my mouth, literally, hurts and I've already downed most of a nalgene bottle of water. I'm ignoring their hoots of approval and I want to slap the looks of pure adoration for this manly deed right off their still pubescent faces. I'm currently doing a mental inventory of alkaline substances at my disposal as I sit down and try to go back to work. No milk. I honestly consider gurgling chlorine... (shut up, I still run the pool)...

So, after what I feel is enough space to give me some distance, I excuse myself to "go to my apartment and also check the pool numbers." I go to my apartment, chew a few antacid (years old, I think they still have a picture of "uncle joey" from FULL HOUSE on the box) and I have some cottage cheese and take a few mouthfuls of that. It helps.

So, feeling better, I go out to the pool and do what I do best: make fun of students.

After 5 minutes and bragging about how awesome I am for hitting this sauce described as "barely legal in the U.S.", Karma hits.

My gut first starts to tingle, then burn, then full-out viva la resistance revolt. There are French people in torn pirate shirts singing songs of rebellion and building barricades in the banlieue.

I honestly get a flash in my mind of Tom Skerritt in ALIEN.

Mumbling some fucking lame excuse, I start to walk towards my apartment. I trip on something before I realize that my pupils have honestly begun to dilate.

I pull out my FUCKING ID and honestly don't know if I can make it to my apartment. So I stop, try to catch my breath and lean over a trash can. But wait, after 30 seconds of exponentially increasing pain, I realize that I'm about to full-on yak into a recycling bin. Yes. I get the irony. I actually slipped a laugh out between gasps.

Bad move. Turns out, my abdominal muscles are the jealous type.

I hear a sound come from my bowels that would make a StarWars nerd applaud. It might have been Klingon, but I knew what it was saying "get this fucking shit out of me you worthless mouthful of cock." (sorry for the language)

I throw up everything I've had in the last 10 minutes. Water? Check. Cottage Cheese? Check. Red bits of Uncle Joey's worthless antacids? Check.

Chicken tender? No dice.

I'm in a cold sweat. My legs quite literally, are wonkier than a newborn colt.

I make it into my apartment and begin an immediate evacuation from my clothes. Everything... almost. Socks are a bitch to get off and the floor was kinda cold.

I'll spare you the rest of the gruesome details only to tell you that I'm only NOW fully recovered. I robed and went back to work. No one the wiser after being gone for 30 minutes. I stayed until around 6 and then came back and took a short nap.

I don't know what I did to deserve that habenero sauce. I honestly don't know.

But I'm sorry, Jesus. I really, truly am.

Fin

Education with "a Capital E."

2008-08-06T10:01:00.004-05:00

I love my job. I love working with students.

College is such a dynamic time in one's life. I'm absolutely in love with how hundreds of people come here from nearly every walk of life, rich, poor, fat, smart, hot, cold, local, international, black, white, mixed, Christian, Muslim, even Mormons who aren't afraid of learning show up sometimes -all come here with different world views trying to leap all kinds of different hurdles to gain an education for a myriad of reasons.

What I think I like most, is the education aspect. I am enthralled by how everyone learns. It might be the one thing that every human being has in common.

But speaking of commonalities, no matter how different all our students may be, there seems to be a lot of the same mistakes made. The psychologist in me wants to talk about Piaget or Erikson or Kholberg or Chickering, but I'll just save you the tired dogma and nerd-talk and drop it like this: Students are a lot like people.

I have a lot of the same conversations about mistakes and dumb decisions, etc. I also hear a LOT of the same excuses. That's cool. Students make mistakes. They should. For some reason, there are lessons out there to be learned that can only be taught through the pain of consequence. Drinking too much = hangover. Not studying = bad grades. Taking turns with your best friend's brother shooting each other in the chest with a paintball gun = bruise on your sternum that makes breathing painful.

Y'know, the basics.

I expect the bone-headed lack of thinking from students. Its comforting. Like the changing color of leaves in the Fall, or the snow in winter, these are things we've all come to expect and plan for. In fact, I would say these are things, students screwing up, are almost depended on by us. While we're disappointed to see them, fixing them working through them gives us a sense of efficacy and job-well-doneness.

But something that really chafes my ass is when PARENTS are behaving badly. You, gentle readers, have no idea how often it is that the parents of a student are completely to blame for their behavior or trouble.

And I'm not just talking about questionable parenting. I've seen girls with enough hard alcohol in their fridge to intoxicate the Irish National Soccer team and while watching them dump out their gallon bottles of tequila, bacardi 151, and vodka complain "my mother JUST bought this for me for my [18th] birthday tomorrow." I've seen parents who send their children to a very stressful first year at college on more drugs than Heath Ledger spending Flu Season at Keith Richard's house (too soon?) and not feel the need to tell anyone that their child might be under stress.

But today, a good friend of mine sent me an email that sorta summed up what we, as professionals, have to sometimes deal with.

"My daughter has expressed interest in attending [your institution]. She is a very good student (SAT 710 math 720 Verbal - member of American MENSA). My brother lived in [this town] for several years and he expressed concern about crime in the [this town] area. Since only about 35% of your students live on campus it follows that should she attend [your institution] she will at some point live off campus out side the safety area provide by the University. Please speak to the safety issues I have mentioned."

Please speak to the safety issues I have mentioned... I honestly don't know what I would have said if this lady, who has every right to be concerned about the safety of her daughter, would have suggested to me that I start worrying about the safety of students as if that weren't already my #1 concern already.

"Oh, make things safer?!?! I hadn't thought of that. Let me go get my tazer and bullet-proof vest. And ma'am, do you mind if I keep your number so that I may call you back for future sage advice? I might be chewing some food later, and while I get the whole 'move the jaw up and down' thing, I sometimes get confused on how my tongue works into the equation..."

I've been told my sarcasm is sticky.

The worst part is that I completely understand how these parents have a right to be concerned. I understand that they want to give their children everything and how they're giving up control and how that can be incredibly scary and the anxiety caused by such can sometimes cloud reasonable thought.

I understand parents who simply don't speak the "college language." It is a whole new world here of forms and FAFSA's and deadlines and housing deposits and core curricula. I can completely understand how the confusion of a first-time college parent can cause the eyes to cross and the straight-forward to bend.

What I don't understand is the consumer culture that college seems to have adopted. Just because you pay to attend, does NOT mean you pay to have your happiness guaranteed. Good grades are a product that can be purchased only through effort, not cash.

Perhaps it is I that needs to change my attitude. Perhaps I need to realize that in today's fractured family unit, a student is not the only one receiving the education. Perhaps my inability to understand that not every parent is like mine, and expects me to deal with my messy roommate or the dude down the hall who watches animal porn "because it's funny, dude" on my own. Perhaps I am the strange one for thinking that my dealing with these issues without having my parents call the President's office made me a little better equipped to deal with the world at large.

Perhaps.

Perhaps not.

One cloud is enough to block the sun

2008-06-26T09:33:00.002-05:00

I guess my approach to my faith and the faith of others can be summed up in the thought that one cloud is enough to block the sun.

But the Sun still exists.

I understand that some people have gotten the shit end of the stick more often than not. And the hurts vary from a broken home to parents who cannot see past their own needs to atrocities I cannot understand. I can truly understand how some people can have trouble seeing the good for all the clouds that block their view.

But the Sun still exists.

But how can a small cloud block the sun, an object 864938 miles in diameter, it's 109 times the size of earth. It's a matter of perspective, quite literally. When you're closer to the little thing than the big, the big thing can get boxed out.

But the Sun still exists.

I guess I'm just saying that no cloud has the balls or gumption to outlast or outshine the sun. I guess at some point it just comes down to your ability to recognize the sun for what it is. Especially when you've never seen it shine before.

But it exists. I know that much.

I just really want everyone to enjoy a tan.

Haven't posted in a while...

2008-05-01T00:27:00.002-05:00

Been tossing around the idea of getting back into the mix. We'll see how it goes.

Some people have asked me to post the speech I gave at the Leadership Banquet last week. And you all know how I love to give the people what they want...

2^nd lieutenant Benjamin Warren Golemo, 101^st Airborne, United States Military Academy at West Point class of 2007 left this morning for his first-ever platoon command somewhere in Baghdad.

My best friend. My closest soul. My biggest fan. My favorite person in the world. God’s greatest gift to me. My brother.

He’s leaving to fight a war about which I don’t think anyone knows exactly how to feel to defend a country, that while I love it with all my heart… I don’t know is always right.

And the job my brother is doing. His M.O.S. is without a doubt the most dangerous job in all of the Allied forces. He’s leading a platoon whose job it is to find, disarm or discharge the IED’s (Improvised Explosive Devices) that are responsible for nearly 40% of all of our soldiers killed or injured during Operation Iraqi Freedom.

And he fought for the job.

When he told me this, I screamed at him. “The world’s got enough heroes, Ben! And you’re not good-looking enough to have your face plastered on the dollar. Cause your nose is huge.” (He has a beak, I’m not kidding. The man can smoke a cigar in the shower.)

I asked him why? Your degree is in mechanical and electrical engineering. You should be behind a desk. A big, metal, desk…. Behind concrete walls… underground.

And he told me that there is no way he’d let someone else take his bullet. Those men need people who do, not assign. I’m here to lead.

Yeah.

Well never one to let the fact that I’m completely wrong keep me from making my point, I responded to him to spare me the “Hooah Army Poster-boy shhhstuff” and I reminded him that he has a family to worry about. I told him what it would do to me if he were to get hurt… or worse…

And he told me that he couldn’t think of a better way to honor our family than to lead where others might falter. What’s more, he said that he learned this not from weeks at Boot camp, or 4 years at the Point, or much less, an Army of One poster.

He said he learned it from a lifetime of watching me.

Yeah. Life has a way of putting you in your place.

He began to talk about my job and where I went versus where I could have gone and why.

You know, the best thing I have ever done in my life is be the big brother in a family. I went to Baylor, 854 miles from my doorstep, because a hot girl talked me into applying and I didn’t know a soul.

I became a Community Leader on that campus because I missed my family. I missed being a brother. That was one thing I knew I was good at it. I believe we are all called to honor each other; to be brothers and sisters to one another.

And then I found out I could get paid to talk other people believing that load, too.

I’ve got the best job on campus. Maybe I don’t get to sit in my Ivory tower… I mean CLB. Maybe I don't have a really intimidating nickname like "The Grinder." Maybe I don’t get a snazzy office with a sorta creepy Paper Mache Sarge to make my head look proportional by comparison... And no, maybe I don’t have the honor or contumacious grit to pull off the bow tie.

Yeah, Ricki, I said contumacious…. You DON’T want to play me in facebook scrabble.

I have the honor of working with a group of students. 15 fine young men and women willing to put their hearts and butts on the line, 15 men and women with hearts set for service, 15 men and women trying to be big brothers and sisters worrying about the rules only because they inform the safety and well-being of the community on campus.

15 men and women trying to be big brothers and sisters to people who sometimes don’t want a big brother or a sister… and they can be quite vocal about saying so.

William Quillen. What’s your number one job? (God, I hope he says: "To know all your residents.")

Why? (Because if we’re all doing our job, there’s not a single resident on campus who can say that someone doesn’t know their name.)

I have the privilege and blessing of rolling out of bed and walking 40 yards to an office full of people who refuse do put up with anything less.

I look around this room and I see the knowing glances that we don’t lead because it looks good on a resume, or because it gives our egos a nice stroke. We lead because, leading in right direction, is a service to our brothers and sisters.

As I look around this room, I see that the idea of honoring each other by being brother and sister to one another; to get in each other’s way and cheer them on when they’re doing well and maybe kick them in the rear when they’re living a little left…I can see that see very clearly in the eyes of each of you, each and every one of you, that this idea is not lost on a generation.

I don’t care what Todd Sutherland says.

(The speech went over well)

The Break in Spring

2007-03-17T21:07:00.000-05:00

I've had some interesting Spring Breaks. I've gone to Chicago. I've gone to Colorado. I've gone to Washington, DC. So the prospect of staying here in Galveston, Texas didn't seem overwhelmingly amazing. But it ended up possibly being my best ever.

I got two play host to not one, but two world-wise and savvy modern-day Elizabeth Bennets. Sara and Em, thank-you for allowing me to be one of the cheering throng beside your parade through the world. For the life of me, I cannot remember being more entertained while entertaining. You were the perfect guests.

The last few days, however, I've kept a promise and done absolutely no work. Which means, that for the last 72 hours, I've had no place to hide from my thoughts.

It's tough to walk on a beach and not get sorta philosophical. You have waves crashing into other waves, driving them in slightly other directions and each carrying sand here and there. You have little boys who pose for pictures that parents will use as blackmail later in their lives. You have little girls who run around with little pot-bellies completely oblivious to things such as tan lines and muffin-tops. And I'll spare you a metaphor my mind concocted for old German men in banana hammocks...

But this week I've noticed how absurd life can be. How entropic the world can seem. A friend gets scammed on Ebay. Another friend is awaiting news about the "lumps" she found. And people are trying to figure out if they can find all the peices of their broken hearts. And even I, with nary a thing to complain about, am frustrated when I look at the machinery of my life.

One thing this job has taught me very well is that it is one thing to have the outlook that everything in life, for good or bad, can be used to give us perspective. That every moment is but one in a billion-billion. That we can't appreciate the good without the bad.

But it is another thing altogether to try and translate that smug and high-brow thought to someone who is dealing with the prospect of litterally losing a part of their body. Where the fuck do I get off? And so here I am, normally verbose and witty, reduced to "oh man... wow... I don't know what to say."

But then again maybe I should just have the balls to say that. No?

I'm consistently shocked that in all the entropy of life, in all the absurd things that happen without any apparent reason, I see one distinct universal truth: that no one is immune. Everyone has something. Cancer, quadrapolegia, death, loss, a broken heart. Hell, even in my favorite case study: Paris Hilton we see something: that the apparent lack of any hardship at all has completely atrophied any muscle that could allow her any meaningful interaction with the real world.

She is the leopard raised in captivity and fed spam on sticks.

Even I, with the world on my platter: a sharp wit, shining personality and stunning good looks have my issues. I have painted myself into a corner where I have no community outside of my very wonderful job. And instead of dealing with it by searching, I've buried my head in the sand of my work. And I have been so oblivious to my whole situation that I couldn't even recognize that I might be attracted to someone. I had simply cut that part of my diet out. No vitamin C. And now I'm fighting emotional scurvy.

Yeah, I know I took that last metaphor a couple sentences too long, but maybe I just wanted to show off my knowledge of scurvy there.

I guess my point is that everyone has something. Everyone is a little bit broken. Everyone has something to which they're trying to adapt or from which they're fighting back. Its all part of the natural current of things. If we're night fighting, we're dying. And seeing as how that really is the one thing that every person has in common, maybe we're called to help each other out. Maybe we're called to push each other in a slightly different direction. We need to get in each other's way.

We all have our broken parts. And maybe, just maybe, if I'm man enough to pour into others and even more manly of me, if I could have the guts to let someone pour into me, I could make my wounds heal. And something tells me they'd be stronger at the break.

From the G to the H

2006-12-21T16:07:00.000-06:00

Right.

So here sits I, listening to a little Nas, trying to enjoy a little moment of mental centeredness. Right now, I am the King of all I survey. Both in the emotional AND the office-management meaning of the phrase.

Its a quiet world.

In about three hours, I'm about to start my drive from my New home of Galveston, Texas to my old Home of Hamilton, Illinois. I know I've talked about this before, but I'm fascinated by how when I'm here, I'm a respected (okay, semi-respected) Student Services Professional. People call me "Mr. Golemo" sometimes.

But somewhere between here and "The Big Ill" I shed the cape and top hat of decorum and professionality and am left 6 years old, in my spiderman underoos, crying about how I my sister hurt my hand... with her face... [wimpers... with occasional glances to see if Pappacho is buying it]

I'm no longer "Neil E. Golemo, with a Master's of Education" I'm "Neeeeeeely Golemo, who never stops master-..." -well you get the idea.

High school was a tough time for me. I was a very late-bloomer with a strong case of Catholic guilt and parent's who were too tricky to let me underacheive... too much. I didn't drink. I didn't chew... and I didn't go with the girls that do... no matter how hard I might have tried.

And no matter how confident I am in the man I know I've become, hob-nobbing with famous and powerful people, making meaningful friendships and finding true purpose in a job I freaking love, some not small part of me still yearns for the acceptance of the people I was too blinded by insecurity to get to really know. Yeah, I can call them stuck-up -because sometimes they were. But I played the game too, right? We were doing the Sharks and Jets dance... but in the end we were the same. It turns out High Schoolers are a lot like people.

I'm no better.

I often say that a person never changes more in their lives than they do in that first year from the summer before and after their freshman year of college. And I stand by that. So its fascinating and fustrating and surprising and disappointing and scary to go back home to try and fit yourself, with your new square edges, if even for a night, into a round hole you never really fit into in the first place. And scariest of all, when you realize that maybe your edges are a little bit more round than you thought they were. And round is comforting.

So I'm excited to go back home. And I'm becoming ok with that. Hamilton might not be a great place for me to live. But it was a fantastic place for me to be from. I'm okay with that.

And I always love my visits.

Texas, I'll be back in a minute.

Rounding out the edges

2006-11-27T09:30:00.000-06:00

For Thanksgiving this year, I went to Lake Jackson, Texas, tagging along with two friends of mine, Baylor grads who have adopted me since I moved to Galveston.

It was weird and different and strange for a plethora of reasons: it was my first Thanksgiving ever spent outside of the state of Illinois, it was my first Thanksgiving without a family member within smacking distance, my first Thanksgiving without my brother and sisters. We fried the Turkey. It was extremely nice and pleasant. I enjoyed myself immensely and was, haha, very thankful for the hospitality I enjoyed.

I'm 25 now. So this was my 26th Thanksgiving. Wow.

I overheard a lady the other day talking about how "this year Thanksgiving is just another day to me." I remember my head snapping back to look at her as if maybe the statement was just a figment of my overactive imagination. Thanksgiving, while yes, starting and ending with the sun just as any other day, could never be such in my eyes.

Thanksgiving is when my mom and at least 2 of her 4 sisters and all of their families, progeny, entourages and hangers-on make the twisty drive down my Grandma's grey gravel lane, skirting the pond and park by the garage. They hold their platters high and hug absent-mindedly as they dodge outdoor dogs whose behavior is only cared about around family gatherings.

I listen to my cousin Monica repeat the same gripe for the 20th year in a row about "who she has to knock off to get a seat at the grown-up table... she has two children for crap's sake." My cousin Zach usually practices his stand-up and button-pushing on us, centering on Steve, Monica's husband. It's pretty simple: get Steve to laugh, then Monica will be mad at him for encouraging Zach and Zach... is free. Go Zach Go.

Andee, not to be outdone invariable has one of her family get-together melt-downs. Epic, my friends. No one ever remembers what starts it all off. (Its always Zach's, Nick's or my fault.) We're usually too distracted by Andee's verbal flailings and accusations of abandonment when we should be staying out of her business in the first place. It nearly always ends up with her locking herself in the bathroom. Sweet Jesus, I miss her.

So yes, I missed all of that. I missed showing up with my parents and fighting for a seat on the couch. I missed doing dishes elbow-to-elbow with a cousin who also said something dumb. I missed being asked by my Great-Great-Great Aunt Dorethy (who tells the best stories) where my "seniorita" is? I moved to Texas. I guess I asked for it. I missed sitting at the kid's table.

It was a little strange sitting at the head of the only table at Thanksgiving, eating fried Turkey and corn-bread stuffing with pecans, being 1 of only 7 people, drinking fine wine and talking of trips to Australia's wine country and not the bowel movements of my brother's roommates. It was a little strange. But not bad.

I got a little perspective this year. I got to see how others live. I got to experience an "adult" Thanksgiving. The kind that people who don't have 3 brothers and sisters enjoy. I am thankful for that, not sad. Brian and Kristen cared enough about me to bring me into their homes and welcome me as their guest. These two people who, a month ago barely knew me from Adam. I am blessed for that.

I guess that's the great thing about perspective. It helps us to round out the edges. As I was telling my friend Charlotte, a broken heart stretches our boundaries and helps us appreciate how good it feels to have love.

The turkey tastes better when you've gone hungry.

A warm blanket feels better when you've been cold.

And being home feels the greatest when you've been a stranger in a strange land for months.

I can't help but wonder if maybe Paris Hilton wouldn't be such a vapid bitch if she had an understanding what it was like to be hungry and cold and lonely and tired but having to work anyway. She has no experience to help her see. When I think of how my hurts have help me appreciate my joys, and how my loves have helped me truly feel the depth and fidelity of my losses, I feel horrible for how meaningless everything must seem for her. No wonder she whores herself for attention, she's desperate for feeling.

I love how the world was constructed to teach. If we're willing to consider them, every little experience, from stop-light to chemo-therapy, can help us to better understand the "why's" and "what-for's." It's tiring, I know. But we feel for a reason, and we don't hurt without one. Don't worry about the reason. Just wonder why.

If life is a game. Play the 48, enjoy the orange slices Jimmy's mom brought, and worry about the score later.

So let her eat cake...

2006-09-20T10:21:00.000-05:00

Today, my little sister leaves our fine nation of apple pie, football and “Don’t Tread on Me” for a land of Tart O’ Pomme, Joue au Foot and “I’m le tired…” It is a big deal. She’ll be on her own for really the first time in her life. I don’t believe she has ever been farther away than a day-trip from her parents… ever.

Elizabeth is, and always has been, the baby of the family. And with our clan, this came with its perks and its quirks.

For instance, I remember the tete a tete (a tete a tete)’s between the four of the Golemo children invariably resulting in having Beth always be the one to “butter-up” my father when we wanted to see a movie on a Friday night instead of “spending real time, damnit” at home playing Trivial Pursuit as a family. Yeah, dad, “real-cheap-time.”

As the youngest of 4 button-pushing children, Elizabeth was always more than just the “cute one.” She was a combo-plate of a full-size, interactive, babydoll, 11th man, lab-rat, and test-monkey.

Through taking advantage of her natural trust and adoration, Kate, Ben and I were all able to learn much about life and the human condition. We all took advantage of her naiveté (ah, the malleability of the young mind) and used her as a personal megaphone from one time to another. If we thought the actions of a certain family member, for instance, was askew but family politics (where hypocrisy is defined) demanded that we keep that particular opinion to ourselves, one needed only to make a well-worded observation in an authoritative voice within earshot of an always-eager-to-be-paid-attention-to Elizabeth, and then remember to act shocked when we hear the opinion how “Rachel has always been a slut when it comes to Ross” spew forth from the mouth of a 3-year-old.

They grow up so fast.

My sister has what could be the worst temper of anyone I’ve ever known; especially when it comes to showing violence. And upon a moment’s reflection, I don’t know that I am not at least partially responsible. I remember the three of us torturing her based on her inability to pronounce certain phrases such as “froon-ral” as opposed to “funeral.” “Froon-ral girl! Froonral girl!” we’d croon. My mother still tells stories about how my little sister would just simply make words up, when she couldn’t remember which one to use. For instance, “Steel Pag-na-doolian” starring Sally Field, Dolly Parton, Julia Roberts, Olympia Dukakis, etc. was a favorite movie of hers as a 4 year-old. “And why not?” my mother would defend.

But back to her temper, I remember once watching her stop -in mid-swing- and with narrowed eyes, coldly consider the hammer in her hands to muse which end (the claw or the head) would do more damage to the face of an older (handsomer) brother who just gave her a wet-willy.
I remember watching my father hold her with one arm and hold a spoon in one of her hands with his other arm and help her lip-sync Stevie Wonder to the entertainment of us all. So one can understand how strange it is to imagine my little sister living –more or less- on her own, in a country across an ocean (a big one, at that).

I don’t doubt her ability to make it on her own. Not at all. It just sorta snuck up on me. She turned 21 last month. When did this happen? I don’t know if I’m ready to stop seeing her in her First-Communion dress practicing converting the neighbor kids with Necco-wafers.

Elizabeth, just like all of my parent’s children, has never really resided in the real world. With her, it really is possible to make a living as a theatre major with a degree from a small school and tons of college debt. And you know, I’m not so sure that she’s wrong. The world is changed not by those who see things as they are, but as they could be.

One more story. I remember when I got the make-a-wish thingy and our family took the trip to Disney World and then up along the East Coast. “Our great family adventure.” Yes, I remember the dorky matching outfits we all wore “in case one of us got lost, we’d all know what everyone else was wearing.” I remember meeting Mickey and the smug look on my father’s face when he found a faster way to do anything.

But I also remember the one who had the most fun of us all, the one who made friends with every waitress or waiter or stockboy at every restaurant or store to which our horde went. I remember the one of us all who managed to make an impression upon every park-ranger and tour guide we met. It wasn’t the bald-headed kid on chemo. It wasn’t the sharp-witted older sister. And it wasn’t the always solemn and completely honest Bennie-hanna. It was the two-year old who had no fear and knew no strangers.

Bon chance, Elizabeth Erin Rose Golemo. I envy the hearts you’ll make a little bigger wherever you go.

Bon Voyage, and Bon chance!

Je t’aime.

40 years of Awesomeness

2006-09-08T10:01:00.000-05:00

Today we celebrate the 40th anniversary of the first episode of Star Trek.

Thank-you, Creator, Gene Roddenberry, for giving all Nerds a common flag under which they may join, comiserate, and with the help of a well-stocked bar at the convention hotel, multiply.

For 40 years, you've helped the world to know that a series full of flimsy plots, formulaic story lines and squelchy acting can truly be more than the sum of its parts. (MTV owes you one.)

For what you've done with so little, we salute you.

For what you've done for the world, we thank you.

Please, live long, and prosper.

Life is in the contrast

2006-09-07T02:25:00.000-05:00

Today was a day like the first time you’re rough-housing with a new girlfriend and she accidentally pops you in the nose. Things are still fun. Things are still cute. But see if you don’t keep an eye on that left hook of hers from now on.

I love it here in Galveston. I feel like I’m kicking ass. I’m having fun. I’m making mistakes and that’s okay. I’m trying. I’m doing things right. And that’s good too. I’m being overbearing and riding on my RA’s. I’m challenging them. And they’re challenging me right back.

Working with James… well its like working with Fred G. Sanford from Sanford and Sons. You really have no idea from one moment to the next whether he’s going to say something crass, complain, piss off a student or clutch his chest and wail: “I’m a-comin, Elizabeth!” Ol’ Jimmy, he keeps it interesting.

I have a boss that has my back. He works for the people who work for him. And for that, he’s earned my very hardest effort. I feel good about things.

However, today… Today was that bop in the schnozz from a pretty girl. I was scattered from the moment I woke up. It was one of those days where everything seemed to be taking twice as many trips because you keep forgetting keys, which seem to disappear the moment you put them on your desk. Everything took me at least two tries today. I left my I.D. in my apartment, went to the office and grabbed the wrong spare key, so I had to do the walk of shame back to the office again get the right spare key to let myself back into my apartment so I can waste another 20 minutes looking for the key that ended up being in the pocket of the pants I was sure I had already checked.

I ruffled the feathers of the one group of people on campus I really can’t afford to ruffle. And what’s more, it sorta went down in such a way that, in my standing up for myself, I’m afraid I might have got them bopped in the nose themselves. I think I’d rather have taken the hit and saved the political currency for a rainier day. But I wouldn’t have been the only one suffering the hit, so I couldn’t.

Apparently, not everyone on campus sees me as Baylor’s gift to the A&M world. Surprise.

Everything took twice as long to do today. I felt like everything I did rubbed people the wrong way. It was the sort of day that made you really understand the phrase: “the road to hell is paved in good intentions.” My intentions were pure, I still think my execution was true. But you know there’s many a slip twixt the cup and the lip. And I seemed to definitely be missing that damn lip today.

But today I also had my very first 1-on-1 with an RA. Not a big production. It is merely meant as time with her supervisor to help her get an idea of her performance as well as a chance for the supervisor to get feedback on their performance. But also, it’s a chance for me to get nosey and let them get nosey as well. After we covered the basic crap about what she had planned insofar as programming, I had a chance to ask her about her boyfriend of nearly 2 years. I had a chance to let her know that I do think about our interactions and that I do notice things. I love bonding.

