Swifty phiphty niner

I keep thinking I’m getting better.   Better at life, better making choices, better with my behavior.   Then it seems to cave in on itself in a bout of narcissistic self-absorption.   I guess some days I just don’t get it.   I’ve been diagnosed with bipolar and maybe all I can hope for is that there will be moments that I do get it but with mountain sized bookends of only trying to figure it out.   Maybe the miracle is that I am trying to figure it out, at least I’m making a fight out of it.   I wonder if I’m fighting or flirting with a depression now.   Typically they’re a downer, tiredness, ennui, isolation, self slutdom, the worst.   But today I feel very tired and tested every day.   I slept for most of the day Saturday and forced myself out of bed Sunday to ride my bike.   I had to get out and breathe.   If being tired is the only symptom this time then maybe I can tolerate it but it won’t subside or bide the tide at this level. This is one of the reasons I’ve decided to wr

Hello.   I’m still here.   Just living life one day at a time.   I just had an ergo evaluation so I’m coming from a much more comfortable place.   It started with a sharp pain in my neck and it started when I started typing this blog.   At first it was just a pain that only lasted as long as I was typing and then it would go away.   Slowly, as I grew more ancient like the planets in the solar system, the pain started to linger.   Then it was just a persistent pain.   Dang, I’m not loving getting older.   But now that my stance is much more acceptable to the ergo gods I do believe that I can type pain free for a time. YAY!   I’ll take it. It seems like days go by and nothing happens but when you think about it in terms of blogging, a lot has happened.   Not only in terms of blogging but just life in general.   I went to my sister’s house the other night to play cards and that was a good night out!   We played 2 games of cribbage and the rubber match is in the wings for championship

I went to visit Bob yesterday.  Denny sent me a text and said either go see him or read his obit.  I took his advice.  I drove to West Sac to their house (Bob and Kathy) that I’ve never been to before.  I realized on the way over that I’ve never driven over the I Street Bridge before.  Details were starting to pop up in my brain on the way over.  Denny said to prepare myself as he is not the man I’ve known.  I’m all right with that I think.  I found the house and knocked and then just opened the door as Kathy was walking to the front door. “Hi Chris Shirley!  It’s so good that you came over.  Bob really loved you a lot!” her smile hiding the pressure of staying awake with the strain of caring for someone so long.  I went upstairs to the master bedroom and there I found Bob.  He was in the sleeping state.  Eyes partially open, mouth open and breathing that death breathing that I’ll never forget from the time my dad died.  Deep breaths, not real deep but deep enough for 20 or 30 sec

Okay I’m unskillful in my hyper active emotional requests.   They come off more as a bull in the china shop syndrome than poppies fluttering in an early morning breeze.   But it’s my desire to live my life as honestly as I can with self-integrity.   It’s not a natural process that I can pull this off with grace but I’m pulling it off for the right reason regardless.   I’m talking primarily of course about my relationship with women.   My relationships with men wallow in the mire also but that touches a different part of me intrinsically.   The last 5 women I’ve had feelings for have sent me to places that are all over the planet.   One was a long term (over 2 years) and the others just a moments breath, fog on the mirror and then done.   And not all have been relationships rather feelings that goose stepped through my emotional parade with crushing pervasive personal truths.   Revealing patterns that I come back too ultimately and repeatedly to no avail.   Patterns that I realize a

Do you put your significant other on a pedestal?   I’m sure there’s a height that’s acceptable and then there’s a height where it might be an inch or two high.   When I talk about height I’m talking high enough that you don’t see the red flags waving in unison beneath it.   All in the name of love of course.   I asked my friend this the other night, who is married and he said that you have to put your married partner on a pedestal otherwise how would you be able to put up with all of their stuff?   Makes sense doesn’t it?   It’s a noble thing to place your partner on a pedestal, right?   Well that’s my fear today when I am in the role of making a decision to choose a partner.   I understand that the partner has to be online with that decision also.   That kind of choice is also what I miss when the pedestal is being utilized.   It’s not always an either/or when a third person is involved.    And if we like each other that’s not tantamount to agreeing that a relationship is in our fut

The following story is historical fiction at its best.   My older sister told me this happened but I was too young and traumatized to remember.   My family at the time was all gathered which included my two half-sisters, Do Ra Me and Fo So La, who came out each summer for several weeks.   They were my mom’s daughters whom she had lost custody of in her divorce with their father. I was running from Mom, not unusual, but today she had that red eye look and I knew disaster was on my butt this time.   I can’t tell you what heinous thing I did today.   Pasted S&H stamps all over the refrigerator door, stopped up the toilet again washing diapers, spilling cereal all over the floor, you name it, I’ve done it and paid a pearly price for each endeavor.   Today’s undertaking was of an elevated crime reserved for crazy lady time.   And she was screaming and snorting and I ran for my little fair life to escape.   I ran in and out of rooms thinking I could hide but she was too close to los

I’m waiting for my friend to pick me up today for dinner and then meditation.   What a date, eh?   A dinner and a sit.   But that’s how we role when we roll into our 60’s.   Not bad really.   He’s my friend, Duke that I mentioned in an earlier post.   My friend that was there when I fell down the rabbit hole of bipolar illness.   He’s my Zen master and I’m his computer wizard so all in all we get along pretty well.   Sitting home Sunday listening to Pink Floyd and Robin Trower.   Now those are names that bark back to the day.   In the not so distant past the free time would be killing me.   I need somebody to be with!   It’s part of that kineticness that I have, always moving, always spassing out like a ball in a pinball machine.   I’m not saying that pretty angels in a bad way, just the way it’s always been.   I’m a man of movement.   Whether in my head, my feet or my eyes.   Just can’t stay still.   If I don’t feel like I’m part cranked on a movement of speed than I think something

I got hit by a car today riding my bike to work.   Luckily the only damage seems to be my front wheel is bent completely out of shape.   I just put a brand new head light on the handle bars last night so I can light up the dark portions of my ride too!   I had 2 lights on in front, 2 blinking red lights on the back and just in case, wearing an orange reflective vest.   No matter.   If you’re not going to stop at a stop sign you’re going to hit people walking or riding.   He didn’t even make an attempt to stop.   It was slow enough that I tried to pull my bike out of harm’s way but he just didn’t stop fast enough and my wheel slid under his wheel.   Fuck. It was 5:30 in the morning and I was yelling at him that he has to stop at stop signs.   “I did a roly poly stop, I guess I have to know that there are bike riders out early in the morning.” Really?   He said that?   He was a nice enough guy and was apologetic and let me take pictures of all of his documents.   He even offered

Bob is dying.   He’s having too many brain bleeds to survive the liver transplant.   He needs the liver to stop the bleeding but because of the bleeding they are refusing to offer him a lifesaving transplant.   I’m sorry Bob.   I’m really sorry for Kathy, his wife who has been his super hero through all of his medical tragedies.   She’s been by his side for every visit in the hospital whether they were together or not.   She has cried herself to sleep many nights over the prospect of losing the man she loves.   This is my example of unconditional love that I’ve been talking about. Bob and Kathy took me in to their home one day when I had nowhere to go.   I had just left my marriage and didn’t know what to do at that exact moment.   I decided to go over to Dennis’ as he was my best friend and he might offer a suggestion.   He wasn’t home and I sat on the bench on his front porch with my thoughts and not much else.   Bob showed up looking for Dennis and I had never really met him