Messages from the frontier

Often I'll listen to the audio-book, "The Kid Stays in the Picture," about Robert Evans. Patton Oswalt does a routine about him (Part one and two). However, the audio-book features an introduction by someone who knew him best.

"My fifth grade teacher used to admonish his students, that by the time we reached adulthood we would have forfeited three quarters of ourselves to be like other people. From the moment I met Robert Evans I realized he was the one person who had not played the forfeiture game. He played by his own rules and lived by his own scenarios. His unwillingness to bend or forfeit a piece of himself cost him dearly at various points in his life, but it also lent him uniqueness. For better or worse, Evans was and still is an original. It made him famous and it made him infamous. Many say they know him. Few do." 

A person has an internal question. Typically, they're unaware of it, but some people are lucky enough to acknowledge it. They know what it is, what it means to them, and what to ask to make sure they provide the best answer for their life.

"What am I doing?"

or "How can I be better?"

or "When will this end?"

or "How do I do more?"

These questions can lead one's whole life. For me, for the past few years, they set a tone for my life. Usually, it was, "will this get better?"

Using Pascal’s wager, we’re at a table and are constantly making wagers. Pascal's was based on whether God exists or doesn't. Gambling in a casino is nothing but a metaphor for life. The cards reflect the whims of how each day may go good or bad. The dealers are the hands of fate: impartial to what actually happens to us. The games' speed correlates with how quickly our lives pass. The octogenarian dragging his or her oxygen tank to a slot machine shows that someone else has it worse than us.

Personally, I think the wager is whether we think we deserve to exist or not - and how much of an impact we can make while we exist and how much remains after we die.

Vice, especially the previously mentioned one, resembles virtue in almost every way: The compulsive maintenance of a singular function over time. I'm not perfect. Though I strive to be good, I know that's just the virtue I can try and achieve - perfection doesn't exist. It never can.

Recently, I went to Pittsburgh with friends. I saw old friends, but one in particular refused to see me. His life has taken a turn for the worse. It’s full of difficulties that made him unable to reach out. I know what it’s like to be afraid to ask for help – horrible. He has it now, but in a place where I can’t reach him and where he chooses not to reach out to me. We’re the same age, but came from different backgrounds: his was one of privilege and opportunity and mine was just one of opportunity and timing. I hope things work out so that he can live in his own skin and get some enjoyment out of the rest of this. 

Everybody needs to make their own way in the world, embracing faults and learning how to work with or around them. I'm just trying to lead a life full of delight, respect, and wonder - with work as a fuel for those things. It’s demanding to live on one’s own terms.  In the spirit that the I make no apology for this chronicle, thank you for making a dent in this man’s bumpy road, for adding to the list of experiences.

The list that contains my life is metaphorically written on my hands so that they're left as a residue each time I grasp for something. These hands hold stories. They're powerful enough to work, bare-knuckled, in 100+ degree heat in southern Virginia or in the driving rain in rural Indiana. On good days I have the thought, "if only I could go back in time and warn myself that this would be difficult," maybe there would be fewer stories. Maybe there would be more: 

I can remember how the singlet felt against my skin, digging into my trapezus. The Asics wrapped tight around my feet like gauze bandages. The feeling of lifting a man off the ground for the first time and slamming him to the ground like a piano tumbling to the pavement after it’s hoisting rope snaps. The sound of the thump, echoing in my chest and head, when bodies hit the ground and the scramble for dominance continues. How my arms felt, tired and slick, wrapping around another man’s torso in order to put him on his back. The referee’s slap on the mat, signaling a win. The feeling of turning toward the crowd, standing tall, sweating and sometimes bleeding, with my arm raised, and hearing a roar after the match is finished. A 165-pound panther, coiled up and rangy, looking to win at all costs.

The past, the one I always write about, can be a tale of regret disguised as a tale of plenty. Any way you look at it, the tale is apparent: I'm looking for some triumph to conclude these stories. Maybe it's in the memory of this effort or the idea that all stories end happily. There's a myth that if you're ticking the boxes you're getting ahead. Whatever it is, I've learned there really are no rules. At least much less than are advertised.  Be as bold as you can be, go as hard as you can, and you'll be tempered from what you've learned in order to surprise everyone, including yourself.

Julien A Williams, at least the Julien A. Williams he was in his own mind, during the matches that knocked him down, wasn't a man you kept down. He was a man who got up. Having read Marcus Aurelius' memoirs, there are many big ideas. One quote a friend brought up was, "When you wake up in the morning think of what a privilege it is to be alive. To breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love." His Meditations are pretty great, but very repetitive. The reason they're repetitive is because one can forget lessons like this. Writing about these past months and years is good to help me remember the time that's passed and how I got up.