And then I gave her the chance to ask me anything. And Sweet Jesus, she went straight for the jugular. Girls. So I was completely honest, though I don’t know she was impressed with the answer. I told her where I was.

We talked about how I’m getting used to living on my own, for the first time ever, after moving from a place where I knew everyone and everything to a place where a month later I’m still a little hazy on how the “hold” button works on the phones. I admitted that it’s a little hard to close my door at night and walk around an empty apartment, hearing no other voices than those on T.V. and my own.

I kinda want a dog. Or maybe a cat.

It was all a little easier to deal when I was working the 14-hour days during the planning of RA Training, the actual days of RA training and then Check-in and Gig ‘Em Week. But now that I’m getting the hang of things, I’m finding that the world actually won’t stop spinning on its axis without me and I actually don’t have to be around all the time.

So what do I do now? I’ve been working out again. I play about two hours of basketball and then follow that up with a quick run around the periphery of campus (two, if I’m feeling saucey or the basketball games were only half-court).

Um, I watch House on Tuesdays at 7 and The Contender at 9. But I don’t really like watching T.V. by myself.

I’ve been bothering the residents on my floor. I mess with the Bulletin Board. Sometimes I go back to the office and check my email, mess with my To Do lists for the next day, straighten things up, take out the trash and save Virginia a little work.

But really lately, I’ve been spending a lot of my free time thinking about how blessed I am to be where I am. I seriously have the greatest job in the world. I freaking love every single one of my RA’s. I think we both began to tear up [still in the 1-on-1] when I was telling her this.

Yes, things are a little… different. But I love the fact that I have days like this. I love that I’m not in a perfect situation. I think that we, as people, need to be a little uncomfortable. We need to have that struggle, that uphill fight, to keep us pushing. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a masochist, [I am Catholic]. I just think that we need to have a sense of accomplishment.

We need to have those sour days so we can appreciate the sweet ones. We need to have bad bosses so we can appreciate the good ones. We need to have our hearts broken from time to time, so we know how to truly use them. Life is all about contrasts.

Today was a classic case of this. I had my moment with Danielle where I sorta began to choke up. Because it was during a 1-on-1 with my first Hall Director and Mentor, Andrew Telep, when I first realized the path God had chosen for my life. I wanted to be a Hall Director. I wanted to have 1-on-1’s with RA’s and hope God will use me, as unworthy as I may be, to pour into their lives as I had others pour into me. I don’t think I realized this morning how that moment was 4 years in the making. I don’t think Danielle realized it either. Hell, I’m not sure I fully grasp it as I’m typing.

I guess my point is that I need to be thankful for days like these. Life is in the contrast, fellas. Thank the black so I can see the white.

Dropping it like its hot,
Neil

Soul'd Out

2006-08-25T07:31:00.000-05:00

In my line of work, if one walks into a large room to the sound of someone yelling: "HUMP IT!", you know the next 30 seconds is going to be interesting.

Still sweating from my late-night run circling campus, gallon of water in hand, shorts slightly sagging from the three sets of id's and keys I have to carry, I see a girl and a fella perched on a railing and smoking in the way only a kid with new-found status can.

I walk through doors and smell the faintly smokey scent of mingled sweat and aggression. I hear strangely syncapated grunts and yells and stroll through yet another set of doors to see a gym with about 50 people in dark red lined up standing on the bleachers chanting in unison to a fella gyrating in a a denim costume.

As people see me, wearing my white shirt decorated with some macho reference to the superiority of one sport to all others written in yellow and green, they smile and cheer and say things like "join us" and "we've been hoping you'd come" as they open a path for me into the middle -the heart- of their mob. I smoosh up between two of their "newer" members. The ringleaders, in their crude costumes, begin to gyrate once again, each theatric movement of their arms answered by a certain sound spewed from the crowd. I stand, awkward, not knowing what to do with my hands.

Every ounce of the Green and Gold flowing through my veins is screaming at me in the voice of William Jennings Bryant: "Isolationism! You have your allegiances!"

And then I remember the diatribe I let loose on a student (imagine that, me lecturing someone?) earlier in the day about sucking the marrow out of life. Finding meaning in every little thing you do. About how life is so short and precious and priceless. And if that the only universal that drives every person is purpose.

So I let go. I stopped trying to be an island of Baptist superiority in a heathen world and let myself enjoy a little dual-citizenship.

I sold out for a little soul.

Days later, I was still enjoying the conflict within me. Should I laugh at the person who just screamed "WHOOP!"? Or should I laugh with them?

For now, I refuse to choose and decide to be one with the wind. I do as I please thankyouverymuch.

My soul can have dual citizenship later. But for now, I'm gonna dip my toe in the water.

Look Ma, no hands.

Island Living... better than Mainland Dying.

2006-08-12T00:49:00.000-05:00

Funny title yeah?

So I got some offers from some different places. I chose my boss. His name is Todd. Pretty cool guy.

I'm Texas A&M at Galveston's newest Student Development Specialist II. I live on campus in Hullabaloo Hall and it is my distinguished job to run the RA program, work in housing and I also run the pool located in the middle of this harbor campus.

I'm not going to kid, I was sorta on the edge of freaking out in my first couple days here. I'm told everyone starting a new job has the "holy shit what did I just get myself into?" moments. I've had like 5.

It was tough for me to move from Waco, where my best friends live, my sports teams play, and I know all the quickest ways to get from any A to any B. Actually, I'm a little shocked how comfortable I had grown with my life of mediocrity in Waco. Nothing bad about my time there. Waco is a fantastic place to live for 4-6 years. But lets be honest, in the 80 yard drive that is life, Waco is ten-yards between your own 40 and the 50. At the end of it, you're out of your own territory, but you still have half a field to go. Y'know? I think my little scamper was pretty good, I broke some tackles, but I'm nowhere near getting the 6 points I have coming to me.

In comes Todd, Colin, David, Shelle, Robert, James and Belinda. The people who sold A&M to me. They got me here on this island city. I moved myself here with the help of my friends the missed company of whom, ironically, was keeping me in Waco. After the pathetic 15 minutes it took to move my material world into my new apartment, we went to dinner. We got lost a couple of times on the way, but we got there.

Dinner at a seafood restaurant (when in Rome...) during which, I managed to simultaneously talk said friends into leaving town that very night, and work up the beginnings of a nervous break-down (caused from pre-emptive homesickness). I began praying under my breath... well it was sort of swearing where I mentioned God, Jesus, and St. Jude. Providence in the form of my ex-girlfriend Rhonda (yeah, we used to make-out on a fairly regular basis ;-) ) presents itself in a whiney "lets go by the beeeeeeeeach [snorts]!!" And so we did.

As we were walking across the Seawall towards the 7+ mile beach at 11 at night, I had my head down, staring at my feet, muttering in my head and calculating certain illnesses I could get that would leave me simultaneously feared and respected but relieving me from all responsibility of any kind- and forcing me to go back to my "dark place" where everying thing is safe. And then something Rhonda says to me about how big a jerk Eric is or something makes me look up. Apparently, I had walked 40 yards on a rock pier into the bay of black waves with white baby-hair curls on their heads sliding in roughly the same direction all around me. I looked up and out and saw an ocean full of my musical new friends, all heading in towards me. I saw the reflection of a big moon in the lumpy water.

Each one of these waves had a story, starting tens of thousands of miles away as a butterfly flapping its wings in Buenos Aires or some jackass throwing a bottle off a fishing boat (seriously dude, give a hoot). But more importantly they have all been marching towards their end. Their special job. Add a little sand. Attack the edge of a rock. Get dirty fish-water on some ex-girlfriend sitting too close to the edge of a rock pier. They do their little job and they're done. And like the universe's biggest dominoe run, they set off another wave on a slightly tangential direction to do a slightly different job.

All of a sudden moving 4 hours away from Waco wasn't that big a deal. Gas is expensive. But Texas roads are good. In the meantime I've got and incredibly important job to do with awesome people who want to help me do it.

Once again, God is more faithful than I deserve.

And talking through waves and a little girl with a big mouth? Apparently, the Big Fella still likes his cliche's.

Kisses,
Neil

Globe Trottin'

2006-07-20T13:29:00.000-05:00

Hey friends! I know its been a long time since I've posted. Sorry.

To be completely honest, I stopped posting because I realized that my own inability to avoid being earnest could bite me in the proverbial butt. So, you know what they say... If you can't say anything honest... well I guess they dont' really say that at all, do they? I shut up. People were thankful.

So to the moment.

I'll admit it. I limped out of the semester. I was working 40-50 hours a week, getting paid for 20. I was taking 12 Graduate hours of school and conducting a nation-wide job search. All while trying to graduate.

I loved my job directing Martin Hall. That was a dream come true! It was quite litterally what I had been dreaming of doing for the last 3 years of my life. And I got the chance to do it. I nearly cried. I miss my bois.

But, life was a little trying. I was beat. The crap with Rhonda nearly ended me.

So the last couple of months... I've been chillin. Sleepin on a couch. Not working. Running when I want to. Playing basketball. Watching Entourage. Reading books. Getting back into the business of being me. I love it.

But a week or so ago, I realized I need a job. So I started sending out applications with my stellar resume. Less than 4 days later, I was flying to Orange County, CA, Galveston, TX, Charlotte, N.C. and Vermont. I need to make a decision though. So we'll see how it goes. I got two more offers today actually to interview with a property in Seattle, WA and Wilkes College. I've loved all of my interviews thus far. So we'll see how things go.

Currently, I am back in the Big Ill for the second time in as many weeks. Adam Ancelet, my old pal and first school friend is getting Married. Ew. So I dragged my friend Heather Turner up here with me so people won't think I'm gay...

She loves it. Hates that I dress better than her.

So that's the do, right now. Great times.

I'm going to get goin. I promise I'll get more Blogging. Real blogging. Once a week. Promise.

Kisses,
Neil

No words

2005-12-09T02:45:00.000-06:00

Tonight I found out that a very good friend of mine, Jacob Burling, died in a Car Crash.

I do not know what to think. My cousin tried to call me but I was in a movie. I sent him a text message telling him I'd call after and he just replied: "Dont bad news jake burling is dead car accident."

I do not know what to think. Its as though the words are a bullet shot into a room full of bells. It's just bouncing around here and there, to and fro. But eventually... eventually it will stick.

My prayers for Jacob's family and many many friends.

I'm not my Stinking khaki's

2005-12-05T04:33:00.001-06:00

Is it me? Or does our society celebrate being "young" wayyyy too much? And we don't celebrate being old at all. To me, this freaking sucks because we're having fewer children, and living longer.

WTF?

If you look around the world today, watch the TV, listen to the music, eat the food, shop in the stores, you're going to see nearly everything is marketed to youth.

What is so great about being young? I can understand the nostalgia of blissful ignorance when my world, quite litterally, ended past the corner of 19th street and was naught but a vision outside the windows of my family's caravan. But now that I think about it, I wish I had better understood my world. I would have talked to my grandfather and not worried so much about the new Lindsay Lohan album or NES. I would have spent more time with the nerdy girl who loved the "real me" in high school and less with the one that only wanted me for a trophy. Cause we KNOW which gained the freshman 50 and which one is currently curing cancer.

Yeah, I'm the trophy, Myles.

Call me a fan of a Liberal Arts Education, but young kids are called young kids for a reason. They're dumb. They're stupid. They don't even know enough of the world to know they know nothing of the world.

If you don't have any money in this world, then you really have no power. This is a basic truth. But there's another side to that coin. If you don't have any money, then you can't do any harm, either. I read all the time that the reason for this marketing towards youth and teenagers is because A) they are dumb enough to fall for billboards, snappy ads and Carson Daly and B) they are the ones with the skyrocketing disposible income. Income? Income? Since when did a 3-6 after school job count as income?

Parents, don't give your kids money.

What is happening now in America is making me sick. Cause it turns out that teenagers aren't the only ones falling for the propaganda that tells them they're the best and that High School is the best time of their lives. It turns out that we really all think Laguna Beach is bitchin'.

I don't want to be a teenager, but damn, they can do whatever they want. They're free to drink and screw and do... -under the safety net of daddy's tax shelter. Surprisingly warm there. And Dr. Spock has a generation of kids who don't know the sweet perspective of pain past having to settle for the green Dodge as opposed to the red VW.

I cry.

How do we fix things? Well there are a lot of clever ways. For instance, we can let every shitty Ashlee Simpson/Usher/Hillary Duff movie be just a smidge more realistic. They can look immature, and stupid, as they should. Ashlee doesn't get her own apartment at the age of 17. Usher has someone not take a check he tries to write because the check number is below #50. And Hillary Duff has a really bad case of Cramps, realizes that a mediocre voice really can't win some fella's heart and that trying some stupid scheme to do something sweet for someone else doesn't turn out for the best, has serious consequences and people are really hurt.

Oh, and they could also put real teenagers in the roles played by teenagers. THAT would help a lot. Chad Michael Murray is 32 years old. I swear to God.

Whatever. I need sleep. I'm out of soap anyway.

Prairie State Perspective (refreshed)

2005-11-28T04:50:00.000-06:00

A 10-day weekend for Thanksgiving. It looks like a lot when I see it in type, really.

I don't have class on Fridays and my cohort is given a free "no questions asked" walk on our Tuesday class to use at our discretion. Add to that a heart-felt phone call to the professor of my Monday class explaining how my mother bought an extra ticket to see the national tour of Wicked on the 18th in St Louis on the off-chance that yours truly would be able to attend with her, you see how I got this wondrous block of days to vacate my everyday circumstances.

I took a morning flight out of Dallas into St. Louis. I had about 7 hours to waste, so I took the Metrolink downtown, found a Starbucks and camped out. Hence the previous caffeine-laced post. However, I was surprised at how nervous I was to be coming home.

You see, there's this certain phenomenon that takes place when anyone who has any semblance of a life somewhere, "goes home." I'll try to explain.

In Waco, I am a respected -okay semi-respected- Graduate Assistant with Baylor Student Athlete Services. It's a tough job and not for the faint of heart. I'm constantly walking the line between being "cool": understanding the lingo, knowing when to laugh, being able to jab and cut with my own lines, being able to be funny. And sometimes I have to be "hard": sniffing out lies, disciplining, kicking athletes out, writing reports to coaches, etc. I think I do a very good job.

And then there's Graduate school. In my classes, being surrounded by very smart and intelligent people driven in earnest pursuit of knowledge insists I stay on my toes. I have professors who push me and a mentor that kicks me and friends that challenge me.

So how is it then, if I am so grown-up, that the very moment I pass the "Hamilton: Pop. 3,300" sign, I cease to be Neil Golemo, Future Student Services Professional and am once again, Neil Golemo, Gregg and Milly's kid, the one who's throw up in the fake potted plant outside the Nurse's office? (Not once, but twice)

This phenomenon truly fascinates me. How is it that I can go from waxing intellectual about what Bonhoefer would say about the debt-load of the average college graduate to having a wet-willy war with my little sister? (she's 20 years old, but in my mind she'll always be 6 years-old and wearing her first-communion dress) I'll say this much. Its fun... for the most part. Oh and for the record, I think 'ol Dietrich would have been "against it."

There was a time where I couldn't wait to leave a Hamilton. I hated it. It was killing me. It was, as Myles told me the first time we ever conversed, "the kudzu around my legs." And believe-you-me, I needed to leave. Leaving Hamilton/Illinois was perhaps the best/ballsy-est thing I've ever done for myself; it was good for me in so many ways. It was a cooling bath of water that hardened me.

I've grown up so much since then. My friends I've made at Baylor are the best I've ever had. (I can just hear every one of them yelling "FAG!" over my shoulder) I am not Gregg and Milly's son. I am not Neil Golemo, super-Christian, holier than thou, didn't drink all through high school, National Merit Scholar, perfect person (vomit). I am not the "miracle child" of whom so much is expected. I can just be Neil, here. I got a clean start.

Despite my relapses, I am not the same Neil I used to be. -Okay, so maybe I didn't toss my childish ways quite far enough. I might not have thrown them, but at least I've loosened my strangle-grip on them. And being away has done that for me. It's let me escape the unchanging definition of me that so makes people feel safe.

But you know, now it feels as though coming back to Illinois might be yet another stage in who I am. In a strange way, we really don't ever change. We just grow. A tree still has its innermost rings and I will always be "Gregg and Milly's boy." And to some, I will always be remembered for the places in which I've retched... But I think that's a good thing. We can never be here without first having been there. As much as I'd like to pretend to be all branches and leaves, I can't forget that I have my roots. It does me good to remember that.

It's sorta like Monet's glance from the canvas back to the actual haystacks. I'm still a work in progress, but its the perspective that can allow me to be a masterpiece. Here's to my own personal Renaissance

Drunk Posting is so Trashy.

2005-11-27T04:47:00.001-06:00

Next time, I promise never to do it again.

On a side note. I'm finally going to send in some of my posts. If anyone has any ones that they find particularly fun, let a fella know. And tell me too.

My Brother, The Genius

2005-11-26T05:38:00.000-06:00

I just had what could possibly be, the moment for which I've been praying my entire damned life.

It started out innocuous enough. The day after Thanksgiving, my favorite holida (0utside my birthday. So I'm an ass, sue me.) We woke up aroudn 10 and went to go play walley-ball. It was two hours of completley un-coordinated fun (walleyball is impossible to be good at. Screw you, Paul O'Neil for trying to give me any God-damned advice on where to stand, you smug asshole.) . And that's why I like it. We're all equal.

Anyway, afterwards, Bennie-hanna, younger brother extrordinaire and I went home to take 5 minute (count-em, 5-minute) showers and retrieve Ben's significant other/girlfriend of 4+ years, Erin O'Neil (related to the smug bastard, Paul of the same surname). 2 showers and a couple of Gold-Bond splashes to the nethers later (I taught him that) we were meeting the rest of the famn Golemo damily in the River City Mall to see "Walk the Line." Great movie. Honestly. Kicked my butt. Made me want to stop drinking. That's wHy Ivey swtihced ot gUienns nd dicer only. [sips Hornsby (John I love you, baby)]

For the record, Bonhoeffer would fucking LOVE ME right now.

After that, we went and played Apples to Apples. A great game I've heard about for years. Madame, mi madre, kicked everyone's ass. Because no one better, on God's green and purple earth, has the ability to think like other people, than my mother. She kicked our asses. All 9 of us.

As the game was ending, I recieved a phone-call from my favorite person ever to graduate from a Catholic school, (other than Pappacho) Tom "my dad's ironically a foot doctor" Sowlles. He says everyone's going to the place my parent's always told me I couldn't go: The "crew." Resident local bar/Den of iniquity.

"I'm in." I say.

I drive my cousin Andee's car, as well as Andee herself (sorry, I'm reading Restaurant at The End of The Universe right now) to said bar. [Enter smokey entrance] Andee is the shit (and a female) and all is good. We kick ass and in the process, names are taken. Good times.

Eventually, such a bombardment of "wasn't it great back when's" and "remember the time you did that's" and "I'll never forget when you kicked that teacher in the ear's" began to get to me. So I decided my brother and his significant other/girlfriend, Erin O'Neill (sister of that smug bastard, Paul of the same surname) should share in the "fun." It'd be good for them.

So I leave (without hollaring at my ex-girlfriend, Nikki McVeigh-even if you still look hot) and drive home and tell my brother that pretty much half of his grade is at the Crew (for the record 12 kids is nearly, in fact, half his grade). He and Erin, under a blanket and sitting upright is a little weird, but I don't ask... or make eye-contact, agree to come with us. "It'll be interesting, they say" (Erin's still pissed because people never cared about my brother until he went to West Point the year after 9/11... which may be slightly true).

But I'll say this much. I wanted my brother to go. Because I've realized this much in my years since High School. If I can grow up even a smidge. Then other people can too, god-damnit. Zach Steinman has. And Jesus-knows, Zach Steinman... well anyone knows-knows. I wanted his approval so much. It broke my heart in high-school when he told me "y'know, Golemo, how popular you'd be if you drank?" And yet, I think he gets where I was, now. If he can get it, 3 years after my graduation, other can, too. Plus, even if your interests are purely sociological, its hella-fun.

So we all go. I've not had a drink. So much fun. I actually, for the first time since watching my 18-month-old cousin learn my name, got to watch someone learn as I saw my brother learn the same lesson I've learned 3 or 4 times over, because once isn't enough for the average genius.

One night of me choiffering (sp?) Bennie and his significant other/girlfriend of 4+ years Erin O'Neill (sister of the smug bastard of the same surname) around, we end up in our kitchen drinking tastey beers (imported) and remembering better times and how perspective can kick all our asses...

Zoned out for a second listening to music.

Zach "the man" Allen leaves.

Erin O'Neill (sister of the smug bastard of the same surname) needed to go home... cause its 3 AM.

"I can walk," she moronically states.

"It's Illinois" as if anyone had forgotten "its 22 degrees outside. You're not walking home."

[skipping stupid not-so-witty reparte.]

I'm driving her home, in the back seat of my dad's second-hand Luxury Buick/"Old-Man-Mobile" (but he really likes it) with Ben in the back seat. I'm driving Ms and Mr. Daisey.

They smoochey-woochie at her front door.

Ben and I start to chat. He's pissed about things. I'm wanting to hear about him. "Tell me something important" my jewish-mother mantra as become. "Seriously." He pours.

I dole out brotherly advice. And honestly, we end up having a wonderful conversation. I drive my father's (surprisingly comfortable) car around all the tracks for about45 mintutes. My brother, the best friend and God's greatest-ever gift to me, have a wonderful convo. We talk about both the important and the retarded-everyday that so makes up a brother's life. A child's life.

I feel like a good man. I tell him how I only want to affect people. I tell him about Jonah and he says he reads my blog about him.... a lot. I choke back the tears.

And then we come back to the kitchen and talk about authors, theology and the girl I dig between bouts with our toilet. (number 2 comes when it comes)

We listen to some Death Cab and I write this blog.

I love my brother. He loves me. He says my life has improved our families. I can die at 5:45 proud. But I hope I live 'til 10 AM. Cause Pappacho's taking me and Bennie to see Camp Eastman at 8. We've planned to ask him about Grandpa and Grandma Golemo. All we know, between the two of us, is that He was a medic in the 82nd, had an Eagle and that She could, in one movement, kick her shoe off her foot and hit a running pappacho in the back of the head with it as he was fleeing the room. We want more.

I love you Bennie. I love you, dad. I love you God.

Kisses,
Neil

L minus the Cool J.

2005-11-18T15:05:00.000-06:00

I'm not going to kid you, gentle readers, I'm having a bit of trouble starting this Blog. I was thinking of starting off with something like "I remember the time I punched Racism in the kidney... that was sweet" but I wasn't diggin that. Too completely pointless.

I'm pondering Love. I was wondering if I've ever Loved anyone. I would say "no." I love my mom. I love my brothers and sisters. I love my athletes and I love my friends and family. I love the guy whose coffee I just randomly bought. He looked cold, and his jacket had a hole in it. And this Gingerbread Latte really IS too good not to share.

I think sometimes I just need to start writing.

I'll just jump into it. Love is not a feeling. Its a choice. People get pissed off when you say that. Because we've been raised on after-school specials and the OC and "The Notebook" on screens in houses where parents let their children learn morality while they are chasing careers in directions that veer like a) "women drivers on cough syrup" (Annie Spruell gave me that), b) "two bottle rockets tied to a shoe" (Trevor, the 8-year-old in Starbucks two tables away from me contributed that gem), or finally, c) "a dog chasing a mailman with a right leg 4 inches shorter than the left (That gem was given to me by Bethany Rose "don't make a perverted joke about my last name" Pettit).

Movies like Hitch, pretty much any collaboration of Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks, or any movie where the audience doesn't see more than five minutes after the courtship, though rife with zany and awkward Ben Stiller moments they may be, don't give us an accurate idea of what "love" is. They tell us about Attraction and Connection and Caring. But Love? Not so much. They're what I would refer to as "emotional pornography."

To be absolutely honest, they really are a form of pornography when you think about it. They're completely idealized, over-simplified, staged and utterly unrealistic. No one ever really talks like that and the music tends to be cheesey as well. But I digress...

As I said above, Love is a choice. It's a choice to be loyal to, care about, and put your feelings below the needs of, someone else. Come what may.

Oh, and lets discuss "come what may." The "what" is short for "whatever" as in "come whatever in the world that could possibly come, we don't care. It won't shake my resolve to love this person." Possible things that may come: Halitosis, a big fat gut, alcoholism, jiggle in the thighs, cancer, annoying wheezing laugh, quadrapolegia, colostomies and their corresponding bags, losing a job, children, loss of children, a third chin, Disease, depression, an obsession with Dungeons & Dragons, a taste for expensive jewelry/bling, receding hairlines, proceeding waistlines, loss of hearing, the inability to cook a simple bag of popcorn without burning it, dammit... That's a short list.

When you marry someone, you're making a promise to continue to make that promise again and again and again and again. And then some more.

And I've never done this. I've had my fair share of relationships, and I've given up on every single one of them thus far. Sometimes it was my choice, and believe-it-or-not, sometimes it wasn't. But there's one thing in common of all my relationships (besides the fact that I was in them... [sad face-melting-into self-deprecating laugh]) : I've given up on them all.

Right now, I feel like I'm noodles on a rolling boil. I'm everywhere and everything but settled, but eventually, I know that I'll get to the point where if I'm thrown against a wall, I'll stick. (That's a metaphor, everyone.)

Here's to being Al Dente. Here's to making it stick. Here's to choosing to give up the right to choose.

When you can't think of anything to write... write what you're thinking

2005-11-07T03:07:00.000-06:00

Yeah so I was walking from my apt to Common Grounds (local coffee shop) one night over fall break a year ago or so and I cut through the Collins Parking Lot. I got to that dark corner where you always see the raccoons and I walk by this car parked right next to the sidewalk. As I get close to it, I notice its sorta bouncing. Its late, and I had junk on my mind and I wasn't really thinking and then I walked right by it and I hear "Jesus... [moan]oh GOD[moan/]!"

At this point, my Porndar goes off and I turn back. I see the sillhouettes... wow. I blushed and clapped and kept on going. I was still giggling like a little girl when I met up with my date. Needless to say, it got the conversation going with the lady-friend... ifyouknowwhatImeanandIthinkyoudo... right. We mutually decided she needed to go home and wash her hair and it was totally mutual.

Sometimes I cry when no one's around.

(whoa, totally give away small-town origins when you reference anything to where you can see a certain type of animal... BID)

Yeah, I said it.

2005-08-19T01:34:00.000-05:00

You KNOW you've been a virgin too long when you talk to a beautiful woman and skip being horny and go straight to "pissed off."

If you don't know how I feel, then you're either under 24, or not a virgin, or I'm wondering why a Eunich would be on my webspace.

For the last eight or nine months I feel I've been a frayed rubber ball made from the stretched rubber-bands of used out and overworn emotional muscles that so form a man. I've had relationship after relationship, both platonic and others with the potential for more, sail into and promptly through the harbor of my influence without so much waggled hand or turned head. It's been a while since I've been able to care enough to care.

I'm not asking for sympathy.

Not asking for pity.

Not looking for attention.

Its just that I don't have the emotional currency to spend on a girl right now in my life. When talking to my recently-married friend Jordan about what it's like to be newly-wed, he admitted that at times, he finds himself a little weirded out and wondering "ok, don't you need to go home? Aren't your parents going to get pissed off if you're here past your curfew?" This ejaculation of inner thoughts put a look on my face somewhere between smelling poo in my office and a friend telling me a story of how he saw a girl throw up on her tray at lunch and ate anyway. I know my emotional stamina is barely enough to sustain a run across the court much less the 12-round bout that can be a day with even the sweetest, most sublime peach of a lass.

And yet, there's this knowlege that someday, I am going to want a woman in my life. I mean, one day, I really do want to meet a woman whom I could serve and support. Someone to argue with over who's going to take little Neil Jr and Neilia to their respective baseball and ballet classes. (Not that I'd have a problem with the reversal of their classes... I'm told ballet is quite a test of one's man-hood... no really.)

