:: Closing Time ::

:: Monday, December 09, 2002 ::

So how about I write a hell of a blog. How about I write a long blog, a deep blog, a thinking blog. How about I support a friend in need, and thank him for his help. How about I affirm his statements, express my opinion, and release more of my soul for all of you. How about I do that.

Ok. I feel comfortable posting the link to Drew's blog because of what he says in it, and because it's in his profile.

http://-thisismylife.blogspot.com/

This is a warning to you all - unless you really know Drew on some stronger level, and I mean REALLY know him, like probably at least as well as I do (and I'll admit that's not so well), you may be better off passing this by. You may not want to read this because it won't have answers for you, just questions. It may taint an image, and you may not be able to handle it. Or maybe you'll be able to, and everything will be good. But be forewarned.

For a moment, because I've gotten there, why don't I talk about Drew. And all the things Drew has done for me, small as they may seem at times, that have affected me in my life. The ways he's helped me become a better person, and who I am.

Start as far back as I remember knowing him - Karate class. I think it was fourth grade we started, maybe even third. And the only real details I remember for a while are that we were always at the same level, belt for belt, at the same thinking level, at the same level of intensity. It didn't take long working together for me to figure out that we had a lot in common. I think even back then, as I remember the looks on his face in class, that I could tell there would be something a little different about us that we had in common. It took me a while to figure out what those thoughts meant, but now that I look back I think it was really clearly there. But Drew helped drive me. While we succeeded at the same level I felt a basic need to keep up with him - not because it was competative, but because I didn't want to let him down. That class had pairings of success. Ben and Lauri moved together, and Drew and I were right behind him. We stood in order of rank. It was always a little unsettling to me when we would stand in the mat room, because it only had room for three people in a row, so one of us would be in the front row and one in the back, even though neither of us had any claim to a higher order. I liked the equality we held. I like to feel we drove each other. This is where I began to understand what I knew of Drew, and where I learned a lot about who he -truly- is, not who I thought I saw him become.

Next phase of life. Call it the middle school years, because although it wasn't all inclusive of middle school and it didn't quite end there, it sure as hell was our Junior high school. Through Drew and Eric Anthony, who I'd known from afterschool since kindergarden, and Milosz, who I'd met and become friends with in my sixth grade class, I became sort of friends with my first real "group" of friends. Jonathan Jimmy Kenny Loaf Drew Eric Erick Kevin Matty, did I miss anybody? If I did, sorry. But suffice to say this group of friends was always sort of. To be frank, I was never really a part of it, because several people had no desire to have me be a part of it, and those who I got along really well with had no desire to speak up on my behalf. To this day I have never begrudged them for it, because I've always understood just how hard that communication is to get through. But I had always hoped that Eric Drew Kenny and Loaf would have stood up for me, and sometimes I really felt that Jimmy had a hell of a good heart in there and could have helped. Matty and I ended up becoming really good friends with another group, but that doesn't involve Drew so we'll not discuss that here. Well, we were friends. And in that time... well, I think we all know what went on in that time that's already been discussed, why re-discuss it? Drew and I both know what I'm talking about and that's the important thing. What else happened in there? We entered the beligerant criminal stage. And there was the shoplifting incident. An incident where I'll still remember, when it was all said and done, although they all left (and I now realize... it was the right thing to do), Jimmy was the only one who came to me afterwards and asked how things went, and apologized for leaving. And talked to me about it. I appreciated him doing that.

Still, that was about the turning point where my friends changed. That was about the time that I became good friends with Ashley and Kara and Matt and Liz and Sasha. The six of us made a nice tight knit group, although Liz was always less in it than the rest of us - Carley made a good replacement for a while but then the whole thing fizzled. Whatever. Drew is no longer a part of my life until two things, and I don't remember which started first - Kate and AD&D. There's very little to say about either of thse things, because neither was a really good experience. I'll spell it out because I've never actually mentioned this to anyone, and it might be good to do so.

AD&D I'll talk about first because it's less interesting and less potentially life altering for relationships with other people. With the exception of Alex and Dereck, the D&D crowd was the old group. We used to play before when I was still friends with them, although most of them liked to play Rifts. Well, we got back into D&D a while ago and I saw Drew, and he ran a couple of campaigns, but it also brought Loaf back into the picture. And I don't like how much things between us have changed, because I still have no idea when or why he started hating me - he was one of the least communicative friends I've ever had. That, not Drew, was the uncomfortable part, but I expect I would never have been invited back if not for the influence of Drew in accepting me at the first meet, and therefore into his campaign (it was at his house so it was his choice). Afterwards, as he continued to DM the same campaign, it was natural that I had to be invited because my character was an integral part of the story of scant few. Well.... that fell apart. And as much fun as it was, it wasn't worth the hassle between Me and Alex vs. Loaf and Owen.

