Regrets

I know what you’re thinking…what did he do now in some random bar with some random girl…the good news is it’s been a while since I’ve spent any time in the bar and even longer since I’ve made any new memories with a lovely member of the opposite sex. No, this blog is about the past, the present and the future. It’s about something we all try to make it through this life without having but inevitably end up making.

I was recently having a conversation with a co-worker and he mentioned that he recently got together with a group of guys he hung out with in high school. He’s now nearing age 50 and this was a core group of friends that he spent many of the “glory days” with, and they wanted to get together to reminisce about old times.

He said that he had spent a lot of time with these guys growing up but around his junior year he started going in a bit of different direction and while they all attended college, graduated and ended up with really good corporate jobs, he had tried college, didn’t like it and now runs a farm, a repair shop, and is the head of a pretty big township as well.

During their conversation they talked about college, all the crazy and fun things they did and how much fun they had, meanwhile my friend was thinking to himself how he felt out of place and began to regret that he did not have a similar experience as these former classmates. I told him that I had gone to college, lived it up and partied all of the time. Spent way too much time and money at the endeavor but finally walked away with a degree but in the end I wasn’t really doing anything with that degree, other than my summer business. When it came down to it, I was doing a lot of the same things as him, but probably started with much more debt.

There was certainly a time when I considered not finishing out my degree. I certainly could have done the things I’m doing now without one, but during my hiatus from school I felt a sense of regret for not finishing, so I went back, took the courses, got the degree and now it sits gathering dust on one of my many book shelves…which one…I mean, which one?! Where the heck is that thing?!

What I’m kind of trying to get across, is that if anyone gets through this life with no regrets, than they probably didn’t spend a whole lot of time living their lives. Regrets aren’t something that you necessarily see while they’re happening, in fact during your life you’re going to have several incidents where everything feels like it’s working out as planned, until the proverbial lemons sneak onto the scene and you’re left without the pitcher to make the lemonade. Bottom line is that you don’t know you’re living a regret until you’ve lived through it, some time has elapsed and you reflect on the situation. You then look back at it and say to yourself, well I wish I had…or, I wish I hadn’t.

You’ve probably seen or heard something along the lines of, “In the end you regret the things you didn’t do far more than the ones you did.” This is a great quote, but also a way of living to ensure that you have several new regrets all of the time.

I like to think of myself as a bit of a risk taker. You can probably see that by my many failed attempts at meeting new girls, or just reading of any of our random adventures through this blog. I’m never afraid to trust new people or try new things, which is a great way to live…but most of my biggest regrets come from some of these situations where I’m trying to live an open, bold life.

Another great quote goes something like, “What you think of as your worst regrets are only lessons learned.” I know I butchered that and I should have gotten it spot on since I’m kind of the “Life Lesson” guy but I think it kind of misses the point any way. Sure you learn a lesson every time you make a mistake, but that doesn’t mean you don’t regret making the mistake. You see hundreds of people every day that didn’t make your same mistake, but they seem to be doing just fine and probably knew the lesson in advance. Hell, you knew the lesson...you just didn’t know you were going to learn it again, until it was too late.

What about the workout where you try to leap a cavern and die?

Most of us try to live in the moment, even if you don’t think that’s what you’re doing, it is. You live your life, things unfold and they can either be good or bad. My mom always use to say that life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans. It’s a common quote but it’s also one of the truest definitions of life that I’ve ever seen. Things aren’t, until they are…and even then they can still go back to aren’t once again (confused?).

I have all kinds of things I can look back on and call regrets. I’ve taken a lot of chances in my life and sometimes those chances didn’t pay off, other times they were just plain old stupid decisions. There’s an episode of How I Met Your Mother where the main character goes through a whole night having his decisions judged by the Knight from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (In case you aren’t familiar with the scene, the Knight tells the bad guy and Indiana to choose a cup that they believe to be the Holy Grail. The bad guy chooses a really fancy cup, drinks from it and shrivels up and explodes, to which the Knight replies, “He chose poorly.”). In this episode, Ted (the main character from HIMYM), picks the wrong girl, and continues to make poor decisions throughout the entire episode but as the whole show is told through the eyes of Ted 20 years down the road, he sees that what at first seemed like a night full of regrets, eventually led him to meeting the right one and may have been a blessing in disguise.

While watching this episode I certainly related to the type of night he was having and have definitely been in Ted’s shoes before, but I think the reflection of his past shows us that some things we regret having to had go through are simply life. You still regret, we all do, Katherine Hepburn puts it best here:

 

So I said this was going to be about the past, present and future. I’ve touched on the past and talked a bit about the present and kind of tip toed around the future, but while I was looking for pictures to accompany this post I found this quote kind which kind of summarizes everything I’ve been saying the best:

 

As Charles Bukowski said, “What matters most is how well you walk through the fire.” In essence, shit happens. You have to pick yourself up, dust yourself off and carry on. If you don’t come out of a regret smelling like roses, redefine what roses are. You have it in you to start anew and make your tomorrows better than your yesterdays. Learn your lessons, try not to make the same mistakes, have regrets but don’t stop taking chances. Life’s not meant to be played safe, it’s meant to be lived.

My biggest regret lately…that it’s taken us this long to get to blog post 100. That’s right, this marks triple digits for this little past time of ours which means that if you’ve been keeping up reading every post, then you’ve pretty much read yourself a regular length novel and it’s only taken you like three years to do it! Congratulations you!

Thanks for reading, and here’s to another 100!

The Banana Bowl Live Draft Extravaganza - Part 1

I’m starting to think that this whole blogging experience is just a way for me to get rid of some of my demons. A sort of internet confession to absolve me from my sins…and I’d like it to be more than that. I want it to be a blog that you turn to for inspiration, for ways to really get out there and live your life to the fullest. I would like it to be the first thing you turn to in the morning because you know it’s going to put you in a good mood right to start your day…in short, I’d like it to become part of your 100 Days of Happiness, or BDandLL Happy Days…

But, I haven’t done anything really inspirational lately and I’d like to take a minute here today, to tell you about the shenanigans that took place just over a week ago during what we at BDandLL refer to as: The Banana Bowl Live Draft Extravaganza!

