On My Impending Nuptuals

8/28/2007


It seems like I have spent a lifetime chasing women, looking for love but finding only lust. It has really only been since my teenage years, of course, but it feels like longer. I actually got to a point not all that long ago that I resigned myself to being a permanent bachelor.

During my childhood I was not the prettiest kid. I had a large mole on my cheek. I wore glasses. I wore a lot of hand me down clothes from my older brothers and that my Mom got from garage sales. Then when I was in junior high, I lost some weight, had the mole removed and got contact lenses. Suddenly, just in time for high school, I was a lot more attractive. I started learning about girls right away. One of my first dates with a girl was when I was 13 years old. She was 18. I told her I was 16 and she believed me. She drove a Firebird and we went to see Rocky IV. After the date I told her my real age. I never saw her again.

I sowed my wild oats early and often, so to speak. Especially after high school when I moved to California, I was working in a gym and at a night club. I was 18, tan, in the best shape of my life and I was almost literally picking up every single girl I set my sights on. For a short time in my life it seemed like there was literally no woman I could not have. I had women throwing themselves at me every single night at the nightclub I worked at.

I recognized very quickly the transient nature of these good looks that were suddenly making me so popular with women. I recognized that none of the relationships I had then could possibly last. A lot of the women I dated had a particular mold they wanted to try and fit me into in order to make me the "perfect boyfriend". Many of them tried to dress me in certain ways or get me to do my hair in certain ways. Some women wanted me to quit collecting comic books. One wanted me to stop watching sci-fi movies. One particularly beautiful woman told me that I would have to "accept Jesus as my personal savior" (i.e. join her particular sect of Christianity) if I wanted to date her. When I was 20, a girl I dated for a year proposed to me. She was joining the Air Force and wanted to marry me so I could go with her. Although we had a passionate relationship, I found myself reflecting on the fact that she was highly critical and prone to saying mean things without thinking. I realized that I didn't want to spend my life with her. Passion just isn't enough by itself.

I dated around and after I moved back to Michigan I met a girl that I got serious about. We dated for over four years.I planned on marrying her eventually. She seemed sweet and sincere. I could see myself spending the rest of my life with her. But then my mother had a relapse of breast cancer. I spent a year and a half taking my mom to the hospital for her chemotherapy treatments and watching her waste away right before my eyes. She grew so weak and brittle that she fractured a rib rolling over in bed. It took its toll on me. I grew depressed and my girlfriend decided she didn't want to be there for me and she left. That took an even bigger toll on me. I went through an extremely turbulent time where for years, I felt very angry, bitter and cynical. I got through it with a lot of help from my friends, from reading a lot of books and from a daily practice of meditation.

Eventually I met Renea. We met online and the first thing I was drawn to about her was her personality. She has a quirky, silly sense of humor. After a short time we decided to meet in person. The first thing I noticed was her big toothy smile and her excitement. I could tell she was very excited to meet me. Instead of having her questions feel like an interview, like a first date normally does, Renea and I just had a good conversation. We talked about our families, our lives, what we had done up till now, and it was all so casual and so... normal... that after only a couple hours in Renea's company, I felt like I had known her my whole life.

I genuinely love Renea and I can tell she loves me. Not because she buys me some expensive presents, but because of all the little things she does for me. The occasional greeting card for no reason. The heart she draws on the top of a mocha with the chocolate syrup. Cutting large letters out of construction paper to spell "I love Kyle" and putting them up on my office wall. All of these are examples of why I love her but the reason goes deeper.

After meeting Renea, my good friend Kristin observed, "She adores you. Do you know how lucky you are?"

Yes, I do.

That is why I am choosing to stop chasing other women, a practice that comes natural to all men, and that I used to be extremely good at, and I am choosing to marry my life to the one woman whom is both my friend and my lover.

Granted, I haven't chased other women since I met Renea, but legally, the possibility was always there. By marrying her I am choosing to move on to a new chapter of my life.

And I do so gladly.

I look forward to spending the future together.

For Tyranny to Reign, First Kill All the Lawyers

Charles Schumer just pointed out the fact that our country currently lacks anyone in any of the top three positions in the Justice Department.

Right now, we have no Attorney General, no Deputy Attorney General or Associate Attorney General.


And one has to ask, which is preferable, bad leadership or no leadership?


Gonzo was one of the worst, most dishonest and most partisan Attorney Generals America ever had to suffer through. The damage he did to our justice system with his unethical, blatent partisan politcization of the justice system will be with us for years, possibly decades to come. By following Karl Rove's directives, he set a prescedent of making the Attorney General nothing more than a partisan stooge.

The Democrats have an opprotunity to redeem themselves by finding their spines and NOT voting to confirm any replacement that is going to be another partisan stooge who compromies our entire political system. They have a responsibility to make sure that any replacement is going to be independant and will enfore the law evenly, on everyone, including members of the party that nominated him/her.

Contrary to Republican beliefs, no one should be above the law.

Great post for Sunday

You have to watch it all the way to the end. The obvious connotation in the metaphor is Jesus, but the metaphor holds just as true if taken as God, the Budda-Nature, or Enlightenment. It is the story of one girl's life and at the same time it is Campbell's, "Heroes' Journey".

Did George W. Bush restart the cold war?

Crooks and Liars had this yesterday.

Vladimir Putin: US Wants To Dominate The World.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, in one of his harshest attacks on the United States in seven years in power, accused Washington on Saturday of attempting to force its will on the world.

The White House said it was “surprised and disappointed” by Putin’s accusations but added Washington expected to continue to work with Moscow in areas such as counter-terrorism and reducing the spread and threat of weapons of mass destruction.