I know this is a need I'm going to have. And thinking about it is like thinking about a huge bill that I'm going to pay someday in the future. My mind-set is "hell, start paying that bad-boy down right away, son!" So one can see my angst.

So I was talking to a friend of mine tonight and I realized this is what I want. I want to meet a girl. A great girl. Preferably a semi-confirmed single girl who is currently focused on her career. One that I could call every 3 or 4 days. No more. -And by "call" I mean like 5 minutes to an hour conversations. Tops. And no text-message conversations. Text messages should be one-and-done in my opinion. Any more than that, pick up the damn phone and call.

Maybe I could see her every couple or few weeks: Movie and/or Coffee (or a beer/drink with an umbrella - guess). Nothing more domestic than that for the first couple months. Maybe, eventually, she could meet a friend or two or I'll cook her dinner at my house after a couple months. No kissing for a month or two. Seriously. That just makes you want to be a dumbass and see her more often.

Talk only. This damn way we'll be forced to actually, I don't know, um, get to know each other?

I just want to go slow. And by slow I mean, not fast. If she asks me to meet a family member in that first few months, they'd better have cancer or some darn entertaining magic tricks (at least be double-jointed? Pls Advise).

I don't know how to say it. But Baylor does weird things to you. I'm only just now realizing how it grips you -holds you. Only at Baylor could you eavesdrop on two girls talking and hear about how the first date with this fella had to be the last because she "just couldn't see them getting married." I know all dates are interviews, but damn.

Now that Graduate school has shoved me towards the periphery of the Baylor bubble I'm able to enjoy the view from my window seat and see how the rest of the world lives. Its not a window seat. Its the blowhole from which I am able to recieve some much-needed air. One of the things about living in the belly of the beast is that most of the time its too dark to get a good look at one's reflection. We forget this sometimes.

Its around this part of a blog that I usually try to offer some catharsis, a road to the salvation for which I so dearly pray. I am sorry, but don't know if this time I can offer such satisfaction. I don't expect to be "over" these feelings anytime so soon. This next year is going to be one of planning for the next leg of my grand voyage through life. Will I stay at Baylor? 50% and falling. Will I finally go "out east" as I've been promising myself for ever so long? Or will God follow precedent and lead me some other crazy place for reasons completely beyond my comprehension? Who's to know? Well me, eventually.

Until the time when what is to be known is being known, I guess I'll just sip my beer, smile and nod the occasional angry nod. Freaking virginity.

They call me "Che" Golemo...

2005-03-30T15:00:00.000-06:00

You scored as Socialist. <'Imunimaginative's Deviantart Page'>

Socialist

100%

Democrat

83%

Green

75%

Communism

75%

Anarchism

42%

Fascism

33%

Nazi

17%

Republican

17%

What Political Party Do Your Beliefs Put You In?
created with QuizFarm.com

The Bliss of Ignorance...

2005-03-12T02:16:00.000-06:00

A woman rushes through her front door, sweat brimming upon her forhead, knuckles still white from the speeding commute from her office. She zips about the room, connecting the dots of mess to mess in a hurried attempt to make her home presentable. Her head snaps up from the straightening of magazines on the coffee-table at the sound of the front door opening.

In walks a man in a suit. As he's putting his keys in the dish by the door she asks, "H-Hi honey! How are you?"

"Tired and hungry" he replies as he loosens his tie and takes off his suit jacket. "What's for dinner?"

"Oh... well, um, I was super-busy at work today and I only just beat you home myself." She throws out the words as if they were paper towels about to soak up a mess she'd yet to make. "I was just going to throw in a couple of frozen dinners..."

At the word "dinner" his face steels from the annoyed frowning at the selection of feminine magazines into a bit-lip stare. "Frozen dinners?" he asks coldly. "So lets see, I get to spend 8 hours at work, plus an hour commute, because, you wanted to live close to your mother... And frosen dinners is what I get to come home to? That's great, Diana. That's just awesome."

"I'm sorry, honey let me just go warm up the oven" she says with half a turn to the kitchen.

"No." he interrupts, "Its okay. I don't care. You know why? Because you're fucking worthless." His sneer freezes her into place. "I make all these sacrifices around here. And for what? What? What the fuck is this?" he growls, barely audibly, as he picks up a peice of trash she was unable to coral. "You can't even keep a clean fucking house?"

He throws the offense at her feet.

"I'm sorry, honey. I didn't see-" her words are cut off by his hand at her neck pushing her back into the wall. Her heels totter as they try, desperately, to keep from getting lost in the backpedaling.

"Diana" he coo's, "what did I tell you about talking back? Hmm? DON'T. TALK. BACK-TO-ME!" he screams, finally, as he hits his fist into the wall, inches from her head. "I am the man, of this house. -And I deserve respect. And I will get respect if I have to BEAT-IT. OUTTA-YOU!" he finally screams, his nose nearly touching hers, punctuating the last phrases with two more punches to the dry-wall by her ear.

"I'm sorry, baby, you know I respect y-" her last words are cut short by his knuckle to her jaw. She crumples to the floor, sobbing, hair sheilding her eyes from his horror-struck expression.

Tears begin to well in his eyes as he falls to his knees. "I'm so sorry baby! I'm so sorry. Don't cry."

Her shoulder recoils from the touch of his outstretched hand.

"You know I love you, baby. I love you so much." he says, voice cracking behind the weight of guilty tears. "You just... you just make me so crazy sometimes. Please don't cry."

Her shoulders continue to shake, like a car on its last ounce of gas.

"STOP crying." He suddenly says, devoid of emotion. An instant later he rises and pushes her away from him.

"Fuck it. Clean this shit up and make me a real fucking dinner." The door slams behind him. Her shoulders continue to shake.

Slowly, her hand reaches out. And begins to pick up the trash.

The previous story, was written by myself and based upon a loose script for something Baylor University puts on, called: "The Tunnel of Oppression." This program, made up of a circuit of vignets in different rooms, each one designed to illustrate a different form of oppression -from racial, to sexual, to domestic-, is unlike any experience I've ever encountered.

Last year, I was asked to fill in for an actor in this very skit. I'll spare you the details, but I had trouble doing it. Litterally. I had acted before, but I had never acted like this. Never screamed in a woman's face. Never punched a wall by a woman's head. Never hit a woman. And each of these "never's" were taken from me in turn. And again. And again. And again.

But let me tell you the ugly truth. I was good at it. I was very good at it.

We all have thoughts. Malicious, dark, devient thoughts. We've all held a knife and wanted, if only for an instant, to stab the cutting board. We've all held a razor and wondered how hard we could push. But these are thoughts we beat down as soon as they arise, like the gopher game at Chuckie Cheese's. But what is it like to not only, hold ourselves back from hitting these gophers down, but inviting them up, examining their features and feeling their curves and grooves?

I know it sounds cliche' but for an instant, I became that man. And it hurt me to know that "that man" wasn't so hard to find. It was sort of like singing obnoxiously in a room you thought was sound-proof only to walk out and hear someone else doing the same thing. The walls are much thinner than we'd supposed.

I realized quickly, that I am no better than any wife-beater, or abusive uncle. We are both fallen, and for different circumstances... well, that's a gopher I choose to beat down.

When I wrote the part of the script, where the man starts to cry and apologizes to his wife, I could hardly believe what I was thinking. And the first time I said it, I nearly vomitted all over the poor actress receiving my abuse. I guess that made me feel a little better. But in the end, it was still me, looking straight into the face of that of which I am capable, the malice and anger in me.

In the end, I told my fellow actors how, yes, it was hard. But that we had a real chance to do some amazing good. And if the better we were, the more likely we were to touch people, to wake them up, to rob them of the indifference allowed them by their ignorance. And that if we put ourselves, our words, our minds into God's hands, and begged him to make the words we speak to be the words he would have of us, he would heal our hearts and make us stronger at the break.

And while I may have been sort of talking out of my ass, perhaps I've since realized that perhaps God can sometimes use my ass to say some pretty smart things. (Yes, Dad. I just said that God sometimes speaks out of my ass.)

I've spent some time with my dark side. And while I doubt I'll ever be comfortable with that "Neil", maybe I'll at least be able to remember not to sing too loud, because the walls can be thinner that we think.

You down wit this, sucka?

2005-02-27T15:05:00.000-06:00

This is flippin' awesome. Check out this site: www.gizoogle.com.

To see this site "Gizoogled", click this: http://sites.gizoogle.com/?url=http://www.neilgolemo.blogspot.com/

Holla at ya boy!

This concept of "Wuv" confuses and infuriates me!

2005-02-16T13:59:00.000-06:00

I love the Conversational Candy Hearts. Yeah yeah yeah, the trite-ness of having sweet nothings and pop-phrases compiled into single letter abbreviations and mass-printed "catty-wompously" onto thousands of heart-shaped candies is intriguing to say the least. The possibilities for pondrance are endless! However, my love has more to do with their taste. I don't know what it is, but I love the taste. They're probably the coolest thing about Valentine's day.

They're kind of like Cadburry Egg's, Mallow Pumpkins and Candy Canes. They're sort of a seasonal delight. If they were around for the whole year, people would probably think they suck. But, since you can only get them for 2 or 3 months out of 12, they're a delicacy.

On Monday, I went over to Danielle's after class for a V-tine's day party/ Chocolate Fest. I sampled her wares: chocolate-dipped oranges and strawberries, chocolate bars, kisses, and, of course, chili. Delicious, Danielle, tasty to say the least. However, when I reached into the dish with the conversation hearts, eager for this year's first taste of that bonemeal-and-earwig honey -chalky goodness, I found that my lips, instead of curling into a smile, had squeezed and contracted into a pucker. These weren't sweet?! but Sour! I felt so let-down.

It was 3 o'clock on Monday before I realized what day it was. I saw people in their S.A.D. (singles awareness day) shirts, and heard friends complaining about their bad luck at being single upon a day like today. I heard people complaining about the "commercialism" of it all. How V-tine's day was invented by the Greeting Card companies. Perhaps.

But upon reflection, I'll give you my day.

I slept late. Did a little homework. Had a great class. Candy and friends at Danielle's. Then I went over and had my weekly face-time with two of the biggest Bad-Asses I know. Jack Bauer and Myles Werntz. I came slightly hungry and ready for this season's episode of of 24, and I left satiated, pumped for next week and with a plane ticket to El Paso in May. Southwest thanks you, Myles Werntz.

On the way home from the house of the big brother I never had, I began to wonder about what a nice, pleasant and quaint day I had just enjoyed. But as a single Tiger on the prowl, how could this be? Its game-day and I'm riding the pine.

I loved Valentine's day growing up because it was a chance to give everyone a Valentine; a chance to let everyone in my homeroom, as I dropped my ALF Valentines into the shoebox on the edge of their desk, know that I thought they made my life, time better spent. My dad takes flowers to the girls in his office. My mom sends me a little care package. I call my sisters and tell them I love them. How can such a day be bad?

Myles fried me some eggplant. I am loved.

But as for the commercialism? There is a bit. I, myself, have always liked Valentine's Day better when I was single. I hate being expected to do something simply because of a day. You can't force romance. And who wants a love like that anyway?

On my way home from Myles's, I drove in front of the Waco Tribune building just in time to see the night watch-man do his rounds outside. I saw him ambling along, awkwardly, his poor belt straining into his waist like a rubber-band on a water-balloon. "He's not very romantic", I thought. But he's like me, maybe. That's the kind of Love I want.

Who wants a Love like a muscle-ly armed Arnold Swartzenegger Green Beret protecting your heart? Arnold Swartzenegger is too high maintenance and not at all realistic. I want to love like an overweight security guard. Perhaps a little unwieldy and top-heavy at times. Maybe I'll spill a little spaghetti sauce on the front of my uniform and won't notice it. But I get the job done and you know I need the job as much as the job needs me. A little unromantic? At times. But, among all things, its true.

Like the candy hearts, its not always so much a matter of quality, as it is of taste.

PS, a special mix CD to the first person who can give me where I stole the title of this post from and their address!

Count your blessings, instead of sheep

2005-02-08T06:21:00.000-06:00

Sometimes I laugh for no reason. Sometimes I'm in a library. Sometimes I'm by myself. Sometimes I'm walking. Sometimes I'm eating. The laughs, they come. They well up within me like so much gas when you're sitting next to a pretty girl. Can't fight it bro, it'll only make you sick. And no giggle or silent nod mind you, but my full, throaty, devil-sounding laugh. I don't know why. But for the longest time, such has always been the case.

It was my inclination to write about all of the possibilities that could be, to lead you, the reader, down a primrose path of the potential this and that. But I know why it is.

I am blessed. I say this with a resigned smile. I'm not jumping up and down, nor am I broken down and bent in self-flagellation. I say this with as much confidence as I have that I'll draw my next breath. I am blessed.

I think I've lived a charmed life. Born to amazing, loving, God-fearing and incredibly intelligent parents who literally wanted nothing more in the world than to have a baby boy, I was an answer to their prayers. They tried for years after having a miscarriage, and I, quite literally, received the early nomer of their "miracle child." I was given all I could hold. Then I was given more.

I have an older sister, a younger brother (and best friend/young man who will always be my #1 fan) and a little sister, who amongst everyone else in the family, is probably built the most like me. An entertainer, wise-ass and my own personal cuddle-buddy and foot-warmer.

If that wasn't enough, The Lord felt like he had to let the WORLD know I was blessed by delivering me from Cancer when the chances were not mine. Apparently the Sky-writers were sick that day.

Sometimes I laugh for no apparent reason. No joke in my head. No deja-vu of a Simpson's episode. Sometimes, I dance too.

I have all I need. I've known the sweet torture of the pain that comes with a chemo-infusion. There is a scent of a particular antiseptic cleaning product, that to this day, makes me nauseous. But those only served as the stand-up base-line to the Coltrain trumpet of my jubilation tip-toeing and splish-splashing its way through my life. Without the base, I wouldn't see the trumpet in my mind... I'd only hear it. Base, trumpet, cow bell: blessings all.

I've known of love with the capital "L." And, I guess I've also known what its like to lose it with a capital "L."

But to be honest, the hurt that comes with not talking to Erin is nothing compared to the warmth I get when I remember the sensation on the ticklish part of my heart when I heard her voice. I knew what it was like to smell her on my clothes. To hold the most beautiful woman I've ever seen before or since, and kiss her in the middle of an Airport, for any Texan to see.

Even the thought of never talking to her dissipates as smoke from a candle at the thought of the woman she is becoming, the good she'll do, the people she will touch. I do not worry about Erin. Few things are so strong as her.

Sometimes I laugh for no apparent reason. I cannot escape my joy. A smile cannot leave my chubby cheeks. I cannot walk in front of a mirror without seeing the 11 inch scar upon my abdomen -the flesh healed- and knowing of the favor I enjoy.

At one time I could have told you a story about the pressure of this knowledge. But really I was selling you yesterday's paper while pointing at the date. I knew better. I am Jonah. If I screw up too bad, there's always the whale.

Its 6:20 AM. And I'm laughing for no apparent reason. But appearances are tricky things.

The boy in a bubble.

2005-02-03T12:26:00.000-06:00

The people in Times Square move along so mechanically. One could tell the tourists apart from everyone else by how they gawked at the millions of bright lights, the huge Coke bottles and the monstrous Cup of Noodles sign. And they were right to do so, these are amazing things, Back to the Future II-esque things. But even they, with their cameras and "don't mess with Texas" shirts quickly learned to shuffle along, fall in line. If you gawk too loudly at a limited-edition Superman #23 with Wonder Woman, you're a nerd. If you squeal because you found that "I Love Lucy" purse that will perfectly match those checkered heels you bought because they reminded you of the vitaminamin episode, for some reason, People will think you're odd.

New York is a beautiful city, even in the winter. And yes, at 12 degrees Fahrenheit, a bit chilly. But I never felt cold until I saw the ten-thousand-plus people on one square block each acting as if he or she were the only ones there.

I once read that communication is the key to life. Not food. Not water. Not Chicago Cubs tickets. Communication.

Without communication, we are merely boys and girls in bubbles, trapped inside our own hairy, or not so hairy, bubbles; shackled within the fortresses of our skulls. So, if one was to think about it, he or she would realize that we, to other people, are only what we communicate, or even, as the case may be, what we DON'T communicate.

So back to Times Square. How is it that people can just turn themselves off? Standing there, watching people move along like blood cells through capillaries, I began to wonder about the people walking by me here and there. That girl has real feelings, needs and wants. That man needs love and acceptance every bit as much as I do. I wonder if one of these people is related to a Circus person. Do any of them have a third nipple? That one! Inny or Outy? So many secrets to be known if only we could take the time to get to know them. But instead, we are doomed to walk along, eyes straight ahead.

If you smile at anyone you're either A) a child molester/homicidal rapist, B) on Ex. or some happy little derivative, or 3) recently escaped from a mental institution.

Now, I'm not talking about making best friends with every person on the subway. But why is it that we turn our blinders on to the beauty that is in every person's soul? Thanks to Christ, our bubbles are no longer dark, like bowling balls, but clear and bursting with color, like marbles! I don't understand how people can have the blank "I don't get the joke" look as their default faces when we've been told that the Kingdom of God is at hand.

We talk about showing kindness to our fellow man. But how many times do we fail to return the smile of the fella next to us? Once again, I'm not saying we should all take to the streets wearing "Jesus Loves You" sandwich boards and handfulls of "Billy Graham doe too" balloons, unless you wanna. But all I'm suggesting is that we just be mindful of what's around us. Let us not live our lives only behind doors. If we spend a little time outside of our heads, gawking at the beauty of our neighbor's soul as we would at a '05 Mustange or Minolo Blanik's, letting the world fill our senses, I think you'll be surprised that it can taste good and top off the tank.

If every choice is "Love" or "other"... Choose Love.

Takin a bite of the big apple (Part 1)

2005-02-01T21:30:00.000-06:00

Me: "How is it that you can lead 40 men with guns through a forest at night using nothing more than a magnetized needle and a palm-sized map, but we can't go three blocks in this damn city without getting lost?"
Bennie: "I don't know... but a compass would help..."

I went to New York City for the first time this weekend. It was my brother's Yearling Winter Weekend at West Point, a weekend where the majestic United States Military Academy puts on her best for her Yearlings (sophomores) and they, in turn, spend as much of the weekend as possible away from her wanton grasp and escape to the City.

I flew into Newark, took a bus to Grand Central Station where I met Ben, wearing his big, brown, BCG's (Birth Control Glasses, because supposedly no Army man has ever managed to get laid while wearing them). We embrace, I laugh at him, and we figure out that we want to go drop off our stuff at our hotel room. We get on the Subway, take it North-ish and start to walk to wrong way. Eventually, we figure this out and turn back to find our hotel.

Hotel 31 turned out to be a gamble that paid off big time. I made the reservations and paid for it all online through Expedia (dot coooooooooom!). We strode on in and announced "reservation for Golemo, G-o-l-e-m-o." A nice looking man in a red suit and greased mafia-style hair started typing away at the computer. I instantly start to make fun of my little brother.

I grabbed his glasses, put them on and engaged in some tom-foolery.
"Hey, my name is Ben." I said with a mumble. "I listen to punk music and decided to the most punk thing I could think of and signed up to kill people at West Point. Also, I have no sense of equity, so if you flick me in the ear, I'll respond by making sure you'll never have children."

Nice looking, red-suited, greased hair guy started to laugh and then looked at us and said, with a look of surprise, "you're funny."

"Thanks for noticing."

So we got our cards and walked up to our room. It was a shared bathroom, no frills type of place and totally awesome. The room was barely twice the size of the bed. There was a sink and a dresser with a 13-inch TV on it.

We both immediately started to flop on the bed, Grandma's house-style. Then Ben turned on the TV to the Spanish Channel and we started to watch one of their prime-time soap operas. I started to make up my own dubbing for it.

A man dressed all in black with a ski mask was talking to a volumptuous, dark-haired, beauty with his hands open before him.
"Jes, I know you are tired of hearing this Lucinda, but you must, by now, have learned how to make a proper bag of the popping-corn!"
"Oh, Rodrigo!" She sighs as she backs away and puts her hand to her forehead. "You know I hate the popping-corn! Ever since father -oh I cannot describe it, -I dare not! For it is too painful!"
"Jes, Lucinda, I know all about your pa-pa. He died during the lawn-mower accident! But it was not your fault! And more importantly, what does this have to do wit the popping-corn!?!?!? Come, let us make sweet love and cut to loud commercial a moment before you are completely disrobed."
"No!"
"Jes!"
"No!"
"Jes!"
"Salright!"
Commercial!

Yes, we're funny guys.

Then I realized I was hungry. So we called my buddy Jordan's (Blog write Boof) wonderful fiance', LaRae who just happened to be living in Manhattan, working for the man and preparing a home for Jordan and herself for their future. Sigh. Anyways, she calls us and gives us directions. We see a huge comic-book shop and, of course, get distracted, turned-around, and lost. But to be honest, with Ben, such is always fun.

Eventually, after walking half a mile in the wrong direction in really cold weather, we show up, numb and rosey-cheeked at the LaRae's. She took us to a place called Playwright's. Excellent food. No joke. De-Lish!

Then, LaRae showed us around Times Square. We saw tons of stuff! It was awesome and inspired a post I'll publish soon. (It's sort of deep) But here was the most the thing that was awesomest. The Dook. Thor's Hammer. Odin's Raven. Whatever! We fricken met SPIDERMAN! The Webslinger himself! Okay, it was actually a semi-homeless man who made the costume himself and was charging people $7 a picture. But I'll tell ya. It was the best $7 Mama Golemo's baby boy ever spent!

I immediately called a friend to let them know what they were missing.

"Dude. Spiderman. Times Square. Me. Bennie-hanna. Awesome!"
"Neil, are you excited?"
"Heck yes I'm excited! What the flip would YOU feel in a situation like this?"

Hang up.

I'll finish this story later. When this medication wears off. Until then, I bid you Adieu.

2005-02-01T21:28:00.000-06:00

Kevo, eat your heart out!

2005-02-01T21:08:00.000-06:00

Sometimes it feels good to be a gangsta... (That's the Hudson and West Point in the background... oh, and some trees too.)

Who's going to be 6000?

2005-01-27T21:32:00.000-06:00

If you're the 6000th person to hit this site, leave your name and address and I'll send you my "super-happy-thanks-for-dropping by-morning mix!" Just leave a comment!

The Plan

2005-01-25T03:52:00.000-06:00

In Dr. Oliver's class, he gave us a doozey of an assignment right off the bat. He wanted our 10-year plan. I'll admit, I've never been much of a planner. I'm kind of a "see where the night takes us" kind of fella. But as I started to think of what I wanted for myself; sythesize all of the "what if's" and "that would be nice's" into a possibility of what my future could hold, I was shocked to see a mission I've set for myself.

I finish my Master's here at Baylor and go straight into working on a PhD. In Higher Educational Leadership at Ohio St., NYU, U of Maryland or maybe even Vanderbilt. Hopefully, I'll pay for my education at whatever school by fulfilling my professional dream of running a Residence Hall and working with Resident Assistants or Community Leaders or whatever, pouring into them and making a difference in the lives of students. My dissertation will be something along the lines of "The acculturation of Student Athletes in Higher Education." I feel very strongly about this topic. It is something that needs and deserves thought and research.

Also, by the time I leave whatever school is lucky enough to have me, I want to be published as an author of both fiction and non-fiction.

Then I'll go on to teach leadership courses in leadership while I learn what it takes to start a school of my own with my friend, Greg Hanson. I figure I'll use what contacts I've made through Horatio Alger to help me get started.

It'll be a 4-year secondary charter school for students showing high-aptitude, but more importantly, high-motivation from lower socio-economic status and backgrounds, mainly inner-city. We'll partner with a community and relocate the students from the City such as Chicago, New York or Miami to a small town outside of walking distance away, like Carthage, Ill.

I have ideas for the housing, such as having Faculty and their families live with students from a cohort to form a true residential learning community. We would live and teach in the cohort system, each cohort or peer group takes the same classes. What's more, we would be two-deep at every faculty level. Then, the faculty members would follow their cohort through all four years of their matriculation.

The school would worry less about test scores and more about the fact that we've never had a student drop out through lack of emotional or moral support. We would try to create an environment of cooperation among the students and not competition.

What's more, I'm very interested in progressive grading which is subject to inflation. That is, I am interested in de-emphasizing Letter Grades and instead pursuing the EverGreen State system of essay grades. For each class Joe or Josephine takes, in lieu of a letter, he or she will receive an essay of fitting length describing in-depth what parts of the course requirements Joe excelled at, fully grasped, and perhaps, needs further thought upon.

Also, while intramural sports or activities will be mandatory, athletics will be de-emphasized. This school's motives will stay pure. Everyone will participate in music courses of some sort.

As for how the school is funded. Obviously it'll be private and fully endowed. Greg suggested getting the money from a single donor and calling it the Oprah Winfrey Institute. Personally, I believe maybe some of my contacts might be more likely. So it could end up being the Wayne Huizenga School or Arthur C. Cioca High or perhaps even Le lycee d'Horatio Alger. I'm not picky. It doesn't even have to sound classy. (Nabisco's EZ Cheeze High?)

That's it as of right now. But I reserve the right to tweak any of these dreams as they are, in fact, mine.

The Devil and General Mills

2005-01-20T12:20:00.000-06:00

I'm sort of an analogy person. I love analogies. They help me, sometimes, to better understand what is happening, like the cross section page of Zoobooks magazine.

So here goes...

Right now in my life is like cereal.

I am a cereal eater who has been choosing from the variety pak his entire life. And I'm dying to settle down to one flavor. I'm sick and tired of only getting to appreciate a bowlful at a time.

Now, I thought I had my cereal -my Lucky Charms if you will. I had honestly thought I had the perfect cereal for me. But General Mills, in all of her Devilish mystery, has decided to stop production of that marshmallow and oats delicacy known as Lucky Charms and it sucks.

Yeah, perhaps General Mills will realize her mistake and start up her supply again, but something tells me waiting and hoping isn't the best use of my time. So, I'll send my letter of disappointment to the company's headquarters in Battle Creek, Michigan and know I did less than I could, but only what I should. If I wait... well I guess man cannot live on cereal alone anyway.

So its back to the variety pak that I dislike so much. As a matter of fact, I'm not sure I'm even in the mood for cereal. (Not that I'm in the mood for sausage.... Okay, bad joke)

But here's the thing. Its morning and I'm freaking starving.

My wonderful friend Stacey (the girl upon whom I have a crush ;) ) told me that I shouldn't even go to the store hungry, because I'll only end up eating junk food.

Jordan (Blog write Boof), reminds me that the great thing about the variety pak is that its only a bowl at a time. Just enough to take off the edge. And if I should just so happen with a Cookie Crisp that's just a little too much sugar and not enough filling, I only have a bowl to soldier through, and not a whole box.

But then again I pause to consider my potential actions. I mean, what about the denizens of the variety pak? How could I use them so? I mean, yeah, sure, it's only a bowlful of commitment to me, but to them, its the whole thing. Its all they are. If I'm not looking at the variety pak with the intention of maybe buying the whole thing, am I fulfilling my gentleman's code?

I don't know about things sometimes, guys. Maybe I'll just have some oatmeal.

2005-01-20T12:03:00.000-06:00

The strange thing is, no one in the family noticed he was wearing the mask... (Ben and Beth at Christmas)

Comfort

2005-01-13T04:25:00.000-06:00

I was fighting off a bit of lonliness last night and I decided to make a mental list of things that comfort me. Specifically, sensations that make me feel warm and happy. Y'know, the ones that touch the ticklish part of the heart.

I'll just list a few or four or five and please, feel free to add any you'd like.

There's the feeling you get when trying on a tuxedo and you look in the mirror and talk to yourself in the mirror using your best/worst Sean Connery. "Pushy-Galore" Or, [in a girly voice] "Oh James! I got you all wet!" [back to 007] "itsh okay, my martini's shtill dry... take off your pantish."

