{"id":1143,"date":"2008-01-26T22:25:22","date_gmt":"2008-01-27T03:25:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/1143"},"modified":"2008-01-26T22:45:04","modified_gmt":"2008-01-27T03:45:04","slug":"random-neighbor-conversation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/1143","title":{"rendered":"Random Neighbor Conversation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>So I&#8217;m out strolling around the neighborhood, cigar in hand, still trying to burn off some nervous energy from my holiday adventures, when I happen across a neighbor packing his car for a little trip.&nbsp; We chat for a brief moment, and it leads to this short exchange&#8230;\n<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><strong>Me<\/strong>: Yeah&#8230;I&#8217;m still trying to de-stress from my holiday trip.&nbsp; My path took me past two of the great loves of my life&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><strong>He<\/strong>: I can see where that would lead to stressful times&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Me<\/strong>: Yeah.&nbsp; My Ex down in Hilton Head just Had to show me the house he&#8217;s living in now&#8230;with the guy he dumped me for.&nbsp; I tried to explain&#8230;but he insisted and I just can&#8217;t say no to him&#8230;&nbsp; (shakes head)&nbsp; He just had to show me.&nbsp; Arrgh&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><strong>He<\/strong>: (Grins)&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Me<\/strong>: And then I drove through Florida, where my first love lives now&#8230;&nbsp; So basically about half my vacation amounted to taking a tour past the lives they&#8217;ve both made for themselves&#8230; (shrug&#8230;puff&#8230;)<\/p>\n<p><strong>He<\/strong>: Yes.&nbsp; But you survived.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Actually&#8230;that&#8217;s still an open question.<\/p>\n<p>One of my D.C. friends asked me why I fucking did that to myself.&nbsp; I told him I didn&#8217;t know.&nbsp; And, really, I don&#8217;t.&nbsp; Except it&#8217;s just the way I am.&nbsp; I had to know.&nbsp; It&#8217;s why I was never able to just sit in my church pews and passively accept what I was being told about life, morality, evolution, creation, and my relationship to my creator.&nbsp; Ever since I was old enough to lay on my back at night and look up at the stars and wonder what they were, I&#8217;ve always had to know what is.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><em><font class=\"quote\">For in much wisdom is much grief:  and he that increaseth  knowledge increaseth sorrow.<\/font><\/em><br \/>\n-Ecclesiastes (ch. I, v. 18)<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">That&#8217;s not really true.&nbsp; Knowledge is broadening.&nbsp; Both the joys and the sorrows increase.&nbsp; But there&#8217;s a point you reach where you find you can&#8217;t cope anymore.&nbsp; Understanding nature as it really is, has provided me with very great joy.&nbsp; But there&#8217;s only one joy that can ease the sorrow I&#8217;ve lived with most of my life, and I don&#8217;t see it coming.&nbsp; And that one great sorrow just really drags me down lately.&nbsp; I don&#8217;t think anyone who knows me really sees how bad it is.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">I wish I could draw.&nbsp; If I could just draw it might help a little.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>So I&#8217;m out strolling around the neighborhood, cigar in hand, still trying to burn off some nervous energy from my holiday adventures, when I happen across a neighbor packing his car for a little trip.&nbsp; We chat for a brief moment, and it leads to this short exchange&#8230; Me: Yeah&#8230;I&#8217;m still trying to de-stress from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[77],"class_list":["post-1143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-the-dumpsville-chronicles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1143","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1143"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1143\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brucegarrett.com\/brucelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}