I'm me, who the f*ck are you

Who are you?

Someone posed this question to me and I thought about it all day until I came to this "off the cuff" reality. 

 My name is Craig, and I am not crazy, I am just a little unwell…actually who we kidding I am absolutely bat shit crazy. I battle demons on a daily basis that I would not wish upon anyone. However, I am a much different person than I appear. I am well educated. My memory is both a blessing and a curse. I love to learn, and can’t tell you how many times I have been talking to someone in a bar, or offered an opinion (ok a drunken rant) and they have looked at me puzzled and have said “you read books?”.

"Yes I do, what are you reading?...Oh Hunger Games? How cosmopolitan/intellectual of you, when you’re done with that I recommend buying a 64 box of crayolas and doing some coloring. Stay in the lines if you can, and don’t eat the glue stick, asshat."

Sorry. I am also someone who has no filter but just bc I have no neck doesn't mean I'm incapable of intellectual discourse and the implication offends me. 

 I am too quick to judge even if I am right 90% of the time, and not quick enough to forgive...especially of myself. I am slow to trust, slower still to love, but when I do it is with every ounce of my being/soul. A beautiful woman once told me the only thing bigger than my neck is my heart, I’d like to believe she is right, but I often wonder. I suppose the drawback to having a huge heart is that the bigger it is the more pieces there are to pick up and try to put to back together when it breaks. Not (m)any people ever see that side of me. I also recognize that life's greatest irony is only someone you choose to let all the way in, to truly and unconditionally love , could ever hurt you. And that's a pain that there are no words for; saying it feels like someone stuck a fork in your stomach and twisted and twirled around your insides like a bowl of spaghetti doesn't do it justice. Perhaps life's second biggest irony is that I haven't had a drink in weeks and have never felt worse. I digress. 

I am someone who values family and friends above all else.  I love my little people (Adam, Emma, Erin, Ryan and Sadie) more than anything in this world. I often wonder if Id be a good dad, or if I'll ever get to find out.  I would quite literally do anything for those close to me; a friend texted me once telling me that righteous vengeance is one of my best qualities. Not sure how I feel about that. ambivalent? maybe? see what i did there? must be from reading books....

I do know  if anyone ever hurt someone I love, I would make it my life's mission to visit a pain upon them that would make Hostel look like a Disney movie. I am quietly overprotective. Don't poke the bear.  The lives of my loved ones mean more to me than my own. In fact that's probably how love should be defined, but what do I do know? I didn't read Hunger Games. 

 I am someone who has been through the closest thing to hell I imagine exists in the world. I sincerely empathize for anyone who struggles at all themselves.  Call me anytime, night or day, and I’ll be there to listen and help as much as I can. Loyalty matters to me more than anything in this world. 

I am the guy in the gym alone in the corner who loves to train and lift heavy bc it is an outlet for the anger that I let define me more often than I should. But I’ve learned as much under the bar as I have anywhere else, even in school,  because barbells never lie. They will not flatter you and tell you that you look great or that everything will be ok. They are always 100%  honest with you and will let you know if you haven’t put in the work. If you haven’t, they will crush and humble you quickly. Barbells never say “nothing is wrong" or " I'm fine”. For that I am grateful. 

 I am someone who gives my all to things and people I think are worth it. I don't believe in half assing anything; have you seen my Sunday meals? I eat because I workout ; I workout because I eat. I'm fat bastard without the infanticide or cannibalism. Luckily my body has an innate ability to repartition poor macronutrients into BOOMSAUCE. In fairness I work my ass off too. 

I am self motivated and driven by something deep inside me that I've never been able to put a finger on.... maybe its fear, maybe it's passion, maybe it's passionate fear. I believe what I believe in. Black and white. There is no gray. Coincidentally I'm color blind. I do not expect you to necessarily agree with me but if you can't  present a cogent argument as to why you believe what you do and display some modicum of passion I will mock you....endlessly. The world is too full of half assery. I invent words when I want to and decided a long time ago one could add " 'ing" to anything and make it a verb. Drunken decisioning are usually some of my best. Good beer-ing. Just like that. 

