Personal posts page 62

Finally beat Nobunaga’s Ambition

I do believe this is the first time I ever beat Nobamb. Paul, my brother, and I were playing a game of it and hotseat Civ III at the same time. I actually died after many attacks and being plagued repeatedly. Paul got a territory that was up for auction for 300 gold, giving him a second territory. Jamie got attacked by an ambitious and stupid daimyo who had 4 territories. The guy game himself and didn’t flee even when he was well near defeat, so Jamie got all his territory. Then Jamie had to leave, so I took back over for him. Paul died after leaving too little rice in his home territory and then being attacked. Paul had left very few troops in one of his territories next to me, so I was able to quickly take that one. I then built up my fiefs and armies and attacked whenever a fief was low on troops, after battles with others usually. After a while, I had enough support from my protected fiefs to quickly build up huge armies in the front ones and then attack even well defended fiefs. I left few troops in the rear, and had a rebellion take over one fief, but was able to quickly win it back with a fief where I had left a big enough troop. I bought large amounts of troops and didn’t train or arm them well, so I lost a lot. In one territory, I lost even with a much larger army. In another, I lost so many taking it that it was quickly taken by another daimyo. Luckily, I had troops in another territory that were able to take it back quickly and then take advantage of the reduced troop numbers in the attackers fief. I moved very quickly at the end. The last fief I took I sent in 400k troops against 200k. I ended up with maybe 70k, but I won. This of course was on the small map on easy, so I haven’t mastered the game or anything. I usually never win the game, as it takes a good while and I’m usually slow to develop to a point where I feel comfortable attacking that first fief.

I haven’t played video games much in a good while, but recently I’ve spent many hours with them. A gift to me of Civ III Complete (finally released for Mac) and from me of Escape Velocity Override have brought back some of my interest in gaming, at least with those particular games. I’ve beat Civ III on chieftain, though I usually never do because of the extremely long time it takes to play through a single game. I usually start them but not finish. I also beat the Vellos line in EVN. I had beaten the Polaris line back when the game first came out, and hadn’t played since then. It also takes a long while to play through. Gaming really takes a lot of my useful time, but it can be fun. As long as I make sure to make time for other stuff and get important things done, it can be well worth it.

Christmas (lighting) has ended for the year

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Nearly since I started driving, I’ve been wanting to put chrismtas lights in my car around christmas time. At one point I got some small sets of battery powered lights and taped them to the inside of the rear window. They were not very bright, and burned through batteries pretty quickly. They were also a pain to turn on and off, as I had to climb back in the back seat to reach the switches. I was dissappointed. I had dreams of lights all along the outside of the car, including on the wheels, which I was attempting to devise a way to create, all powered from the cars battery and easily switched on and off.

This year I finally got around to getting a new set of lights for the car. I got a full string of 60 of the LED lights just for it. They were AC, so I bought an inverter, figuring I could use it for my computer and other stuff as well. I routed them along the outside edge of the roof on the inside of the car, using twisty ties slid carefully into the trim. They were very bright and were a much bigger display than the previous set. I felt they weren’t noticable enough on the inside of the car, but I got plenty of compliments.

Christmas has passed, but I figured I put the effort into putting these up and liked them, so I’d keep them going until about the 15th of January, giving them a full month’s employment. I worried a bit when cops drove by that there might be something illegal about the lights in the car, but none seemed to find it a problem. But just two days short of my planned finish date, I finally got pulled over. It was right in Peninsula here, and I knew the cop from when he pulled me over last, while I was taking a late night walk alongside the road. He said that I can’t have the lights on, and added that it was well passed christmas. I am always nervous around cops and had just had one follow me for a while earlier that trip, so I was especially nervous with this guy.

I don’t know what the law says about christmas lights and where they can and can’t be placed on cars. Where I had them, they really weren’t a distraction to myself, save for a bit when backing up. I can hardly see them being a distraction to other drivers, unless their interest got the better of them, as they weren’t nearly bright enough to cause problems. I know others have had lights on their cars. I will have to look into what I can and can’t do, and perhaps figure out a way to move the lights to the exterior of the car.