Cleaning out the lint-trap in the clothes dryer.

The few seconds where the sheets are cold in bed that makes you ball up right before you get warm.

The feeling you get as you turn to the second-to-the-last page of a really good book and you can see the silhouette of the last words through the page.

Wearing a hoodie straight out of the dryer.

Two words: "Ears" and "Q-tips."

Scratching the itch on your nose after you put down the really heavy box full of super-fragile stuff.

Hitting a baseball right in the sweet spot of the bat.

Running barefoot through wet, freshly cut, grass.

The way my mom smells.

Unwrapping a new DVD.

Having all seven seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer... um, or so I've heard....

Sticking your tongue out at someone when they aren't looking...

Any more to add?

A glimpse through the window....

2005-01-10T01:49:00.000-06:00

I'm "brookshallprez" and my good friend an recent Baylor Alumni, Sam Ikonne is "SASEIKON." I don't know why I'm actually publishing this. Its not like I'm an especially whiney person. I guess this is just the closest thing I can give you into my mind-set right now.

brookshallprez: so how was SO CO?
SASEIKON: it was fun
SASEIKON: it was a good getaway
brookshallprez: yeah, no men in white robes?
brookshallprez: awesome
SASEIKON: plent of confederate flags
brookshallprez: no crap man
brookshallprez: lol
brookshallprez: i mean, i'm only a pollack and I felt self-conscious
brookshallprez: jk
brookshallprez: but seriously, i really liked it when i visited
brookshallprez: beautiful country!
brookshallprez: how's Kel? good i hope?
SASEIKON: she is going good
SASEIKON: just doing the same old, same old
brookshallprez: i'm honestly glad to hear it
brookshallprez: so, i'm well, than

brookshallprez: heart still different shades of being broken. -but thanks for asking

SASEIKON: well over time things should be fine
brookshallprez: thank-you, "dear abbey"
brookshallprez: ;-)brookshallprez: any more cliche' advice to give?
brookshallprez: i'm actually joking
SASEIKON: well i mean what can i say other than the next time you enter into a relationship make sure it is for the right reasons and understand that nothing is for sure
brookshallprez: i think this time was for the "right reasons" but it just didn't work out
brookshallprez: and i think, honestly, that i should just stop torturing myself by wondering why i got dumped by just saying "she was a psycho who didn't value my state of mind enough to let me know why i got dumped" But I've tried that. And, it turns out, I don't think she's crazy at all. Just... just a mystery.
SASEIKON: Neil here is something helps me through those times, most girls dont know what they want
brookshallprez: now that's good advice
SASEIKON: especially at this age half the stuff they say they dont really believe and many of there relationship amoung themselves aren't that real
SASEIKON: so we as guys just have to be patient for the right girl that wants a geniune relationship
SASEIKON: cause most girls want to be love, but have never taken the time to be humble enough to actually learn to love someone eles
SASEIKON: they are in love with the idea instead of knowing what the reality is all about brookshallprez: dude, this is good stuff
brookshallprez: honestly
SASEIKON: yeah i only came to this conclusion after first examining myself and realizing i have those same problems
brookshallprez: oh damnit
SASEIKON: cause i mean if you read 1 Corinthians 13 and see what it says about love brookshallprez: i suppose you're telling me I'm as much to blame as well
SASEIKON: not necessarily i really dont know everything that happened
SASEIKON: but i mean i think it is healthy to look at yourself and examine possibly what you might have done wrong or why you did the things you did
SASEIKON: and take lessons from that
brookshallprez: yeah...brookshallprez: but this year has sort have been a case-study in "regret"
brookshallprez: end of the college career... "what could I have done better?"
brookshallprez: first semester of Grad school, immersed in people that are, for the first time i can honestly remember, for the most part, every bit as smart as I am
SASEIKON: yeah that is life the only thing really great about a person is that there is only one of all of us
brookshallprez: yeah, we're all unique... just like everyone else
SASEIKON: but i believe that is the great thing because God has just made one us and we are called to do something in a way that only we as unique individuals can do
brookshallprez: Way to go, Sam, completely ignore my cynicism
SASEIKON: yeah someone has to
brookshallprez: keep going, it completely adds to the effect that's going to come out when i publish this all as a blog
SASEIKON: cool i am going to be part of your blod
brookshallprez: yeah, also part of my "blog"

** a couple of minutes go by **

brookshallprez: get it? i was making fun of you just then
brookshallprez: y'know, you miss-spelled "blog"
brookshallprez: i corrected you...
brookshallprez: is this thing on? (taps mike)
SASEIKON: i have a cold so i am not as sharp as i usually am
brookshallprez: excuses, excuses
brookshallprez: long story-short
brookshallprez: thanks, Sam
SASEIKON: well i plan on coming to Baylor on Firday
brookshallprez: wicked
SASEIKON: no joke
brookshallprez: you can look me up
SASEIKON: yeah i will call you on Thursday
brookshallprez: do it
brookshallprez: hollar
SASEIKON: i will
SASEIKON: i might come in on thursday night it just depends
brookshallprez: if you need a place to stay...
brookshallprez: call Eric
SASEIKON: thats hot
brookshallprez: ;-)
SASEIKON: nah i'll call you instead
brookshallprez: word
SASEIKON: or Hassan
brookshallprez: seriously, though
brookshallprez: my casa
brookshallprez: es su-irish pub
SASEIKON: right, right
brookshallprez: so you can come over and not drink with me
SASEIKON: well i'll call before i come
brookshallprez: can't wait
brookshallprez: night bro
SASEIKON: night

F.F.F.

2004-12-30T13:04:00.000-06:00

Forced Family Fun, or as the Golemo children call them, "Triple-F" nights.

I just got back from the yearly Golemo Family Mandatory Retreat. Every year, for at least two days, our family does something over the winter break. You don't have to be alive, but you have to show up. Usually Mommacho rents out a cabin somewhere and we bring food, chips, hot cocoa and enough board games to annoy even the Parker-Bradley brothers. True to form, we always complain before-hand but have a great time when we actually show up.

Make the best of a bad situation. With parents like mine, its a mantra.

Before we all started moving off to college, my parents would occasionally spring a FFF on us during the week like nail in a floorboard snagging our brand new socks. It doesn't matter what "plans" we had, "family comes first." And when I say it doesn't matter what we had planned, I mean it. Unless it was a graded school event, prom, or similar matter, my father didn't care. FFF came first.

If he was in a charitable mood, and the look on our face was particularly surrendering, we were allowed to call our friends and cancel our trips to the pool, study dates and dentist appointments. And we were even given permission, when my mom wasn't around, to use the excuse, "my father is a sanctimonious asshole, that's why I can't come."

It used to annoy me, but now I'm glad my father and mother were such ruthless jerks about it all. They helped me to understand that, for the most part, outside friendships are fleeting. Johnny down the street might be fun to hang out with now, but there is no way he could be more important to me than family. And young Suzy may be waiting at Dairy Queen now for me to come flirt with her, but there's no way she's more important than family. When the whole world's coming down on my head, my friends will leave, hell, my faith may even leave. But my family will always be my family.

Thank you GOD for giving me sanctimonious assholes for parents.

Christmas Noogies

2004-12-23T13:41:00.000-06:00

"MOOOOOOOOOOM! Neil's cussing at me in French again!"

"MOOOOOOOOOOM! Ben's in the Army!"

What is it about being around my family that brings out the pre-pubescent in me? I'm a college student -no, a graduate student. I've supposedly grown up since being an undergrad (all of 4 months ago). So how is it that I can go from writing 20 pages of pure genius on "The Language of Mediocrity in Higher Education: Being the Second best Italian Restaurant in Town" to finding myself in "time out" at the age of 23?

For 11 months of the year, I am an expert in conflict resolution. It is what I do. As a CL, I kept the towel-snapping and late-night pillow-fights to a bare minimum. As a Graduate Assistant with Baylor Student-Athlete Services, (take a moment to genuflect) it is my job, at times, to calmly explain to a 250lb+ offensive lineman that playing with the exposed wires from a light switch fixture that's being worked upon really isn't such a good idea and perhaps his time would be better spent studying for his English final.

So how is it that at the first "Nerdo Neilie-Wheelie!" from my older sister, my fists are balled and I'm showing off the latest in cursing terminology?

But its not all so bad. Being able to hug my mom at any moment is pretty sweet. I swear, everytime still, when I smell the woman, I'm 7 again and curled up in her lap. And believe it or not, the woman can still give me pause with the shout of "Neil-Edward-Golemo!" or even worse, the dreaded phrase: "wait til your father comes home."

So why is this? Is there a magic line somewhere between Waco and Hamilton wherein none of my maturity may pass? Maybe it's the cartoonish Jesus Christ billboard sign reading "This Blood's for you" somewhere in Missouri...

In this house, I can be myself. I know love like everyone should know, free of strings attached and clauses or conditions. Yes, my house is a verbal minefield. But it is only so because I know there is no action upon this earth that I could ever commit for which my family hasn't already forgiven me. I know this, and so does my family. Ben can be grumpy and we'll only laugh and try to make him smile. My dad can yell and we'll only let him feel like he's the boss. Kate can be sarcastic and we'll marvel at her wit. Beth can be dramatic, and we'll play along. Mom can nag and, with rolled eyes, we'll comply. And I can completely disregard everyone's feelings and they will only continue to bless me by listening to rambling story after rambling story after rambling story after rambling story...

Hamilton is no longer my home, but it will always be the place to which I return. It would be a horrible place for me to live, but it will always be an amazing place to have been from. However this house will always feel like love, and the people who live there -if only for a couple of weeks a year- will always hold my heart.

Right now, it's 12:35 AM on a very young Christmas Eve. The living room is dark save for a touch-lamp we have to turn on/off by twisting the bulb in and out in the far corner of the room, and the soft glow of the white lights on the Christmas tree "that's going to be classy for once, damnit." This old house is quiet, but not lonely. Dark, but not cold. Upstairs, my brother and sisters have settled for their slumber, and I am up, thinking about how blessed I am to have had my life flavored by them. I can hear my parents chatting, the two best friends, as they always have. Genuine tears come to my eyes, as I drop to my knees and thank the Lord for the five greatest gifts a fella's ever been given.

They say Christmas is a time of miracles. Amen, Jimmy Stewart. Amen.

Drop it like it's Hot

2004-12-14T03:15:00.000-06:00

Dancing in public is a different animal from the creature that is dancing at home, in private, putting on a show for nothing more than the potted plants. I love music, and as my roommate can probably attest, I will occasionally shake my bon-bon to a particularly rockin' piece of music. However, I usually will respect a dancefloor enough to avoid it as though it were a pool of lava.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not ashamed of myself or of my body... ask anyone, I'm plenty proud of it. I guess my reluctance to dance at social gatherings has more to do with respect. I'm not a good dancer. When I dance, its best described as looking like a combination of the floor being really hot with a lot of gnats flying around my head while I'm trying to contemplate a really hard calculus problem. (There is no spoon.) Sigh. So, for the good of those who might risk being hit by an errant, spastic hand, I usually refrain.

However, not tonight.

For some reason or other, tonight I throw caution to the wind. And this time, when someone says "hey Neil, come dance!" I don't fight the urge. My hand doesn't come up in protest. I just go with it. Yes, yes ladies and gents, I proceed to shake what my mamma gave me. I quake my "ga-dunk-a-dunk" and proceed to drop it as though it were exceedingly warm. Its how I roll, baby, holla at ya boy.

As I danced, as I realized how much fun it is to move with pure, unadulterated joy, I actually began to wonder how this was such an amazing metaphor for life. I know the whole "Dance" analogy has been totally played out, but perhaps you'll forgive me a reprisal of this oldie. I promise not to remix it and sample it and Britney spears it. I'll do it acoustic, like a surprise Simon and Garfunkel cover by a rock band. Everyone loves Simon and Garfunkel.

Y'know, not everyone dances so well. And some of us, well, we were just blessed with the happy feet. Well, the way I see it, you can do two things. You can sit and watch or you can get in the mix. You can throw your hat in the ring and play your hand. It doesn't matter how good or bad you are, because you see, the truest beauty of this dance is that we do it together. It doesn't matter how spastic you are or how graceful your vogue is. The joy is in just that itself, finding joy. And I believe true, pure joy can never be a bad thing.

The Lord wants us to dance, people. Sure, we're going to step on toes, (see picture below) but then again people are going to step on ours. And as I always say when someone steps on my feet, "its okay, I walk on them too."

So lets dance, people. Drop it like its hot.

2004-12-14T03:11:00.000-06:00

Neil... that's my foot!

The younger Golemo boy...

2004-12-07T17:05:00.000-06:00

I miss my brother. That's his picture below. He's currently going to college on the Government Buck at the presigious West Point. Oh my, the things he must be learning...

2004-12-07T16:05:00.000-06:00

okay, who needs a hole in something?

2004-12-05T19:15:00.000-06:00

Andrew and Dana are engaged!! Congrats and Huzzah! (Shh she doesn't know its a Zirconia.)

On Balls of Gas...

2004-12-05T01:40:00.000-06:00

So the stars are out tonight... kinda.

I'm amazed at how, even in our 3D, hyperactive, image driven, smell-o-vision, now available in high definition culture, the stars are able to not only catch our attention, but grab it. Hold it. When I look at the stars, I can't help but think. It doesn't matter what I think about, I just think. And I imagine that's the way it's always been.

I'll spare you the references to ancient history, the Greeks, the Romans, etc, etc, etc. But everyone has looked at the stars and thought. Its this force that manages to touch that ticklish part of our hearts. That part where dreams and crazy thoughts hide, abide and grow strong. Its like we know that if its possible for these lights to just hang there, free of glue and nails, then maybe anything really is possible. The unconditional Love of Christ. Half off everything at Best Buy. My finding True Love. A Chicago Cubs World Series Game 7 Win.

Maybe its something else. Maybe its that I look at all of those stars and as I start to count them I realize there's more than I ever begin to numerate. There's something scary about the realization that infinitely, the closer I look, the more there are.

Its like the time when my brother and I had a water balloon fight in our front yard. (it was great so anti-climactic at the beginning because we only had one faucet that could fill the balloons, so we'd have to take turns using it... looking at each other... giggling... okay me giggling, while my brother would frown in frustration and wonder what I was so excited about... "We get wet all the time Neil") Immediately after discovering what we had done, my Mom gave us a stern speech on "loving Mother earth" when she realized we hadn't picked up every piece of shattered water balloon. As we started to search the yard, we would notice the big pieces with the knot at the end easily. But when we bent down to grab those pieces, we'd notice smaller pieces, then slivers off of those pieces, then we'd notice other things like tootsie roll wrappers, the parts of the icee-slid-up popsicles that you bite off and spit out, tons of little things. Before of you knew it, you'd have a handful of stuff and only a small part of the yard had been searched. A genuine feeling of fear and panic would arise and make me promise never to throw another water balloon. At least not until we could go to Ryan Muegge's house. His mom'd let us do anything.

Sigh... exhausting analogy.

But back to my point. When I look at a sky full of stars, I the idea of complete insignificance coming from comparison [of me and it] collides with knowing that there's a God out there who, in fact, made this all for me. Yeah sure, he made it for everyone else too, but c'mon, I love the notion that he made it so that he and I could share the notion I'm having right now. He wants me and him to share inside jokes.

When I'm laying on the crest of a hill on a blanket staring up at the stars, my peripheral view doesn't allow me to see the horizon so all I can see is Sky. Navy-blue-black sky with dots here and there. If the air is right, its like I'm floating. Its one of the rare times I like to be alone.

Its a strange thing to gaze upon something and know its the closest you'll ever come to viewing infinity. Sometimes its just too much for the mind to process and I am truly full of awe.

If you have a spare night, do what I did tonight and drive up I-35 for 20 minutes to exit 353 (TX 2114 East), and drive for another 5 (if you go 1.7 miles, there'll be a road on your left called "Mechell"), go for another mile and you'll be on the top of a hill. Get out and sit on the hood of the chariot that got you there. Enjoy.

There's minutes wasted, but a piece of mind to be gained.

Lost the Found

2004-12-04T20:48:00.000-06:00

Today I did it. I removed every piece of Erin from my room. Most of the stuff, the pictures, the candy, the birthday present package of Hershey's Kisses wrapped in a blush bow, these things were removed respectfully, one at a time, within a couple days of our last talk.

However, today, I removed that last worldly reminder of her former presence in my life. The razor she left in my shower. I could write a bajillion different ways that razor could be a metaphor for the ending of our relationship. But, honestly, none of them would fit.

I've gone on with my life. I haven't shed a tear. I imagine most people I know have any idea we're not talking anymore. I'm happy. My life is, undeniably, blessed.

For the last couple of weeks, I've enjoyed all life has to offer. I've commiserated with those near to me, and I've been home to spend time with those most dear to me. The world has reminded me how good a place it is, and that it loves me.

But now that I've put a little distance between the cup and the lip, Erin and me, I have some time to think and maybe lament a bit over my actions or lack thereof... whatever. I'll spare you the results of my self-examination.

But you know, we say things sometimes when we're in relationships. You can call it "pillow talk, baby" if you'd like, but that comes with a sexual connotation most that my words, as well as those of many of my friends, don't deserve. They're rubber cement words. Sometimes we say things hoping that they'll be true; as if the act of releasing them into the air will help them to substantiate and solidify.

But I really don't think such was the case with Erin. I really thought I was in love with her. Maybe I was, maybe I wasn't. How would I know anyway? Have I ever been in love? Isn't it kind of cocky for people to say they "know" they've been in love? How can you really know until you, well... know?

I don't know. But one thing I do know is that I don't think you ever stop feeling for people. Even if you only love them a little -if there is such a thing- I never lose some of those feelings for people. I will always feel I have a vested interest in Haley Dowdall's life, even though she clearly chose Justin Hamilton over me behind the see-saw in 1st grade. I had feelings for her then, and while the Flintstones' vitamins haven't helped my emotions for her to grow quite as much as they helped my ol' temple, they haven't really diminished them, either.

But I really thought things were different with Erin. I mean, I know they were different from anything I'd ever felt before. I was calm in my excitement at talking to her. She was a woman who could have been my best friend and more. She'd the rare mix of personality that could handle me and beauty that could enthrall me. I thought I'd found her. Sigh, but there's many a slip twixt the cup and the lip, they say. And I guess I've not found my find afterall.

I've been rejected. Plain and simple. But then again, I know who I am. I'm a catch, dammit. And I know this. I'm a good person, future professional, hopeless romantic with a lot of hope and the kind of guy who wants to coach his kid's little league baseball team... someday. I know I'm a great guy and have tons to offer. But that means these women must be crazy, right? So why do I end up with all the psychos? But then I looked at it empirically. The color drained out of my face as I held my cup of hot tea when I realized that the only consistency in all of my relationships was ME.

So, does that make me the crazy one?

I was talking to Mary the other day and I realized that everyone's a little insane. Sometimes when two people get together, their craziness's add and can become explosive. Maybe what we need is to find someone who cancels out your crazy. An electron for your proton. But even then, orbits can get messed up by factors like maturity, timing, law school and parents.

Love -no, relationships- are like a bar of soap. They're slippery as hell. And if you ever want to get any use out of them, you've got to hold them gently, enjoy them, and understand that, sometimes, they're just bound to escape your grasp. So it goes, as Vonnegut would say.

I'm frustrated with Love right now. But me saying "I'm frustrated with love" is kind of like Paul Bunyan looking out at a forrest and saying the trees tire him out. It's what we do.

I'm going to find my someone. I might have found her already. But until then, I'll sit and dream and praise the Lord for that person worth my prayers.

Last "Quiet, Lovely" concert. Tonight. Scruffy Murphy's. 10 O'clizzy.

A treatise on "quaint"

2004-12-02T05:20:00.000-06:00

quaint ( P ) Pronunciation Key (kwnt)
adj. Quaint·er, quaint·est
1. Charmingly odd, especially in an old-fashioned way.
2. Unfamiliar or unusual in character; strange: quaint dialect words. See Synonyms at strange.
3. Cleverly made; artful.

I miss my parents. I miss the smell of my old house. As much as this 23 year-old knows he should repress, he cannot help but feel a genuine sense of... well... genuine-ness when he walks crosses the threshold of the place in which he grew up.

I remember how endless the banister used to seem when I was sliding down it in my sleeper pajamas. Old family paintings that used to be haunted are now just dusty. But, I still swear that arms are about reach out from the space under the basement stairs (where the bodies are stashed) and grab an unsuspecting quarter-Sicilian, quarter-Pollock, eighth Irish, but all-stud ankle one of these days.

There's something about the smell of the French bread my mom bakes and the grunts that spew forth from my father's throat at the mess she makes; though we all know the only reason he's chosen that exact moment to clean the "command center" is because he wants to be in the same room as my mother. There's something about those moments! There's something about home that makes it easier to get through the hard times. Its like home, my mom, my pappa-cho, dog (that can tell my mother's footsteps and knows to get down off the couch before he gets yelled at), two beautiful sisters and not-so-little brother are this base-line for my life, a rock-bottom foundation, the north star from which I know I'll be able to find my way.

Home is my chain-smoking Aunt Teresa (we call her "Aunt Tar") who lives with the white-haired matriarch of the family, my super-Catholic Grandma Veith. Home is my always teary-eyed, Aunt Loretta, and my seven cousins. Zach with his always uncouth -yet extremely hilarious- stories, usually involving some combination his bodily functions, a girl, Brett Farve and beer. Ah, Shorty! There's my always-disapproving (usually with reason) cousin Erica, the overprotective Monica, her husband Steve and their progeny, Aedan, who try to fight the urge to laugh with an aire of disdain.

Home is driving by my old High School and wondering what all the fuss was about.

But now, Home is also seeing the gilded dome of Pat Neff Hall over the shoulder of Judge Baylor's statue. It's seeing young couples necking on the path through the North Village. Home is the courtyard of Brooks Hall, where I've lost myself and found myself. Home is the "tink" of frosty brews with friends like Eric and Myles. Holla at ya boy!

These things, they're familiar in their quirkiness. They're sort of old-fashioned but great. They are beautiful, and artfully done. They are, in a word, "quaint."

So you see, Stace, -may I call you "Stace"?- your words, your sweet innocence, your delicious sublimity, your utter honesty, they're masterfully done to me. Stace, when I imagine you, holding plastic bags, the hard-fought day-before-Thanksgiving contents straining against the handles and digging into your hands, standing in front of a red-haired, feisty mother doubled over in laughter at the sight of your scrunched eyebrows, wrinkled nose and the corners of your mouth turned down with frustration, its like home-made French bread being wafted in front of my nose. I don't think "quaint" is such a bad thing, hopefully you no longer do either.

Thanks, Stacey, it was great talking to me, wasn't it? Hopefully, you'll deign to do so again soon.

[My Ghosts] Re-published for Myles

2004-12-01T01:46:00.000-06:00

The most painful memories of my life are evoked by the mere mentioning of the words “Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital”, and now I’m entering that very place. It’s been almost five years since I’ve been here. Its prodigal son returns.

My ears begin to tingle with familiarity as I step onto the worn out pressure sensor mats in front of the automatic doors. I can see the inner hallway through the fencing reinforced plexiglass of the inner doors. I steel myself.

As I step through the entrance into the hallway, I notice the sea-foam colored tile that lines the hall and the same pastel pattern that borders along its edge. Only now, it’s seems lower. Have I grown that much?

I make my way, almost on auto-pilot, to the elevator. I notice, with a grin, how the arrow that points up still blinks with irregularity.

“Oops, my bad.”: says the orderly as he bumps me with his cart full of urine samples and the like.

“De nada.”: I mumble as I follow him onto the lift.

My finger finds the button for the ninth floor even though the number is scratched and appears now to be just a sloppy “3". I push it until it’s illuminated a pale orange.

It’s just the orderly and me now. We both smile and nod as we attempt a witty reparte’ while we wait. At the “ding” of the bell, I step off as I wish the orderly a good day.

The ninth floor. The Oncology ward. As I walk towards the door, my legs begin to feel like I’ve just run a marathon. They’re tired and heavy. I reach out a clumsy hand towards the cold metal of the doorhandle. My fingertips are surprised to feel a warmth in that seemingly heartless piece of steel.

As I open the door my nostrils flare as they are assaulted with the smell of the antiseptic cleaner used to clean up vomit. I, as Pavlov’s dogs salivated at the sound of a bell, have associated that unctuous odor with vomit and begin to get that bitter taste in the back of my mouth that touches the sides of your tongue right before you puke. My eyes dart around the hallway searching for a trash can. Not finding one, I run back through the doors and out of the Cancer ward, my heart racing.

I sit down in the corner of that hallway and put my head between my knees in a futile attempt to make that feeling of fear and anxiety subside. Throwing up would be a release.

Standing up and ignoring my own lightheadedness I step to the door, draw it open and attack the entrance. I step through it with all the will I can muster. As I look down the hallway, I observe a frayed knot of action. Nurses are walking stiff-legged with urgency from room to room, alcove to alcove.

As I start to move down the hall, I feel more like the hall is moving around me. I look down at my feet moving step ahead of step. It’s like I’m watching someone else’s feet. My breath tightens as I look through the crack of an opening door.

I see a child sitting on a table. I feel my stomach tense as his blue eyes lock with mine. His head is bald and lumpy resembling (though I hate to say it) a potato. Through the crack of the door, I can see the patches of gossamer hair that cling to his head in clumps. I see how on his arm is a board; and in his wrist is a needle, an I.V., a heparin lock.

In his eyes I can see a strength beyond his stature. As they hold me in their grip, I see a determination, a will greater than I can understand, a fire. He lays his head in his mother’s lap, and I can see him no more through that crack in the door.

As the hallway begins again to pass by me, I run, quite literally, into a little girl. She too, has the gaunt figures that remind me of sights I’ve seen only in National Geographic Magazine of starving Ethiopian children. But there is no emptiness in her eyes. I hear her squeal with delight as she races along the pathway and skids around the corner with her I.V. pole in tow. Her pink bathrobe with Barbie monogrammed on the back fluttering along after her.

I run after her. I want to see where she’s going. But when I turn the corner, my smile fades. I remember this place. It’s a cul de sac of a hallway; a giant “u”. It’s the infusion area. This is the place I remember all too well. This is the place I’ve been trying to forget. This hallway is more of a big room with little alcoves along the outside wall that surround a nurse’s post. Each little “room” has a bed, a tv, a chair for the parents, a pole for the medication, and a curtain for privacy.

As I walk through the hallway, I hear screams of pain. I can hear the children cry to their mothers “mommy, make it stop! I’ll be good, I promise!” My nose begins to drip and my eyes start to well and itch. In with the pleadings of the child I hear the alto sobbings of the mother: “I’m so sorry baby, I’m so sorry.” I go to this room, and I peek around the curtain to see the child laying down with another board held on by clear adhesive medical tape to his arm. It’s the boy I saw earlier. Wincing in pain, he once again lays his head in his mother’s lap. She strokes his lumpy head and begins to sing in a deep, melancholy voice:

"Summertime, and the livin’ is easy...” Instantly there is silence; silence, save for that sweet sound seeming to saturate every pore of my soul.

I look at the little boy. The pain has not left his face though his tears have stopped. I see all motion leave his face. My tears flowing, I close the curtain.

Republished for the lovely and "quaint", Miss Stacey {Does being nothing special make you special?}

2004-12-01T00:56:00.000-06:00

Origionally published: August 16th, 2004

I wasn't going to go. I didn't really want to go. I felt like being there would somehow be betraying my friends and family. Like going to the movie you told a friend earlier in the day you didn't want to see.

So as I was clapping and cheering for numerous of my friends as they received their diplomas from President Sloan last Saturday, I did my best to yell in such way that wouldn't get me noticed. Its kind of contrary to the whole purpose of yelling, I guess. But we tend to suspend logic in situations where it isn't welcome.

I was able to avoid any real pangs of guilt until I perused the Commencement Program and discovered my name.

Elizabeth Anne Goble
Neil Edward Golemo
Miguel Gonzalez

I recently had a conversation with a dear friend. She felt the need to inform me of how "hard it is to be your friend".

