Deviant Rambling

Got paid today for my writing, for the first time ever. The content was garbage but it was easy. I am excited an looking forward to acquiring more writing opportunities.

First week of October I will be taking a much needed road trip with my lady and the dogs. We have no plans whatsoever except a general direction and a full-sized SUV rental to sleep in. We are going to bare bones the whole trip and figure it out as we go.

I think the general concept is just to get far away from people, disconnect from the world as we know it, and fully connect with one another and nature. It is a good, old-fashioned road trip. It is a welcome respite from the abortion that is 2022.

I’m excited for this trip and to just go be lost for a minute on purpose. It’s been too long.

A large distraction from being able to fully enjoy and be present in life is the perceived necessity for money, and by extension, our collective obsession with productivity. The cult of productivity has made slaves of even the most well-intentioned people. It’s an illusion but the most persistent kind.

I spent years of my life in service of this illusion and I can feel it creeping into the periphery, begging for my attention again. As with any illusion, once it is broken, all you need to do is look at it with a new set of eyes and it crumbles. The set of eyes I now possess are capable of this deconstruction in a moment. Since it took years for this illusion to really build and take root, it may well take years before it stops.

Just now, as I read the previous passage and scanned for clarity, mistakes, etc., the illusion presented itself to me. “You need to get up and do something. This is not providing anything of worth to the world. No one is reading this, and if they are, they are rolling their eyes the whole time.” Oh, I forgot to mention, the illusion has a voice, and it’s only ever critical. I can handle constructive criticism, but this is all a bunch of bad-faith “get to work” style berating.

There is the illusion, plain as day, trying every trick in the book to get me to concede to it. I already conceded. I will never live under the grip of this illusion again.

Joshua Nash Wagoner passed away on Friday, August 26, 2022.

Decades of drug abuse took their final toll when Josh passed away at home. He died as he lived: how he wanted. What killed him was a part of what made him special to those who knew him.

The same reckless abandon for consequences that made Josh fun at parties made his untimely death inevitable. Methamphetamine will receive the blame for another life but the fact of the matter is he had a choice to make all of those years ago. Responsibility is important even on the occasion of mourning.

Josh did this to himself.

Whatever perceived need drove Josh to substance abuse was one he could never satisfy, with or without drugs. He chose to try and fill the hole inside by digging out the bottom. Despite knowing the risks of collapse, he kept searching for the bottom. The bottom isn’t something you find, though. It finds you.

They say to remember the good times and who a person was at their best. What is a person to do when those memories are inaccessible? When I seek out the memories in any such attempt, I have to wade through 20 years of complete insanity. There may be some idealized version of this man that people need to see to feel better but he wasn’t that man. The image makes people feel better, though. Speak no ill of the dead and all.

Speaking the truth is my duty, though. This is a duty I take seriously. Josh wasn’t the type to pull punches and it was one of his redeeming qualities. It is a quality I possess as well, so in that way, we were very much kin.

I have zero illusions about who my brother was. Josh was an abusive, racist, alcoholic, drug addict. He was helpless to fill the void inside that screamed for his attention. He had the decency to disappear when he knew his lifestyle was something mom and dad wouldn’t want to see, but his hiding only prolonged the inevitable. He was as stubborn as he is now unironically dead.

An obituary is supposed to be a rosey picture of a nuanced individual. Bullet points about why a person was great. Josh would have used the bullets to shoot something he bought the day before because it pissed him off. And then he would have set whatever it was on fire, and pissed out the fire.

How’s that for rosey?

All the same, he will be missed. Not for the man he was all along, but for the man he could have been in spite of who he had to become. We mourn the loss of this possibility as much as the man himself.

Every version of him is gone, and at long last, the hole is filled.

Life on this side of the employment grind has far fewer headaches but there are still necessities that require attending to. My working career was in a business that was completely dependent upon the cooperation of the weather and that made us all accustomed to the “feast or famine” mentality.

