Docreed2003
Docreed2003's JournalMelancholy mood...
Anyone else think about the music they'd like played at their funeral? I know it's morbid....just feeling the need to share tonight:
This is us...
My wife has been begging me to watch this show for months. She says she sees me in the dad Jack, and she knew that much of the show would speak to me...she's already alluded to Memphis being featured in the show, a place I dearly love and lived for four years in Med school (please don't ruin it for me). Well, the kids are spending spring break with the grandparents so for the last few nights it's just been the two of us. I obliged watching the pilot for "This is Us" Sat night and we've been watching a few episodes each night since then, yeah I got hooked. Such a well done show...it does have its flaws, but I'm really enjoying it thus far.
Just going on the record now...before he dies...
"The Killer" has now outlived them all...I've loved his music since I was a kid. He had plenty of faults, as did Chuck Berry and damn near every one of the early Rock pioneers. This isn't an indictment on the man, only an acknowlegment that the guy who lit the world on fire with a piano, rather than a guitar, survives, and I've loved his music for as long as I can remember. I took up piano as a kid in hopes of mimicking his style. From that, I taught myself guitar. My love for music and musical instruments can be traced back to my first exposure to "The Killer".
He is a complex man, highlighted in Rick Bragg's incredible biography. His life has been spent torn between serving God and the calling of his life: "Rock and Roll". That may sound strange to those not born and raised in the south, but I get it. My whole life since a young adult has been a struggle between feeling "called to serve" God and being drawn to my ultimate profession. As for Jerry Lee, I'll leave you with a tease...I had the simultaneous pleasure and displeasure of meeting him as young adult. He is both the most caring and compassionate person you could ever meet, wrapped in the biggest sonofabitch you could imagine. When he's gone, I'll share that story...until then...Let's enjoy some music, shall we??
And the same song in Germany at the Stat Club in 1964.
"The Dude" honors John Goodman at "Walk of Fame Ceremony"...
I love this...clearly these two care very deeply for each other and I especially love it because I get to see one of my favorite movie characters riff off a film from years ago thats still so widely loved!!
A breach of trust (in our home)...(Update)
Taking a break from the all encompassing Trump fiasco for a minute to share a situation our family is currently dealing with and hoping for support and advice.
Our family recently moved back to the area where I was raised north of Nashville. With my line of work, I was immediately engulfed in work at the hospital, which left my lovely wife holding the bag to arrange for things around the house that needed to be done, some simple some major, but things that, with my schedule, I knew I wouldn't be able to complete in a timely manner...I confess that my "Honey-do list" often takes a while for me to address.
Anyway, my wife had contracted a guy through an app who seemed reputable and came with good reviews. He came in and replaced a ceiling fan and a couple light fixtures and did a nice job. We were so pleased we called him again when we needed a few little things done in the house. On the second visit, I was at work and my wife was home alone with him. He did some work in our bonus room and my wife even showed him a few other things in the house that she felt he might be able to help with. While he was working in our bonus room, my wife had to take a call and went downstairs, leaving him unattended at his work. She made the comment that he made several trips out to his truck but didn't think anything about it. Later that night, we realized that he had stolen several PlayStation games, PlayStation controllers, and some jewelry from my daughters room. We know it was him because no one else was in the house that day and we have a security system that documents every time a door or window is opened in the house.
When I found out about the theft, my first response was to call him...although I was extremely pissed, I was extremely civil, but he didn't answer his phone. I left a message saying "Look, I know what you did and I'm willing to forget all about this, just call us back". That message went unanswered and we ultimately contacted our local police department.
Now, I don't know about you guys, but it's pretty freaking embarrassing to have two patrol cars with four officers show up at your house in the middle of the night when the kids are in bed and the neighbors start turing on their lights trying to figure out what's going on. It didn't help my anxiety that at that point my wife and I had both had a couple glasses of wine and I thought to myself "These guy's are gonna think we're crazy". They took our full statements seperately and one officer went out to the car and ran his info and came back into the house smiling like the Cheshire Cat and said "Oh we know him". They assured us that the matter would be taken seriously and that was that. For me, naively, I figured that would be the end of it. It wouldn't be pursued and the matter would just die. Thankfully, we have the means to replace everything that was stolen and the kids are none the wiser. My wife on the other hand is a nervous wreck, fearful that this guy we trusted, knows everything about our house and could come back. She's been on pins and needles for weeks.
Well we got news today that we have a summons and a court date to face the guy. Turns out he is involved in some other shady stuff and our case is the tip of his iceberg. I'm severely torn over this. I'm pissed and angry this guy stole from us while we were willing to give him more work and even paid him more than he asked for the work he did because he did such good work. At the same time, I don't feel like I can let this breach of trust slide, even over something so minor.