Apparently, and I'm doing my best to recreate words she used, it is hard to be friends with me because I'm perfect. I'm smart. I'm funny. I'm well-read. I have high moral standards. I'm devoted to my family. I love children. I laugh at everything. I'm in a good place with the Lord but not complacent. I can sing. I'm an excellent cook. I'm courteous and romantic. I have a "way of making myself the center of attention". I'm "one of the most confident people" she's ever met.

And supposedly all of these things make me perfect, thus intimidating.

What in the hell?

Immediately I questioned how well this girl could have ever felt she knew me if she could honestly think of me as "perfect". I don't see how she could have a conversation with me and not take note of my arrogance. I'm not perfect. I'm nothing if not completely and utterly flawed.

I found myself growing angry with her. I'm nothing. If I have any worth its because of blessings given to me by the Lord. I know this. Obviously, she has not the audience with my thoughts that I enjoy. But she should know me better than that. I don't really trust many people, but I had trusted her. I'd been honest with her. How dare she think me superior to her. Its flagrant misuse of the word "perfect" that degrades the word and superlatives as a whole. Damn, I was mad.

I'm nothing special. I'm just a pudgy, socially deft yet relationally inept connoisseur of Chicago area baseball clubs trying to find my christian way through the media-driven wasteland that is our world.

Wait.

Do I really believe that? Do I really think that I'm not special? Don't we all truly believe that we, alone, are the center of the universe? We've all entertained the thought from time to time that maybe this life is, quite literally, a dream from which we could wake up at any moment. Who hasn't watched The Truman Show and not wondered "what if our reality was merely someone else's media? How real is our world?

Or in the Christian identity sense, don't we all have a personal relationship with Christ? Is it not the idea of a Lord that knows every hair on my head that comforts us like a warm quilt? The idea that I am in possession of some trait(s) that sets me apart from every other soul existing, existed, or yet to exist makes me feel, well, special.

So as I was defending my own mediocrity, I started to wonder why I was fighting it. Yeah, she was wrong. But why was I fighting it? Was I simply trying to avoid the hubris of which I'm very susceptible?

I don't want to be intimidating. I don't want to be ashamed of who I am. And I'm not. I know I have (many) faults, but I'm not ashamed of them either. The other day, I was watching "the great biker build-off" on TLC. I'm addicted to these Chopper series. But one of the master builders, as he was installing the headlight into his newest masterpiece, his hand slipped and the chrome-plated casing falls to the floor with a fitting crash. He simply picked it up and after glancing to see any new defects the plunge might have caused he simply put it into place with a "hmmph" and the comment "now it has character".

That's me. Yeah, I may have a few scratches but that doesn't mean the Lord won't use me as part of his masterpiece. My dents have blessed me with "character".

As I watched Elizabeth Anne Goble walk across the stage and heard the name of Miguel Gonzalez come next, I watched carefully the people surrounding me to see if they had notice the egregious error made my the announcer. I was searching for the small girl grabbing the arm of her mother and asking pleadingly "mommy, why didn't they read Neil's name?"

I was expecting to see men rising and storming out in protest. Women should start crying. I expected friends and strangers I had benevolently touched in some unknown way rise to my defense.

But much to my awe and gaping mouth, no one said a thing. No wailing women wearing black. No men with a beef. Nothing. Nada. Zilch.

As I sat back in my stadium seat, the plastic fighting the relaxing advance of my thoracic vertebrae, I smiled. What does a dumb ol' girl know about me anyway?

It's a [insert race] thing; you wouldn't understand.

2004-11-30T15:49:00.000-06:00

One of my favorite things about the great land of Texas is Bush's Chicken. When I'm away, in the world of good dental hygiene, green leafy vegetables and Deer Huntin' orange with camouflage interior design motif's up north, the pale tan of the chicken-fried chicken strips, gravy the consistency of warm Vaseline (not that I would know anything about that) and fried okra of Bush's Chicken are what calls to me. Top all that off with a half-gallon of pancreas-punching sweet tea and coma’s almost worth it. It's what I call tank food; the kind of food that just marches through your system; kicking the ass of anything that would step into its way.

So one day a week or so ago, two of my friends and I decided to assuage my angst at becoming part of the single's community by kicking my arties in the crotch with a 2 piece at Bush's. Dine in, please. Tim Chao, Dave Chen and I order our food and find a nice booth on the right side of the restaurant. Dave and Tim sit facing doors; I hit the other side with my back to the entrance. I only say this because I usually like to sit with facing the entrance, in case someone decides to run in with AK-47's and hold up Bush's for extra Bush's Chicken Seasoning... yes, I'm strange. Very strange.

Anyway, just as I was finishing my crinkle-cut fries, I notice two young black men snicker as they walk by. To be honest, it really was a "snicker". I'd never really thought I'd actually heard a "snicker" until I heard their particular snicker. Yes, it was definitely a snicker.

I didn't think anything of it -people usually laugh when they see me. A couple seconds later, I hear more laughing and then I think I catch the words "chop-sticks." Wait, this is a chicken joint. I eavesdrop -no I observe- a little closer and try to catch the rest of what these fellows are saying. I don't really have to listen closely as they start to get louder and louder.

"Hi YAW!" one yells as he rips through a napkin held up by his friend. "Oh, Daniel-San, your technique racks the soul of a warrior!"

At this, the devilish smile melts off my face as I realize these guys are making fun of my Asian friends. I turn around and look at them with the sternest, most withering scowl I can shape upon my face. They see me, laugh, duck and keep going. I hear them yell "Jackie Chan" and "Bruce Lee" in between purposely poor attempts at the Chinese language. The whole time, I'm getting more and angrier.

Finally, I see something come flying across the room and onto the ground. That's it. You can be openly racist, and you'll make me angry. But you litter? That's just too much! Whatever the reason, I stand up, calmly walk over to their booth, pull up a chair and sit upon it backwards while facing my two new friends.

With a grin, I look at the first one, the one on my right, and ask "Have you ever been the victim of racism?" I stare at him, my eyes locked onto his, and wait for a response that won't come. I turn and look at the guy on the left, "What about you? Have you ever had anyone call you a racist name? Have you ever been treated differently for no other reason than the color of your skin?"

This guy must have been the brave one because he started to respond, "well, um, ye-"

"-No." I interrupt. "No, I don't think you have. Because if you knew anything about what racism feels like, I cannot believe you would be treating my friends with such a lack of respect."

Stunned silence.

I wait one RCC-esque pause, and wish them both a nice day and walk back to my table to eat. To be honest, I'm not really sure what happened next. I know that my friends didn't really have much to say. It was kind of a crazy thing to do. I mean, who does that? That's the kind of thing I usually think of later, after the clouds of anger of have dispersed from my mind and the size of the other guys have shrunk into something more manageable by my imagination.

Race, racism, bigotry, these are my chocolate; things subjects that just ignite my passion; my push-button issues. I have no idea why. I’m no crusader, I do not pretend that these are problems I can solve for the world. But these are huge problems.

So often people will claim things like “racism is getting better; its not such a big problem anymore.” Well I think that any racism is a “big” problem.

I get frustrated sometimes. So it goes.

The kind of heavy gravity ignores

2004-11-14T17:15:00.000-06:00

"Big things are happening" our hero thinks to himself as he waits in line. It is 11:45 pm on an island of a Monday night and here I find myself bouncing foot-to-foot as if I'm a 4 year-old doing the "Potty dance" in a queue for the highly-anticipated, nearly 2 years waited, video game of the year. The "Lord of the Rings" of the video game world. Halo 2.

Go earth.

In just 30-45 minutes, depending upon traffic and how fast I drive, I, "Master Chief", will be, once again, saving the universe and all mankind from "The Covenant" and "The Flood" while wielding an amazing assortment of weapons and never lacking in cute quips for those who would stop me.

But for now, I wait. Its a strange thing to spend 3 hours in close proximity with this especially avid form of video gamers. Its an oxymoronic phrase: "video gamers interacting." You should have seen the two fellas in front of me. The sociologist in me came out to play while watching these two Dagwoods. I swear they spoke, nearly exclusively, in grunts and gurgles. It took me about 5 minutes to realize that Lump #1's name wasn't actually "Exturmn8er702" but that he and his friend, "LyvYer2012" only refer to each other in their Xbox Live handles.

Sigh.

I could see the excitement in the glistening of their pasty-white hides and spotty mustaches 14 years in the making... "Come on puberty! You can do it!" But a surprising thing happened. Being near these guys began to get my heart pumping a little bit. They were pumped! And I have to admit, it was rubbing off on me. Yeah sure, their untucked, two sizes too big shirts show signs of their last two lunches and reek of B.O. Sure, they have the social skills of a Mongol with Tourett's and the attention span of a "huh? What were we talking about again?" But this was a big night for them. A night two years in the making, and I found their passion to be inspiring.

LyvYer told me, between heaves on his inhaler, how he'd been dreaming of this day for the last two years, "ever since I beat the Halo 1." The release of this game was a big thing for them. A heavy thing.

Sometime around hour 2 of 3, with all of my social currency spent, I began to reflect as I sometimes do.

Big things. Big, heavy things.

There's been a few of those for me this week. On Tuesday I found out that my cousin, Andee, practically a younger sister, who is in Iraq, would be -and currently is- involved in "Operation Phantom Fury." This was a little sobering. Yeah, I've sent her an email and a letter or two. I pray for her constantly. And I'll get a mass email from her occasionally as well hearing how life "over there" sucks. But until now, until I heard about casualties coming from her battalion or company, (or maybe both?) I'd been just imagining her at summer camp. A really dry summer camp... with guns... and where they curse a lot... a really dry, militant summer camp where they curse... like Boy Scout Camp in El Paso...

But now its real. People are dying and my worries are no longer held in check by anonymity. Andee is in danger. Real danger. And I fear for her. This kind of fear... its a sort of an Achilles-cutting debilitating phobia-forming fear. I'm helpless to help her.

On Wednesday, a very good friend of mine here at Baylor had a child. Around 1:51 PM, Brian Rowe's beautiful daughter, Emma Merie Grace was born into this world. Earlier in the day, Brian called me, let me know what was going on, and asked me if I would be his "communication guy." He would call me and I would farm out the information to "the Crew." In my "Goofy" voice, I answer with the kind of awe that seems to accompany all requests (no matter how mundane: "would you mind cleaning up the vomit left by the wedding party?) surrounding things like births, weddings, funerals, bar-mitzvahs, duels?, "um, garsh, I mean, shucks! Yeah Bry! Of course! I'm your man. Let me know what you need... shucks!"

The baby came. Calls went out. We all, Jordan, Rae, Dave, Crawford, Beth, Tim and myself, went to go see the newest edition to our group of fellas. It hit me when I looked through the glass and saw this little red-faced wriggling thing wrapped up like a candy bar in commercials, "she is new." Right now, this child has not a sin upon her soul. I understand why it is that parents always call their baby's "perfect" no matter how butt-ugly everyone else thinks they may be. (Oh, right, like YOU'VE never thought that.) But all light-heartedness aside, one cannot get avoid seeing the gravity of this situation. This is big. This is heavy.

I begin to fall prey to my own sense of solipsism and wonder about myself; how this all affects me. Brian, is a year younger than me. Yet, should an outsider with no knowledge of Brian other than his age see him with a stroller walking Emma, I imagine no real flags would be raised. Its natural for a 22 year-old to procreate. Perhaps he is a little young, but not too much. What does this say about me? I'm 23. I've graduated from a good University with a very marketable degree. I'm doing well in Graduate school in a cohort where nearly half of my peers are married, engaged, or well on their ways to being so. And here I am, wallowing in academia, afraid to leave my niche as the spunky student and wondering if I'm ever going to get this "Bill-paying" thing.

When I think of the long-term, I'm simply finding it hard to see anything beyond receiving my Masters in Education a year from May. Its as though there is a curtain pulled across my future. I know its there, (hope its there), but I cannot see it. And for now, now is enough to keep me occupied. My line is weighted well enough this far from the bobber.

There's the girl. Erin. She makes my heart sing but things are tough. For the last couple of years I've been a wreck when it comes to the opposite sex. Either I'm all in it or not at all. I find a woman of worth, and I have excellent taste in women, and I place her upon a pedestal; hold her as my ideal. "The girl."

But with Erin, things are different. She's not so much a "girl." She's, well, she's just "Erin." She isn't a sex to me. She's just this person I think I might love. It was a slippery kind of back-door realization of this, too. She started out as a crush. But somewhere over the years I gave up and decided to just get to know the girl, her crazy little peccadillos. But before she would show me hers, I had to show her some of mine. I dropped the playboy routine for the first time with her. We were never going to date, why not? For some reason, it has always been so easy to lay myself out there for Erin. Guys, she's amazing. I've never known someone more unafraid of a hard-day's work. She's not a wimp. But, she's girly too. Sometimes she lets me act like I make things better for her.

She's loyal. She's loyal to her friends, her parents, her family, her school.

She has most pronounced northern accent I've ever heard from someone south of Milwakee. Everytime "bags" becomes "bigs" or "gosh" becomes "gash," "Neil" becomes "mush." I'm praying like hell that she comes down here to Baylor for her master's degree. I've never lived in the same city as the girl. It would be nice. And I've seen what Baylor is when she's around. The team wins football games, Thai food tastes better and my friends are funnier. Its something I could get used to.

But when I think about it, I'm not sure I'm ready for the weight of serious monogamy. Is there anyone else? Absolutely not. If I had to choose one person on this earth, any person, with which to get married and have tons and tons and tons of marital sex, it would take me no time to give you my answer, Erin Many. (totally wanted to say something like Gandhi, Jessica Rabbit or Bosephus the Rodeo clown)

But, I know that right now, I'm not the man that Erin deserves or will need. But will I ever be? And does it matter? Its not fair to imagine Brian "ready" to have a child, a mouth to fill, diapers to change, a butt to have inoculated and clothed, a soul to guide for, at least, the next 18 years. I cannot see how my melodramatic cousin Andee, the one who would wear yellow or pink everyday for everything if she could, who loves Winnie the Pooh more than most people have any business loving any fictional character, was ready to go to war; to pledge her life to protect those of others. I don't care what you say, but how can someone be ready for something like that? Hell, even my buddies LyvYwer and Turmn8er might have balked at whether or not they were ready for something like Halo 2. But damnit, they dealt. Just as Brian will deal and Andee will deal.

Brian will raise his child. Andee will come home. Lyv and n8er will beat the game. They will carry their burdens and maybe their burdens will carry them. Life is funny like that. Gravity has no power over this kind of heavy. But we do.

Brian, Emma, Andee and Erin, I will see you all soon, ready or not.

Announcement/Cop-out Blog

2004-11-10T04:43:00.000-06:00

Sorry its been a while since i've posted. I'm afraid its actually going to be a bit longer.

Big news: I've decided that I'm going to pursue my Phd. in Education as soon as I can. Most likely it will be after I finish my Master's in Education in May '06.
Baylor beat aTm 35-34. Proud of my boys.
I heard Bush won. I know I should feel something about that...
I've been writing my little pucker off... just for academic purposes...
My buddy Brian is having his kid on Thursday! Prayers!
Cousin Andee needs prayers.
Myles, you need to call a brother.
Mary, frozen fruit, hot tea and good conversation awaits us.
That Erin is one amazing girl.
I've decided to go by Neil E. Golemo. I was named after both my grandfathers. I'm sick of barely recognizing my link to Grandpa Golemo. (I wonder if this is how Sting felt when he started asking all of his friends to call him "Sting?")

Hollar at your boy and listen to "Snow Patrol."

Neiliness to you all,

A letter of recommendation

2004-10-27T16:45:00.000-05:00

This is a letter I've been working on for a very deserving man. I was kinda chosen out of my cohort for this honor. I had no idea until about 24 hours ago how big a deal this is. The last fella who got this award was given a $20,000 grant and the option to present a paper upon the topic of his choice at a banquet in held in his honor. The only obstacle between Dr. Cloud and this award is my abilty to articulate how wonderful a man he is.

For your consideration:

Neil Golemo
Master’s Candidate
School of Education

October 27, 2004

Nomination Committee, One great expectation of being in Grad School that has completely come true is that of exceptional professor performance. It’s only my first semester, yet I've already been exposed to three excellent teachers. Dr. Martha Lou Scott is fascinating, yet wholly disarming with her East-Texas accent. Also, she bleeds Green and Gold, just as I do. Dr. Shushok has proven to be one of the best facilitators of classroom discussion I have ever encountered. Then there's Dr. Robert C. Cloud. And he says his middle initial, as if he were a civil war general of old. Robert C. Cloud—or RCC for short—is a true commander of dramatic teaching form, the master of the 3-second pause. He literally reminds our class how smart and good looking we are at every meeting. He can take us from laughs to tears in the "flick of a cricket's leg."

I don't really remember either of my grandfathers. One died years before I was even conceived and the other, my namesake, died when I was very young. I remember only tiny bits. I remember looking at a cartoon in a Sesame Street book, seeing a portrait on the wall of Bert's father, and thinking I was reminded of my Grandpa Veith (He kind of had a pointy head). I remember, after he died of a heart-attack, giving my Grandma "hug-attacks." I remember pipe smoke, but I don't really remember him in the flesh.

And now the Lord has brought Dr. Cloud into my life. RCC challenges our class in a way I doubt any of us ever thought a professor could. He engages each and every person with every word of oration. When he speaks, his watery-blue eyes have a way of finding every other set in the room, demanding their attention –no, their fixation. And every time he says "now listen to RCC on this one..." we are all rapt in concentration, secured upon his every word. His are words that do not seem to come from the man, but from every man, woman or piece of prose that has ever touched him and taught him a lesson. When RCC holds forth, one does not hear only the words of a silver-haired gentleman, but the sagacity of Plato, the simplicity of a kindergartner and the wisdom from the mouth of his 92-years-young “Mee-Maw” when she admonished him that “there’s always the morning after the night before.”

Dr. Cloud is emotional. He shares his life with us so that we may know exactly how the skills and information we are learning now will make us better equipped to serve the Academy in our futures. With RCC, every reading has weight and importance. He has shown us that passion can have a place in our careers, passion tempered by knowledge. Dr. Cloud bares his soul for the good of ours.

Lately, he has been reading to us at the end of every class and I cannot help but feel as I might have felt—could I better remember—when my Grandfather read to me. Last night, when I felt his raspy voice wash over me, I was taken to a different place: the book-bag sitting in my lap became my old teddy bear and my jeans and Doc's were suddenly "footsie pajamas." For only a moment, I was little again and my life lay completely ahead of me. With whimsy in his heart, he spoke to us of the places we would go and the things we would do. And then, solemnly he informed my class of how he wished he could go with us, yet he could not; his time was passing. With a tear in his eye, he asked us to take him along in spirit. In that moment, RCC made me feel as though I had all the potential in the world and that my life is a book yet to be written. One can only imagine my shock when I realized it was true.

This only begins to describe how each one in my class feels about Dr. Robert C. Cloud. He continues to change the face of scholarship, enhance the level of academia among the students, and create leaders in education for tomorrow. I, along with my classmates, would like to nominate Dr. Cloud for the second annual Cornelia Marschall Smith Professor of the Year Award.

Sincerely,

Neil Golemo

Lines

2004-10-23T05:08:00.000-05:00

Tonight I was watching my favorite TV show on DVD. Yes, once again, I couldn't sleep.

There's this scene where the main character is drawing the image of the woman he once loved. For most of the scene, you cannot see the picture though you see his scowl and he, pencil in hand, working furiously to render her visage to parchment.

Finally, we see the face of his beloved. It's an incredibly simple drawing; just a few lines -but beautiful and sublime. My heart sunk and I'll admit I got a little teary. Yeah, I know it's been one of those "weeks" but even still, the pure poignancy of the drawing touched me.

Upon a second or two of reflection, I was touched even further to realize that I was so moved by a collection of lines. Black upon white. Nothing more. But then again, yes. Yes it was.

In this world we've been lead to believe that we are more than just black lines against white paper. Life is more than black and white, the song says. There's grey in there too.

We have "yes" and we have "no." "Maybe."

This picture. It captured her completely. It required no grays to encompass all that made his muse beautiful. This drawing made my heart sing and cry and mope around in its socks and stained hoody drinking milk from the carton for three days in a row, all at the same time.

I heard a quote by Oscar Wilde that once said: "morality, like art, means drawing a line someplace."

Whatever the case may be, for good or for not-so-good, it is the lines we draw that define us. Grays and shadows will fall where they may, but my friends, it is the lines we draw that make the man... or woman... okay person.

I could launch into a whole diatribe (or prolong the current one) by talking about morality and all that stuff. But as ol' RCC would say, "folks, maybe that's a rabbit I'll chase another time." Perhaps our time is better served wondering why it is that we need lines.

We need lines to show us where to park and where to walk. We need lines to get tickets to a show... or Pigskin (Nice legs, Mary!). When you think about it, you've lines to thank for reading this particular bit of prose. Lines bent into the shape of letters.

We desire lines. Sometimes just because we want something to toe. Other times, we love the connection that only a line can illustrate. I remember before a recent trip to Illinois, I was "MapQuesting" routes to drive home from Hamilton. (Wow. Weird statement. Waco is home? Waco is home.) On a whim, I decided to plot the course from my apartment to Erin's. One cannot describe the particular flavor of comfort I got from seeing a red line cross states and rivers to connect the two places in which we both sleep, eat and breath.

Sigh.

What a wonderful thing a line is. Comfort-bringer and curse. Much like my fallen form, forever shall it bring me wonder of a greater thing than myself.

The "bit role"...

2004-10-10T15:07:00.000-05:00

Put on some pants... check.

Shirt... check.

Tuck in... whoop!... check.

Got my keys, got my phone, fly's up. Let's go. Phone rings -it's Myles.

"Hey Neil, on your way over?"

I start to walk to the door. "Just stepping out of the Apartment... en route, brother".

"Well, um, okay we're going to take a field trip... I can't explain now and I have no idea what's going to happen."

I lean forward, interested. "Um, okayyy, I'll be there in a minute".

What in the heck? I'm used to Myles saying things over my head, but this was crazy. So, I hurry up and get to Myles to discover a skinny looking African American woman looking quite perturbed and sitting on Myles's stoop. Well, actually, I didn't know for a fact that it was a woman. To be honest, I thought it was the infamous "Glenn". (A homeless man Myles and his roommates occasionally support with a meal or the occasional buck or two) Turns out, I wasn't that far off...

I park across the street; say a quick prayer asking for nothing in particular. I turn the ignition key counter-clockwise, sigh, and pull it out. I glance up at the rear-view, fix my hat. I close my eyes and open the door. After crossing the street, I get to within a few feet of where the young woman was sitting and subsequently realized that not only was she a "she" but also that she wasn't exactly all that young.

As the realization begins to curve my eyebrow Myles steps up with a "Neil. How are ya?". I shake his hand and introduces the lady to me as "Deisha" (sp?). In the next few minutes, I found out that Deisha needed a ride to her place a few miles away, a room in the "Viking Inn". Since I had plenty of gas, I volunteered.

Deisha looks at me and asks: "Do you think that maybe we could get me some chicken or something to eat?".

My heart drops and I say: "of course, Deena".

Yeah, I definitely blew that one.

I'm not really sure how to describe the thoughts going through my head as we held forth unto the highway out towards a rougher part of town. Deisha's telling us about Glenn ditching her far from the apartment and how he's smokin' again, etc. At this, I wonder if the Bob Marley in my CD player was such a good choice... or was it? Then Deisha gets quiet and Myles says "so how was your weekend?". I was surprised at my own ability to Bullshit calmness on the surface while my heart is fluttering wildly underneath.

As I pull into the "Viking Inn", my mind is in a state of horror confused with intense interest. My eyes wide, I sucked in every detail. Three cars in the parking lot. A lady in tight and dirty jean shorts stands in the doorway of the of motel office sucking a cigarette all the way down to her orange fingernails. 5 episodes of MakeOver have taught me that Orange is an "unfortunate" color for her complexion.

"Its the apartment on the other side of the suburban" Deisha croaks.

As I stop and before the struts can even dampen the inertia of the car making it bounce back --you know what I'm talking about-- Deisha leaps out the back-right door of my Stratus. The second the door even shuts Myles turns his shoulders towards me, leans slightly forward and without taking his eyes off of a Deisha angrily pounding upon the motel door, says -as if he had to- "Neil, I have absolutely no idea where this is going. If I were you I'd be ready to throw it in reverse and get the hell out of here".

After a few seconds of pounding on a door that won't be answered and a few attempts to peer through a curtained window, a livid Deisha storms off through the parking lot back towards the office. She motions for us to follow her. Forgetting I had already slipped the car into reverse in preparation for a hasty get-away, I accidentally put it into neutral. As I was looking down to fix the problem, I see Myles's eyes focus upon something over my shoulder. I twist to look out the driver's-side window to see a skinny African-American man in a torn, red t-shirt stumble out of another motel room with two beers in one hand --one open, one not-- with a younger-looking woman tottering behind him. He walks right up to the door upon which Deisha had so eagerly been knocking and slips in a key. He looks at us, Myles and I look at each other, then he seems to recognize Myles.

He walks up to the door: "What's up?".

Myles: "Deisha's looking for you. She just went to the motel office to get your key".

Yeah, this is Glenn.

So Glenn walks straight to the motel office. We follow, -in the car of course. I'll spare you the rest of this story but I will let you know it involves a husband and a wife yelling and screaming at each other, a motel key being thrown into the middle of a parking lot, and Myles and my not saying a word.

As we drove Deisha back to Myles's place, I guess because that's where we found her, I think I began to kind of cry inside. Had I just witnessed the ending of a marriage? A breaking point in the conjunction of two lives?

What kind of shit was this? How could this be? I hadn't said anything. I hadn't done a thing to help them. Hell, in a way I had facilitated this whole event via the four wheels of my Dodge. But then one tells himself there really was nothing he really could do. That the relationship had been deteriorating for months or even years before this day and I had only caught but a frame or two of a story reels into the telling.

Sigh.

As I gave Deisha all the money I had, I suddenly wish I had more to give. I hated myself for having a good car. I despised myself for purchasing a wicked-cool CD player to put in it. I saw the Baylor ring on my finger, the Nike Watch on my wrist and the phone in my pocket and I all of a sudden felt heavy, as if I was wearing three parkas on a spring day.

I thought about the parents who've placed me in a position to succeed. I have a wonderful life with friends who support me and an amazing woman who waits to kiss me. I think about the life I've had and all the days I've yet to enjoy, and I wonder what I could have done to deserve it. It's a beautiful thing when the heaviest weight upon your heart is watching October baseball without seeing Cubbie Blue.

In stories of many lives, I play a major character. I may be the quirky roommate, or the fatherly mentor. I could be the naive apprentice or the hunky "Mr. Right". (thanks, Erin) But it appears that in this case, I am but a random dude playing the "bit" part. In the credits of Deisha's life, I guess I'd be "Guy #2 in Car". I guess I'm okay with that. I only hope I got my line right.

A many splendored thing

2004-09-26T17:44:00.000-05:00

I was so nervous I couldn't even walk in. Also, I didn't want to have one of those weird moments where you're walking from the plane and you see the person who's come to pick you up from like 12 miles away and then you have the weird sustained eye-contact thing...

Okay, I was nervous. Could you blame me? I hadn't seen the girl in forever and yet here she comes -after driving to St. Louis to get on a plane and taking that plane to Houston and sitting through a 2-hour lay-over waiting for her flight to Waco... I was a little... "Willie McWiggins."