I always likened this to being in over your head in some body of water. Drown, gasp for air, rinse, repeat. The drowning causes all kinds of stupid behavior money-wise and has long lasting effects. That’s if it doesn’t just kill you outright, of course. The phrase “scared money don’t make money” applies here. If you’re worried about making a payroll every week just to stay afloat, you’ll do stupid things to make sure it gets covered.

In my postmortem inspection of the business it was apparent that we played this game all the time, and it never really improved. It changed appearance over the years but the bad behavior was underneath it all the whole time. Now that I’m free of all of the business burdens, I have to make sure that the bad behavior isn’t anywhere in me personally. This would make me a problem for anyone near and dear to me.

I’m in the process of shoring up debts used to fund this expensive hobby, and once the debts are paid, closing the accounts. I have found myself disillusioned by the lose-lose game of maintaining a credit score once again. I looked at one of my statements and at the minimum payment it will take me 35 years to pay off. This jarred me out of my complacency to drastic action, but that is what is required to change.

All of this struggle in the name of a business that would have taken my life too. No thanks, I’ll be getting off this ride now.

An idea has cropped up about starting yet another blog, this one will be about intentional living. The overarching themes of this year have brought what is important to the front and center.

Since this is a concept near and dear to my heart, it will be easy for me to write about. For once, in all of my years writing, I have found something that I would be happy to try and monetize. I will sell something I believe in: experience. It is hard to fight the gut response to selling anything but I do honestly believe that experiences are one of the only things worth trading your time and money for.

This space is still going to exist as an outlet for my stream of consciousness. Every time I write something here, I feel better for having done so. This catharsis keeps the site relevant to me.

Have a look at the haul above. This is the entirety of my brother’s estate before the debts are accounted for. After the debts are discharged because there is nowhere to get them paid, this pile of change is all that’s left.

I’m not saying that I will leave much of anything for the world to deal with in my wake. If it were a pile of change and no debt, cool, but I’ll be dead either way.

My point is a simple one: I will leave written instructions on what should be done. There will be very little to speak of possession-wise and I have advised that whoever handles it use their discretion. My things will not be a burden to anyone. If it doesn’t immediately make sense to keep, get rid of it.

No one should die and leave this kind of chaos in their wake and I certainly won’t.

Labor day today and there is a touch of fall in the air. Although I look forward to fall, the cooler weather, the changing trees, I know winter is gonna be here all too soon.

This is meant to be a day off for people who work for a living but for the rest of us, it’s just another Monday. I’m using the peace and quiet to attend to some household tasks.

Not feeling especially creative today but I am hardly feeling anything.

Grief seems to be the theme for 2022 in my family. (What’s left of us.)

When dad died, I could safely say that given how closely we worked together every day, nothing was left unsaid. Closure was swift and I could get to the business at hand. I knew him as well as anyone, save for mom. The knowledge about who he was gave me all the strength I needed to attend to the affairs. He was gone, but I had his strength to carry on.

When my brother died, I could safely say that there was nothing left to say. We’ve exhausted all of the “should have” and “could have” conversations. Closure was something I had 20 years ago when I saw much of his life was going to be a foregone conclusion. This isn’t a conclusion that others can come to easily, but they didn’t have to be a party to his fall. The best lessons I learned because of him were all what not to do, and what the attendant consequences look like. I am grateful that his burning out could light a fire or two within me to be proactive.

It’s a mess of a year but the sun still rises and falls every day. I still have a life in front of me and boundless freedom to do as I see fit. There is work to do but I have both of these men’s strength to bolster me.

I’ve been in a funk the past couple of days. The reality of money has come back to be an issue. If it weren’t for the debt I took on in the name of the business, I might have more empty space in my mind to occupy with positive things.

But there in the background, it lurks. When I start to feel like I’ve gained on it and can put it out of my mind, it rears up. Fighting the presence only seems to give it more weapons so I surrender. This can toss me headlong into sadness. All of the “should have” and “could have” arguments surface but are meaningless after the fact.

I never should have leveraged my personal credit against a business’s debt. Now I am the only one who can take care of the problem that should have never existed in the first place. This brings up feelings of resentment toward others but the feelings are misguided. I must accept responsibility and find my way out of the rut I am in.

Less thinking, more breathing.