I think we'll go to court. I've told my wife that if asked my response to the judge will be "If he had asked for the equivalent money he stole from us, I would have gladly given it to him. I'm angry at the breach of trust"
Am I being too much of a bleeding heart here? Should I be angrier than I already am? I guess I just needed to share as this has been hanging over our house for so long that I needed an outlet. Thanks folks!
Update:
Thank you to everyone who encouraged us and gave us such great support during this issue. After some whaling and gnashing of teeth, we finally had our day in court. Turns out the guy had a prior record for some serious stuff and he was in violation of parole, and he's also wanted in a neighboring state on an outstanding warrant. Because of what he did to us, he's now looking at a pretty lengthy jail time, per TN law, because of the parole violation. We "won" our case, but the DA said we'd likely never see restitution. That's fine, I'm just thankful that this guy will no longer be able to take advantage of any other families. I can only stress to everyone here: if you bring someone into your home for any reason, be careful. Even a reputable app service doesn't reveal everything about a person.
America was never great...
And yet it always was. That dichotomy has haunted our nation since it's founding in 1776. Jefferson's document espousing independence spoke of inalienable rights of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness", a truly enlightened document reflective of the high hopes of that age. The rough draft even went so far as to call for abolishing slavery but that was quickly edited to appease the slave holding colonies.
In our time as a nation, we have seen, time and again, the power of right over might. Religious freedom for all people, something the early colonies of Massachusetts and Virginia would have been appalled by, was accepted as rule of law. When the loose, unstructured "Articles of Confederacy" threatened to tear the country apart after our war for independence, a constitution was born, along with its "Bill of Rights", creating a republic with all its glorious institutions which were entirely new and unique to the modern world. Yet, people of color were still viewed as less than human and women equally so.
A civil war raged across this country, and yet the hope of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" persisted. In that war's aftermath, as new freemen made their way into communities across the country, laws were passed to limit the former slaves from participating in government or even society itself. The controlling powers were able to convince the poor whites that opposing the free blacks and supporting Jim Crow would increase their station, but they were only pawns in the game.
All the while, the country would continue its program of assault and diminishment against its native peoples, which had been occurring since the times before the revolution.
Yet, progress persisted.
Immigrants would pour into this country in the years following its Civil War, each with the hope of finding a more prosperous life than the one they left behind. Every immigrant class in this country has faced its own discrimination and struggle at times, yet the country has always found a way to remain a melting pot.
As the country became industrialized, workers were abused and used by their overlords. Yet those same workers would fight and spill their own blood to ensure the rights of all workers and through their efforts, organized labor would be born.
Women came into their own through suffrage. They protested and were assaulted and abused but through that fight they won the right for women to vote.
Two world wars and a Great Depression swept up the country in a hardship that would last through two generations. But through those struggles we made a New Deal and created a safety net for our countries seniors and we finally integrated our armed services. Out of those conflicts, the country would emerge stronger than ever.
And yet, all were not free. The Fabulous Fifties and the veneer of peace and prosperity would be a thin veil covering the blot of segregation across the land. The fight for equal and civil rights would lead to the birth of a dream, the spilling of saintly blood, and the first acceptance in this country since its birth that "all men" truly were created equally".
As years passed, the struggles continued. Equal Rights Acts and Voting Rights Acts and Medicare and Medicaid and a "Great society" and Row v Wade, each step striving to mold and create a country that would live up to the ideals of its founders, or, more precisely, one which was better than the founders limited world view could have imagined.
In the face of that progress, the country would experience war, both red hot and ice cold, as well as corruption from its leaders and yet through it all, the republic remained.
Even those on the extreme sidelines of society who happened to love those of the same sex or who were born identifying with a sex they were not biologically born with would eventually gain acceptance. But it took extreme fighting and a healthcare epidemic which struck down far too many souls before those causes would gain the light of day and ultimately begin to attain acceptance.
And here we are in 2017. With every great advancement for human rights in this country's history, there have been those who vocally stood against that progress and longed for days gone by where bigotry and racism and sexism were acceptable. Make no mistake, when anyone says they wish to "Make America Great Again" that is what they are referring to, even if they cloak that phrase in the idea of bringing back jobs or stimulating the economy in places left behind in the modern world. At every step, some individuals have heard that plea for a return to "the old days" and have taken a stand against progress, many times violently. Despite that, the ideal that we are all created equally and have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness continues to provide the lifeblood of this country.
The fight for a better, more civil, more humane country goes on, because America was never great...and yet it always was.
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