The blogging world evades me. I've really just been very busy. What used to be my release (blogging) has become work. Facebook is so much quicker and easier. Yet not nearly as satisfying as a good blog. Unless you want to write a "NOTE" you are limited. So I have tried to be faithful to blogging at least once a month. Last month I use the excuse I was in NYC.
What follows are rants of various topics as they come into my head. Just venting. Don't mind me.
This year has been long. I am looking forward to it's end. The new year will hopefully bring a new job in a new place. Looking hard in Virginia. Hoping to get out of the corporate world of manufacturing. I think I've learned that corporations are all about keeping the board happy, and rarely about taking care of people. Like all political spectrum's, corporations care about the bottom line first. I'm tired of seeing hard working folks being treated like worthless pawns. The tendency to throw those making the right decisions under the bus while those who brown nose while making the wrong decisions continue to thrive and climb the corporate ladder. Quite frankly it's disheartening.
I'm am currently trying hard to get into one of two careers. One as a consultant who after some intense training would be instructing people how to better themselves and be more efficient. The other as a job recruiter helping find work for the unemployed. Both jobs would give me relative freedom to work at my own pace, my own way, on my own schedule. I am also passively sending out my resume to various potential opportunities as they arise.
I turned 34 recently. I was in NYC at the time and took POB (my wife) to see a Broadway play. It didn't really hit me though until today when I was trying to remember how old I was and had to calculate it. I never had this problem when I was in my 20's. But being married with kids, my actual age seems much less relevant than it did when I was young and single. My perspective has shifted from a self-centered, whimsical, what about today mentality to a guardian and protector. Someone who is constantly focused on the future, and the potential threats to the well being of his family. I can say I have become more cynical in the last few years.
I often joke with POB that we have become conspiracy theorist. I used to make fun of conspiracy theorist. But the more I learn, the more I become what I held in contempt. People like Alex Jones don't seem so crazy to me anymore. It's the Matrix, the Red pill or the Blue pill. Ignorance is truly Bliss.
However my quest for understanding of our world, of politics, of economics, of history, of freedom, and many other things which currently escape me, has left me spending much less time with God. Less time praying, reading scripture, leading home studies with my family. I have taken advantage of the blessing that God has given me by ignoring the one who has given all to me. I have tried to get back on the wagon many times in the past year, but I keep falling off.
It's as if my life has become confining and all I want to do is escape. But I don't turn to God, no, I turn to myself and my plans for the future. Maybe that is why LA feels like a cage and my apartment is no longer a place of rest. "I will figure it out. I always do." I'm so arrogant sometimes. No comments from the peanut gallery.
Part of the problem is my family has grown but our living quarters haven't. The little ones are quickly becoming not so little. They need space. They need to explore and learn of the outside world. They are full of of pent up energy and times of peace are few and far between, but quite the treasure. They are strong willed, stubborn, disobedient little brats. I used to think my stubbornness was a result of surviving my upbringing. Lately I have come to believe it is genetic. My kids have it, especially COB.
So what of the elections? Americans are in an uproar, the Tea Party came up with a vengeance, Rand Paul actually made it into the Senate. The net result will be a stalemate. House and Senate are clearly opposed. And the Obamanator will use the all mighty power of veto anyway. Alas we will be left at a stand still till the next election. Which might not be bad for the economy. A congress in gridlock can do little harm.
I don't think it matters. Our country is already destroyed. It cannot recover from the economic hole which it is still digging deeper. I used to think, what if the whole thing just fell apart like Rome. I figured it wouldn't happen in my lifetime. Yet today, I don't see how it can not happen in my lifetime. We are a sinking ship. I just hope I end up on a good life raft.
The lack of skill in America astounds me. I'm reading the biography of Buffalo Bill written by his sister. At age 8 he was hunting, and scouting and leading his family. By age 12 he was moving cattle. His father, a great orator, was also a skilled farmer, hunter, and builder. His father built for his family by hand the largest home at the time in that part of Kansas. As I continue to read I think of my own grandfather who also was a man of many talents. Or my grandmother who was a talented seamstress (good with anything that involved cloth, or yarn or string), a gardenerPuerto Rico.
So much knowledge is lost to my generation. So much more will be lost to this generation. It's ironic that in a world where the Internet can provide you with info on just about anything almost instantly, that we are all so ignorant. I long to learn the skills of old. Woodworking, metalworking, farming, hunting, foraging, camping, gun smithing, ect. I long to have the skill to uproot my family with the knowledge that wherever we go, we will thrive.
But my public education has left me with a narrow skill set. I'm highly intelligent, yet trapped. Trapped by ignorance born of a mind-numbing lack of real education. And the worst part is I know it, but don't know what to do about it.
Fatherhood and responsibility keep my grounded when I want to return to my Nomadic ways and see what new adventure and knowledge life can afford me. Sacrifice the wants of the hear and now in hopes that my children will be the better for it.
My children. If you know me, you know I homeschool. I am often challenged by stranger and love ones about my choice. Yet as I learn more and more about gov't schooling and see how year after year it changes for the worse, I can't but feel blessed that I can spare them from that unGodly institution called Public School. This year we started Latin and Logic. Of course there is much grumbling, but it is wonderful to see understanding come to a young man.
While we were in New York I was looking through the selection of Public High Schools that NYC has to offer. There were only two categories. Schools with a graduation rate greater than 85% and schools with a graduation rate of less than 50%. No middle ground. What I found most interesting is that almost every one of the upper level schools required Latin.
Well, I've babbled enough about who knows what. Maybe I should re-read this before I post it so I at least know what I'm putting out to my ever shrinking audience.