Lights on the car is my favorite way to decorate for christmas.

Mimi died

Mimi, also known as my grandmother on my father’s side, or Melba Mackenzie, died Friday (10/28/5 in the afternoon), the last of my grandparents. She had been ailing for quite some time. I was surprised how long she made it. She had had a stroke some years back that left her unable to manage at her former home, so she moved into a retirement village. She lost some physical capability. She couldn’t operate her right arm very well, having trouble writing, which she had loved so much to do. She also had trouble with one of her legs. Over time this worsened and turned out to be something wrong with her knee. Eventually she couldn’t walk, though she could uncomfortably stand and make her way into a chair or to reach some things. She was still able to live by herself, at the Cardinal Retirement Village where she lived. They made dinner for her, but she complained about it constantly. Some of her friends moved over to a place in the Falls called Danbury and had liked it a lot. They said the food was excellent, prepared by a five star chef. She had been complaining about many things regarding Cardinal for a while, so she finally moved out, over to Danbury. The apartment was smaller, so we had to help to get rid of some of her stuff. It’s always so sad having to get rid of stuff, especially because of the possibility of getting rid of something important, that holds some spur to the memory of some important event or thing in the past that could otherwise be lost forever. We crammed her remaining stuff into her new apartment and storage locker. Danbury was amazingly nice looking compared to Cardinal. It was more like a nice, clean, new hotel than an old shabby apartment building. The food was also indeed quite excellent. This more than made up for the smaller apartment with a smaller outside porch. Mimi loved watching the birds visit her apartment, so she got permission to attach a bird feeder to the overhang of her porch. My dad visited her every Wednesday night and Saturday morning to have a meal and help her with the things she was unable to do herself, like fill the bird-feeder, do her shopping, and refill her prescriptions. She managed alright, though everything took her much longer than it used to. I had to help with her pills and other things when my dad had a heart attack. I also had to drive her to the doctor’s and to the hair dresser at Cardinal, whom she much preffered to the one at Danbury. She went every two weeks if she was healthy enough, so I got to see a lot more of her. I hadn’t seen her too often for a good while there. We’d usually go out to eat after the hairdressers. This wasn’t exactly easy for her. She had trouble getting into and out of the car and chairs at restaurants, and hearing the servers. But she enjoyed the food and spending some time with me. I even introduced her to real Mexican food; she must have only known Mexican based upon Taco Bell before that. I only got to take her there once, but she enjoyed it a good bit and had mentioned it several times since then when we talked about where we could go. She usually wanted me to choose, but I generally didn’t care where we went, and wanted to take her somewhere where she could get something she wanted. She enjoyed Eat n Park a good bit, because it had some good spaghetti, one thing Danbury wasn’t able to make. It also had a chicken stir fry that she really liked. Other things, such as the gravy covered sandwiches and strawberry salad, she didn’t like too much. One of her favorites was Olive Garden, but we only ate there once because of the cost and goodness of the spaghetti at Eat n Park. We even had Jamie come along to the Olive Garden. We were going to have Paul come along as well, but he hadn’t been able to for some reason.

Mimi had gotten a little motorized scooter back at Cardinal once she couldn’t walk anymore. She drove it down to meals, and occasionally we had her drive it down and park it at the front door when taking her places. She took the cart to Danbury. It got a nice reception there. One of the woman working at the dining room would drive it around while Mimi ate. She got her a horn for the cart and would toot it whenever she drove it. All the people at Danbury were very nice, and they even got to know me a bit when I came to visit Mimi. The people at Cardinal weren’t all nice to her. Many of the resident’s were her good friends, but she had trouble with some of the employees. When she left though, many wanted her to come back. The two woman at the front desk always enjoyed seeing her revisit to get her hair done, and wanted her to come back. Many others knew her and greeted her when we came in. Sharon was the hairdresser that Mimi liked so much. She was a nice lady, and was always able to give Mimi the hairdo she wanted (although Mimi would sometimes move the bangs near the side, to Sharon’s disapproval). She’d tell me when I needed to be back by to pick Mimi up, and was always just finishing up when a I came in.

