crooked tale primitive continues his never-ending saga of woe

[franksolich]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x4536045

Oh my.

Did anybody remember to nominate him for Mr. Wiggums's most-excellent Top 10 DUmmies of 2008?

The Straight Story  (1000+ posts)        Tue Nov-25-08 08:50 PM
Original message
 
"I have no gift to bring" - a post of thanks to my many friends here on DU this holiday season

I heard the song The little drummer boy today and heard the phrase "I have no gift to bring" - and as usual little things can set my mind in motion and certain items in life just click.

I will explain why I am posting this at the end of this thread (so as not to bore those who want to skip my posts about my life).

So often people feel bad seeing others in pain/need and are not readily able to do something for them. When I was able I helped a local charity by adopting families for christmas and working with my engineers and others to raise money to buy everyone in those families the things they asked for (a total I think of 11 families we were able to assist.

This year I cannot, nor can many others I know. This year, once again I am on the other side of the fence.

And as I sat and pondered those lyrics the gears within my mind began to flow in a positive direction.

I am not a little drummer boy, nor would I suspect are many of you. I can't play a song to soothe your woes.

But I can do what many of you can here - I can write and be decent and empathetic to others. I can encourage. I can listen (read). I can try to see the pain others are and write back and tell them that even if no one they know personally will understand and listen I (and others here) will.

I can kick a thread someone put effort into writing and that is sinking, so that the person at the other end of this long super highway does not feel that what they took the time to post meant nothing - that someone cared to read it and at least say 'hey, efven if I don't have time to reply with something I can let you know you are not all alone out there'.

I can't do it for everyone, not here enough to be able to of late - but it doesn't really cost me more than a few moments of time to welcome someone to DU, to kick something, to tell someone I am sorry for what they are going through, etc and so on.

I have no gift to bring but the ones these hands can give through the keyboard I sit in front of - and sometimes that gift means a lot more to someone that I or others realize.

So many here have put up with my rants, my postings about my life and trials, they have put up with some guy they have never met who is going through a few years of hell and has no outlet other then to write it all out and get it from my head to the screen. Because it helps me - and I know when others type out things, even if not heavy and just plain fun, they are using their instrument to play a song to which they hope others will listen; and maybe their song will bring something positive to others.

Without even trying so many here have brought me a gift, I feel like when I am here around you all I am in the calm of the eye of a hurricane - destruction has hit, more is to come, but for those brief moments I spend here I find a peace that gets me through many a night. A peace many of you have given others without even knowing it.

Words mean things, and kind words are free to type and the rhythm they produce can soothe the hurting soul. I have written my share of things that probably didn't help, but instead hurt. We all have probably posted things we later regretted - so if I have to you please accept my apologies at this time. After 18k+ posts I am sure I have not always been the best man, but I won't let my failures detract from my efforts to do better.

The ship that carries this soul won't sink because I have hit a few icebergs on my life journey, instead I will mark those places on the chart in my heart and try to avoid such things in the future. I am sure I will hit more but my skills at navigating this world wide web are getting better and my map is made more clear by the knowledge that as I travel I can leave behind something good and positive if I choose to give the gift of kindness over one of anger and trying to just be right.

Thank you all for donating to DU and helping to keep this place going. It is the one place I can use to help me chart a new path on those dark stormy nights at sea, when I feared my ship was sinking there were those here who gave me something when they thought they had no gift to bring.

You listened and gave me positive thoughts to keep me on this vessel so that some day I may reach those calm seas as I travel across this vast ocean we call life.

*** The personal stuff:

My life is falling apart in ways only a few here know, several here have helped me out and you know who you are and I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

I find myself near being homeless and alone, my wife and daughter will be ok - which is what I wanted for them. I won't live with my dad, and am not sure how much longer I can live here with my wife and my friend . For the first time in 10 years I am searching for someone else, something else, because I feel like no matter how hard I have tried I have failed.

I would never bail on my wife and leave her alone while she goes through her parkinson's, but I have become nothing much more than someone whose responsibility in life is make money and pay bills and try to smile through this whole situation. I'll spend this Thanksgiving alone as I was not invited to his sister's house as it might seem awkward (He's told her all about how much he loves her and that I am understanding of the situation as I want her to be happy while she is sick and I am willing to let her be free in this relationship).

I basically live alone in the basement of some other person's house and am expected to be happy about it and have been told it is all my fault because I was not there enough for her. If I am upset about it, I am being selfish. I am told I was not there and now I want to be there because someone else is. Such is the life of a care giver who did what he could for those he loved but could not be there 24x7 like someone else can now (try taking care of a sick wife who was in bed most the time, taking care of a kid, and working 12-16 hours a day managing 3 data centers - then being told you did nothing).