This year’s draft weekend began the Friday night at what we are affectionately referring to as, “The Fucking Catalina Wine Mixer.” Barry and a few of his banker friends started a tradition a few years ago where they go to this soiree  at a ritzy golf course and enjoy a fine German cuisine and all you can drink beer for a measly $20 from 5:30pm – 8:30pm. This year marks their 3^rd annual attendance and it just so happened to fall on the weekend of The Banana Bowl Life Draft Extravaganza!

Ryan and I arrived at around 7pm, enjoyed a nice plate of Brats, German potatoes, and some delectable beans and then began to attempt to empty a beer truck. By 8:30 I was preparing for the next day’s draft by trading away players I didn’t even have, then making calls to try and secure those players so that the first deal could go through. The wheels were in motion, the plan was going down exactly how I had planned and by the end of the ordeal I ended up with Matt Prater (Kicker – Denver) for the first round of drinks at the draft…it seemed like a lot of work to just end up with a kicker, especially a suspended one, but Cam (the guy I got him from) was devastated and that made it completely worth it.

For some reason Cam decided he needed to purchase a bag of Brats as we left...
No one knows what happened to these brats.

Somehow we felt like the next logical move for us would be to head downtown  and keep our little party going, so we went to our old standby, “Rooters.” When we arrived we quickly realized that we were very old (relatively) and out of place. The place still smells like week old stale beer, though, and that brought back many fond memories of our time spent there while attending my pre-med school thingy at MSU-M (it must have been pre-med for how long I spent there…although I can’t find my certificate or whatever you call it anywhere…).

We exited “Rooters” and had no real idea of what a better bar may be for our current age situation and intoxication level…we were looking for something in the early 30’s Intoxicated genre but weren’t exactly sure of where to find it…that’s when I remembered a few guests that had spent a night with us at our campground who worked at a new bar downtown called, “The Wurst Beer House.” And our German night was going to continue!

We’re lucky that Cameron was familiar with the newer bar scene in downtown Fargo as I really had no idea where to find this bar, I just knew that I wanted to go to there… We arrived and immediately felt more at home because we could actually hear each other talk and people were sitting at tables rather than standing or playing pool or darts…let's face it, this had early 30’s Intoxicated (and lazy) written all over it, and was the perfect place for us to continue our night! On top of the perfect layout and décor, individuals at just about all of the tables were drinking out of giant boot glasses, just like in the cinematic adventure, “Beerfest!”

As we sauntered by a table admiring some of this fine glassware, someone at the table said: “Why don’t you join us?” I looked up from my trance to discover three lovely ladies were the ones holding the boot (I’m not totally sure on the “loveliness” of the ladies as I had spent a good portion of my night at an all you can drink event, but at that moment, in that place…they were the most beautiful, kind, and caring creatures I had ever laid eyes on).

I honestly don’t know what I was more interested in, the beautiful young ladies or the boot…that may cause me future problems…but one thing was for sure, at one point I traded them Matt Prater (Kicker – Denver) for a boot, which they in turn traded to our waiter to deliver a boot to our other table. Long story short…the waiter at The Wurst Beer House now owns the rights to Matt Prater (Kicker – Denver).

I found a much better picture of this lovely lady on my phone, but I wanted you
all to see her how I remember her..through the eyes of beer goggles.

It was draft weekend after all. We also discovered, at some point during the night, that Cordarrelle Patterson (Wide Receiver – MN) was going by the nickname, The Flash. Now for those of you who don’t know, there is only one “Flash,” and he won that title in a naked race years ago and the only way anyone else can go by the moniker is if they beat him in a naked race, which Cordarrelle Patterson (Wide Receiver – MN) had not…so we called him out on Twitter:

We take this nickname thing pretty serious.

Man, I’m really starting to love Twitter! So, we had some good food, great friends, some possibly beautiful new friends, and boots filled with beer…but, as it does, time slipped by, the girls had to leave (not with us), the bar decided that it was time to polish the boots and put them to us 30-something drunks to get us out of the bar and the remaining members of our crew decided it was now time for some Drunken Noodle (Restaurant – Fargo)…

I think I’ll take a page out of Barry’s book here and make this a two part post, but I may actually come to a conclusion with mine…whatever did come of that 3^rd part of his trilogy?! Anyway, enjoy this post and I’ll tell you all about the main event of The Banana Bowl Live Draft Extravaganza in my next post, pre-warning…it may involve more alcohol, dancing, karaoke…and maybe, just maybe…another random bar make out session…I really need to find Jesus…If you guys see him let me know, he’s about 5’ 11” and really knows his way around a garden sheers.

I am the Red Mage.

I awoke this morning, stepped out into the bright light fusion-core drive of our cosmic armada - system de sol - feet comfortably planted on the deck level of Spaceship Earth, walked to the public center of the enclave zombie-fortress residential quarters, and bought myself a Mountain Dew. Pepsi was sold out. I know once you turn 30 you should probably not drink the Dew. It is an age after all where one is gearing up to stagger through at least another 30 to 40 and every soda-pop drunk after 30 eliminates 2 years from your end game. It's the delicious 290 calories of high fructose corn syrup. I'm hyped up on Mountain Dew and operating a keyboard irresponsibly under the influence of super sugar.

Texting (cuz it's 2014, it's what we do now) with a good friend recently about writing, gaming, finding time to do either, video-game addiction, and writers talking about writers, I was reminded of an idea for a blog post that I never got around to writing entitled "I am the Red Mage." The meaning of which I will get to, but suffice to say this is my experience with writing so far: 'that's a great idea' *write it down* 'I'll get that knocked out this weekend' *procrastinate* *forget* 'I need to post, I need to write, but what about?!' *play video games*

Had I wrote this post when I thought of it, there is ample anecdotal evidence it would have been the best blog in the world. Alas, I can't remember what it all was going to entail. So this is just a tribute, to the greatest blog in the world, I am the Red Mage:

For as long as I can remember I've liked books and I've liked video games. I remember going over to a neighbor's place to play Atari (Pitfall, Joust), begging my cousins to let me play their NES (they had all the sweet games like Duck Tales, Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers. Kirby) or my uncles had P.O.W., Baoyou Billy, Tecmo Super Bowl. The day my very own NES system arrived, that was really the game changer. It came home with Super Mario Bros/Duck Hunt and Rad Racer II. I was pretty young at the time, and I remember bugging my mom to make the really hard jumps in Mario, and Rad Racer II was, like most NES games, borderline impossible.