I never really got to know a whole lot about Mimi. I was too young for her to tell me much about her when I used to visit as a kid. Then there was a lull where I didn’t see her too much. I started seeing her a bit again when she had gone to Cardinal and occasionally needed assistance, such as going to the doctor (that conveniently was right across the street). Then after she moved again I started seeing a lot of her, though perhaps not as much as she would have wanted. She often would say that I could stop in or call her at any time, though I never ended up taking her up on that; I always found myself quite busy even though I didn’t necessarily have anything to do or get anything done (I still am this way). I didn’t ask her about her life, but she did occasionally tell me stories. I had known from before that she had been a teacher, including at Tri-C, had lived up in Maine for a while but found the winters awful cold, and had had a husband and daughter that I never met due to their early deaths. She told many stories about her teaching years, as well as some about Maine and about raising her children. One story of hers:
She was walking with a student through some town once. Mimi stopped at a crosswalk with a red light. The girl asked why Mimi was just standing there. Mimi said it was because there was a red light. The girl said “so” and wondered why that mattered. She had never seen a stoplight before, living in rural West Virginia, and Mimi had to explain to her what it did and how it worked.
She also often mentioned that she had done many things in previous lives, including visit Jamaica. She had said this when her granddaughter Kris took a vacation there. Kris was going to tell this story at her funeral, but then didn’t, perhaps because of the pastor’s (or whatever he was) strong religious theme to his speech. The funeral saw many guests, though, as we were the first there, I had worried we would be the only one’s. Guests included her Sister, some of my Dad’s cousin’s, us, Aunt Linda, with her husband and two children, some folk from Danbury, even two of my Mom’s siblings and their families. I was surprised to see my cousin’s Paul and Ally. They hadn’t known Mimi especially well, though she had made it to some of the family gatherings on my Mom’s side over the past several years. I had to talk to them, though, about camping plans. Kris, who had come down to see Mimi in her last days, invited us up to Maine next summer.

Mimi died over maybe a two week period. She had been feeling sick for a while, and wasn’t able to go out to the hair dressers one Thursday. This happened occasionally. She continued to be sick for a while, progressing to the point where she was vomiting and unable to even get into bed. The people at Danbury wanted her to go to the hospital, but she didn’t want to. She seemed to hate that. She even signed a waiver when Danbury finally called 911 saying she refused to go. But as she was unable to do anything for herself, they, including my dad, convinced her that she had to go to the hospital. At the hospital, they found numerous things wrong with her, including pneumonia, failing kidneys, and dehydration. They re-hydrated her and what not, but her kidneys were in awful shape. She didn’t want to go on dialysis. Of the options given by the nurse, she decided to go to a hospice for the rest of her days. They’d give her medication and care for her, but take no other action to save her if she were dying. She was very tired and slept a lot, which slowly progressed to constant unconsciousness. I visited her twice before she died, once in the hospital just hours before she was moved, and once at the hospice. At the hospital, she for some reason thought my dad told her I was Jamie, but then realized I was Toby. She was very tired and didn’t talk much there. She did say that she’d be going to the hospice to die, and thought she had worn a white coat on her trip to the hospital. When I talked to her at the hospice, it was also brief. I didn’t know quite what to say, and she seemed to be very tired anyway. At one point she said she couldn’t stand her boredom there, and just wanted to sleep. I did get to talk to Kris a bit though, a cousin who I hardly know and haven’t seen very often. Too bad I didn’t realize that’d be the last time I’d see Mimi.