The dark side of things many have not seen here is the depression my wife has been through, I am not mad at her - I have seen her go downhill the last few years, and now she has something new to cling to - someone who can do nothing but give her attention 24x7, which I used to do until we had our baby and she (the wife) got sick.

And the last few years I have suffered through multiple deaths, found my kids again (2 of who signed up with the army so they can go to Iraq, and whose step dad abused them), lost my house, my career, and now sit here each day in hopes of just getting a job so I can the bills and feed my little girl and hope to have enough left over so that I can get a few beers and smokes just to try and kill the pain.

When I suffered the worst in my life people told me to just get over it, like they are now. I would like nothing more to be that happy go lucky wild guy I once was. I can barely afford to buy my daughter a happy meal most the time, when I used to be able to get her just about anything. I am willing to support my wife through this and see her happy, but somewhere in it I got lost and became the bad guy.

I live now off the kindness of strangers, when I used to live off my skills and hard work. My daughter and wife/friend have food because others saved my ass, but right now I just want something for me - to be able to go out and talk to some people and have someone tell me I am not a crazy SOB, to have listen to me when I am down and not tell me I just need meds (which I have) but to realize I am more sad than depressed. I want a life with someone I can share without all the guilt and yelling and blame.

Deep down I know she loves me and relies on me, I know she needs me - But I have spent a great deal of my life taking care of others and their needs, and when I have needs I am just being selfish.

I can't fix her disease, her brain cyst, her heart issues, her asthma, or her mental problems. I can only do so much.

And the only people I have left to talk to are here. Everyone loves my wife, she is pretty, smart, and sick - and the old TSS is just a broken down old man that no one seems to want around unless he can give them something.

I have nothing to give my baby at Christmas, The little kitties she loved and adored - well I had to shoot one of them after the flea bath the wife gave them with dog flea shampoo put them into seizures and they were biting off their own tongues (she still thinks they are at the vets and daddy calls em each day, just waiting to get a replacement cat for her), I should be getting my unemployment in a few weeks which will help - but I spend my days scrounging for change just to get by. I apply for about 5-10 jobs a day, but the market is tight here for us computer nerds (I also applied at every fast food place in town).

The one place I have been able to come and talk is here. The one place I have not felt like I am a total failure is here on DU.

The one place I have relied on over these last few hard years is here.

Thank you for listening all these years and donating to DU so I can have a place to get out all the things I have had to talk about.

The guy shot his daughter's kitten?

I thought he had it euthanized.

A few primitives show up at the bonfire, to offer their white light of healing.

Better if they sent him some green paper.

[Carl]

In other words please PM me for my paypal address.

Sorry ain`t buying it..I know bad things can happen but this person has been from Ohio to California and back without once being able to find any form of employment?

I graduated from a high school in a backwater upstate NY town and have been able to have constant employment my entire adult life here,it can be done.

Just requires a little more in your belly then perpetual self pity.

Taking him at his word about his wifes medical condition..let me digress for a sec...

We have a fellow in the shop whose wife had a stroke or something at the birth of a child,I am told she has the mental capacity of a 5 or 6 year old as a result.
He has spent decades now raising children and working as best he could,maybe he has had government help along the way,don`t know,but he gives it his all to do what he can for himself.

Okay...I would guess that even without insurance this persons wife could have received very good care in California,I know in NY they would.
It is a sad thing if real but still not a reason for this guy to always be whining and using it as an excuse for how pitiful his life is.

[Chris]

Things seem to have gone downhill in Candyland since the Big Zero got elected.  Someone has taken away all their chutes and ladders, and installed more snakes.
 

[Texacon]

These kinds of people remind me of the dude I tried to hire in the middle of the street in Jacksonville, FL.  He was holding a sign that said he would work for money or food.  I pulled up beside him and told him to get in the truck and I would pay him $12.00/hour to sweep the floor in the tank I was working on.  He told me he couldn't do that because he had a bad back.  I then told him I would pay him to be a 'hole watch' (we were working in a confined space and had to have one) but I couldn't pay him as much.  He asked me what he would have to do and I told him he would have to sit on a bucket and if anyone had a problem go get help.  He said he couldn't do that because the refinery we were working in had bad chemicals in it and they would bother him.  I asked him if there was anything he was willing to do and he said 'not construction'. 

All the while I was talking to him (it was between Thanksgiving and Christmas) people were running up handing him $20 bills.  I drove off and have never given a dime to anyone on the street again.  I donate to charities but I don't give money to people on the street.

KC

[NHSparky]

And yet I've been called a heartless bastard for not giving money directly to homeless people.

[Chris]

I've met lots of homeless people... they all have a story.

