Scholarship selection weekend was great. Now that I’m a divorced man, I have a greater appreciation for these extraordinary long friendships. While I still haven’t had a belly laugh in over two years, I had one, maybe two, really good laughs. Slowly, I’m coming back together.
Regarding the scholarship trustees, four are childhood friends from Mineral Wells. Throughout high school and college, I was always the heaviest. Now, I’m the lightest and only one under 200 lbs. I never thought that day would happen.
When you are a full-time dad, you feel responsible for your children’s safety 24/7. When you get divorced, and while you always remain a dad at all times, you are no longer responsible for their safety 24/7, just your court-agreed possession time. So, when the kids do something like fly out of state for a long weekend, it’s a weird kinda feeling. You also want them to have nothing but joy, but you feel bummed you aren’t making lasting memories with them.
My closest peer in a divorce-recovery texted me a photo I sent him one year ago over the weekend. It was of me and my kids on the roof of GeedingManor watching the sunset. In the original text from a year ago, he was checking in on me, because at that time, I was only allowed to see my children nine hours a week. It was interesting looking at my eyes in that photo. They belonged to a broken man, longing for his marriage, already missing his kids, sitting on the roof of the home he doesn’t want to sell, not having any idea of when will the healing process can begin because so much was still ahead of him in terms of the divorce. Rebuilding could only start once the divorce is over, and I still had to finish the court mandated parallel parenting class, get the results of my psych exam, mediation, selling and moving out of the house, the actual divorce, and a hundred of other unplanned and unwelcome things are finished. Otherwise, if you start the rebuilding process too early, everything you worked on may come crashing down and you have to start all over, and I didn’t want to start all over again. While I’m not where I want to be, I have made progress since that photo. It’s a mixture of the simple passage of time, counseling, medication, prayer, and a handful of other things. I just wonder what the percentages of each are . It’s hard to measure that kind of progress. That person in the photo does not know how much stronger he is than he imagined.
One thing I wonder is if I’ll ever be able to trust anyone unequivocally again. The last time I thought I could be myself, be transparent with my thoughts and fears, confide my stress and depression, and share all my medical information, that woman left me at my lowest point and continues to work to alienate our children from me. I fear I so desire to love again, I’m going to sacrifice some things I shouldn’t have the first time. If I question integrity, I need to go with my gut and not my heart. So, if your bride doesn’t even glance at you as she walks down the aisle, run. She’s not there for you, she’s there for the show.
One thing that bothers me is the person who makes a big deal out of when they are included in the photo, even if they aren’t the main subject. My brother was like that, I feel robbed of many family photos. You miss looking at that stuff when you lose your family. Those folks don’t understand how a small act of humility on their part makes such a difference in someone else’s life. When that person does it, the rest of your time with that person feels like you are walking on eggshells and just can’t act yourself.
I knew Nocona Boots were made (at one time) in Nocona, Texas. But I didn’t know there was a connection with the Justin Boots company. This is from the founder of Nacona Boots, Enid Justin:
Her father was the famed boot-maker Herman Joseph Justin, who cobbled his first pair of boots while working in a Texas barber shop. A student of the boot-making craft herself, Enid opened the Nocona Boot Company in 1925 after her brothers, John, Sr., Avis, and Earl, decided to move her father’s business to Fort Worth, Texas.
The Batman Starring Adam West.. Coming Soon! – The guys who put this together did a great job. You’ll really appreciate it if you’ve seen the new movie or at least the trailer. They actually put together a behind-the-scenes featurette if you want to know how they pulled off the great CGI.