She was cremated. Her ashes will be spread over the lake by her camp in Maine in the summer. The pastor at the service gave a good speech to us. His speech was quite religion based, but many of his stories worked for us non-religious as well. I was a bit disappointed by the “punch-line” of one of his stories:
A man and his children were at the breakfast table, and jovially talking about people’s words at their death beds. They changed the tone by seriously asking him what he’d tell them if he knew he’d die. He said he didn’t know. At some point he had a heart attack and nearly died. After he was better, he told the kids he had thought about and written down what he’d have told them. He’d tell them to remember Jesus, or something like that.
This story wasn’t especially applicable to the non-religious, and was too long in the telling to find that out. He was a practical theologian who liked to show how theology applied to real life. My dad, Aunt Linda, Kris, and, on the spot, Uncle Art, gave short little talks about Mimi. They were all good and important contributions to the ceremony. My dad talked a good bit about her life, and her interest in education and strong will. Aunt Linda talked a bit about her life and read one of her poems. Kris also read one of her poems. Uncle Art told a few brief stories about her. I liked the ceremony, especially how it wasn’t so sad as some are.

I got to see many pictures of Mimi and her husband and children from long ago. It’s always interesting to see those snips of peoples lives that I’ve never seen before.

I will eventually expand, better organize, and turn this into a page.

I’m back (from Scotland that is)

Ah, back home. I had an enjoyable trip for sure.

The plane trip was quite long. The first leg was in a smaller plane, then the second in a big one. As my first experiences in big planes, they were nice. There were some nice views on both, which I tried to capture with my camera. The windows were dirty though and made for not too clear photos. There was a nice sunset and sunrise and interesting cloud formations, as well as the stuff on the ground. It was amazing how quick Kelley’s Island came into view after leaving Cleveland. Lots of waiting at lines and terminals in airports. I had to empty my bag (my carryon contained all my luggage, the only way to travel if possible) at one airport at the security check, but not at any other.

We took an introduction to Scotland tour to show us the main stuff. It went from mid Sunday to early Friday morning. We were bussed about to various attractions, and our lodging and many meals were included with the tour.

I will continue my story later…

I’m going to Scotland

Hey hey. My first trip off the continent. I’ve been to Canada before, but otherwise just the USA. Later today I shall leave, and will arrive tomorrow. I plan to take lots of pictures, and perhaps I shall put some on my site. I will also consider writing some log entries from Scotland if anything interesting happens. Hopefully it’ll be fun. I’ll get to learn a bit about my Scotish heratige, see some castles and other pleasing scenery, check out the state of old Britland, and relax a bit.

Cat Replaced

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A week and a half ago I replaced the catalytic converter on my car. As I had said, during my trip to Lakewood, it had broken in two near the flange at the front, so I needed a new one. NAPA surprisingly didn’t carry one for that particular car. I went to Advanced Auto, as they had the cheapest quote that I got. The cats they had, however, didn’t have flanges, so I would have to figure out some way to attach them, perhaps a clamping flange. I paid the 30 extra dollars at Auto Zone for the one with the flanges. It included gaskets as well, but no bolts. I was going to just use the old bolts, but I had to cut two of them with the angle grinder. I wanted to replace them with stainless steel, but no one seemed to carry metric stainless. I bought some cheap regular ones to use until I can find the stainless in metric. Lowe’s amazingly didn’t seem to have metric at all, so my temporary bolts are 9/16″. I grabbed them all from the 5/8″ bin, but they seem to require the 9/16″ wrench. Strange. In addition to stainless bolts, I also wanted a stainless exhaust, but they seem to be way too expensive, even much more than the expensive cost I thought they’d be. Instead, I plan to buy some engine block 1200° or 1800° paint to seal the exhaust from exterior rust anyways. Hopefully that’ll increase the lifespan noticeably. The rest of the exhaust system seems to be in need of replacement, as it is getting rather loud again, so I’ll try to paint it when I do that.