Part two though, involves when Drew and Kate got together. One of the more spontaneous and surprising relationships I've ever seen, and I think anyone has ever seen. What, as far as I know, NOBODY knows, is that in the two weeks before they got together, I had been actively pursuing Kate. Not heavily, but there was a lot of flirting going on. It also had potential appeal because even though we didn't see each other that often given who our friends were at the time and school, we lived so close that if anything HAD come up it would have been easy to keep going. So Drew came into the picture and I was pleasantly and unpleasantly surprised at the same time - more so pleasantly. Realistically, I knew that things between me and Kate had virtually no chance, so I wasn't too miffed that she was out of the picture, and I was also happy to see Drew start coming to things that Kate would be at, because my friends were pretty decent friends with Kate. I started seeing them at a lot of things, and although they got Caitlin in trouble at Natalie's surprise party, I still couldn't be entirely pissed. Plus I had an interesting situation - I was one of very, very few people who knew both of them pretty well. So I got into a great situation to do what I absolutely LOVE doing, and what I think I do very well - I became something of an occasional social counsellor, or a reassurer for the both of them. I was uniquely in a situation to tell Drew that he could trust Kate, even though she had an ugly reputation of having cheated on the last three boyfriends she had had, because I had had the conversation with her where she explained to me how she felt bad about that reputation, and felt bad about the things that had happened, and really wanted to be faithful. Where she had told me that she really cared about him and didn't want to screw that one up - I was able to truthfully tell them both that everytyhing was going to be ok when they had rocky moments, and after a few months I'm sure it's pretty obvious to everyone that things worked out well. Unique situation I had there though.

And finally, of course, Swim Team. I've said this before, and I'll say it again. Drew is the one person most responsible for my actually joining the team. Jack is right up there, and I can't thank him enough for helping me in preseasons, because I would have never survived without that, but on the night OF the first practice, when I had decided I wasn't good enough, that I couldn't manage, with less than an hour before practice started, Drew was talking to me. And when I told him I'd decided not to come, that I didn't think I'd made enough progress, Drew was the one telling me to come to one practice, and then decide. Drew was the one who told me, "At least talk to the coaches. I'll be honest with you, they're going to be - they've told people before that swimming wasn't for them." And Drew was the one who asked me, as a friend, to try it at least once. No commitment. After that one practice I never looked back. It actually drastically parallels my other atheletic story, when I came back from my first football practice and John told me he'd gained a lot of respect for me that day. Well, Drew pushed me and showed me I could do it, at least at my own level, and I really really really feel stronger for having been a part of that team.

SO.

To the original reason I wrote this blog. To respond to Drew's blog. I'm going to talk a little about drugs. And then I'm going to tell you all what you wanted to know, and what some of you have threatened to hurt me over, what the $64Mil question was. And then I'm going to answer it, because it pertains. I think. We'll see when I get there. But having promised it (look back a line, I did), I have to at least tell you what it was.

Drugs. In my case, the drug of choice is mostly alcohol. As most of you know, I had a serious incident with the police, and my parents, involving a lot of alcohol last summer. I got somebody else in trouble and I myself got let off. I've not stopped feeling shitty about this. I guess it has to be in the past some time though, and the person I got in trouble was one of the best in dealing with it. He told me to let it go, and that everything was ok, and I have to take that from him. But yeah, I've learned a lesson with alcohol - what not to do. Since then, I haven't even come close to that situation. And I've learned what feels right, what feels wrong, and when to let my body decide. I've become a much more sensible drinker, and a much more common drinker. I joined a fraternity - it was to be expected that drinking, if I wanted to, would come with it. Now I'll be the first to defend the reputation of my fraternity - nobody forced me to drink, or even tried to make me. We have a non drinker who didn't drink through the whole pledge process. It was his choice to make. But then, there's weed. There's a lot of weed in my fraternity, and I think almost my entire pledge class smokes. They've all smoked up a few times, and every time I've refused to go with them.

I've never been stoned in my life.

I tell them all stories, that I think in my head are true. That I believe. I tell them I'm not a happy stoner, that I get depressed, and that I don't see it as an activity in of itself. It's a lie. I've tried the stuff, but never enough to make a real difference. Never been blazed, never been stoned. Never been high. But boy do I drink. I'm happy to say I don't think it's affecting my grades - my general inability to work hard is doing that just fine. But it is consuming a lot of money. The big difference for me is that at this point I don't think I have a problem. When I need to not drink, like when I was fighting a bad cold, I can do that just fine. I didn't drink for two weeks when my body was badly dehydrating itself already. I can still say no. The bigger problem is that alcohol, much more so than weed, is chemically addicting.

The biggest problem is this newfound commitment to truth and open honesty that I have. I discovered it through blogging, and it seems now Drew has adopted it as well. Chris has adopted it, Alex has tried, and lots of my friends have said they agree with it. Some have tried it that I don't know, I'm sure. When I'm drunk, it's a whole lot easier to do. When I went back home during parents weekend, I got drunk with a lot of my friends - and told them all a lot of really good things I had to say about them that weren't easy to get out. I'm not an angry drunk, or a violent drunk. I'm just the opposite. I'm the happiest drunk out there..... usually.

I had one incident. Where it got so bad, I can't even explain it.