I learned to swear because of these goats. Pain in the ass
Himalayan level!

I could go on name dropping NES games that I played through those first years of gaming. Castlevania I-III, Baseball Stars, CONTRA!!, etc. And I kept faithful to the 8-bit NES and was bitter when Nintendo Power started featuring mostly games from the 16-bit "Super" NES. Psh. I wasn't getting one of those any time soon, so wtf? I never did get one actually, jumped right to the Playstation from the NES with a brief interlude with Sega Genesis (Mortal Kombat?!). But I did rock out some sweet Super NES days with a couple good buddies later in life (Phalanx, Rock 'n Roll Racing, Super Mario World). Those were the days.. sigh.

However, there was one game that forever changed my perspective on gaming and established, really, my genre of choice when it comes to "wasting" time with video games. Final Fantasy. The cover of that game, the music, the storyline is forever embedded in my brain. If I lose my memory in old age, or if I ever suffer from amnesia, just mention this game and along with the plight of the Light Warriors defeating the fiends of earth, fire, water, and wind (Lich, Kary, Kraken, Tiamat, respectively), igniting the 4 elemental orbs allowing them to travel 2000 years into the past to defeat Garland/Chaos in the Temple of Fiends, closing the time loop and saving the world from non-existence, and the rest of my memory should return.

This was my first experience with a "Roleplaying" game set in a fantasy or "high" fantasy world (think Lord of the Rings), and I've played many since. Including other Final Fantasy games. But yes, yes the point of this, beyond the shameless recalling of my gaming history.

In Final Fantasy you had to select 4 characters that would be your "party" for the entirety of the game. You could select from Warrior, Thief, Black Belt, White Mage, Black Mage, and, wait for it, Red Mage. The Warrior specialized in heavy armor and weapons, the Thief in combat and the ability to get your party out of battles it couldn't handle, the Black Belt became a unarmed combat specialist, the White Mage in white magic (healing, enhancements, etc.), the Black Mage in offensive/black magic (FIRE 3 Bitches!!) and the Red Mage was a jack of all trades and master of none. He could use weapons, white magic, and black magic, just not the highest levels of any of them. 

Sweet Swashbuckling Hat Wearing, Magic and
Sword Wielding Red Mage!

So if you haven't put it together yet, here is what I mean when I say I am the Red Mage: I weave both black and white magic and practice daily with a scimitar. Still looking for that sweet hat/cape combo but I stole the feather from a bald eagle I was drinking bourbon with a few years ago as we discussed existentialism. Pretty straight forward this time. No metaphors and such. That would make today's BD&LL a non-fiction piece.

Well, actually. My point is this. I've done a lot of random things, practice quite a few hobbies, held a lot of odd-jobs, and possess a pretty good smattering of related and unrelated skills. I won't rehash them here, but take a quick look at my bio to get an idea. But because I don't feel I've mastered any of these and seem to be floating in career-limbo while my peers are locking in theirs, I am left identifying with our red light warrior acquaintance.

Here's the thing, some days I really care and am bothered by this. It gets me down. I'm 30. I should be locking in my job, getting promotions, buying a house, getting a mini-van to put my 2.1 kids through grade school while complaining about my mortgage and worrying about my 401k. You know, Living the American Dream.

Otherdays, I'm grateful I don't have some of those things. That I have experienced a slightly wider range of what life offers than a majority of folks. It's not that I believe the American Dream is completely evil ;), but there are many things about it that I just can't get behind and I get exhausted feeling guilty about it.

The great philosophizing-pop-punk mega trio Green Day once asked "if you feel like a social tool without a use?" Sometimes, yes. Other days, I feel like a Swiss Army Knife.

Fin.

Epilogue: BD&LL Happy Days

This has become a normal Friday night at Bombshelter Rehearsal
Studios. Set up to practice, write, create music. It's a great
refuge from the 'real' world.

I spent most of my Labor Day recovering from Sunday
and reading the philosophy of Paolo Soleri. I understand about an
1/8th of this most of the time. An additional 1/16th with every fifth
re-reading, but that is really enough to feel the brain explosions.

Whiskey & the Wolves' first 'gig'. Open Mic
night in Long Beach. It had been 8 years since
the last time I had performed. Felt absolutely great
to get back on the horse.

My good friend, Tyler, posted a great piece on Bill Murray that gave me some honest LOLs. The deaths of Robin Williams and Phillip Seymour Hoffman remind me of the great exposure that celebrity passings usually bring  and that we tend to celebrate them more when they are gone. With Bill Murray, we shouldn't wait until then. The stuff this guys does alive will far outshine any celebration we could put on after his death. Check out these reads, you won't be disappointed:

What it's like casting Bill Murray in a movie

Bill Murray shows up at Toronto 'Ghostbusters' screening, answers fan questions

~Until we cross paths again, BD&LL faithful.

Creativity Round Up

This has always been one of my favorite quotes. I actually have it taped to the cash register at our business and has always been something that I strongly agree with. When our business first got going, times were pretty darn tough. There was stiff competition, no water, and it was a new type of business that had never been in our area so our parents really had to sell people on the idea that tubing was a fun activity and something that people should be willing to spend their money on.

In short, if they hadn’t possessed the passion needed to truly believe in what they were doing and want to see it succeed, then we more than likely would be doing something else right now and there’s a fairly good chance that our little community couldn’t boast that we’ve had individuals visit us from every state in the United States as well as people from several different countries.  It’s a pretty cool thing when you’re trying to ask someone what they are looking for and they don’t understand you because they only speak Hungarian.