Lakewood visit

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Yesterday, in place of going sailing, I went on a bike ride down in Lakewood. I drove down and parked at Lakewood Park. I used to go there a lot, with the family on picnics (often KFC), with the summer daycare type thing I was in, and occasionally to see fireworks and bands play. While there yesterday, I saw all the kids that must have come from the summer daycare thing playing on the playground and swimming in the pool. There were certainly a lot of them. The park had changed in several ways. The playground area was totally redone, though I had seen the beginning of that remake near the end of my life there. Also, a skate park was added just recently, a few months ago evidently, and a building near the parking lot was renovated. Other than that it was very much the same. Quite amazing. I took pictures here and of other places throughout the day that brought back memories.

I took my bike from my car and rode around town. I first rode to my old street. I saw the old school, Lincoln, where I spent 6 years of my life. Lots of things happened there, and many of the people I knew I went to school with there. Riding down the street, I came to my old house. It looked very much the same, old and gray. The three neighbors house on the one side, Chris’s, the McCray’s, and Phil’s old house, looked almost the same, but changed a bit. The playhouse was gone from the back of Chris’s house, now that Katie had grown up. At Chris’s and the McCray’s, there were a lot more flowers in the front yard. At Phil’s old house, two big trees from the tree lawn were gone, making it look very empty. There was a tall fernlike plant and some other plants in the front yard. Otherwise, they were very much the same, with the same colors and the big fence in the McCray’s back yard. It didn’t look like anyone was home at the McCray’s or Chris’s, except for in the upstairs of the duplex Chris lives in (I never knew the person who lived there though). I wondered what had happened to everybody. I saw a young kid go into the garage of my old house.

I then rode on down the street. I saw the old rail road tracks, and then Ross’s Deli, where I used to go to buy Laffy Taffy, Bonkers, and other treats. I saw the Taco Bell next door. I rode around some more, and came to Woodward, where Phil had moved a year or so before I left. I wasn’t sure which house was his, but thought 1510 sounded familiar. Riding passed, it looked like it could have been it, but it would have changed a bit, getting a fence to the backyard and losing the basketball hoop on the garage. No one seemed to be home. Riding on, I went down to Edwards Park, where I had played a bit as a kid. I then rode on down the street where my friend Ian used to live. I really had no clue where his house was: I thought I remembered it being on the corner, but then I also remember walking down the street several houses to find it on the side toward my house. I also thought I remembered a big tree in the front yard, and a gray color to the house. I remembered little else about the house, as we spent our time inside. I rode up and down a couple times, but couldn’t tell at all which it was. Not many people were home at the time.

I rode down past the old middle school, Horace Mann, where I spent one year. It looked quite the same big old brick building. I then went back down to Lakeland and looked more closely at Lincoln. Both a new parking lot and playground had been added soon before I left. The playground had been changed at least a little since then, as there was no tire swing where it had been before. A gazebo and some plants had been added to where part of the parking lot had been before the new one was put in. That may have been there before I left, but I don’t remember it. I rode past the houses once more, and it still looked like no one was home at the two neighbors. I rode on down and walked along the railroad tracks to the small park nearby. I hadn’t gone there a whole lot, but did play put-put at the course that had been put in there several years before I left. Bored, I went over to the library and decided just to read for a bit. Up until this point, and especially at the library, I was checking out every person that looked to be about my age to see if they might be someone I knew. I was hoping that I may chance upon someone, though I knew my chances were extremely slim. I looked around a bit and then read a book on objects in PHP 5. I couldn’t read much of it though, as my thoughts were elsewhere.

I left to just ride around for a bit; I expected that 17:00 would potentially bring my neighbors home, so I would ride until around then. I saw the little strip-mall area that had been put in during my stay. It used to have Arabica, where I had once gotten ice cream, but it looked like some other coffee shop in its place. I rode around some more and then rode down Detroit a good ways. I didn’t plan to turn off it, but I found myself in a right turn only lane. I then turned again. I surprisingly passed one of the park entrances to the Rocky River, the place where Paul and I sail out from. I could even see the parking lot and boat ramps. I had no idea it was that close to Lakewood. I rode around a bit, taking pictures of some of the expensive houses out there. Paul and I had actually cycled around that area once not too long ago when we had ridden up to the Lake from a park near his house (sort of anyway). I rode farther than we had ridden along that route though, and saw a park that I had visited only a couple of times, with my parents and possibly my cousins the Shury’s.