I meant to go to the counsellor. I really was going to. Then I missed my appointment.

I was going to reschedule, but then it happened.

The reason I actually wrote this blog.

Like Drew, nobody would have believed it.

I found God.



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Pick your jaw up off the floor. Especially because I'm going to tell you how I found God, and I hope it's going to help Drew. Because he too has found God in the way I have - he just isn't quite sure of it yet, because he's a pledge. I found God through my fraternity. Through a story I honestly cannot relate to you because of an oath I took, I found a basic faith in humanity, and mankind, that I fundamentally believe must be the underlying basis of all things.

I do not believe that the world, the universe, or anything within it can possibly be ruled by chaos, because no order would present itself. No rational patterns would exist. This is how I now believe in predestination, fate, and Maxwell's Demon. Maxwell's Demon is God. I don't mean to describe God as a demon, as in anything evil, but for those of you who didn't have physics w/ Mr. Krieger (who taught it to us), here is the concept of Maxwell's demon.

In chemistry and then physics, we learned of something called the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. It states that at NO point in time can we, humans, know both the exact position and velocity of a given particle, because to find either one we have to bounce another particle or a photon off of it, thereby altering the one we've not measured and rendering it indeterminate. Take a corrollary though: At this exact point in time, all particles in the universe have a given position and velocity. Just because we can't measure it doesn't make it less true. The concept of Maxwell's Demon is simple: suppose there is a demon which somehow, through magic, can know the position and velocity of every particle in the universe, including those of the neurons and electrochemicals in the brains of living things like ourselves. If that demon has infinite processing power he can predict how the particles will affect each other, very much like a pool shark knows exactly where each ball on a table will end up when he takes a shot. This demon can predict the future, and thereby we have no free will because everything is predetermined.

This sounds like a pretty grim concept until you realize that this in no way matters. What we define as free will IS free, it's just predetermine. Just because Maxwell's Demon knows what we're doing before we do it, doesn't mean I feel any less free. And in the end, our emotions are what this all comes down to.

So Maxwell's Demon is God.

He knows everything that has and will happen, and may have had a hand in setting things in motion - but he's not watching over us smiting the sinners and blessing the good, even though he knows what they're doing. If there is an afterlife, it's totally ethereal, and although there is little evidence for it, there is even less actual evidence against it. Therefore its existance is the most likely explaination, and damnation MAKES NO SENSE.

I think I needed some kind of death in the family to understand this. Ever since Siegfried died, I've had this image in my mind of her above me, running around in a grassy field, rolling over to have her belly rubbed and eating the grass, utterly happy. It's the image of her I'll remember for the rest of my life, until I too go to that place and rejoin my lifelong friend. I know she's up there - don't ask me how, but I do. And thats how I know I've found God. Because for the first time in my life I can reconcile my science and my faith, and my feelings. And I can be utterly happy in the face of death because something in my tells me it's going on.

This is how billions of people have believed in this, and I have called them brainwashed. This is how billions of people have felt this, and I have called them stupid. I don't change my belief that most were brainwashed and stupid, because most were also trained to be bigoted pigs. But I do clearly understand now that I too was stupid, and that not everything they were told was untrue.

This I will leave as close to the end of my blog, because it's my best note. And only in the presence of my best note, and my explaination to you all of how I have found inner peace, and faith in mankind, can I say two more things. Which are likey to be long.

First, the $64,000,000 question, was this: How is it that the most damaging thing a girl can do for my self esteem is tell me she finds me attractive? Call me hot, or whatever you want to say - how is it that that's -the- worst thing she can do to me?

I know the answer. And I'm still pretty certain none of you do.

But that doesn't fucking matter anymore, because of how I found my faith- My Fraternity.

Faith is the reason this brotherhood, and hundreds like it can exist. It's the reason any Beta across the country will take me in without knowing me. They don't have any kind of guarentee that the Betas of this chapter wouldn't have taken in a bad brother, who will never do bad things, or who is somehow of a higher moral caliber than the rest of the world. What we have is an undying faith in mankind which is the source of our strength. We cannot call each other brother if we can't trust each other implicitly, not because we know each other, but because we believe in everyone. That faith is a basic principle of my fraternity, and I share no secrets with you by telling you this. Every fraternity across the country must have that at its core or it will collapse, because a brother that can't trust even the furthest brother from him is the undoing of his chapter, and then his fraternity. You do not get to where I am without knowing, learning, realizing or feeling this.

This is why I'm slightly saddened that Drew is going PKE instead of Beta, but I'm glad he's going greek. Because as much as you fucking bastards will openly disrespect what I've come to love, and realize that what you do is like pissing on my fucking face, I know that he knows this truth. And I know he'll get out of it what he puts in, and I trust him because he is a good person and because I know him personally to put in everything, and that he will prove himself worthy of the highest. So I'm slightly saddened that I'll never get to call him Brother. At least not for that reason. But I'm sure as hell fucking glad I've been able to call him Friend, and I hope I'll always continue to be able to do so.
:: Peter 1:22 AM [+] ::
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