But the passion my parents put forth in starting and maintaining our business is something that I’ll always be proud of and something that I think my sisters and brother and I try to keep going, not only in maintaining our parents legacy with our business but in the many facets of our lives.

My oldest sister has always been really great with kids and consequently she has put her passion into trying to help kids through her work with Inter-County Services.

My next oldest sister is also very passionate about kids and has put her passion to work teaching and being a DECA advisor at her school in the cities. She has taken a program (DECA) that really wasn’t doing that great and has now made it a powerhouse in the State and Nation.

My brother is very passionate about a lot of things, but mostly I believe he really truly loves kids and tries to show that and better their lives through his time with them driving bus and coaching basketball (another passion of his).

I am passionate about many things but mostly I love creativity and helping people to bring that out in themselves and helping to promote others creativity as well.

That’s one of the main reasons we started Banana Daiquiris & Life Lessons. It’s a creative outlet for me, as well as a medium where other creative people can come together and work out their creativity collectively. Each person that writes for us is taking a big chance putting themselves out there to both of our followers. But we’re all somewhat passionate about the things we write about or just writing in general and what is a random blog written by a bunch of misfits if it is not a creative endeavor?

Some pretty cool things that have been happening for BDandLL lately include getting put on some random writers to watch thing which I’m pretty sure we can attribute to Mr. Dolores as it all stemmed from his suggestion to start to follow “Advice to Writers” on Twitter. Somehow along the line they pegged us as a group to watch and now all of these published writers seem to be following us on there…the problem is that I run the Twitter account and truth be told, I’m really not that interesting. But we’ll use the exposure, write our book, collect the millions of dollars…or just try and do the writing thing and get addicted to video games once again (That’s Mike’s and my prediction!).

But that was a pretty cool thing to see, whether or not we can do anything with the recognition more than likely will solely depend on how passionate we are about the endeavor and how much time and effort we’re willing to put forth. Nobody ever said it would be easy, they just said it would be worth it.

So that’s BDandLL’s current creative pursuits round-up, but although I think that we’ve written some pretty decent blogs over the past year, I think that one of us has the greatest potential to really explode into the creative cosmos and that’s Mike.

I don’t think a lot of you know Mike but he’s definitely a guy to watch. Not only is he a very talented (and underappreciated) writer, he also has a side gig (sorry Mike, I’m counting writing for BDandLL as your full time job) as a musician. You may have seen a video or song that I’ve posted about “Whiskey and the Wolves,” which is Mike’s band, on Facebook and he’s even written about it for BDandLL. I personally think the songs are fantastic but you’ll have to make up your own mind on that.

I spend a lot of time listening to the radio, be it on my bus, at the campground, or in my car, and I can honestly say that the stuff that Whiskey and the Wolves is doing right now is much better than most of what I’m hearing out there and someday when they’re famous…I’m making Mike bring me on tour with them so that I can sit and play video games…maybe I’ll set up a mic stand or something and they can call me a roadie…but mostly I’ll be there for the Whiskey…and women.

A lot of bands put out a great album but you catch them in concert and they suck…Whiskey and the Wolves isn’t one of those bands. Check out this very professionally shot video from an open mic night in California:  https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=662588903848911

I’m sorry I couldn’t post the video right here…I still have no idea how to do so many things in the blogging world that it’s a bit disturbing.

So there’s a bit on what’s going on with our crew in the creative world right now. Hopefully you’ve seen the last post from Kurt about his final Freedom Run and hopefully some of you can attend that or at least drop him a line or two of encouragement! It’s a great thing that he’s been doing all these years and without a doubt he wouldn’t have been able to complete without being very passionate about the endeavor.

I could go on and on about Kelly’s math blog, Pat’s remodeling , Adam’s graphic designing , and Kari’s…well everything, but mostly I just needed to get a few words out there before I head to the Catalina Wine Mixer and Saturday’s Live Fantasy Football Draft for the Banana Bowl and I can’t use my mind anymore.

I feel like I’m definitely slowing down in my old age here…but this weekend we’re going to see if we can’t tap into some of the passion needed to live like we’re young once more. Have a great weekend everyone! Find something you’re passionate about and devote some time to it, if you’re a parent…spread that passion on to your children. Show them that life is full of creative endeavors and worth the search to find theirs!

All Good Things Come to an End - The Final Freedom Run

Although it’s been said, many times, many ways...Merry….oh, sorry I was really getting into it.  What I meant to finish with was, “all good things come to an end”.  It’s fun but at the same time, not fun when this happens.  You enjoy the moment and excitement that surrounds that particular event but deep down you wish it would never end.  

I will get to experience this personally next week down in Detroit Lakes, MN.  

Almost eight years ago (hard to believe it’s been that long already) a friend of mine and many lost his life serving the United States of America with the Minnesota National Guard.  He was only 20 years old at the time, just missing his 21st birthday by only twenty-nine days.  On December 2nd, 2006, Corey Rystad from my hometown Red Lake Falls, MN was killed in action (KIA) over in Iraq.  One of thousands who have lost their lives not only in the Iraq war, but from years past.  

Finishing the Wicked Half Marathon in Salem, Massachusetts
back in 2011

War, cancer and several other horrible things affect our lives all the time.  Everyone has been affected by the two I mentioned, but others such as ALS which you are hearing more and more about each day with the Ice Bucket Challenge, are subject to less promotion - until now of course.  

I honestly never had the drive or the desire  to run a half or full marathon until the passing of my friend.  Don’t get me wrong, I do enjoy getting outside and breathing in the fresh air with a nice leisurely run, jog or walk, especially with my wife, but before it never occurred to me that running such a long distance of just over thirteen or twenty-six miles would be such a flattering accomplishment.  More like stupidity at it’s finest the way I saw it before.  

Things do change though, and life changes in ways you never thought possible when your mind isn’t opened up to all of the possibilities that such life throws at you, both good and bad.  
Upon my friend’s passing, I decided it was time to do something more as my sister had asked me to give it a try the previous spring.  I did mention to her that I’d only give it a shot if there was a good reason to - which to me at the time, never imagined anything could change my mind.  Well, there was, and it brought me to a level that didn’t deem to exist before 2006.  I surely wasn’t pushing myself to do better; more like just coasting and following along with others who were doing the same or more than I was.  