I also have a lot of bad ideas. Some are directed at bad people, who should be picked up by the face then introduced to the pavement ...from a third story window. Others manifest themselves after 17 budweisers and a bottle of rumpleminze, like running over cars, going down a flight of stairs in a shopping cart, or playing keg Donkey Kong. "Hold my beer, watch this" should probably be on my tombstone. I suggest sticking around for the tom foolery likely to ensue whenever you hear that line. It's trite/hackneyed to say "I love to have fun", and it sounds about as philosophical as tony stuttering tony, but it's true. I'd rather regret the things I've done than the things I haven't. 

  

I am comfortable in my own skin, even though others may find it abrasive or offensive. At least I am not trying to be someone I'm not or doing the "fake fun, phony friend" bullshit. More than anything I am just a tragically flawed man who tries his best every day, and often worries that it is not good enough.  Maybe time will tell you , why I got so much hell to sell you,  but please understand me bc you can't just dance around me. 

 

 

Remeberance

I was working third shift that fateful Tuesday morning. Ironically it was one of those September days only someone from the north east could truly appreciate. You see as August turns into September most people in the area accept that as summer coming to an end. The days are noticeably shorter/colder, the kids are back in school, and the weekends are dominated by dreams of October baseball as well as the start of football. The leaves have not yet begun to turn, but the change in the air is palpable. Just as we are resigned to those facts we inevitably get one or two days that remind us of July. A day of brilliant sunshine and gentle zephyrs that force us to scramble for one more round of golf, one more day at the beach/pool, or to call in sick to work to do these things. That Tuesday was one of those days. The sun hung high. The mercury rose even early in the morning. I considered playing golf and ducked out of work at 7AM in order to do so. Unable to convince anyone to bang in to work ,I stopped at McDonalds, grabbed a handful of breakfast burritos and hash browns then headed home.



I began channel surfing and happened to skip over CNN around quarter to nine as they switched to live coverage in NYC about an “accident” involving a place and the WTC. I remember Paula Zahn discussing what she could see from CNN HQ and when they finally put a camera on the WTC I only had one thought in my mind…..there was no way that was an accident. The plane didn’t clip the WTC, or hit the antenna, it was dead in the middle of it. I have always been a cynic, and refused to believe that what the world was now seeing could have been anything but deliberate.



Shortly thereafter cameras captured the second plane crashing in to the second tower. The silence on the broadcast was deafening. My heart sunk. Selfishly I began to think about my friends who worked in and around NYC. I tried calling them to see if they were safe but couldn’t get through. Nothing but a busy signal. It was now even more evident that the United States was under attack in the most vile and despicable way imaginable. My brother called me and asked what I knew bc he was only hearing rumors at work. He was working at the Prudential building in Boston at the time and I told him if I were him I would get the hell out there. That this was no mistake. That there seemed to be a plot in place to hijack planes and crash them in to tall buildings. The call only lasted a minute or two but I couldn’t help but think how many other people must be having similar conversations…..sadder still how many people were never given the chance to.



As the day’s events continued to unfold the news broke about another plane crashing in to the Pentagon , another in Shanksville PA, and ultimately millions of us watched in abject horror as the twin Towers collapsed. I couldn’t help but jump to the conclusion that some Islamic jihadist must be behind all this. That bw “their” previous attempt to blow up the WTC , the embassy bombings in Tanzania and Kenya, only “they” would sink to this level of depravity. It must be their fault I thought; those radicals in the Middle East.



In history the middle east if often referred to as the cradle of civilization. I respectfully disagree. The only thing accurate about that contention is that many parts of the middle east are very much like an infant. A penchant for temper tantrums, an inability to form rational thoughts or put together a cogent argument. Not in any way self reliant, but rather reliant upon the politics of fear and hate mongering. For many the only message they spew is hate/intolerance; the only language they understand is violence. On 11 September 2001 “they” made this pronouncement to the world and in so doing thought they could break America, but they were wrong.



While America’s loss was tremendous that day; our resolve was greater. Whether those that hate us will ever realize it or not, America is the single greatest country on earth unified by a common bond and desire to be the best, the last best hope of man on Earth. America is benevolent beyond measure. Whenever tragedy strikes, who is there? Who leads the battle against man kinds terrible afflictions such as cancer and HIV? What country does more for the well being of others across the globe? Who led the charge on the beaches of Normandy and Okinawa to rid the world of brutal despots? Flying planes in to buildings will not and cannot change that. America continues to shine as a beacon of freedom and hope for the rest of the world. And no amount of hatred, no matter how it manifests itself, will ever change that. GOD BLESS AMERICA