But then, finally, her plane shows up and taxi's in. I walk into the small airport and wait in front of the gate. My eyes dart around for possible places to position myself. Should I lean up against this post? -Too James Dean. I could hide behind this corner and jump out at her... stupid. Should I sit on this airport bench, lean back and act nonchalant (as if girls on which I've had a crush for 5+ years fly 900 miles to see me on my birthday all the time)? Maybe I should start up a conversation with the lady next to me so I'll look popular... D'oh! Something on my shirt. Why did I wear these khaki's? I look like I'm freaking rushing FIJI... I should-

And then I see her... in her jeans and white, sleeveless shirt with her hair all blowing in the wind that seems to always surround airports (what's the deal with that, anyway?) and I feel those blue eyes lock with mine; I watch her lips curl into a smile... I might as well have been naked. -That's how I felt. Erin has always had a way of seeing right into me. Yeah, yeah I know it's cliche' but it really is true. It's like with her, not only is my inner monologue not so "inner" but she got an advance copy of it a couple days ago.

We greet with an embrace and a "hey babe" and then we close our eyes, lean in and kiss our first kiss right there in the middle of Waco Regional Airport for all the Texans to see. I could have sworn it was my first ever.

I open my eyes it's three days later and she's wearing glasses and my favorite Baylor hoodie that I gave her. As our embrace relaxes and she backs away from me toward the security checkpoint, our hands slide down each others arms and our fingertips catch. First she lets go of my right hand with her left and we linger on what will be our last contact for who knows how long. When we let let thos last few fingers relax, our hands fall to our sides as if they've failed their only purpose.

I say a prayer under my breath beseeching the Lord to watch over her and keep her safe; to bless his prettiest --and best smelling-- blessing to me.

As she is walking down the promenade to board her plane, she slows and looks over her shoulder. I mouth the words "I love you" and she mouths them back through watery eyes. I wink, the corner of her mouth curls upward and she walks through the door taking my heart with her.

It was a weekend of "firsts." Our first kiss. First time to Texas. First time to eat Thai. First Big Time (Big12) football game. Second time doing the "Sic 'em Bears" claw. First time meeting my friends. First time making out while watching The Lord of The Rings. (Ahh J.R.R., will your gifts to me never cease?) First time I've ever felt completely myself in front of someone with whom I don't share genes.

Now I only hope for a "last." I don't look forward to watching her walk away again.

Older and Wiser

2004-09-22T11:58:00.000-05:00

One great expectation of being in Grad School that has completely come true is that of professor performance. In only my first semester, I've already been exposed to three excellent teachers. Martha Lou is great and completely disarming with her east-Texas accent. Also, she bleeds Green and Gold, just like me. Dr. Shushok is awesome, as expected. This week he facilitated what might have been the best classroom "workshop" and interactive-roleplaying experience I've ever experienced on Monday.

Then there's Dr. Robert C. Cloud. And he says his middle name, as if he were a General of old. Robert C. Cloud -- or RCC for short-- is the master of the dramatic teaching form; the commander of the 3-second pause. He has a way of literally reminding our class how smart and good looking we are at every meeting. He will take us from tears to laughs in the "flick of a cricket's leg."

I don't remember my grandfather. One died years before I was even conceived and the other, my namesake, died when I was very young. I remember tiny bits, I guess. I remember looking at a cartoon in a Sesame Street book and seeing a portrait on the wall of Bert's father and thinking I was reminded of Grandpa Veith. (He kind of had a pointy head). I remember after he died of a heart-attack giving my Grandma "hug-attacks". I remember Pipe smoke, but I don't really remember him in the flesh.

I guess I've had other Grandfather types. There was PeeWee Hestilow, the Brooks Hall night monitor for 14 years-dammit. PeeWee was the kind of person I thought I'd meet when I moved to Texas. From his silver handle-bar mustache to his Bryl-creamed hair, the man fit the part. He wore "cowboy shirts" adorned with the occasional longhorns or cow skull that were so starched with such vehemence that many of the S.P. Brooks staff were sure that's what kept him up right at times. He wore the Wranglers, tight and cowboy style. With that cramped of an environment, its a surprise he had 4 kids. Funny story- PeeWee had a set of keys he always kept locked up in the office locker. And on those keys he had a wooden peg attached to the keyring. For the life of us, we had a hell of a time trying to figure out its purpose. And then one night we saw him walk his rounds. PeeWee's Wranglers were so tight, that he couldn't fit his keys in his pocket, so he would just stick the peg in. To us, it was like watching two Pandas mate in the wild, you knew it happened, but you just never thought you'd see it. Seriously, I know how Jacques Cousteau must have felt.

I'm not a big sleeper, so many a late-night hour was spent hearing how good we rich "kids have it" and playing dominoes with the Baylor DPS officers as they'd stop by to "stretch their legs". I miss PeeWee a lot. He had a particular kind of wisdom one can only procure through a divorce, four boys, "tank-bustin' in Korea" and a wife named "Kitty". I remember the night PeeWee tried to talk Andrew Telep and myself into buying $800 Ostritch-skin Boots using the logic that if we spend $100 a year on "tenny-sneakers" --which I haven't spent in 2 years-- and his boots have lasted 20 years then it must be a good deal! Ahh, PeeWee. The world needs more of you.

But now I have RCC. RCC challenges us in a way we'd never thought he could. He has a way of engaging each and every one of us in class with every word he speaks. His clear-blue eyes have a way of finding every other set in the room when he speaks, demanding their attention -no- fixation. And every time he says "now listen to RCC on this one..." We are all rapt in concentration, fixed upon his every word.

Lately he's been reading to us at the end of every class and I can't help but feel as I might have felt --could I better remember-- when my Grandfather read to me. Last night, when I felt his raspy voice wash over me, I was taken to a different place:the bookbag sitting in my lap became my teddy bear, "chipmunk", and my jeans and Doc's were "footsie pajamas." For only a moment, I was little again and my life lay completely ahead of me. RCC made me feel as though I had all the potential in the world and that my life is but a book yet to be written. One can imagine my shock when I realized it was all true.

I cannot wait for Tuesday next.

Keepin' it "on lock"

2004-09-16T21:11:00.000-05:00

"Whatever you do, don't tell 'em to 'shut up'."

This is my mantra as I walk down the hallway from a comfortable office with a big, leather chair towards towards the sound of laughter and mirth. As I hear a high-pitched laugh, I start to cringe. I must put an end to this. No one is going to have a good time. Not on my watch.

As The Graduate Assistant for Student-Athlete Services working in the Study Hall, I am the stamp-outer of fun --or at least any fun that requires or produces noise. I am a Nazi. "Surfing the net" will get you removed from the computer lab. Using a cell phone will get you signed out and sent home and talking back will get a note to the coaches. I don't play.

When I hear people enjoying themselves, it is my job to put an end to it. I am paid to be unpopular.

Such was not always the case. Once it was my job --nay, my vocation-- to not only allow people to have fun, but to contribute to it. At one point in time, my job was composed nearly completely of talking, "dialogues of difference" and discussions about spirituality, socialism, racism or communism. Name an "ism" and I've discussed it.

But no longer is that the case for this wanderer of the academy. Mine is now to stop the buck. And though I do it, at times, with a heavy heart, I have to remember that it is a heart that's getting free tuition and $750 a month.

If that's what heavy is, then pile it on.

Older brothers we've never had

2004-09-05T20:21:00.000-05:00

I was having a tough time with life last summer. I was stressed from having, for the first time in my life, done mediocre work. An emotionally draining relationship had taken its toll on me and it was showing.

Coming into my senior year, I was supposed to be somewhat relaxed. As it was my last year as a CL, I was supposed to leading our staff. But as it was, I was shit. I had no stamina for drawn out discussions. I had no patience for difficult people. And worse of all, I had begun to get tunnel vision when being able to see outside the box had always been my greatest asset.

We all need a big brother. No matter how great a relationship may be with your parents, no matter how close you are with an older sister; there is something about a relationship with an older brother that simply can't be synthesized.

A big brother is like a father whose authority is derived completely from respect. It depends not at all upon the societal constructs that so strengthen the idea that we should trust our parents; "father knows best". A good older brother combines the wisdom of a more experienced man with the familiarity of a peer and the trust that can only be shared between family members.

I've always needed a big brother, but it just so happened that I was the oldest male to spring forth from Gregg and Milly's loins. I'll give you a minute to catch your breath.

As a result, I've been collecting older brother figures my entire life. My first was my cousin, Nick Short. I'll never forget the time when I was six...

"quit hitting yourself!" my cousin, Zach, would say as he slugged me in the jaw with my own fist as he lay atop me, straddling any escape I might make.

"Zach, that hurts!" I'd say through an already swelling lip.

"That's the point, 'Neeeeeeeeilly'" he'd sneer as he abandoned my fists for his own.

"Zach!!!", my cousin, Nick would roar as he rounded the corner to discover me in my predicament.

Instantly, Zach would roll over and start to sob and scream: "Get off me, Neil!" as if I were the one beating him up. The next couple moments almost always went the same as Nick would do something crude and gross to Zach as a penance for winning a fight against me. Often it would be a wedgie, a killer Indian burn, or my personal favorite: a lugey to the mouth.

Nick was, and in many ways still is, an older brother to me. But as we grew older I was forced to find other surrogate elder siblings. There was Joe & Steve in High School and then Spencer when I went to college. After Spencer there came Andrew and Chad.

Perhaps more than any other older-brother figures I've ever had, Chad and Andrew changed and affected me. I'll spare you the exact details, but it was they who helped me to see my tunnel vision. It was Chad and Andrew who took my hand and used it to slap myself in the face so that I would open my eyes to see the error of my ways. They didn't lead me out of my dark place, they dragged me kicking and screaming. They helped me to know that I was something more than a broken heart. They made me see that I was bigger than so much trash that one could cast aside.

As I was sitting across the table from Myles, and listing intently to whatever Zen-like wisdom Myles sometimes likes to dole out, I couldn't help but say a silent prayer to the Lord who has always blessed me with the older brothers I never had.

As a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs...

2004-09-01T12:44:00.000-05:00

I want to say that grad. school is something special. I want to say that its great, amazing and expanding my borders.

Kinda yes, kinda no.

The classwork is a little more serious. The pressure is a little higher. But to be honest, the feel isn't much removed from my last real semester of college courses. Its actually pretty much the same. You really need to do the readings, which are sizable, and you need to get your junk done. We're treated as professionals.

But then again that may be a little of the problem. This whole "you're a big boy now" treatment is kind of undermining its own intent. If we're big kids, do we really need to be reminded?

But that's all the good stuff.

And for the inevitable "bad" stuff. Dealing with my fellow grad students has been more of the same crap. Don't get me wrong, I really like them. I mean, I really like them. I haven't been so impressed with a group of people since CL training.

But all that being said, we're a diverse group and some of us are bringing in the same ol' baggage that all people bring in. I hate having to deal with really competitive people at the beginning of a relationship. The initial posturing that has been taking place is inherent behavior amongst a group of people so "professional" and new as ours. We're all looking to be taken seriously and that requires putting up our best sides. We all want to make it known that we belong.

Well, most of us anyway.

I am not a competitive person. I do not care if I'm first, last or middle. And while I've always been addicted to attention, I've never felt the need to overshadow anyone else. The position of others in relation to myself has never been much of a concern. This makes people nervous.

There is a group member who I completely freak out. She is one of the most competitive people I've ever met. If someone mentions a date at which they left school, she left a month earlier. If someone shows up to class a minute before her one week, you had better believe she will come to class next week two minutes earlier than last. And then you throw me into her life. I know myself well enough to count being on time to be momentous and to be early damn-near miraculous.

I don't care if my team wins so long as everyone does well . I don't care if people think I'm crazy so long as they know me to be dependable. I don't care if I'm seen as intelligent so long as people feel I'm competent.

But then you throw me into the mix with all of these people trying to express themselves and impress our professors. They want others to see them as the future Deans, provost, Presidents and policy makers of Universities nationwide. They throw around words like "ramifications" and phrases like "let it be known" as if we know what we're talking about. And then there's me, I make jokes and point out ironies. I compliment people on their ties and try and organize football teams. I feel completely comfortable saying "I don't know" and it drives some people crazy.

I think my lack of posturing bothers my new friend. In a room full of robins puffing out their chests and singing their anthems of their accomplishments I'm the parakeet playing with a bell in the corner.

Does this mean I'm not nervous? Absolutely not. I just know this is what the Lord has called me to do. I believe the best lesson for leading is found in the story of David. He was given his throne. He became the King because he was the Lord's anointed. Leadership is not earned, its given. And shall it be with my accomplishments. I will work hard the task that I've been given. If I become more than my position, I'll be rewarded. But I'll never complain about my rank in life. Its enough to travail in the tasks we've been given.

Its not that I'm special. This knowledge doesn't make me enlightened. I only recognise that I'm different. Just like everyone else.

Bennie Hanna, MSG and Me.

2004-08-05T16:20:00.000-05:00

Today is August 5th. It is my only brother's 21st birthday.

Throughout my very blessed life, I've had the pleasure of meeting many a character. I've had lunch with Billionaires and homeless bards. I've played been beaten in chess by mensa club members and old men in a park. I've conversed with Poet laureates and Grammy Award winners.

However, I don't believe I've ever met someone so completely interesting as my younger brother, Benjamin Warren Golemo.

I'm not sure how to describe my brother, Ben. I guess I could start of with the phrase: "he is loved." My brother is loved by everyone who has ever known him. For the life of me, I cannot think of one person who holds him in anything but the highest esteem.

He's the protector of all. He was the only one of the Golemo kids who ever required my parents to "meet with the principal". And the reason being because he pushed down a kid that had pushed down another, smaller, kid. My brother is not, nor has he ever been, a violent person. But he was imbued with an innate sense of justice, and has never failed to act upon it. But somehow, even the kids he was pushing down always got up with a deeper respect of my brother than they had had before.

It's so hard to stay angry at Bennie. He just has this "thanks for noticing me" type of personality. We used to call him "Eeyore" because he has this kind of trudging way about him. I remember one time when we were young, our parents had saw fit to take us on a rare trip to Dairy Queen. We were all ordering our sundaes, star-kisses, and Mister Misty's (cherry, for me) and my brother reached up and tugged on my Pappacho's shirt. My father looked down at him and said "Yes, Ben?"

"Well" he mumbled while looking down and kicking at his foot. "I don't suppose you'll get me a Chocolate cone, will ya?" -his frown already in place.

I need to point out here, that my brother is not a sarcastic person. I think that in the warfare of the verbal minefield that is our home, Ben has chosen to sign his own non-proliferation pact. He is simply too sincere to go that route. Besides, who wants to call an arial strike of cynicism when you can bludgeon them with wit?

My brother is someone whom doesn't' find it strange in the least to spend an hour or two in the corner of a room playing with his Incredible Hulk figurines. (Remember, he's 21.)

My dad used to have to bribe my brother to comb his hair. We used to have to bribe Bennie-hanna to do a lot of things. Every Sunday morning, my Dad would make my brother present himself to see what he intended to wear to Mass. And every Sunday, nearly without fail, my brother would appear on the landing wearing torn jeans and three t-shirts, layered, with his hair uncombed and invariably, his shoes untied.

Such has always been Ben's way. We would have to drag him everywhere because he never wanted to do anything. Just sit and "relax." Once, we went to Six Flags. My brother cried because he didn't want to go. Then he saw the double-decker carousel. He wanted to go. But then he cried because he didn't want to wait in line. Then he cried when he got on because he wanted it to start. Then he cried because he didn't want it to stop. He cried all day and had a better time than anyone else.

He's a hard worker. Probably the hardest worker of all the Golemos. But I will never forget him complaining to my mom when we had to clean the house before Dad got home, "Mom, we always have to clean. How come we never get to relax?"

He was also the one that coined the phrase "Screech Owl" in describing my half-Sicilian father who had a tendency to get a little worked up from time to time when one of us made a particularly nasty mess and forgot to clean it up. (We always blamed it on Beth, the baby.)

There are more "Ben" stories in our family than anyone else. And my family loves to regale others with them. Last summer when I brought my friend Kelli home, we had just missed Ben after he had left for his first year at West Point. I was pretty disappointed. So in an effort to make me feel better and let Kelli know exactly what she was missing, we all told Ben stories, did Ben impressions, and talked about all things Ben for the better part of 2 hours. I would say I was sorry for Kelli if I didn't know her side was just as sore as mine.

Bennie is about to start his second year at West Point where, I'm proud to admit, he is kicking arse. When we first found out about my brother's ambitions to attend that institution, we were a little shocked. Because Ben, well, lets just say Bennie has a style "all of his own." He's kind of punk, kind of grunge, kind of slob, and all "I don't give a crap what anyone thinks." He's such a free-spirit. So you can understand our surprise because you know how the Military loves individuality.

But I don't worry about Benjamin at West Point. He has a magnetic personality I'd kill to have. People are drawn to him. His friends are loyal in a way that inspires others to pledge their allegiance as well. Ben is the kind of person people want to follow, because they can be sure he will place their needs in front of his own and he'll be bewildered when someone thanks him for it.

I've been touched by many people who've blessed my life in real ways. People like Myles, who challenges me to be a better writer. Someone like Andrew Telep who has taught me to put my feet in someone else's shoes. Mary Gajewski, who has given me hope for women. My roommate Dave who has taught me there's real joy to be grabbed from every part of life, and its up to me to grab and squeeze. Greg and Jason; regulators of my ego, who've taught me friendship can endure any change or distance. My parents, who, more than anyone I've ever known, have set such an amazing example of Love and what it is to do so unconditionally. But to be honest, I'm not so sure that there's anyone who has taught me more about the kind of person I want to be, the things I want to be and the impact I want to have upon people, than my brother. My friends, if you hold me in any esteem at all, five minutes spent with my brother would show him to be twice the person I could hope to be.

Bennie, you're my hero, and the greatest gift I've ever been given. I'm forever in your debt for the impact you've had upon my life. Happy Birthday.

I love you.

"Three may keep a secret, if two are dead."

2004-07-31T00:35:00.000-05:00

I love this quote by Ben Franklin. Its true. If one doesn't want a certain fact(s) about themselves spread about town, then one shouldn't share it. I rarely blame the person who blabs my hidden truths. Its a risk I take in trusting someone.

But then again, there's those people out there who tell all. They constantly pour their thoughts and emotions out for all to see. It all leads me to question their wisdom.

Myself, I believe there is a certain correlation between those things that we hold as "secrets" and those things that we know to be "sacred".

I like that I have secrets. I like that I have things about myself that only I know. It means that there are things I hold sacred. There are things that I want only myself and the Lord to share. It may be something so delicate as a John Donne poem rip-off or something so rambunctious as my impression of Louis Armstrong singing "Amazing Grace" I sing for my Savior in the shower. But they are special things that only he and I shall share. That makes them special. That makes them sacred.

Secrets are sometimes treated like emotional currency. People will confide in you to make you feel trusted. Just like people like the feeling of being entrusted with some previously unknown fact about someone else.

I submit that I think secrets are shared out of selfishness.

There's a reason why people sometimes feel the need to share their burdens. Knowing that a friend is suffering through a secret illness is a hard thing to deal with. It hurts. I can handle crap happening to me. I have a good audience with myself, so I know that I deserve just about anything I receive. I also know that the Lord will help me through it. I've never had to deal with that worst punisher of all, Despair.

However, when it comes to seeing a friend suffer, I fall apart. I'm not going to play. The world is a much simpler place in which to live when I know less of the evils it holds. But one way in which I can help people is share the knowledge of their troubles. I pray for them and, just as importantly, I hurt for them.

Never underestimate the comfort it can be for a person to know they aren't hurting alone.

But what about secrets of the more mundane sort? Things like "my roommate listens to Britney Spears when he's sad". Or, "My girlfriend is ticklish behind her knees and barks like a seal when I pinch her back there."

You know, I think these might be the most sacred secrets of all. One amazing example my parents have shown me is that they have moments that belong to absolutely no-one but the two of them, and the Holy Spirit, who blessed it. I remember asking my Pappacho about moments in their relationship. And while he thanked me with a teary eye for reminding him, he simply let excused himself for leaving that moment sacred.

I've never understood those people who could just leave their lives an "open book." I know that mostly, its because I'm so completely not built like that. But how are they able to maintain a balance of what is theirs, and what belongs to the world?

Myself, what happens between me and someone else is to stay between us. The time I was most hurt by love was that in which someone was reckless with my trust. But even though that trust may have been betrayed, I've kept my promise as best as I honestly could. I've kept the moments I most treasured locked away in the safe of my heart. You'd be surprised the strength such things can afford.

The thing I love about a moment in time is that it all happens in the mind. Yes, my first kiss actually happened. But all I know of it is what I remember. And any description of that instant in time is going to be skewed between the romanticism of my mind and the experiences that have happened hence. But in my mind, it is perfect. I rely not on my crappy vocabulary or prose to convey the moment. In my mind its happened thousands of times. Isn't that what really matters?

Sometimes when I try to explain a moment, I become a bumbling artist trying to release the instant from a block of stone. Only the more momentous the occasion, the less likely I'll be to do it justice. I feel horrible. My moment, beautiful and perfect in my head, has been reduced to a maimed figure hewn out of rough rock. Sometimes, isn't it better just to leave something perfect and untouched?

I feel as though this society has lost touch of what is sacred in this world. We throw around the name of Jesus and print it on baby-t's and call it Christianity. And you dare not question the wearer's sincerity, for you fear of appearing as if you love your savior less.

There are ceremonies too holy to be made into a T.V. show. We've lost that. Past family and my very closest friends, I couldn't give a rat's ass who comes to my wedding.

We've forgotten that there are things that shouldn't be shared with all to know. Yes, I understand the irony of my sharing this on a blog, but for every thing I post about my life here, there are 50 that I'll never tell a soul.

Having a secret always doesn't mean we're ashamed. Sometimes it means we hold something special, and holy. Pearls we wouldn't risk throwing before swine.

A Guest Submission by Ricky Dugal

2004-07-26T10:49:00.000-05:00

My Crew.....

Now before I post anything more. I want to give a shot out to my crew. My posse. Better known as the BROOKS crew. Now as a kid growing up, one of my dreams was to have my own crew. And, now I can say I have one. My crew and I have had some great great times. I mean we roll. I have their back and they have mine. They have tattoos and chains with my name on it. If someone says something about me, my crew is right there to say "that's hearsay." They repeat everything I say. If I say lets go to the mall, then they repeat, "THE MALLL, we are going to the mallll, with Rigga." Its great. Not only do they repeat me, they copy everything I do. If I walk a certain way, they have to copy it. If I start chewing gum, they start chewing gum. If I start eating some Dunkin Donuts, then they copy me and they start eating Dunkin Donuts. Its great having a crew, and yall know who you are.

NBA players have posses or crews. Rappers have crews. Captain Kirk had a crew. Grandmothers whose sons play in the NBA have crews. It was time for me to start my own crew. You know, people that hung with me from way back. They are people that never turned their back on me when I wasn't a legend. People who look out for my best interests, so I look out for theirs. If they need an apartment? DONE. They need a car? DONE. If they need tickets to games DONE, DONE. If they need a job? It's done. Its both a thank you for the years past and an assurance that they will forever kiss my ass and go along with whatever I say.

It doesn't matter if its ridiculous or just outright stupid. They have my back. I'm talking about guys who are down for me. I'm talking about guys who will help me commit crimes and then conspire with me to cover them up. And if you aren't part of the crew and think you should be, ask yourself that question. Would you do that for me? I thought so. So get out of my face with that question girlfriend. Don't go there. Talk to the hand.

No more are crews reserved for NBA players, rappers, high-school golfers, NBA mothers/grandmothers et. al. I've gotten after it, paid my dues, bided my time and now it's finally here. I have my boys and they have my back. I say it, they repeat it. They don't question me or second-guess me. They just do as I say and as they're told. I keep them around, they keep me happy. If I say 2+2 = 5, I don't have to worry about hearing a lot of nonsense about how that's not the right answer. Those days are over. We hang out together, we roll in the Audi A-4 Cabrio together, we are Rigga and the Crew.

I have their back and they have mine.

If you are against the idea of me having my own crew you're in trouble. Don't go there, and get that out of my face. They're here to stay and will always have a place in my heart as long as Im alive. They throw the fast balls down the center over the plate, I knock it out of the park. They're my boys, they're my crew and we're rollin'! Rigga, keepin' it real.

Speaking of dunkin donuts, they are the food equivalent of crack cocaine, plain and simple. If there ever needed to be an example of the law of diminishing returns, here it is. The first doughnut is like heaven on Earth. The sugar rush probably would incapacitate most individuals. Sugar shock is a likely result. You can't beat that first doughnut.

The only problem is that all of us try to match that experience with the second, third and sometimes fourth doughnuts. And for some reason we don't realize that we're actually getting less and less joy from the doughnuts. We're trying to re-experience that initial sugar-rush and it's just not possible. The more we eat, the further we get from reaching the goal.

If you haven't had a Dunkin donut before, imagine a block of sugar, syrup, butter and bread packed into a circular blob with a hole cut out. It sounds good (I think) and even tastes good...in moderation. But every single time, all of us get caught up in the euphoria of the first one. Next thing you know, you're rolling around in the office, climbing the walls and feeling like you drank 14 cups of coffee. And oh yeah, just gained 15 lbs. and 6 cavities. Other than that, they are great.

And you know my crew, the BROOKS crew. They always have my back. And when I have a Dunkin donut, they have to have one too. That's how we roll."Rigga gets a Dunkin donut, we all get Dunkin donuts!"

Ricky Dugal has his own site, www.riggamania.blogspot.com. He's a dear friend and honest-to-God Brooks Legend. At my request, he's finally begun to record his pearls of wisdom.

Holla,
Neil

The Walk of Life

2004-07-18T08:26:00.000-05:00

I was talking to a friend the other night (last) and I made her laugh so hard she had to hang up to go throw up. She says it has nothing to do with the margarita she had a dinner. Sure. At least she thought enough of me to give my ego some way to roll with the punch she had thrown in its direction. Thanks, sweetie! ;)

After she called back, we were able to actually carry a fairly serious conversation -which was really a testament to our friendship. Having a serious conversation with someone after something like that is kind of like arguing apologetics with someone in clown shoes.

So we were talking about some of my blogs lately. I admitted to "being in love with the idea of being in love". She expressed that might be a dangerous thing.

Oh contrare mon frere. It's nothing I'm ashamed of. I wouldn't wish to be different. "Being in love with the idea of being in love" is kind of like having one foot larger than the other. It's something of which I must be aware. And its only really dangerous if I forget when going up some stairs... I'll let you draw whatever conclusions from that declaration/analogy you might. (Knock yourself out, slugger.)

I realize now that I am indeed ready to feel with authenticity.

Everything in my life is showing this. I'm no longer waiting to be ready to be ready. I'm just simply ready. Damn ready.

I'm not in a hurry. Just ready. I'm ready in the way that Michael Jordan was always ready to be the go-to guy. He wasn't itching to take that last shot. He just knew that when it was time, he'd be able to pull the trigger.

Prepared. Yeah, that's a better way of putting it.

Every day I'm feeling more like myself. The Lord has blessed my heart and helped me to power-spray off the mud and crud placed there by reckless hearts being reckless to my own. It was a choice I made. And I've been blessed with resilience.

Just because people have hurt you, doesn't mean you deserved to be hurt.

But yeah, I've got a few quirks. I'm becoming my parents in some real ways. I'm constantly cleaning, like my mother. I caught myself yelling "God bless America" the other day, ala my Pappacho.

Sometimes I leave the stove on. I have to have the bed made. I'm obsessed with Spider Man and the Cubs. (If that's news to you, I'll give you a hammer for you to use upon the side of your skull). I sometimes forget that non-stick pots shouldn't be machine-washed. I'm not perfect at all.

I do these stupid things. And yet, I'm kind of proud of them. I know that I should work on my imperfections, and yes, if I forget to turn off the stove I guess the place could burn down. But I'm proud of my stupid little idiosyncrasies because those are the things that make me... well, ME. Those are the things that are going to make some woman fall deeply and madly in love with me. -Or rather, not because of these things, but despite these things.

You see, I've realized a thing or two about life. I no longer care how the average Baylor girl sees me. I realize that on the surface, I'm a pudgy, cheeky, perpetually middle-class, smart mouth with an obsession with a loser baseball team and his own prose. But you know what? That's what I am.

And being exactly what I appear to be has become so very liberating. What you see with me, is what you get. I love with everything I have. And somebody, someday, is going to find my particular kind of crazy something she can't live without.