When your life gets impacted by something, sometimes your mind gets twisted into doing a full “180” and you start to realize some things.  You begin to focus on what’s important in life.  You begin to notice that you’re not the only one going through rough times and that the best way to fight through it is to do something for others.  I was taught that way and extremely glad that was the case because when you help someone out, or just simply be there for them when they need someone the most, you really do feel good about it.  You feel accomplished.  

With that, back in 2007 I set out to accomplish something - to run a memorial race in my friend Corey’s name, with a little added incentive.  Knowing that there is more sacrifice than any of us can really fathom compared to a military family, the decision to not only run, but carry something that my friend and so many others fought for and defended made the run seem to go better.  Tougher in the aspect that yes, you limit yourself from movement in one arm when you bring a four foot pole that straps a three by five foot American flag to it while trying to get to a finish line that is thirteen or twenty-six miles away - but the reason for doing so is what makes it mean the most.  

I have done this in six different states and finished fifty-nine events while toting the red, white & blue in honor and memory of my friend and his brothers and sisters in arms.  Come Saturday, September 6th - in the place that I finished my first entire half marathon with Old Glory, in the cold and the rain, having to stop in a porta-potty at mile marker eleven because both of my arms and both of my legs started to cramp up to the point that I didn’t think the finish line would become a believable goal, yet somehow after warming them up, steam filling the tiny little potty room I was in and trying to tell myself there was only two more miles to go, I had to get there, even if it comes to crawling - I’m going to finish one more half marathon which will be numbero sixty-o (just sixty) with the flag that represents the country so many fight for, or in my friend’s case, fought for and made the ultimate sacrifice.  

I say it will be the last, but who knows.  Maybe I’ll Brett Favre it and show up again at some random race, flag in hand, ready to rock and-a roll.  

This last one is going to have more meaning to me than ever before.  My first half marathon as a married man.  

With Sara (my girlfriend at the time, now wife) following
the 2013 Dick Beardsley Half Marathon Relay

My wife Sara and I did the half marathon relay last year at this same location, the Dick Beardsley Run in Detroit Lakes, MN.  That was a few weeks before I had asked her to marry me.  

We both have running that is something we enjoy...most of the time.  Training sometimes sucks, but who really likes to train anyway?  It’s part of the deal though, I guess.  

Back in the spring, after my annual check up post-mononucleosis that knocked me down for quite a while back in the spring/summer of 2013, my doctor told me I should stay away from long runs for the remainder of the year.  In a way I used it as excuse - to let myself go from getting back on the training and running path.  Sara saw through that and brought up some good points I wasn’t really thinking at the time.  It was almost like my mind closed the door back up like it had been before it turned around with a total “180” to realize that I should do something more.  This time, it turned the other way; all I was thinking was how it could be tragic if I attempt to even step foot on a road again and  give this crazy running thing another chance.   

I had listened to my doctor and took her advice through the entire suffering of mono - which at the age of 30 is absolutely awful.  If you’ve had mononucleosis before, you know what it’s like.  If not, it’s hard to even explain.  All I know is that of the twelve symptoms people with mono can end up with, some may get half, maybe seven or so of the symptoms.  The majority only suffer from a few of them.  I was the one so fortunate to get eleven of the twelve - the one symptom I didn’t get to endure was jaundice - the least painful.   I remember part of the conversation Ms. Doc and I had when I first started going in.  She had asked me if I drink alcohol in excess.  I told her, “Well, it depends on who I’m with…”  The look on her face made it known that she was pissed and didn’t want to joke around, snapping back with “What’s THAT supposed to mean?”  
I stopped the pun quickly and told her I rarely do.  The explanation she gave me was my the enzyme levels for my liver were over six times the amount that they see in a raging alcoholic.  In simple terms, I’m lucky my liver didn’t fail.  I was threatened to be hospitalized if I decided to head back to work  which was against Ms. Doc’s rules.  I’m glad she was as stern as she was though.  If I would have gone off on my own journey which I tend to do with things sometimes (because I’m invincible, you know…), I’m not sure how my body  would have reacted.  Probably about as well, most likely worse than it was at the time.  If you want to know how it looked at that time, ask my wife.  I’m hoping I didn’t scare her too much, but if so, I had no control over it and would never do that on purpose to someone I care about so much.  I didn’t know it (obviously) but my brain was getting less oxygen due to the enzyme levels leaking out like that, which made it extremely tough to focus, at times, to the point that standing up became the toughest task I would try to accomplish all day.  

Ms. Doc was amazed at my progress in a months’ time
I like to call it “from near death to more breath”

With all that being said, I’m fine now and feel ready to give it a shot by running one more half marathon.  

Those days have passed and it’s time to get one more big run in!  The best part is, I will be running it with my best friend - my wife Sara right by my side the entire way through.  That was one thing I had hoped for in all my years of running events; to find someone who I could share this with, every step of the way.  

We’ve been training in the mornings, running around Fosston, dodging cones and pot holes and what ever else is happening with the construction zone which consumes half the town right now, but we’re getting it done.  Like Sara says, “We’ll just wing it!”  It truly is the best way to go into a race!  No worries, no goals, just get out and run.  Doesn’t matter how fast, just move forward, one step at a time.  

The more I thought about it after having a conversation with Sara about running  back in the spring, the more I analyzed my past and how this all came about.  I noticed that running was something  I do enjoy overall, but never had a real love for it.  It was something I could do on my own, to make myself better and to do something for others by running in memory of our fallen soldiers.  If I wasn’t impacted the way I had been eight years ago, I really don’t think my sister would have been able to break my mindset of never wanting to do a half or full marathon in my life.  Ok I take that back, she’s pretty good at getting little brother to do what she thinks would be good for him, but it’s still a mystery and always will be.