I rode back to Rocky River and rode down to the dock area, as Paul had said he was sailing out at around 5, and it was in fact around 5. He wasn’t there. The lake was looking rough, it was very windy, and dark clouds were coming in, so I suspected he had checked the weather and saw it was looking too bad to go out. I walked around the marina area a bit, and checked out some of the sailboats there. Before I left, I decided to leave them a message in case they did come. I rode around the parking lot picking up sticks, then put them together to spell out my name near where Paul usually parks to step the mast and set up the boat. Riding away, I noticed it wasn’t easily visible from very far away, but I hoped they’d get close enough to see it. At this point, I could hear thunder, it was getting very windy, and the clouds were getting very dark.

I rode back to Lakeland for one last visit. This time, a car was in the drive at the McCray’s. I slowly rode past, not seeing anybody. I rode down to Lincoln, deciding if I should knock on the door or not. When I came back, a woman sat out on the porch that looked very much like I remembered Mrs. McCray looking. But it had been so long, that I wasn’t sure. I rode past and thought a bit about what I should do, what I should say. I’m still, after all, very shy. A car pulled out that was parked across from the McCray’s and drove by. It looked like it could have been Rena, and I soon found out it was. I then got the strength to go up to Mrs. McCray. I rode up, and asked if she was Mrs. McCray. She said she was. I approached the porch and told her I had lived down the road a bit years ago. She then began to recognize me. I couldn’t think of much to say, and it was a bit awkward for a moment, but then I asked how Rena and David had been. David was down in Columbus going to school. He didn’t like school much, and wasn’t sure what he wanted to do. Rena had gone to school for both nursing and psychology, and also wasn’t sure what she wanted to do. She was doing something related to nursing now, and was planning on getting into lab work for a while. Mrs. McCray called out her husband, Dave. He was surprised to see me. We talked for a bit and I gave him my parents’ phone number, as he had lost it. He said they had talked about my dad just recently.

Dave took me over to show me to Chris, who also still lived in the same place. Chris didn’t recognize me at first, but soon after realized who I was without even having to be told. His wife came out as well. She didn’t recognize me right away, and I actually didn’t recognize her either; I didn’t remember her very well. We all sat out on the porch and talked for a bit. Eileen (Mrs. McCray) soon came over as well. Chris’s wife (I believe her name was Jeanne) went and picked up little Katie, who wasn’t quite so little anymore, and was going on 17. She looked much older, of course, but I could still see the same facial features from before. She didn’t really remember me, though she did remember my brother a bit. She sat on the porch with us for a bit, but went inside when someone called on the phone.

They told me of what had happened since I was gone. It was mostly the same. The had recently had a block party, and had had two others since we left. Dave was one of the people setting the recent one up, and Chris had been on the one before that. They had put up a volleyball net accross the street, had games for the kids, a raffle, and free pizza. Evidently, some residents had gotten mad about the whole thing and tried to drive their cars on through. One had called the police, who told him that the block had gotten a permit for the party and so was allowed to block off the street. Flyers had been handed out to warn everybody to move their cars to parking lots at either end, but some still found that too inconvenient for a day. Chris and Dave had been working on their houses, especially Chris. He had sanded off all the old paint and repainted. The McCray residence still had the same old paint, though it will need to be redone soon. My old house had seen several crazy residents come and go before settling on the quiet mom with her child that lived there now. The residents beforehand had been loud, and one had stolen a package. One had been renting the house out, though it’s not supposed to be. Other neighbors, who I hadn’t known too well, had moved out.

I told them about what had happened on my end as well, how I had graduated from Kent for restaurant management and planned to possibly open a restaurant with my brother, how I had moved into a trailer near my parents and needed to do work on it, how my brother had also moved out, and how my dad had had a heart attack but was doing fine now.

