Grief and accidents: a PSA

I officially lost my cousin today. Early morning on July 4th, he was admitted to the hospital after he flipped a 3-wheeler. He was not wearing a helmet. As a result, he was in critical condition for 9 days, with severe damage to multiple parts of his brain. Irreparable. The end result: he died today, at only 27 years old.

When grandparents or the elderly die, we can find comfort in statements like "at least they had a long, fulfilling life". But when the good die young? No. Not here. There is no false sense of comfort any of us can give ourselves that will help us get through these moments. The best we can do is try to remember the good times we've had with them, and to understand that the time we have is short and we need to make the most of it.

J was a sweet guy, always happy. The last time I remember seeing him angry was when he was a toddler, throwing a tantrum. The last time I saw him sad, was at my grandparents funerals. Otherwise, he was always smiles. Our very large family has always been close, but there was a block of us born within 6-8 years of each other, and that meant we grew up side-by-side, more like siblings than cousins. So when I say he was my cousin, I want you to understand that he was so much more to me (to all of us) than that, he was like a brother. Maybe then you can get the sense of just how large of a hole is in my heart right now. There is no trying to logic our ways through this tragedy. It hurts. And it sucks.

This life, while he touched many people and made a huge impact on any who crossed paths with him, had so much more warmth and love to share. It should not have been his time to go. It was senseless, stupid, and unnecessary. And it could have been prevented.

Despite what people say, recreational vehicles are not toys and they should be respected for what they are - fun, but dangerous. If you are going to ride, always understand the machine you are riding before you take it out for a joy ride. And always, ALWAYS wear a helmet. All of this could have been prevented had he been.

So reach out to those you care about. Tell them you love them, even if you are uncomfortable with it. Because you might not think it, but today may just be the last chance you get to let them know.

For you, J. With all my love.

All Lives Matter - stop the qualifiers

So tired of all of this shit. I have refrained from commenting on many posts these past few days that pertain to this matter but I can't take the police bashing any longer, and on top of that, now we have retaliation shootings. Nothing that is going on is excusable. All lives matter.

Don't argue, just read.

All lives matter. It's the qualifiers - black lives matter, police lives matter, white peoples lives matter (pick whatever one you want) that is keeping groups of people separated. It is allowing for this us vs. them crowd-mentality that leads to nothing but violence, hatred, xenophobia, and bigotry in ALL GROUPS OF PEOPLE. It is clear - by all of the crime and the shootings, the wars between gangs, between races, between the police and citizens - that no one group is "worse" than any others when it comes to perpetuating hatred against another group, or even amongst members of their own group. To think so is ignorant at worst and naive at best. You want a solution? Here it is:

First, we all need to acknowledge that the real problem is not about skin color, sexual identity, or religious beliefs - it's about people seeing everyone else as different from themselves, and acting in accordance to that belief, through hate and fear and a sense of resentment because only one groups lives seem to matter at a time. It's allowing some dick-bag to run in the presidential election who is clearly doing nothing more than stirring up the muck that our country has been trying so hard for the past hundred years to clean up (not bury, but clean up). Wake up! You want freedom for all, you want safety for all, then you need to start seeing everyone as one cohesive unit - a human entity. The "this group has it worse...no that group has it worse...no basically every group but White people have it worse...White people have no problems because they have privilege, and if they do it's really not that bad... unless they're women but even white women - even those getting beaten and discriminated against among the rest of society- don't have it nearly as bad as others... oh, and men - especially white men - can't be abused because they're the most privileged of all..." THIS IS THE PROBLEM. BAD IS BAD! We aren't fixing a fucking thing with this mentality and it needs. To. Stop.

And we are looking in the completely wrong direction. And it works for people who profit off of the pain and desolation and poverty of others. Stop fighting each other and start working together. There will always be bad apples in every group. This is nothing new. It doesn't just qualify to police officers, but to EVERY GROUP. The mentality of ALL GROUPS need to change. You can argue against that fact all you want to but I hope that this latest incident in Dallas clues people into this - that inability and stubbornness to see the picture as a whole, only being able to see it from the side of the group that you morally support is the root cause of this inability to move forward peacefully, and together, so that our kids don't HAVE to grow up in a shitty world, and they DON'T HAVE to be the ones to clean up our mess. Everyone - except maybe the uber rich because they can usually buy their way to happiness, or at least out of most of what ails them - in America is suffering. Reasons and causes may be different but none are less or more valid than the hardship of any other group and when you think they are, that's when the shit storm starts.

Second, I am all for body cameras on police officers. You'll always have conspiracy theorists but if officers are required to have these devices, not only will we catch the bad seeds, but we'll also be able to support officers who were simply doing their jobs and had a tough choice they had to make. I honestly don't know why this hasn't been implemented yet, to be honest. It should have started the instant that people became aware of racial profiling and the resulting targeting of police officers.

One more thing to chew on: Wars are great for economic growth, at least in the short term (they're horrible for it afterwards but the longer you can string out a major war, the more money is brought in). I can't help but feel like we're being manipulated into one by our own politicians. I'm more interested in what you all think on this front, than on what you think about the rest of this mess. I don't usually post too much about politics or negative stuff, I've had enough of it and frankly, why? Many people who post shit on social media are just reposting something they saw, without fact checking it, or are posting things from a biased perspective, and therefore aren't open to discussion. They are more interested in hearing themselves speak than they are about finding a solution to the problems. And frankly, it's all exhausting. Arguing with a bigot or zealot is like trying to convince a brick wall to walk. It's not likely to happen.