I’m very glad I changed that decision though, which shouldn’t have had to be the way it was with such unfortunate circumstances, but that is life.  You lose some good people as you go and you really have no control over that.    

I do have control over my decisions though and I am glad I will get this opportunity to run one final “Freedom Run” with my beautiful wife right next to me.

Sara and I with the legend himself, Mr. Dick Beardsley
prior to his running event in 2013

So come check it out if you get a chance - one final time we’ll have Old Glory flying high on a race path in the area...unless of course someone else picks up a pole, straps on a flag and gets out there to honor those who have done so much for us.  I would really like to see that.

Just remember that no matter what happens in life, you can always adjust to make things better.   Enjoy every minute of your time on this earth - it passes you by way too quickly.  And if we’re lucky, we’ll be passing you at the Dick Beardsley Half Marathon on Saturday September 6th!  

We’ll see you at the finish line.  

ALS Ice Bucket Challenge

When my mom was going through a reoccurrence of ovarian cancer we talked a lot about how there just wasn’t enough money being put into finding a cure for that specific kind of cancer. It’s a crazy thing to say, but we just kept thinking that if some celebrity would get diagnosed that it would raise awareness and maybe someday, hopefully while my mom was still here, lead to a cure.

As most of you know, that didn’t happen. We lost our mom in 2006 shortly after we started our own little fundraiser, not for ovarian cancer specifically but for cancer research in general. Losing her was one of the toughest things I have ever had to endure in my life and even today I really struggle with not having her here on my bad or good days. She was my mom, and taught me everything a person needs to know about what true love really is…but she did teach me, and I’ll always have those awesome memories about who she was, and to me, she was worth finding a cure for.

The year after she passed away we decided to keep going with our little fundraiser, not just to keep a positive memory of her alive, but because we didn’t want other families to go through what we did. I’ll never forget being stopped by an older gentleman by the name of Winton, and he asking if Diane was my mother…I said that she was and he told me that he would like to donate, that she was such a fantastic lady and that he missed her.

I think that’s when I first realized that my mom was a celebrity, that she was important enough to find a cure for, and that although she was only 57 when she passed away, that she had made an impact with her time here…In essence, that it’s not the length of your life, but the depth that truly matters.

Since that time more and more people have joined our cause and the amount of money being put towards cancer research has really become astronomical and undoubtedly will one day soon lead to a cure. You can argue this fact with me all you’d like, I hear all too often that there’s too much money in cancer, that they already have a cure for it but won’t release it because big companies make too much money off of people being sick, but there are too many people who have had a mom or dad like mine. Too many of these people who are searching for a cure, too many who the cure means that other families won’t have to have the same heartbreak that we’ve endured. Try to stop a cure from being put out by these people, just try.

But the main point of this little soliloquy is that we’re all important, that we all serve a purpose while we’re hear and that each and every one of us is worth fighting for, that it’s not the length of our life but the depth.

The ALS Ice Bucket Challenge has shown us the individuals who are battling the disease, but more than that, all of the people who choose to battle with them. 

We had a close group of friends who first got our little fundraiser off the ground with us but I can’t help but think just how amazed my mom would be if she could have been around to see just how big it has become, how many people she touched in her life that have now kept coming back to try to make a difference in her name. To our family, it means the world.

I had not personally been challenged to the Ice Bucket Challenge until one of my bus riders, Jaden, challenged me pretty recently. I was just going to do the challenge and write a check in honor of Chad Schmitz but I couldn’t help thinking, how do we do more, how do we go above and beyond, like Chad would do?

A quick side step here with one of my personal interactions with Chad. A couple of years ago I made my first really big purchase, a new car which I bought from Chad. He was fantastic through the whole process and made it one of the easiest things I ever did.

Shortly after, about 1,200 miles in, I hit a moose with said car and totaled it out. The problem was the insurance company and my definition of totaled was somehow completely different. After going back and forth with the insurance agency for about a month (all while the great people of Thibert’s Chevrolet were letting me use a rental car) I was contacted by Chad just to see how things were going. When I stopped in to talk to him he marched right over to my insurance agent with me and told them to total out the car and that I was sick and tired of waiting around without my car. He went above and beyond and the car was finally totaled out and I could move forward with getting a replacement, as a kicker, Thibert’s also threw in the use of the rental, which I had had for about a month!

On top of the wonderful customer service Chad provided during his time at Thibert’s, he also served as a volunteer fireman for our community eventually serving as Chief! His wife has also made her stamp in our community as one of the councilors at our High School. I didn’t realize just how much of an impact until I went to brag about how well everyone did for our charity basketball tournament on a “Town and School Days” radio broadcast and heard the Dean of Students brag about all the stuff she was doing to help out the kids in Red Lake Falls.

I’ve also gotten a unique opportunity to be the one who gets to transport Chad and Jenny’s youngest, Blaine, to school every day. Occasionally Maddi will ride as well, but Blaine is a constant and even though he doesn’t ride very far with me, I’ve gotten a chance to get to know him and I see how good of a kid he is, a testament to his upbringing and just how wonderful of parents Chad and Jenny have become.

The point of all of that is that Chad is a celebrity in our community, not because of the disease that he is battling, but because of the man that he is. The disease just gave us all a reason to rally up and show him and his family what he means to our community and that he has made an impact with all of us in one way or another.

One of the coolest things, which I recently found out, was that the team that the Schmitz’s walk with for the Grand Forks ALS walks, Chad’s Cruisers, wasn’t even formed by the family. It was formed by two sisters who had been loyal customers of Chad’s. Two people who he made such an impact on that they took it upon themselves to start a group to raise money for Chad and a cure for ALS. How good did this team do? They raised more money (over $20,300) than the next 9 teams participating, combined! There is no question as to the depth to which Chad has lived his life to this point.

Which brings us to the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge.  Here are some quick facts for you:

·         ALS is not contagious.

·         Anyone can get ALS. Genetics account for about 5-10 percent of ALS cases. There are about 12 gene mutations found to cause ALS and it takes only one parent to pass it down. The rest of the time, there is no known cause.