I was offered and ate tortilla chips, some tasty amish cheese, some iced tea, and then two tacos. They said they were going to invite my parents over for some kind of party soon. I hope they do. I really miss the old neighborhood and the sense of community we had there. I’d like to know what my life would have been like had I not moved. I guess that’s quite impossible though. I then said bye and rode off to my car. It was a little bit wet from the short rain we had gotten while on the porch.

I realized I left there much later than I had wanted to. It was almost 21:00 when I got to my car, and I had to be in Kent for my show. Normally I try to make it there by 22:00, though we don’t play till 22:30. I looked at the map, but saw no quick easy way apparent to get to Kent. I drove by the Lakewood Winking Lizard while going to the highway. I drove on, unsure of exactly where I was going to go. I looked at the map as I approached several of the exits, trying to decide which I should take. I eventually decided I should take the long route that was all highway driving, down into Akron, then over and back up a good bit along 76. Somewhere along the way, my exhaust got extremely loud. It was somewhat painful to the ears. I was quite worried a cop would pull me over about it. None did though, even riding home. It was definately loud enough that people were looking at me though. When I parked near the ECC, I looked under the car. I saw that there was a clean crack right through the exhaust at one point, and the front part was hangin down so that it was shooting the exhaust straight out from there. Later, with aid of a flashlight, I found out that the crack was through the one end of the catalytic converter, right next to the flange used to bolt it to the front part of the exhaust. This means I will need a new cat. They are a bit expensive. I’ll also have to figure out how to get to the store to get one, as I’m not sure I want to drive it around much. Another difficulty is that today I was going to get the car transferred to my name, so I was going to get it e-checked, then go get the title transferred, then get the plates. I certainly won’t pass e-check bypassing entirely the cat. That may have to wait till tomorrow.

lakewood class of 2000 folk

I went to Lincoln Elementary and, for sixth grade only, to Horace Mann Middle School. Those were some great years and I knew lots of cool people. Lots of things happened in my life then that made me who I am today. I really miss those days and all the fun I had. Some recent searching through various things I still have from then, after seeing a girl who looked like someone I had known, brought back many good memories. I had not thought much about that time period for many years.

When I moved away, things seemed to change for the worse. The shy person that I am, I had lots of trouble adjusting to the move from elementary school to middle school. Lots of my friends went to another middle school or had classes in a totally different part of the school. There were also lots of new people there, and classes were done much differently, with a teacher for each subject instead of one for most of them. One of my best friends had moved several blocks away and also was attending that other middle school. I was much more socially cut off than I had been during the elementary years. Then I moved to a new home. Suddenly, all of those people were completely gone, and everybody was totally new. I got one friend easily, because he was my neighbor. I had too much trouble reaching out to anyone else. I went through school hardly talking to anyone at all, except the one neighbor. He went to a private high school, so I then had nobody at school. I’ve never recovered socially from that, and currently have virtually no friends. I lack the social skills to gain any.

I’d like to contact some of you folk who were my friends then, at least to hear what had happened after I left. Phil Nash, David and Rena McCray, and Ian Howard were all my best friends back then. Some of my favorite times were with you. I had a bit of a ‘crush’ on Rena. Joey Machol, Morgan Bishop, and Ryan Overman were also good friends. There were lots of other really cool people as well. Angie Bowers was the girl I thought I saw at a recent show of my bands. I didn’t get a chance to ask her if it was her: I’m of course rather shy; I have a poor memory and was unsure if I remembered correctly ; I also wanted to wait until after the bands were done, but she left before then.

I tried to find information on some of you on the internet, but that never seems to succeed well. All I found were a few stories in the high school newspaper with quotes from Rena or written by Ian.

