Turn on the music and recognize how age hasn’t softened all of the edges because if it has the response that came from being repeatedly pushed wouldn’t have left me fuming hours after the incident.
It took some doing for them to get me to that place where the family tells me the rumble coming from my lips can be heard upstairs, outside and in the closet.
Took repeated and regular effort on the part of another to ignore the warning signs and to reap the rewards of their endeavor.
There was a moment when they made me want to share my displeasure by playing mohel and rancher using a dull knife and piping hot brand but these days they send you to prison for such things so I had to keep that idea to myself.
Hours later I am still fired up and will be for quite some time so it is good I can’t just hop in the car and head south to see the very foolish person who thought that repeatedly going after me would serve as motivation to do as they asked.
Know your audience and know who you are dealing with.
I’m Not Walter White
I’m not Walter White, no one calls me Heisenberg so don’t go misinterpreting my words to mean anything special.
What you can take is the same lesson my kids have gotten, especially my son.
Sometimes presentation is everything and you better damn well understand who you are speaking with and whether you are operating on a level playing field.
And even if you think the field is level or tilted in your favor you ought to consider whether you have real influence because if you try to throw your weight around you might not like what comes.
It doesn’t necessarily mean that you are dealing with a tough guy either. It doesn’t mean that pushing will lead to physical consequences though sometimes you might wish it did.
Because the physical often heals far more easily than the other stuff and you really don’t want to find yourself in a position in which you wonder how you could have been so dumb.
I could go Johnny Cash on you and tell you a story about my favorite mistake. Or I could share a Johnny and June story about how she tore into him and what it did or didn’t do.
There are lots of options ranging from the days of pursuit and those that came after but what fun would it be to try to use tales to tell other stories.
What good would it be to ask you to read between the lines or interpret a particular story or stories when I could pull out Wilner’s sledgehammer and be so blunt you wonder if I ever knew what tact is/was.
Instead I am going to climb into my own hot air balloon and let it float into oblivion. I have had enough.
My body aches from slamming into the wall and I need to rest while seeking a way back into the secret kingdom.
The heart may want what the heart wants but the almost middle aged man would be happy to sit on a beach or go sailing for about 19,383,292 hours.
One day I will go wander through the fields of corn to see what lies beyond and oh what a story it will make.