Why do I want love so badly? Its because that is why we were meant to be. When we fell, we lost our ability to know exactly how to love the Lord. That's why we have each other. Every time my Mom sends me a random text message telling me: "I'm so proud of you! I love you up to the sky and back!" for no other reason than she's in Colorado and thinking of me, I know a little bit better what it is to know God.

When I smoke a pipe with my roommate, Dave, I know a little better how God wants me to be happy.

I imagine that someday, when I'm telling my wife to lay down and I'll feed the colicky baby -when I see the face of that wriggling little miracle in my own hands, I'll get it, if only for an instant, why it is that we are meant to be.

I'm sorry I can't say this as well as my heart knows. My words fumble. If I was Michelangelo, I'd create a sculpture to express myself. If I was a musician, I'd get Dire Straits to write a song with me about it.

I guess I'll just have to be okay with screaming from my own little soapbox while others shuffle along the walks of their lives.

Insert the Keyboard riff...

PS, Charlotte, I'm not that funny, hot-stuff. You need to get out more. Maybe you should make a call to Lubbock? ;)

Social Suicide

2004-07-17T15:50:00.000-05:00

We all have secrets. We all have things that we're ashamed of. There are things we love very much. The intersection of these three facets our lives represent our "Guilty Pleasures."

Everyone has their own Guilty Pleasures. You know what I'm talking about. Everyone has left a Vin Diesel or Arnold Swarzenegger film hiding their smiles amidst people talking about how that was "2 hours of their lives they would never get back."  Who hasn't curiously found themselves wanting to belt out "Why'd ya have to go and make things so comp-licated!?!?" in a particularly quiet moment alone in the car?

There's a thing about secrets, y'know. They tend to beat up the insides of you. Like little gnomes inside the chest hurling their bodies against the walls of your heart in not-so-feeble attempts to get out.

So, I'm going to exorcise a gnome or two.

I am one who is very susceptible to Guilty Pleasures of the Cinematic kind. I love movies and I imagine I always will. I'm afraid this is yet another situation in which my imperviously positive attitude fails to serve me so well as to give me an aire of culture. What can I say? I'm eager to be pleased. Such is obviously the case when it comes to my first Guilty Pleasure.

The Pest.

This movie, starring the hyperactive comedian, John Leguizamo, is quite possibly the worst, most idiotic rip-off/spoof ever inflicted upon celluloid.  -That's assuming it actually was realeased into theatres. I'm not optomistic.   The humor in this movie is slap-stick, base, vile, disgusting and absolutetly nothing is out-of-bounds. And I loved it. I'll admit it, I own this movie. And yes, I'm ashamed of it. If you've ever seen my DVD collection, you might have noticed that many times its the one placed backwards, or away from the others.

Sigh.

Dungeons & Dragons

Yes, yes, yes. I am the biggest geek alive. I play Dungeons & Dragons. It started when I was a geeky adolescent.   And seeing as how my voice still cracks, I see no reason why I should now stop. I took a looooooooooooong break from it. I hadn't played since I turned 15, but this year, when a few residents mentioned it to me, I must admit I was intrigued and let it be known that I had played before. We only played a few times and I loved it. We had a blast! There were 6 of us, dressed in Abercrombie and Baylor Athletic sweats, playing the roles of our characters. I, of course, was the mischievious Rogue, constantly picking the pocket of our unsuspecting Palladin and then offering to take him out for a drink after this mission was over.

Escapism at its best; and to be honest, exactly what my soul needed. It was fun to be someone else, untethered by expectations of what I'm supposed to be and represent for the purposes of the Department and University.   It offered nothing more than a short respite, so I never felt guilty of abandoning my post.

So while you may laugh at me for being a geek. I'll just have fun "firing Magic Missile at the Darkness" while a friend asks if there's any hot chicks in the tavern... because he want's to "doooo them!"

Newlyweds

This is the one tv show on earth to which I am completly and utterly addicted.  I love this show and, as completely pathetic as it sounds, I think I've developed something of a genuine admiration for Mr. and Mrs. Nick Lachey. (For those of you living under rocks, Nick Lachey and Jessica Simpson, both Pop singers are newlyweds and have their own reality show on MTV.)

I love watching the genuineness of Nick and Jessica's relationship. She is genuinely kind of dumb, in the very sweetest and good-hearted kind way. And Nick seems to posess the nearly endless reserves of patience that can only be sustained by a real and enduring Love.

While I cannot help but admit that Jessica is gorgeous, I must say that the one on the show that keeps me coming back is Nick Lachey. Call it a man-crush or whatever, I have a deep admiration for anyone who can so love such a woman as Jessica Simpson so unconditionally even though her carreer seems to be taking off while his is becoming stagnant. Tough issues for a guy. Their love and candor are what makes this show the single redeeming star in the reality religion that has swept our television networks.

Singing

I love to sing. It is sincerely one of my very favorite things to do. I sing in the shower. I sing while I work. I sing when I'm happy and I sing when I'm sad... and I sing when I'm bored. Oh, and when I say I sing, I don't mean it in the sweet little lovey-dovey bluebird-on-my-shoulder type of way, either. I am usually belting that crap out. Hard-core.

All of that being said, I don't want to give the idea that I'm that good, or that I take myself seriously. I'm not, and I don't. I know I'm pretty alright. My mom has a beautiful voice and my dad can carry a tune around a campfire at least. So any talent I have, I come by it naturally.

But, I am a little squeamish about it. Okay I'm way squeamish about it. I don't really like to sing in front of people that much. Yes, I had the lead in "Yankee Doodle". And yes, I sang the solo parts for Perfect Gentlemen in High School. But those were different. We practiced for hours and hours and hours for both of those things. And I was always accompanied or singing harmony. Totally different.

One on one, though. It can be a little awkward. I've made situations totally weird because I couldn't or wouldn't sing. To me, its just something I don't like to share with just anyone. I like to think and pray about it. Its something I do with such emotion and the way I sing usually requires such confidence that, should anyone shoot me down in my attempt, it would hurt badly.

But I do love to sing, and sing loud. Especially when I'm by myself. Its truly a Guilty Pleasure of mine.

Sharing is Caring my friends.

My own personal Mary Jane Watson...

2004-07-12T22:58:00.000-05:00

I am a Comic book nerd.

I realize that's news to few, but I feel I should say it aloud... er type it, whatever. Y'know what? I'm going to drag my brother into this too. Bennie-hanna, you're a comic book nerd, too. (I'm imagining him raising a defiant fist, and lowering his head). (actually, strike that. If I know Ben, he'd probably just shrug)

Fight the power, Bennie. Fight the power.

I saw Spider-Man 2 for the second time with April the other day. I loved it just as much the second time as I did the first. Even if my friend couldn't stop hitting on me the entire time...

I was struck by the love story. Here we have Peter Parker. Spider-Man. He's sacrificing everything he's ever wanted because he has some kind of "Survivor's Guilt" complex and genuinely cares about people and knows he can help. Its killing him.

In comes "The Girl". Mary Jane Watson is basically the perfect woman. Incredibly intelligent, gorgeous, strong, hard-willed, confident, has a hold on her baggage, devoted to her best friend (despite himself) and she needs to be saved at least twice a movie. Oh, and she calls her man "Tiger". (My brother and I were able to realize, even in the midst of our "Kootie Insurance Sales Push", that was something we wanted a woman to do for us... then we'd have to pull her hair or something.

Spider-Man has had to save Mary Jane Watson countless times from one costumed "baddy" after another. But the ironic thing is that she is actually what has been sustaining him throughout his soul-draining hardships. The damsel saves the hero. Do you think that Dudley Do-Right ever realized that his existence was actually being continued by Nell?

And yet MJ loves and adores Peter Parker, not Spider-Man.

Its the weakling, inept nerd that catches her eye, not the muscle-bound do-gooder with snappy replies and come-backs in the midst of life-threatening battle. It was the zero in the hero that held worth for her.

Mary Jane Watson has affected my female ideal in a very real way. I know it sounds preposterous, but I'm serious as a Tumor. (I can say that, other people can't)

I've realized that there's more to a woman than how she looks or even how she makes me feel. There's real crap that needs to be discussed.

Being "elegant" is so much more important to me than being "beautiful". The former can produce the latter, but not the other way around.

I've mentioned the "Tiger" thing.

What about things like "I can't stand polish sausage or sauerkraut"? How many times have we had a girl/boyfriend that is of like mind/political views, is good looking, correct approximate height, only to have little differences that just really suck?

I'm not sure I could handle a girl who couldn't stand sauerkraut. Or my mom's Galumpke's (Stuffed Cabbage).

I like to smoke a pipe and have a Newcastle Brown Ale. I really like that. Truly one of my favorite things to do is just sit outside on a porch, sip a fine ale and puff from my Peterson Pipe that Dave got me. It'd be nice to have a girl who might sit on the swing with me. Her legs over my lap, reading a book about philosophy or something just enjoying being near each other.

Man, it'd be nice to be with someone for whom uncomfortable silences aren't.

Mary Jane is Peter's conscience. His outlet to all things good in the world. She is his partner. She knows there's nothing to two of them couldn't do, no bad-guy too bad, no problem too tall.

I want to be someone's hero. I want to be the greatest man in the world to someone. A knight in shining armor.

I want someone who, will save me by letting me save them.

But until that day comes, should it ever, I'll be content knowing my Mary Jane is out there somewhere. I can wait. It's cool. I'll just work on shining my armor.

The Peripherals of Love...

2004-07-11T01:14:00.000-05:00

Love is such a simple action. Like the song says: "Birds do it. Bees do it. Even educated fleas do it...." Everyone can do it; from the most affectionate child to the Grinch, heart filled with hate and all. I believe love to be the one universal thing. The one thing everyone/person/thing has felt.

Well, you'll excuse the Yogi Berra-ness of this rhetorical question, but: If love is so simple, then why in the heck is it so complicated?

Because there are more things to be negotiated than just "guy meets girl."

Because on the roads that represent our lives, there are many an "unmarked intersection." Everything is not black and white. Everyone doesn't wear their hearts on their sleeves.

I was thinking about this all tonight as I was talking with a friend. She is currently struggling with whether or not she should let the guy she likes know of her feelings. Sitting from a vantage point that offers complete personal emotional safety, I told her exactly what every friend in the same position would say: "go for it". She and I danced the same dance many friends have danced before of "well I know I should do 'blank' but these reasons are why I just don't know about doing 'blank'."

My friend's main excuse was the tried and true: "I just don't know if I have the confidence right now". And I guess that's where I saw how I'm different from most people. Confidence has never been my problem.

When I decide there is someone with whom I'm interested in pursuing a relationship, the thing I'm most motivated by is my desire to love that person in a deeper way. That pretty much goes across the board from friendships to romantic relationships.

I guess that sounds kind of selfish.

But this is what I told her "[friend], you're a wonderful person. You will find love. If its this guy, then its this guy. If you get rejected, its nothing more than one more name you can cross off the lists of possibilities. Your future of happiness does not rest in this man, but in following the Lord. If you trust he will provide, even if its later than sooner."

That attitude is one that tempts me to randomly walk up to girls and ask them what they think. I'm not even kidding. So badly do I wish I know exactly with whom I'll be spending the rest of my life serving.

She countered with worries about how she didn't know if he's interested or not. I'm not a huge fan of that. Someone finding you attractive almost always makes that person more attractive to you. Even if its in but the smallest degree. People always love their fans. And I don't want my potential feelings for someone to be tainted by the temptations of a "pie on the windowsill."

If there's a fear at all involved with me wondering if I should tell someone how I feel, it usually comes out of "what will happen if I don't say something?" This one gets me into trouble. I'm so afraid that I'm going to say something motivated out of "what if's" as opposed to "I need to know this." I usually think and pray and go through a lot of trouble to get to know a person so that I can better discern the nature of my emotional attachment to them.

I guess I hide behind that a lot, too. I use my confusion in this area as an excuse for inaction. I'm afraid more than one possible meaningful relationship has fallen prey to such a convenient quiescence of cause.

Even recently, I've let myself balk at letting someone know how I feel on the grounds of not knowing if my feelings for that person would merit the words I know I would speak. She deserves only the best. I'd never see her with less.

So what should we do?

"If you come to a fork in the road... take it." - Yogi Berra

No one has said it better.

Okay, so this is how it happened...

2004-07-07T22:34:00.000-05:00

So I'm in Washington D.C. Black Tie event. $1000 a plate. 15 minutes ago I shook hands with Kenny G, one of the night's performers.

5 minutes ago I got the "wink and the gun" from Ed McMahon. Earlier in the day we bonded over brunch. He told me how he met his wife as we dined on poached eggs and fresh fruit.

I see Bob Dole across the room.

At lunch that day I ate lobster, scallops and caviar with Clarence Thomas, Wayne Huizenga (owner of the Florida Marlins, Miami Dolphins and Pro Player Stadium) and a killer blonde to whom I was extremely attracted.

And I have just given a short speech of a lifetime. Life is good.

Then I see Colon Powell making his way over in my direction. We shake hands. I'm sure he said something, but for the life of me, I cannot remember. I only remember my roommate and fellow Scholar, Patrick, telling me I'm a lucky... well for my mother's sake, I'll skip the particulars...

Life is great.

Then, as if God were trying to remind me that my life is a comedy, I see a woman walk by me nearly falling out of her dress. Which was a bad thing since she was like 70. I made a face. And might have made a little comment beneath my breath. I hear a giggle and I turn behind me to see a stately looking woman laughing at me and only laughing all the harder when she sees me begin to blush as I realized the degree to which I was "busted".

Well, I've never been one to back down from an audience so I quickly rationalized, verbally, my earlier statement as only I could: "Well, its a $1000 dollar-a-plate meal, you think she could wear a whole dress."

More with the laughing.

"How many of my Grandmother's curtains had to die for her to wear that dress?"

I use laughing from this comment to move in and go for my forte, flirting with older women.

Once again, for my own sake, I'll spare you the exact particulars. But I can assure you I chose from some of my many lines I've honed from years of working in a Drug Store where 70% of the clientele is Senior Citizen women buying medicine in the hopes of making them feel better. Life is so much easier for everyone involved when one intrepid enough is willing to ask Mrs. Meckimson when exactly she is going to run away with him. The look of surprise as it melts into a smile and laugh is still music to the ears of this young former employee of Arnell Drug Co.

So, we're flirting... okay, I'm flirting when Mr. Soon-to-be-Secretary-of-State Colon Powell begins to leave. All of a sudden the my "bull-o-meter" begins to go off and I know that no one is going to believe this happened. So I say, "man, I wished I would have gotten a picture."

My heart instantly deflates as I realize there is no way I'm going to be able to fight through the other Scholars to get to him. As my shoulders drop, the hairs on the back of my neck stand to attention when the woman to whom I've been speaking grabs my arm and yells "Colon! Honey!"

The next few moments blur a little and I'm not sure exactly how to describe it but only as my head felt as though it was Gumball rolling down one of those swirly dispensers you see in Wal-Mart. I do remember reaching for a fork as Mrs. Colon Powell dragged my by my arm, laughing as my cheeks flushed crimson, towards her husband and a slew of photographers. Ah, but if only the shrimp fork I snagged were sharp enough to slit these mortified wrists of mine! Sweet dagger! Find thy sheath in the jugular of this tortured soul!

Alas, I had to "deal with my media" as a million lightbulbs flashed when Mr. Colon Powell and I shook hands.

Alma Powell waved to me as she and her husband walked back to her table. I could only think to thank God for humbling me and once again, reminding me who really brings the funny.

True Story.

Moments lost

2004-07-06T16:54:00.000-05:00

Anyone who says they don't have regrets is more than just ignorant. They're a fool. We all have things we wished we would have done. We've all gone out on the date that made us wish we would have "been washing our hair". We've all gotten that haircut that looked really cool in the magazine, but just didn't quite work well with our bone structure.

Everyone reading this has, at one point of time or another, grooved to New Kids On The Block.

Yes, we all have things we wished we wouldn't have done. But today, I was wondering about the things that we wish we would have done. Things like investigating whether that cute Pi Phi in your chem lab was flirting with you when she always asked to borrow your lab notes. Or what would have happened if you would have tried out for the baseball team at your new school? What would have happened?

But even more specifically, I've been thinking about those points in time where lives intersect. Like those moments where you could have done something that could have affected people or a situation. We've all been in situations where we're at the edge of a cliff. You can jump, you can run away. Or perhaps a better analogy for the situation would be to consider it a Bomb. Its just that volatile. You can excite it or snuff out the fuse.

Here's a for instance: Lady and the Tramp eating spaghetti. Tramp decided not to take that exact moment to put the move on Lady. He didn't. Now if you forget the rest of the story, would you have wondered how things might have gone differently in that situation if he'd played ball in that moment? Do you think Tramp would have ever wished back in frustration?

Everyone has situations like that. Times where, in retrospect, you wish you would've had the gusto to grab that bomb and light the damn fuse and to hell with the consequences?

I remember the first time I ever had a girl tell me she loved me. (Other than family, of course.) I completely blew it, man. I have no doubt she meant it. It was just so unexpected because she was usually so emotionally unavailable. (A trend in ex and most likely future ex-girlfriends that continues today). And then you have me, love first and ask questions later. The glancing comment hit me like a 2x4 to the skull. I'm told that a train running break-neck can be thrown by a penny on the track. Such was the case in that lost moment. I blew it and said something stupid. It haunts me still today.

I try my best not to let my lost moments punish me, but to make them experiences to learn from. Testimonies of "what could have been". It just kind of sucks when I think of how their number seems to grow.

Yeah, so not much of a point. Just typing to hear the sounds of the keys.

Check out Punjabi MC. He owns.

A prince or a frog?

2004-07-04T01:36:00.002-05:00

I was about to go to bed when I decided that maybe listening to Coldplay loudly wouldn't exactly be conducive to a good night of sleep.

Well anyways, as I was about to type in the "alt F4" to end out the winamp function on my computer, thus halting the "Ooooooooh yeah" in "Daylight", I noticed my MSN messenger popping up with a "jessicabozarth.blogspot.com". I was intrigued, so I checked it out.

Her latest blog was about kissing.

Man, that is so girly. If I was forced to come up with a list of things that a girl would be most likely to blog about, that would be like number 2.5. No crap.

I'm actually surpised I hadn't apostolized upon the subject.

The basic thrust about her blog was basically a "what if this (blank) was the one of my prince charming" type of thing. A basic girl blog stand-by.

She talked about kisses for the whole thing. And strangely enough, I found it interesting. Although I'd expect nothing less from Jessica.

So anyway, for the interesting stuff. Like how I feel about kissing.

I think I'm a pretty good kisser, actually. As a matter of fact, I've even had an ex-girlfriend say as much to another girl who, quite rudely I might add, asked me point blank if I was any good. Like I would know. But much to my surpise, I was given a highly favorable rating.

That ex-girlfriend hasn't said a nice thing about me to another girl that I've admitted I might be interested in, ever. At least, not that she or I know of.

I remember my first kiss. I was a junior in High School and was actually not even expecting it. I was more sort of hoping for a peck on the lips. I'd never even had that much.

I just remember being shocked as I moved in, (I had asked permission, of course) only to find a gaping, saliva-rimmed hole surrounding the entirety of my mouth. I swear my eyes would have shot wide-open if they had been any less clamped shut from shear nervousness.

Ah, the whiles of dating an older girl.

You know, when I stop to think about it, I hate myself more when I think of how I've even kissed more than one girl than I do at any other time in my life. I honestly wish to God that I could say that I've only kissed but one girl in my life.

I hate the idea of having any background knowledge as to kisses. I hate the idea that the idea of how well any girl kisses as compared to another might cross my mind. I despise it.

But that being said. I love to kiss. I'm a kisser. My family has always been a very affectionate family. To this day, I still kiss all of my immediate family members upon the lips every once in a while, when pains of distance hurt most. I remember the last time I kissed my father on the lips.

I kiss some of my dearest friends on the head every once in a while. Okay, I rarely do it to my male friends, but that's mostly because they'd freak. Damn Texan homophobes.

When it comes to girls... I'm more than slightly ashamed of how many girls I've kissed in my life. I never go "past" that. But I do sincerely love to kiss. I do'nt know what it is about having a hand upon the side of an angelic face, guiding someone I feel so incredibly close to into a long, meaningful kiss that gets my heart beating just to think about it. The sociologist in me might want to postulate that it has something to do with exposing such vulnerablility that excites me so. And the nerd part of me would find that fascinating.

However, the romantic part of me wants to think that, if only for a moment, I'm joined with someone else beyond words. The dance that is a kiss can tell you so much about a person.

All of that being said, I should let anyone reading this know that I am not someone who kisses lightly. I never kiss on the first date. Hell, I rarely even kiss on the second date.

Most of the time I ask permission. No crap.

Sometimes she makes the move. As a matter of fact, most of the time she makes the first move. But then again, I have definitely been the first one to tip my hand.

I think the best kiss I've ever had was completely unannounced. Just like some stupid movie. The moment was just right and as a result, is forever chrystalized in my memory. I guess I don't have to be proud of something like that to appreciate it.

My knees still get weak.

Did you know that according to a Stanford Survey, men place approximately twice as much importance on the first kiss as the average woman? Of course, they also place about half the emotional importance upon the first time of intercourse, but that's another blog.

Sometimes its actually okay when your baggage gets lost...

2004-07-02T17:20:00.000-05:00

Maybe its a delayed spring thing. Maybe its hormones. Maybe its the fact that I lost the remote for the digital cable and as a result had to watch Lifetime television for 4 hours the other day. For whatever reason, I'm beginning to think about "love".

For the first time in a loooooong time, I'm not thinking about love in the "sell your crazy someplace else, buddy. We're full up, here" type of way. Every time a girl flirts with me, (and yes, it happens) I've begun to stop mentally whipping myself for even thinking about being attracted. Though I doubt I'll ever stop being surprised. ;)

I've begun to stop avoiding movies whose plot obviously revolves around romance. I've watched a couple of my own chick-flicks and hell, I've even told myself I'd go see "the notebook" the first time an opportunity presents itself.

I woke up around 6 am this morning and couldn't sleep. So I went for a walk. It was a good chance for me to have a little quiet time and sort out some of the feelings that've been bouncing around in my head. I was just walking when I felt like talking to Jesus for a little while. So, I sat down on the steps in front of one of the most beautiful places on earth, Armstrong Browning Library to talk.

I don't know how it is. It makes no sense to anyone else. But when I talk to Jesus, its like I know what he's saying back to me. Or at least what he would say back to me. But anyway, I've begun to notice how lately, life has just gotten easier. Believe it or not, I laugh even more often now than I usually do.

Spending time with others has become not so hard, taxing. I even had a dream the other night I was writing a love-letter. For the life of me, I can't remember to whom it was addressed, or even if it was addressed to anyone in particular, but I remember meaning it.

I've rediscovered how much fun it is to make eye-contact with a beautiful woman. How even that fleeting glance makes that back of your eyeballs feel like they're going to explode. I've remembered how nice it is to share a knowing look with a very dear friend.

Lately, wine tastes sweeter. Compliments touch me more deeply. And the Ginger-Peach iced tea is so much cooler sliding down my throat.

Time passed with cousins I haven't seen in 3-4 years picks up as if it had been 3-4 days. And for the life of me the only reason why I can see that this has all come about is that I've simply let it.

All of my passions have become arroused as of late. I think the first time I really noticed this was during the Spider-Man 2 movie the other night with two of my best friends. Of course, we got two jerk-high schoolers behind us who didn't realize exactly how little their comments were welcome.

I found myself more and more strained to turn around and inform the two litle punks that I had actually paid to watch the movie, not listen to them make asses of themselves. If it had been only me and Dave in the movie theatre, I almost definitely would have. But, alas, I balked only because I didn't want to make a scene in front of my third friend.

Last night I began to see flashes of the entertainer I used to be. Not that I was really missing that guy, I was just glad to know I still had it in me.

I guess what I'm saying is, I think I've lost my baggage. Yeah, I got hurt pretty badly last summer. And I imagine it will never be pleasant to think about. But I think that maybe, the hurt is going away.

Or maybe sometimes like when my shoulder hurts, I'll stop noticing it after a while. Maybe its like that.

Alls I know is I'm not feeling so tethered. I've gained a bounce in my step. And more importantly, I'm beginning to think that maybe I'll stop worrying about who I can let in and out of my life and focus a little more on just living.

Maybe I'll find a girl. Maybe I won't. Hell, maybe I've already found her.

But whatever the case. I don't care. Either way, win or lose, the Cubbies and I are going to keep playing ball.

"The only thing better than playing a ball game today... is playing two! Lets play two!"- Ernie Banks (first player to be named MVP of a team with a losing record 58' Cubs)

Peter Pan

2004-06-17T18:52:00.000-05:00

Last night, my roommate and I watched the new Peter Pan movie on DVD. It was a good adaptation of it. It kept all the whimsy of the Julie Andrews version but added a little bit of edge. I'm surprised it had a PG rating.

Yeah, so the movie didn't suck.

But as I was sitting there, watching this movie, I finally got it. I got what the story was really about. It was about me. And I was afraid.

Peter Pan is a boy who never wants to grow up. But more than that, he's a boy who has no idea what growing up is. In every adaptation of this story, especially the more poignant ones, there is a point where he finally realizes that there is a concept of what it means to grow up. And it floors him. Fortunately for him, it only seems to take him but a minute or two to understand and toss aside/accept this truth (depending upon the adaptation) and rush forward to resolve the climax rosily by fighting Captain Hook.

If only I were so lucky.

I have realized that I don't want to be a boy. But growing up has so many strings attached. All of a sudden I have to worry about things. I've moved out of the halls, so I have bills to pay. I no longer have residents, so my years of being a mile-wide, but an inch-deep have finally caught up to me. I get lonely.

All of a sudden I worry about what my future holds. My cares and plans for my future have shifted from being a kaleidoscope, changing with the angle -but always different in every viewing; to being worries and plans with walls and doors and keys that must be fashioned, books that must be read, people that must be impressed and deadlines that must be met. I have to start budgeting for my future.

All of a sudden the worries about being alone for my entire life have left the mouth of my older sister and begun to ring around my own head. (And here's the scary part) the voice is not my sister's, but mine own. I all of a sudden wonder if I've met the girl I'm going to marry.

And for every time I have answer "I don't know", I feel a little bit of my confidence ebb away. The sheer reality of phrase, "I don't know", has morphed from the magic egg full of possibilities I could get in return from a mechanical rooster for a quarter, into two pieces of molded plastic formed by the hands of Malaysian slave workers and hold nothing more than a scrap of soft aluminum bent and painted to resemble, "bling".

I never used to care about "not knowing". I used to find the idea refreshing and empowering. But now, I yearn for the truth.

I want a Jesus that is real and in my hands. The closest thing I can find is at the altar when Father asks me if I care to receive the "body of Christ". THAT, my friends. Is real. THAT, my friends, is what Jesus left for ME. And while this does give me respite, it seems a floating barrel to a man treading water in the middle of an ocean. I need to take my barrel, and find my island or, if I'm lucky, continent.

I've had enough of my Castles in the Air. Fuck Thoreau. I need the foundations he said, as if in afterthought, should be built to support them. I need my earth, so that I may know which way is up.

I know God has something very important for me to do in my life. I know it. That thought defines me. It, quite literally, is what I live for. But I feel sometimes fear I'll become the man waiting on the roof of his flooding house who passes up a truck, boat and helicopter because of his faith the Lord will save him only to hear later in conversation with the Lord exclaim, after his immediate death due to drowning, "what do you mean I didn't save you?!?! I sent you a truck, a boat and a helicopter!"

I'm beginning to realize, and fear, that God has given me more power over my life than I had ever fathomed. Okay, maybe "freedom" is a more suitable word. But to be honest, I'm scared by either.

I'm no longer afraid that whatever it is the Lord has planned for me is to be the foil to someone else's rising star. I now fear most of all that I'll not make use of my "talents" while waiting for my master to return.