In a speech in Germany, which one U.S. senator said smacked of Cold War rhetoric, Putin accused the United States of making the world a more dangerous place by pursuing policies aimed at making it “one single master”.

Attacking the concept of a “unipolar” world in which the United States was the sole superpower, he said: “What is a unipolar world? No matter how we beautify this term it means one single center of power, one single center of force and one single master.”

“It has nothing in common with democracy because that is the opinion of the majority taking into account the minority opinion,” he told the gathering of top security and defense officials. Read more…

Unfortunately Vlad is correct regarding the neo-conservatives current in power. They have openly stated their goal is American dominance.

The 11th Hour

I have been looking forward to this movie. It comes out here in the Detroit area this weekend.

Cheney's Biographer on the Daily Show

Once again, Jon Stewart absolutely puts to shame every talking head that the conservative corporate media puts forward as "Journalists" by having the conversation that the public needs to have.

Thanks to the rise of progressive media like Air America and the blogosphere, we are now able to see confrontations like this in the more mainstream media and the audience knows exactly what Jon is talking about when he mentions "The clip of Cheney from 1994".

The conservative corporate media sure as hell wasn't bringing that up in 2002!




The Democratic Underground has a great list of the claims made by Bush Administration officials and their supporters, against the patriotism, integrity and intelligence of progressives who just happened to be concerned about the same things Cheney mentioned in 1994 and that have all since come true!

What the hell is wrong with Chris Matthews?

This is so typical of the conservative mindset. Erin Burnett thinks China is our best friend for sending us poison food on the cheap.
Chris Matthews is too busy leering at Erin and telling her she is "a knockout" to bother calling her out on this outrageous nonsense. Would someone please get that letch laid so he can start doing his job as a journalist for a change?



“A lot of people like to say, uh, scaremonger about China, right? A lot of politicians, and I know you talk about that issue all the time. I think people should be careful what they wish for on China. Ya know, if China were to revalue it’s currency or China is to start making say, toys that don’t have lead in them or food that isn’t poisonous, their costs of production are going to go up and that means prices at Wal-Mart here in the United States are going to go up too. So, I would say China is our greatest friend right now, they’re keeping prices low and they’re keeping the prices for mortgages low, too.”

Rumsfeld Busted

Here is a great video of Rumsfeld getting busted for his lies leading up to the invasion of Iraq. Ironically it is a conservative who was a cheerleader for the war, Tom "Globalization is great" Friedman, who busts Rummy.

Cheney was right the first time

Dick should have stuck to his original assessment, seeing as how we all now know Iraq is a quagmire.

Here is Dick in 1994 describing why invading and occupying Iraq would be a huge mistake.

We will file this under... "Duh."

Candorville Slams Obama

I have to admit this is a legitimate slam on Obama and every other Democrat who shares his incorrect opinion about Impeachment of Bush and Cheney.

The Rising Undercurrent of Popular Discontent in America

I have noticed something recently, both around the "water cooler" at work and creeping into the public discourse.

I keep hearing the same sentiment expressed in conversations between ordinary Americans: "things in this country are only going to continue getting worse until we have an armed insurrection."

And it isn't just progressives and liberals. I have heard some conservatives say the same thing.
Everyone is thinking the same thing; Are we headed toward another civil war?

A woman recently asked Michael Moore about this on Hardball.

"UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Michael, my name is Becka Baker. I‘m from Tulsa, Oklahoma. My question for you is with 71 percent of the American people dissatisfied with this country today, dissatisfied with the war, health care, education, that the sky is blue, you name it, they‘re dissatisfied. Do you think America is ripe for a revolt? Will a revolution put this nation back on track?"

Also recently, Hugo Award winning Author Orson Scott Card wrote "Empire", a fiction about a near-future revolution in the United States between liberals and conservatives.

This thought is on every one's mind, because there are no practical solutions being offered. The corporate control of our government seems total and immovable without violent overthrow. The conservative world-view that government cannot do anything right and that only private, for-profit enterprises can do anything for America infects our media and therefore infects a great many Americans, to the detriment of all Americans. We are being polarized into classes again and the media is keeping everyone ignorant to that fact.

That is what John Edwards is talking about when he talks about "Two Americas". My brother delivered a truckload of relief supplies to the Gulf Coast after Katrina and afterwards he told me that "those people needed those supplied desperately... before Katrina had ever hit."

There is a new book, "Richistan", that talks about how the wealthy live in a completely isolated world of their own. They send their kids to private schools and use private hospitals. Executives have private parking spaces and private entrances in most of the largest corporations. They live in gated communities and use personal assistants to do their shopping.

The corporate media keeps telling us that the economy is doing great, but their only evidence for that is that corporate profits have been going up.
At the same time, for average workers, real wages have been falling and our benefits have been drying up right before our eyes. We are watching our neighbors and families going bankrupt and losing their homes because of medical costs, outsourcing of jobs or because they were patriotic enough to go over and serve in Iraq.

Protests have not worked.
Writing letters has not worked.
Calling our Representatives has not worked.
They just caved-in AGAIN and gave into Bush on his warrentless wiretapping.

And the rightwing is thinking about it too. They are waiting and watching for the straw that breaks the camels back.

After Supreme Court Justice Roberts collapsed this week, rightwing radio host Michael "Savage" Wiener claimed that it was because of a "conspiracy by Democrats".

This country is headed straight for another civil war.

The signs are right under all our noses.

A Democratic victory in 2008 will only prolong the inevitable unless something radical happens and a real progressive populist is not elected. That will only happen if enough concerned Americans get together and take back the Democratic party.

A Republican victory in 2008 will only guarantee that the next American civil war happens sooner rather than later.