·         About 30,000 people in the United States are living with ALS at any given time. According to the ALS Association, about 5,600 more are diagnosed each year.

·         Early symptoms include muscle stiffness and weakness, slurred speech, manual dexterity problems, and difficulty swallowing.

·         There’s no one medical test to diagnose ALS. It is diagnosed based on symptoms, neurological exam, and a series of tests to rule out other diseases.

·         The leading cause of death for people with ALS is respiratory failure. According to the National Institute of Neurological Diseases and Stroke (NINDS), death usually occurs within 3-5 years, but about 10 percent of patients survive beyond 10 years.

·         It’s rare, but ALS can stop progressing. Some people even experience a reversal of symptoms.

·         There is no cure for ALS. An FDA-approved drug called riluzole (Rilutek) may help reduce neurological damage for a time. Other treatments are designed to address individual symptoms and improve quality of life.

·         Research at the NINDS is ongoing, and the Ice Bucket Challenge is a fundraising success. As of August 22, The ALS Association reports receiving $53.3 million in donations compared to $2.2 million during the same time period last year (July 29 to August 21). In addition to their global research program, the ALS Association provides services to people living with ALS.

Read more: http://www.care2.com/greenliving/this-als-ice-bucket-challenge-gets-to-heart-of-it.html#ixzz3BaoxsH5Y

For the most part people have taken to this challenge with open arms, it’s a simple enough thing to complete and can even be pretty fun! Not everyone donates that does the challenge, but even if only 10% have been donating, look at the amount that has been generated, over $50million! Now we as a company have decided not only to take part in the dumping of the ice water over our heads but we’re also going to do a little promotion where we donate a couple of dollars for every tuber we have on Sunday, August 31^st. It’s not much but we wanted to show Chad how much he means to our community and wanted to get our 7,500+ followers on the ALS fundraising bandwagon! With any disease, and the fundraising for it, awareness is the key.

There have been people bashing the fundraiser efforts for a number of reasons; not everyone that does it is donating, they’re wasting clean water when other countries and even parts of our country don’t have clean water, and my all-time favorite, “the videos are clogging up my Facebook newsfeed.”

First of all, as stated earlier, if only 10% of the people are donating, it has raised the funds over $50million in a very short time frame. It also has spread the awareness through user made videos. If the person who posted the video didn’t donate, maybe some of the people they nominated did.

Secondly, don’t use clean water if you don’t want. Come to the river, add some ice and dump it back on the ground or river. Eventually it will end up back in the river, somewhere will purify it, and it will once again become clean water. We have the technology, we can rebuild it, we can make it stronger…Aquafina!

Finally, I do apologize that you haven’t been able to find your favorite Banana Daiquiris & Life Lessons posts because there are far too many videos of people pouring ice water over their heads. The news feed is to show you what your friends are up to, the good news is that they are currently raising money and awareness for a cause bigger than you or them. The news is that people are suffering from a disease that robs them of their life so maybe the message you should be taking is that it’s time to stop scrolling that news feed and time to go out, make a difference, and live your life.

Sorry about the rant. I probably use social media more than anyone, but it too is a tool that can be used for social change, to create awareness, and when used properly (such as with an event like the Ice Bucket Challenge) can raise money, awareness, and even hopefully save some lives.

Come out Sunday, August 31^st and support ALS research just by enjoying a day of tubing down the Red Lake River. Pour a bucket of ice water over your head and donate, or just donate. Tell your family you love them and try to do the kind of things in your life that will one day band together a family, town, state, nation to save your life.

Make your life as deep as possible, like they say in football, leave it all on the field.

Stories (Drama and Mundanity)

Prologue: Sunday Morning

Update on me. It's been a rough couple weeks. Not every day of those two weeks, but enough of them. While I'm not a wandering male out sipping whiskey and chasing women like our well know and dearly adored comrade recently seen here, I have experienced some rejection - along with some fear, sadness, worry - that made it a tough go. But not unlike our resident lady's man, I did drink some whiskey. I listened to music. I played guitar. I wrote. And I got through it. I feel like I've been putting off some decisions and some actions, going to be working today to change that. Current events and world happenings also bring me down, perhaps more than they should. Robin Williams, Ferguson, and I saw this horrible video of monkeys and how they're "prepared" for flight to labs that traumatized the shit out of me; no joke. For me, it's not as much the rightness or wrongness of these things, but the pain inflicted and the anger kindled regardless of who is right. Life can be pretty ugly and sometimes it gets really hard to see the light for the darkness. But I guess moments like these give stir for me to write. Which no matter how good or bad I may be at it, I think it's not only a good thing, but an important thing to do with one's time.

-1-

Brutal honesty is perhaps the most entertaining of all human endeavors. Jason's recent post is a prime example of the drama factor within a solid, honest recalling of life's more - and less - desirable moments. Good, and also very bad, things happens to us here and there along this road. Yet for most of us average, God-fearing, Jane's and Joe's, life is rather mundane; most of the time. Neither good or bad. Just life. The normal tides of the voyage. But the unordinary moments really stitch together our life pattern. The stories we grow old recalling; or at least the ones that just don't seem to leave you, if you're fortunate enough to keep your memory into old age, or to any age for that matter.

Please allow me a short digression.

Stories are a human endeavor and though we've been telling them for awhile now, it's really only been for a rather short time in our overall existence on Earth. Yet these stories have had the power to build a simple creature into a civilized one; a key piece in the development of culture. Kurt Vonnegut, (an excellent author and if you're unaware, go to the Library later, you won't regret it) was an expert, of sort, on the "shapes" of stories. A humorous 5 minute video of Vonnegut lecturing on subject explains how he graphs the shapes of stories on axes. There is also a pretty rad blog post on the matter by Robbie Gonzalez.