I'll have no more being Peter Pan. I've made the decision. My age of reason is now. To every season, there is a turn. I will laugh. I will love. I will learn. I will do so with hope. I will trust in the Lord, and hold onto my barrel, until we both find our paradise... or at least a bit of sand.

22 1/2 years of virginity

2004-06-08T23:02:00.000-05:00

I'm a label-ripper.

I peel, tear, scrape, etc, every label or sticker off of every coke, beer [gasp] etc. If it has something that can be peeled, I'm all over it. I don't even do it consciously. So I did it a few weeks ago in front of the Mary. She told me how doing that is a sign of "sexual frustration." Then like four hours later, my friend Blake reiterated the same point when he noticed me absent-mindedly rending label from yet another drink.

Once more, I hear the words "sexual frustration" pointed towards myself.

"Sexual Frustration"

All of this begs the question: "Can you be sexually frustrated if you've never had sex?"

If the answer to this question is "yes", then I guess you can sign me up. You know, it would be nice if I could blame my lack of a sexual life for all of my frustrations.

I'm going to be honest. I think about sex. I think about what it will be like. I wonder if I'll be any good at it. I've had friends-that-are-girls who've told me how afraid they are that its going to hurt. Some of them who would know, have told me how it really did hurt. So that scares the royal hell out of me too. I don't want to cause my wife pain like that. Especially in that area of her body. What in the hell? Yes, I know it doesn't hurt that badly, or that women obviously don't mind it that much or else they wouldn't be doing it. And yes, I know it gets better (hopefully), but remember this is all bouncing around inside the head of a guy who usually won't remind the lady at McDonald's she didn't give my my Hot Mustard sauce for my Nuggets (mmmmm nuggets) because I can't stand the look of disappointment on her chubby little face. If I'm afraid to sing in front of people on the chance they might not like listening to me, where am I supposed to get the guts to put my new wife through that kind of pain? I mean, sometimes it causes them to bleed!

The idea of having sex someday definitely does frustrate me. I mean on the one hand, I have my Catholicism telling me that I should do my best to force these thoughts out of my mind. And on the other, more prevalent, side we have a new American Pie sequel/clone coming out what seems like every other Friday. Its kind of tough being a consigned virgin in a world in love with sex.

My mom knows who Jenna Jameson is. (I'm not even going to touch that one.)

I sometimes feel like a Mariner trying to get his "wand'ring bark" through a stormy sea of Late Night Girls Gone Wild infomercials, Victoria's Secret magazines, Coors Light Twins and Baylor Girls in just-long-enough pleated skirts crashing over the sides of my boat trying like hell to drown my weak little boat.

Yeah, that's about it.

One thing I've realized lately, is that the older one gets, the more complicated things grow. Its sad, but true. Depressing, but true.

Now, I feel the need to say this: "I am not a prude." I'm not innocent. As my mom would say: "I got the 4-1-1, Neil. I know what's hip. Fo' Shizzle, dizzle, silly nizzle." (That was an amalgamation of actual things she's said.)

That being said, I am glad to say that there is a lot of the world I don't know about. There are things about sex that years of Baseball bus trips and Boy Scout Camp didn't teach me. And I'm happy about that. Another thing that needs to be said is that I have a wonderful set of parents who've put sex in a very healthy perspective for me. My mom has a master's in Health Education. Yeah, it was embarrassing in High School. But then again, everything is.

My parents did a wonderful job of framing what sex is, means, and in what context it should be shared. They weren't Nuns, but they weren't hippies. They trusted me, but I wasn't free to do "anything I wanted."

They helped me to know that sex isn't only for procreation, nor is it only for pleasure. Its a little of both. And its also for bringing two people closer together. Did you know that there's a hormone that women release only once in their lives, and only during their first sexual encounter? It helps to bond the woman to the man. That's why you see girls who have sex with some asshole in high school have so much trouble letting go.

Sex isn't something just to be thrown around. What good things have happened to people who sleep around?

Yeah, so I'm frustrated. I'm really frustrated. I'm a virgin and my Cubbies are droppin like flies. Nobody sneeze.

Frustration, Death and Taxes man. Everyone has to deal.

Go Pistons.

The pointless Blog

2004-05-22T00:42:00.000-05:00

Okay, I smell like smoke. In the last 4 hours, I've visited and spent more time in bars than I have altogether in the last two years and subsequently been hit on by more broads, respectively. My ego would be served by the second participle of the last sentence if only the "ladies", and I use that term lightly, would have been under the age of 35.

Yes, folks. I'm back in Hamilton.

I called up one of the very best friends I've ever had in Joe "Southpaw" Bradish. He was my best friend for years, along with the best first basemen I had ever played with, as well as the only perons I've ever known whose love of the Cubs could rival mine own.

Joe's back from Korea now, and unemployed. So basically, we went drinkin'.

We called up my cousin, Zach, and met him at the "gay bar." An esablishment in the next town of Warsaw, owned by two Gay "life mates." Apparently, its the place to be. So there we went. We sat down and played pool, the three of us, and the guy who lived next door to Zach growing up, Eric Morehouse. Eric, I discovered, is going to graduate with a computer science degree, even though he hates computers. He still drives the 45 minutes home from WIU to work in neighboring Keokuk, IA's Wal-Mart on every weekend. He hates that too. He was drinking Bud-Lite, which, believe it or not, he also hates.

I think you're seeing how the evening went.

WELP! You're wrong, my friends! I actually had a pretty good time. Once I got over getting hit on by drunk much older ladies, and the smoke, and the bad country music, and the "freebird" being played on the jukebox, literally, every other song, the times were good. Joe and I mopped the floor with Zach and Eric on the pool table, and I got to see no less than 5 or 6 girls who "used to be hot" walk through the door.

I also had fun explaining to people how Baylor is actually in Texas. Even more fun was the automatic 2 part respect I instantly received from whomever I happened to be talking. The first part was that I had actually escaped. The second part was that I was actually at a good school. They had heard of Baylor, though they couldn't remember why... I was quick to point out that it was the "Harvard of the South." They didn't disagree...

Anyway, we ended up getting lost in the country on our way over to a friend's house. Classic Hamilton passtime.

I've realized that Hamilton is a great place to "be from." Like it or not, this will be and always remain, my home town. I don't have to like it, though I imagine I will always love it.

My home is in Texas, but a large part of my heart is and I "reckon" always will be, in Hamilton, Illinois 62341.

Fire!

2004-05-20T02:22:00.000-05:00

Okay guys.

Its about 1 A.M. I'm supposed to be asleep because I somehow got drafted to go upon my grandmother's roof, when she knows I'm deathly afraid of heights (I always feel like this set of mickey-mouse hands are going to reach up and pull me over the edge) and re-roof it, at 8 AM. But of course, I'm checking the Cubs' score, because it might have changed in the last 5 minutes? Anyways, I hear my wonderfully smart dog, Irish wimper so as to say "Look, Neil, something's going on outside... maybe someone's stuck in a well".

Of course his sanguine wimpers are nearly drowned out by my older sister's Bitch (I can say that, she is, in fact, a female dog) barking her damned head off.

So, naturally, I go to the door. What do I see but flashing lights upon the trees in our yard. I lean out the door and look down the street and there are TONS of lights. My first thought, "Aliens"; the Hamilton Po-po's finally realized that the broken-down house down the street who always has a different car parked out in front of it doesn't belong to "car-dealers." But then my huge snoz caught a wiff of the sweet spring air and methinks I smelled burning rubber.

So I follow what was quickly becoming a congregation of my fellow neighbors down the street to see what the comotion was. Now, let me tell you, everyone was there. Mrs. Backer, Mrs. Ancelot, Mrs. Connaly. Didn't anyone leave this town? Besides, there were more moo-moos there than an Indian Temple. (Austin slaughterhouse? Barry Manilow concert? eh, I'm working on it)

I find that the house that was in flames was, in fact, The Ruark's. I think that's how you spell it.

Here's the weird thing. I was running the Bear Trail, I mean walking the Bear Trail, Okay, walking to McDonalds last week when I had a random thought. Mark Ruark, whatever in the name of Super-fly Jimmy Snooka's Bunghole happened to him? I remember he was the guy who made being the Hamilton Cardinal Mascot Cool. Yeah, I said it.

That kid was hard-core. I remember how he could do a standing back-flip. No Hands. He would do summersaults and cartwheels with the big cardinal head on. I remember when we went to state, and he got into a fight with the other mascot and kicked his ass. I also remember him with a bloody nose afterwards... oh well.

So anyways, I was just thinking about that kid no more than a day or two ago when I come home and see his house burning down. I don't mean to sound cavalier, I just thought it was weird.

Moshi-Moshi?

2004-05-04T10:15:00.000-05:00

I think I'm a pretty darn laid-back person. I take joy in just going with the flow. In life, there are only so many things we really have any say in, so shouldn't the amount of worry we invest, correlate?

But those things I do sweat, truly do get to me. I'm not sure I can reconcile any of them. But I guess that doesn't stop them from existing.

#3. Phone etiquette. I cannot stand it when people are rude on the phone. Usually in life, we have many nonverbal ways to communicate and leave impressions upon people. However, when we're on the phone, we rely completely upon our words, tone and verbiage. That is why I so value what you do or don't say. I have had my sisters' suitors and friends (mine and my brother's) actually hang up and call me back.

Here's an example:

Ring Ring

Me: Hello?
Random Dude: Is Beth there?
M: excuse me?
R: um, is Beth there?
M: I heard you.
R: ... huh?.... wha?...
M:Well when you put it that way... Nevermind, who is this?
R:Um... Johnny.
M:AH! Hello, John. My name is Neil Golemo.
R:cool
M:Do you understand what just happened? That's what most people call an "INTRO-DUUUCTION". Yeah. They're nice.
R:cool. Beth there?
M:Okay ,(I sigh), John, this is how this will work. You're going to hang up, sit there by your phone with a bewildered look, think to yourself "what the heck just happened", and then you're going to call back. 9 in 10 chance that the phone will be picked up by yours truly. And you know what I'd like to hear from you?
R:um, my name?
M:Nice. Talk to you in a few, John.
R:Kay...

Ring Ring
M:Hello?
R:Um, Hi... This is... um... John, I'm a friend of Beth's.
M:Hello, John. I'm Neil, Elizabeth's gun-owning, older, brother. How may I help you?
R:Uh... um... yeah, would it be alright if I talked to Beth?
M:Oh, John, I'm sorry, she's at her friend's for the night. Would it be alright if I left her a message from you?
R:Uh, naw I'll just talk to her later...
(I'm usually choking in laughter from the awkwardness felt on one side of this conversation)
M:Well, I'll let her know you cared. Do you have a last name, John?
R:Yes
M:.... Nicely put, John. Okay, well its been a pleasure, John. I hope you have a nice day!
R:... uh yeah, you too.
M:God bless
CLICK

I think I just changed a life. You may think I'm torturing this kid. Yes, yes I am a little. But he's calling my sister, I guess I'm just preparing him for the long-run. In any case, how are you going to call a girl's house and be anything other than on your best behavior? tsk tsk. I did that fool a favor.

#2. People who talk on cell phones while you're with them. Barring emergencies, serious business or a returned call, I can see no real reason that this should be allowed. Its rude. Really rude. First of all, its an exclusive conversation. Its not exactly like when you're working out with a friend and an old friend of theirs walks up. This is a chance to meet another potential friend. I get to introduce myself and interact.

I've been to dinner with people and they have insisted upon having an extended, (and pointless, I might add), conversation with an old girlfriend/boyfriend while I get to sit and eat my food, look furtively around the room, wonder how many breadsticks I could wrap in a napkin and stick and still escape the restaurant with an acceptable amount of sneers from my fellow patrons...

To me, if someone calls, and you must pick it up, please, state the obvious, that you're with someone and ask when the best time to return their call is. Most of the time, I won't even pick up the phone. If you get a busy signal, its probably because I'm busy. Sorry.

Related to this pet peeve, are people whom I call when they're with people and they talk to me anyway. I don't want to be "that guy". I know for a fact how annoying this is. If you're going to be a jerk, I don't necessarily want to aid and abed.

#1. The number one Pet Peeve on my list is the sound of people eating. This includes, slurping soup from a spoon, slurping coke from a can, lip-smacking, stuffing your face so full you have to breath through your nose making it whistle (you get the idea). When I say this is my number one Pet Peeve, I mean it. I've literally punched my brother over this. Mostly because the little punk is doing it on purpose, but also largely because it so infuriates me.

I don't know what it is that so infuriates me. I really cannot trace its pathology. It just merely is.

Freeeeeeeeeeedooooooooom!!!!!!!!!!!

2004-05-01T19:21:00.000-05:00

So I was singing the "Star Spangled Banner" in the shower the other night and I began to think about the definition of the word "freedom."

What is "freedom"?

I think there is many kinds of freedom. There's freedom in the Mel Gibson-Braveheart kind of way. The kind of freedom that Hollywood and over-zealous war veterans exhort to us can only be bought through the blood of countless heroes. The kind of freedom that can only come from countless mortally-wounded patriots raising a flag on some God-forgotten piece of terra.

This time of year, the word "freedom" might illicit thoughts of Spring days and Summer Vacation. Of bikini's and Disney World. Of our days starting at noon and dinners cooked to order by our mothers.

There's the freedom that can only be described as that feeling you get after you step out of the classroom after having taken that huge test that was dragging you down like a tire-iron tied to your neck. For better or worse, you're done.

Only slightly less serious, is that feeling of freedom that comes after the really hot girl (or guy, I guess) you've been suffering through a terribly anxious conversation with leaves because you've got really bad gas. (One of my residents told me that's why he always "walks and talks"...)

Now that we've delineated all these different forms of freedom, what do they mean? I mean, what does it really mean to be free? Can total freedom ever truly exist?

I was watching an episode of "Da Ali G" with some of my residents when he pulls out one of his alter-egos, "the gay guy". And of course, he goes to "the gayest place in the world... Alabama!" After a few hi-jinx including: cheering in leather pants and a pink mesh shirt with the Crimson Tide cheerleaders at a football game, interviewing a football player and asking him what messages he has for his "huge gay following in Amsterdam", and nearly inciting mob-violence from some extra homophobic Alabamans, he decided to go to the "Patriotism Convention."

His first interview was with an older man who had some choice words to say about the U.S. Government being all up in his business. He said that he believed in "freedom".

So, to that Ali G says: "Vell, en my country, freedoms mean zat I can valk hands-en-hands vith my boyfriend, Armando, downs ze street and nots have to sthink a sing abouts et."

The Patriot basically begins to go off on Ali G and basically makes more of an ass of himself than the viewer thought him before... if that was possible. But this all begs the question, "isn't one man's freedom, another man's oppression?"

Take religion, for instance. We have freedom of religion here in America, but do we always enjoy freedom from it? Prayer in schools is such a sticky subject. Its like Christians automatically have the moral high-road on this just because they're Christians. I'm sorry, but I'm not so sure I agree. Just because prayer is a good thing, doesn't always mean its a good thing. I know people who pray for the extermination of all the Muslim traitors to the faith. Am I the only one weirded out by that?

Here on this campus, which I DO LOVE, I can't go a week, without having my breakfast, lunch or dinner interrupted by some crazy Antioch freak witnessing to me. Don't get me wrong, I respect them for having the guts to risk the annoyance of so many to possibly reach a few, but don't they realize that they're causing some people some real and honest discomfort? I mean, the reason many of these people get away with this is because they know that if someone kicks them out, they're going to feel like a modern Anti-Christ. Also, in more than a couple of the Sub-Way sermons I've heard, the speaker uses nothing but guilt-trips and soft deceits stemming from irresponsible shot-gunning of scripture verses here and there. Maybe I'm a little conservative, but I think that using verses purposefully out of context just to prove a point and take advantage of someone else's ignorance is blasphemy.

But I digress...

What is freedom? Is there really freedom with Christ? I mean, isn't it true that when we decide to become followers of Christ, we choose to amend our ways of thinking and being to that of his? Yeah, the uber-liberal Christian would pull out the Gospel reading where Jesus talks about the "Ass and the well." (why does Chad and Mark always come to mind when someone mentions that?) Anyways, no Christian can deny that we are giving up some real "freedoms" when we decide to follow Christ. There are options that are not now, well, options to us anymore.

So what freedom do we, really have? I mean, C'mon, lets break it down to the basics. When you really think about it all we really have is the freedom of choice. Christianity vs. Buddhism. Baylor vs. Bradley. Count Chocula vs. Lucky Charms. Okay, so we all know that Count Chocula sucks and anyone with a brain in their head is going to choose Lucky Charms. But my point is that you DO have that choice. Even if the choice is "smart" vs. "incredibly stupid", you have that choice! Ya feel me, dog?

So that's it. That's freedom? Everything else is an illusion? Or merely nothing more than a bunch of societal constructs made up of tiny morsels of "yes or no" choices?

Hmmph. Sounds good. Now that I've exercised my brain, I'm going to go play some basketball, or will it be raquetball?

College, a time for experimentation

2004-04-24T15:24:00.000-05:00

As my fourth year of college begins to wind down to a close and the grains of sand dwindle through the hour glass of my undergraduate career, I begin to reflect upon my life.

I wonder if I've lived each day to the fullest. I wonder if I can be proud of what I've accomplished. Then I wonder why you can't understand what snuffalufagus is saying? Man, that gets me. I was annoyed when I was 6 and I'm annoyed now, when I'm... older than six. But I digress...

I wonder if I've had much of a life. I wonder if I've enjoyed much of the "college experience". Now, now, before you get all in a tither, let me qualify my last sentence. I was a veritable commuter student my first year of college, so that was little more than another 12 months of High School.

I guess I did have a lot of fun my first year here at Baylor. But that was fun in the Super-Christian summer-camp kind of way. It was very much a blur of "Hi! My name is Neil. No, I'm not interrested in going to Antioch"'s, evenings in Spencer's room, gawkings at the beautiful Baylor girls, "yes, I am Catholic"'s, caffeine consumptions at Common Grounds and WWJD bracelets. It was an awesome time.

Then the last few years, I've been a Community Leader (CL), which is Baylor's version of a highly over-trained RA. Being a CL has been a labor of love. Its never been easy, but its never been hard. I do not regret a second I've spent on this hall, a moment of sleep I've lost because a guy needs to watch the History Channel at 5 in the morning for a class project or a dollar I've wasted on pizza for two. No, I promise you all that I'm quite thankful for the opportunity to do so. Being a CL is the greatest thing the Lord has allowed me to do with my life.

But all that being said, it has taken up a bit of my time. And while I honestly mean it when I say that I regret nothing (much to the contrary), it has taken up a bit of my time. My life has not been the same as that of the average Baylor student. I've not yet had to worry about horrible roommates, or paying rent. I've never suffered from an inconsiderate landlord or wanted for playmates. I haven't had to deal with seeing people day after day that I'll never get to talk to or get to know because they moved out of the Residence Halls for the expressed purpose of not having to deal with Howdy-Doody Olive-Branch-Weilding Tools like myself.

On the other side of the coin, I've never been to more than three or four parties. And if you're only counting parties that've included alcohol, even less. I've never really taken part in much debauchery at all. I've never really gone clubbin'. I've never really done any of those things. Now, I've never exactly been beholden to that kind of stuff. But it would be deception upon my part if I put forth the idea that I'd never even thought about it.

So anyone who really knows me is probably thinking "Okay, Neil. What brought this up and where is this going?". Well, here it is.

Thursday, I decided to experiment.

In the southwest corner of the Brooks Hall courtyard is what has come to be known as "the smoking club". I always enter the Hall from the door in that corner, so I've kinda come to know those guys. I always have a comment for them or something. Well, Thursday was a good day. I was feeling a bit saucy, so I decided sit down chill out with them. For some reason or other, they were talking about dip. They asked me if I'd tried it. Well, I've been lying for years about whether or not I'd tried it. But I never had. So I figured: "what the heck? Worst that could happen is, I puke.". You all should have seen the look on their face when I said "sure" to them.

Anyways, so I try it.

As you may or may not know. "Dip" is basically rough cut tobacco with pieces of fiberglass mixed into it that you wad up and stick in your cheek. The fiberglass is added to it to cut the inside of your cheek so that the nicotene would more easily be absorbed into one's bloodstream. All I know about Dip is that you, under NO circumstances, swallow your spit.

So I'm chewing, spitting, spitting, chewing and all of a sudden it hits me like a tennis racket to the face. The "Buzz". I get light-headed and dizzy. I keep going... but yeah, its a lot. I get asked "dude, Neil, are you F'd up?"

"uh, huh?... oh, um, yeah... maybe. Perhaps... grrrroooan maybe... yes." I mumble.

"You can spit that sh*t out if you want. It's totally cool." Chris Churchey informed me.

"Um, yeah... [spit]... yeah um... [spit] maybe thats uh... [spit] uh good idea." And I chunked that crap as far as my chubby little fingers could send it. "Um, guys? Do you think maybe somebody could let me in? I'm a little dis... disory... awe you know what i'm trying to say, one of you jerks let me in. I gotta lay down."

So I went upstairs to the bathroom and sat for a while, trying to gain control of my head. I was completely vulnerable. If someone was ever going to come up and give me an atomic wedgie... that totally would have been the moment for them to try it. So anyways, as I was upstairs in the bathroom, swishing my mouth out and spitting constantly when one of my residents walks in and asks "Neil, you okay man?"

"Huh, what do you mean?" I stammered as I tried to smile. As I say this, I look up at the mirror to see a pastey pale face somewhat resembling my own.

So, I go lay down, proud I've finally experimented.

Have angst, will travel

2004-04-17T15:06:00.000-05:00

Hello, my friends.

I have a problem. Lately, I've had nothing to write about. Between my reading about the Cubs, the end of the year coming up and the different possibilities of a Graduate Assistantship, I'm afraid I've not allowed my mind much room to wander, or wonder as the case may be. ;)

And lately, whenever I do come up with a thought I'd like to write about, it seems as though I wear out my angst before I finish. (Something you probably could have figured out by the crappiness of my last couple of posts)

So basically, I'm asking for a prompt, or a question. Anything. Help me out, y'all.

Most sincerely,
Neil Golemo

Jesus and Baseball... An Easter Story

2004-04-13T23:23:00.000-05:00

The other day was Easter.

As I was growing up, every year, around this time, I would hear my father explain to my brother, sisters and myself how "this is the most important holiday of the year... even more important than Christmas and Pulaski Day. [Insert knowing smile and a wink]" (My dad's so Polish, he burps and kolaches fly out... or not)

I completely understand why it is my father felt this way. Easter Sunday is the day Jesus triumphed. I've heard the stories, I've read the stories, I've seen the movie. Easter kicks Christmas's butt. Think about it... Jesus rises from the dead in one hand <==> Mary gives birth. Hmm, which one is more unusual?

But I will say this about Easter. Its kind of anti-climactic. Isn't it? I mean think about it. Throughout the entire Bible, we keep hearing about how this guy is going to come and do some crazy stuff. Then he does the crazy stuff. Then... what?

Going through Lent, which, I think is my favorite time of the year, and then seeing Easter elicits a weird feeling. Its like you know something big is happening... but you're not sure what it is.

I remember one time when I was little, I was listening to a Cubs game on the radio. [Yes, folks, yet another baseball metaphor.] It was the bottom of the 8th and Ryne Sandberg, the great Cubs 2nd baseman, had hit a home-run, a double and a bloop-single. That's right, folks. He had a chance to do what, literally, only a handful of men had ever done in the entire history of Major League Baseball. Hit for the "Cycle". Which is, to hit a single, a double, a triple and a Home-run in ONE game.

Ryne Sandberg steps up to the plate. Strike one!

Fart!

Strike two

Stink!

The third pitch comes and I hear the announcer yelp: "OMIGOD, OMIGOD!"

Harry Caray slurs: "huuuu-it could be... huuuuu-it might be.... Sandberg is on his huuu-orse!, he rounds first as the right fielder scrambles to the corner for the ba- ho my! He's rounding second! Here comes the throw.... hhhhhh-he's in thar! He did it! He did it! Holy Cow he did it!"

Now, I'm not exactly sure how to describe the feeling as I heard this. I could tell from the initial "Omigod" that whatever was happening, it was big. But I didn't know exactly what it was. The whole Easter season is kind of like that for me. We know something big is coming and we pretty much know from the crack of the bat what it is... but we're not exactly sure about the what, the where or the why.

And don't forget, this was only the 8th inning. There was still a whole inning yet to play. There was still work to do. How was anyone on the field supposed to be serious after that? This huge thing has just happened and you're expected to keep going as though nothing happened?

If you think that's crazy, how much worse must it have been in the days after Christ ascended into heaven? I'm talking about the days after the initial shock and awe had worn off. After the "afterglow" had begun to fade. How were the disciples able to deal with the fact that they were "it" for a while? I can tell you this Yankee would be a little overwhelmed. Guess its a good thing I was born now, no?

Anyways, that was just a thought.

On a roll...

2004-04-06T21:03:00.000-05:00

Who's to say human beings aren't in possession of the fabled "6th Sense"?

Have you ever been thinking about a friend you haven't talked to in a while only to receive a phone call from them minutes later? Have you ever had a song you haven't heard in years stuck in your head only to have it come on the radio? We've all shared those weird, yet strangely comfortable moments where you seem to share one brain.

Well, my friends. I'm here to tell you I'm a believer.

My last post spoke of my pissing people off. I believe that I have psychic capabilities.

In the last four days...

I've lost my patience for the first time all year with a few of my residents.

Jerk

I've insulted a good friend by calling him a hypocrite for doing something he was really doing out of regard for my feelings.

Punk

I've offended not one, but two, ex-girlfriends.

Schmuck

I've abused my body by forgetting to eat and staying up too late. Now I'm sick and completely slacking at my job.

Moron

I've been curt with my fellow staff members, and shirked responsibilities.

Fool

I've harbored angry thoughts against people I love and care about completely out of jealousy.

Butt-head

I had the gumption to rain on a dear friend's parade when she was giving me awesome news about herself and how she's finally gotten a chance at something she so clearly deserves by changing the subject to what's going on with me, in my life. I was unable to be happy for her because all I could see was how the situation was going to affect me.

Freaking Jackass

I've disappointed my father.

Crap-head

I've asked God to look the other way because "I'm going through some crap".

Not cool

The worst thing I can say about our recent actions is that I did them with almost full knowledge of what I was doing. I saw myself sucking happiness out of the atmosphere, and I allowed it.

I've had friends that say "We all have rough times, Neil. It's okay". But I've never been okay with "okay". I so treasure the people in my life. They are what matters in life. Its not how much money I make or what car I drive. Its not what books I've read or what my major is or where I'm graduating in my class. Its how I treat my fellow children of God, that matters.

So if I know this, then why do I keep screwing up? Why should I tolerate it? Why should anyone else? I know, I know. This is where Missy or Beth would tell me I'm being too hard on myself. This is where my mom would tell me to get down off my cross because someone needs the wood. But its so hard for me to forgive myself. I hate that I can do this to my friends. I hate that they trust me and I hurt them.

In moments of total confusion, my friend Daren would ask me this question: "So, uh, Neil. Whaddya think Paul has to say about it?"

Hebrews 8:12 "For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more."

Col 2:13 "When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins."

About this point my father would start explaining to me how I'm being a jerk. If God sees fit to forgive me, but I don't, I'm contradicting the Lord. Where do I get off thinking I know better than the creator of ALL THAT IS?

Ahh, I do it all the time.

I'm sorry. I don't know what my problem is. I can't say that this "isn't me" because it really is. I'm weak. Is this the part of me that's usually rearing its ugly head? No, thank-GOD, its not. (Not this particular ugly head, anyway).

I'm sorry. I don't know how to fix it. But I do know what to do.

I need to hit my knees and thank the Lord for such amazing friends who'll swallow a plate-full of abuse and come back for seconds. I need to thank the Lord for his never-ending forgiveness. There's not a sin I could commit that hasn't already been wiped clean by the blood shed by his Son. I'm so thankful for that.

As for the forgiving myself part, I'm working on it... baby steps y'all, baby steps.