If any of you folk, especially if you remember me, would like to contact me, that’d be really cool. I feel this awful, melancholy feeling right now that what was once my life and joy has disappeared forever, leaving only a few pictures and papers and some faded memories.

accident and dead deer

My ride to band practice was both long and interesting today. The traffic was awful on the way there. I was in two seperate sets of stop and go traffic. Both times it took me somewhere around 10 minutes to go perhaps a half mile. The second traffic jam was caused by an accident on Graham Road. There were lots of emergency vehicles surrounding it, taking up two lanes of the four lane road, so traffic had to be averted into one lane of the other side of the road. It took a while for that to happen, so there was lots of waiting. As I drove past, I couldn’t see what happened, with all the emergency vehicles in the way, but I did see a stretcher with a group of people around it. They had very blank expressions on their face, so I couldn’t tell what was happening very well. I will have to look for some sort of news about the accident; I’d like to be able to find out about the accidents I actually see.

A little further on down Graham, the traffic was still pretty bad. A couple of cop cars drove by, one with flashers. I stopped at a traffic light. The road was clear on my side of the road but only partially on the other. A little fawn, of whom I have no idea how it got into that residential side of the road at that time of day, made a made dash to get accross. It was really flying. The cars on my side had been stopped, so they just didn’t accelerate fast and were able to avoid it. On the other side, a red car of some sort must not have seen the little thing speeding across and ran right into it. The fawn flew forward relative to the car a bit, flailing about, as well as forward in its direction of movement, so that it arrived right in front of a truck that stopped in time to avoid it and soon fell to the pavement. The red car sped along past, while the truck driver sat looking down at it. It seemed to happen so fast, yet take a long time. From a bit back, I thought the fawn was not badly injured and wondered why it wasn’t getting up. As I went past, however, I saw a large pool of blood that looked like it eminated from its nose. Not something I like to see. A frantic young life cut off. I drove past, so I don’t know what became of the deer or the truck driver sitting there looking at it. Damn red car driver.

Bridge to Terabithia

I read a book today. The whole thing. One I had read when I was a kid and remembered being good, but didn’t remember much about it. I had liked it so much as a kid, I even named my mouse Prince Terrian. The book was Bridge to Terabithia. Weird that it was in the kids section at the library though I didn’t remember it being so kiddy.

I read part in the afternoon before work. At work I got stuck on fry, my least favorite (read most disliked, perhaps only disliked) station. I’m slow on it, but I didn’t care. I just wanted to get home to finish reading. It was weird, as I’ve not in recent memory had a thing I so wanted to do that I ached to be doing it. I got home and stayed up late finishing the book. As I approached the end, I had an inkling memory of what happened in the end, facilitated by knowledge that something had to happen to end the book. I didn’t remember exactly what it was at first, but it came to me as it approached. I feared its happening but still wanted to read on. Strangely, though I knew what would happen, I was still hit hard when it happened. Harder than I’ve been hit in a long time. I cried, and hard, all the way through the ending. I hadn’t actually cried in a long time: I don’t even remember the last time full tears rolled down my face. I had thought I had lost all capability of emotion, that practicality and indifference had taken over with the realization that life happens, and occurences good or bad can’t be changed, only dealt with. That prudent stoicism has enveloped me as long as I can remember. But this story touched me and moved me to tears.

Perhaps it is because I have always want somebody to pop in to my life to take me off to Terabithia. No one has. Terabithia seems like the place I always wanted to go, that I wish I had gone to when I was a kid. The friendship and love lost, though common to many stories, felt so much more close because of the realism of the story. All the joy in Jesse’s life was in Leslie and Terabithia. When those were gone, he was left with seemingly nothing of value. Things of joy and pain can appear and disappear so quickly, and when gone leave nothing but a frail memory. Guilt is wrought when run a thought that a seeming small poor and insignificant choice could a hand lend to such a terrible end. It reminded me of a small occurence in another book, Ordinary People, involving a friend of the main character from the therapy he had recieved.

I’ve never been to Terabithia, and perhaps never will. Nor perhaps shall I find such a close bond as between Jesse and Leslie.