There was one guy that used to park his wheelchair on the side of the street with a big posterboard that said "homeless, please help".  He must have passed out in his chair one night because I didn't see him as I was driving home.  Surprised the hell out of me.  I used to see lots of dumb college girls getting their pictures taken with him like he was some kind of tourist attraction.

There were a few young homeless people, but they were mostly moochers and airheads.  The girls were willing enough, though.

[BEG]

I apply for about 5-10 jobs a day, but the market is tight here for us computer nerds (I also applied at every fast food place in town).

How can he apply for 5-10 jobs a day if there are no jobs out there?

[Miss Mia]

I have to say, the longest I was ever unemployed was 6 months.  I was honest.  I got fired from Starbucks.  They ****ed me over, and if anyone ever took the time to ask me I would tell them what happened.  (And my manager was fired a month after I was, karma bitch.)  When I stopped putting on the applications that I was fired, I got hired immediately.  In the interview I told the guy what happened.  He still hired me as manager of his coffee shop. 

I don't understand how people on DU can be so long without employment.  *shrug*

[Chris_]

He's my pick for Top DUmmie.

I call bullshit on his "story".

You mean to tell me in the weeks since he's moved back to Ohio from California his sick bed wife has fallen in love with his friend ?  The woman who claimed to love him more than life itself ?

He does this crap in one form or another every year.  He's looking for money.  His lazy crybaby ass needs to go to work and stop begging for handouts. 

He's run out of family to get freebies from so now he's playing pity puss on the DUmmies.

He's pathetic.

[Duke Nukum]

He's my pick for Top DUmmie.

I call bullshit on his "story".

You mean to tell me in the weeks since he's moved back to Ohio from California his sick bed wife has fallen in love with his friend ?  The woman who claimed to love him more than life itself ?

He does this crap in one form or another every year.  He's looking for money.  His lazy crybaby ass needs to go to work and stop begging for handouts. 

He's run out of family to get freebies from so now he's playing pity puss on the DUmmies.

He's pathetic.

He's just a con man.  Like any liberal democrat.  Hard to fault a man for being what he is.  But it is good to know what he is and keep the money hidden when he comes around.

And the prims who aren't proficient con men liked to be conned so he is fulfilling his position in life.

[Chris_]

He's good at it too but it's wearing thin.

I see more people sending white light instead of cash.  At least I hope that's the case.

[Traveshamockery]

He's good at it too but it's wearing thin.

I see more people sending white light instead of cash.  At least I hope that's the case.

But he's still got a computer and an interweb connection.  Things can't be all bad.   

[Miss Mia]

But he's still got a computer and an interweb connection.  Things can't be all bad.   

I have to agree.  I know my internet/cable is around $100/month.

I have a friend who's car was repoed this week.  I love the guy, his wife and kid to pieces.  But I know that he was out of a job for a couple of months, but he's still had cable/internet.  And he has a Wii and Playstation and plenty of stuff he could have sold to make a car payment.  While I feel bad for him and his family, I don't have so much sympathy.  *shrug*

[rich_t]

I have to agree.  I know my internet/cable is around $100/month.

I have a friend who's car was repoed this week.  I love the guy, his wife and kid to pieces.  But I know that he was out of a job for a couple of months, but he's still had cable/internet.  And he has a Wii and Playstation and plenty of stuff he could have sold to make a car payment.  While I feel bad for him and his family, I don't have so much sympathy.  *shrug*

If I lose my job, the cable/internet will be one of the 1st things I get rid of. 

Other things like paying the mortgage, utilities and groceries come well ahead of entertainment expenses in my book.

[Texacon]

If I lose my job, the cable/internet will be one of the 1st things I get rid of. 

Other things like paying the mortgage, utilities and groceries come well ahead of entertainment expenses in my book.

That would be the prudent thing to do but we are talking about DUmmies/Liberals.

KC

[Chris_]

He's now posting his daughter's picture.  That is so uncool to use your daughter for sympathy.

I see some have taken his bait and want to help.  I'd be very careful about that.  This is his second time pulling this Christmas stunt.

[Carl]

He's now posting his daughter's picture.  That is so uncool to use your daughter for sympathy.

I see some have taken his bait and want to help.  I'd be very careful about that.  This is his second time pulling this Christmas stunt.

Pretty amazing that we know the hearts of these miserable pieces of shit better then they know themselves.

[Texacon]

Ya gotta love adbot!!

"Buy with Google today!!  Start Shopping!!"


 

KC

[Duke Nukum]

He's now posting his daughter's picture.  That is so uncool to use your daughter for sympathy.

I see some have taken his bait and want to help.  I'd be very careful about that.  This is his second time pulling this Christmas stunt.

Is it really his daughter or is it just the photo that comes with the frame?

[jukin]

Maybe...just maybe...if you were not a lazy conniving ****, life might be a bit better from the inside out.