Traveling further down the blog rabbit hole on this one, I found this post by Derek Sivers, who condenses Vonnegut's lecture down to a lesson for all of us. We follow along with great stories, such as the example of Cinderella, with all it's up and downs and big dramatic moments as plotted on this time vs misery/ecstasy xy graph:

In the video above, Vonnegut refers to this story as "the most popular story in our civilization - Western civilization - as we love to hear this story. Every time it's retold, somebody makes another million dollars, you're welcome to do it." (Vonnegut's sense of humor is scathingly beautiful). According to Sivers, Vonnegut makes the point that people love this story, along with the other popular story shapes, "and because of it, people think their lives are supposed to be like this. But the problem is, life is really like this...."

Again, according to Sivers, Vonnegut's final point is "because we grew up surrounded by big dramatic story arcs in books and movies, we think our lives are supposed to be filled with huge ups and downs! So people pretend there is drama where there is none.” 

This would explain our current fascination with much 'reality' television broadcast now-a-days.

Real life rarely plays itself out the way Vonnegut's story shapes progress. For some people, the major historical figures in our history, it has, but for most of us the big dramatic curves aren't that poignant. That doesn't mean we treat them as undramatic, it is our story after all and the only one we get to tell. But there are rises and falls along the misery/ecstasy or good/ill fortune axis that make up dramatic moments, our stories, our escape from mundanity. And that is really my focus here. Digression over.

-2-

Someone I probably don't know, and was not me, once said that sneezing is one of those pristine moments that lifts you above the mundane bullshit of ordinary life. Or something like that. I'm not great at remembering quotes verbatim, just the ideas behind them. Sneezing is pretty awesome. 

But select moments in any given individual's existence do the same thing: lift them out of mundanity. Sometimes it's a rather good thing. Some of my own examples: my 19th birthday spent in Canada, the night in Crookston when 9 Paces West won the battle of the bands, one random night spent in a basement apartment drinking Blue Moons and watching Bloodsport and Apocalypse Now with some of my closest friends (which coined the term flabulolinguistics), meeting my future wife for the first time and the wedding 5 years later. This isn't an exhaustive list, but these moments have stuck with me and are some of the high point blips on my otherwise pretty normal overall story shape. Then there is also the dips into the realm of misery: the death of my great-grandmother and later, the death of my uncle and my grandfather. Terrible moments of loss and with my great-grandmother, probably my first real sense of it. Because of the reality of life, I'll face more of these days, as we all do. I don't know that they get any easier. The more you love someone, and the longer you do so, the harder it is to say goodbye.

Another story shape that people love is mundane crushing event that's good in a bad a way (bad in a good way?) where it is usually bad for the main protagonist of the story, but extremely entertaining for the costars, bystanders, and future audiences. The slightly embarrassing, one's 'finer' moments, Jason when he drinks whiskey - who gets bonus points for his revealing, dare I say compromising, honesty.

Most of us have those. I do. No space to share them here.

The proverbial, "point of all this," is not to 'enjoy the moment they don't last forever,' or 'time heals all wounds' or some other cliché. The point could be to enjoy a simple lesson in humility or to stop taking your life so seriously it paralyzes you - don't overdramatize your good or bad moments. But really, I think it is gratitude. Life offers up these opportune and not so opportune moments. Simply, some are great, some are shit, most just are. Together it weaves your story here, in the now, chronicling regardless of the level of dramatic curves, story shapes. And when the dramatic moments in life do happen, they provide you with choices. Sometimes the choices are also dramatic and change forever the weave of the pattern, the path of your life. Some just make for good stories for social gatherings. The real ones, you know where people talk with each other. Best done with moderate levels of alcohol. But that's totally optional. Sort of. See also: Barbecue.

The cold truth of the matter is that we don't have a lot of time. Our lives are actually quite short - or at least shorter than we really like to think about. Coupled with the fact that most of it will be spent on the mundane necessities, that overall mundanity which is quite alright for watching football on Sundays. 

Philosophically, we could argue that it's all that time spent in the mundane, that makes the story moments of our lives stand out so much. The darkness makes the light brighter when the sun rises. The bad shit makes the good moments so incredible. We could argue that, but like most great philosophy, it's a thought experiment that poses more questions than delivers answers we can move on with.

Simply, the lesson is to be grateful there are dramatic curves in our stories; good or bad. Life would be pretty dull, without pain or joy like some lamesauce movie you went to where the popcorn was cold and the overpriced 'coke' was RC cola. Actually, that is traumatizing. I'm going to yell a lot about it and probably get my own reality tv show.

Do stuff, take chances, make choices, enjoy life as best you can and write your story. You'll be mostly to blame if it's not dramatic enough.

Prologue: Sunday Afternoon and #BDandLLHappyDays

I leave you with a bit of randomness and current developments. 

~ Lucas and I were able to get another of our Denver tracks mastered. Whiskey and the Wolves, "Black Letter." You can listen here - we're still pushing for EP release soon, just need to get some of the business aspects of it taken care of. Another thing on the Sunday to do list.

~As I've mentioned before, I keep a notebook at my side and write pretty much anything in it, some of it turns to blog posts, some of it is just reading notes and thoughts. Sometimes the random thoughts, make good little blurbs. Here's a moment of zen from a recent bit of random:

The traffic sound in Southern California is the constant buzz of the consumption hive. A giant, protruding hive sticking out into space with the atom like hover of bees in and out of the LA basin. A buzz populated by the BMW, Audi, Mercedes, Lexus, the drone Prius, and the over compensating Riverside monster truck; the worker bee caste system. The rare Tesla bee has begun to appear. Bee collectors are envious.

~My last couple weeks, as told by my libations:

On the bad days, sometimes a pale ale and shot
of whiskey is exactly what is needed. But mostly
I just needed to write.

I found myself in random bar in Long Beach one
Saturday morning. It was a bloody mary morning.
The drink and food wasn't especially awesome, but
everyone seemed to know each other. I felt like an
extra on an episode of Cheers.

Try this. Take your favorite Hefeweizen. If you
don't have one, just buy one. Pour 3/4 of it into
a well sized beer glass. Swirl the bottle to get the
goodness on the bottom. Pour in the rest. Top off
with orange juice and orange slice, which I did
not have, sadly.

It's taken me much too long to write this post, and like a Kevin Costner film, it's grown too earnest and tiresome. Until next time, BD&LL faithful, salud!