The point is this then.

If there is a reason for all this native and singular suffering, whether collectively in a lifetime or in a spate, it can be thought that it is to make the individual a better person. The burdened person then finds a way to shrug off the worries and hardship. They find karmic or public justice away from the oppression; they overcome to find true peace and happiness.

Try telling this to someone still crushed underfoot, however, and they cannot believe you. It is sometimes worse when someone outside the personal sphere makes the observation that things can only get better.

If the point of my solitary existence at this moment and really thus far is that "when I am ready it will happen", then I have missed the train as it pulled into the station and left several times. This mindset, of course, implies that I was always the one responsible and contained some flaw for my inability to find a love, a purpose, money, sense of well-being, and so on. Obviously, if we retain the analogy then, there were several times in which I was ready for the train with ticket in hand only to watch it speed through the station without stopping.

But let's get personal before we go any further. It's a little thing I'll call "no one really wants to hear about all that, I have my own issues."

I am 38. The last time I can remember being an age is 25, except for all the gray hairs and creaking that remind me now that I'm older. I aspired to be many things in my first college career (I had two), and while I learned much there was no focus. Graduating first with a film degree, I couldn't bear leaving Wisconsin. So I took a job in a television newsroom as a video editor. This was my job, it was not a career. My career was as a writer, artist, gourmand, and general life enthusiast.

Without focus, I worked there for 10 years until I couldn't take the death, destruction, and sniping involved in local TV news anymore. I returned to university for a degree in my one constant: print journalism. It was 2004, the lip of a disastrous cliff for the profession in which thousands started to be laid off and the whole dynamic changed. I've likened it to being a glassblower and saying "I think I'll give pottery a go."

Now, I have been unemployed for over six months after a fascinating but brief online-multimedia job at a local newspaper. With my 'spare time', I currently write and do editing work at a (re-)start-up arts and entertainment website based in Milwaukee. Because of my situation, I moved home for a few months until I could get steady. That was almost three years ago. The city is 40 minutes away and I miss everything. I have hobbies and organizations. I have events that I attend, and the always shifting set of core friends to hang on.

As a result of my downward pendulum swing, I have minimum insurance and therefore avoid the doctor and good health. Without support, I would not have food, internet connection, a place to sleep, and more. I am a ghost in most matters. It is a humbling way to live and write.

As for love, I had many near misses in college (both times). There is the one who got away; she now is expecting a baby girl and has been married for nearly a decade.

There is the one who I loved more dearly than life; I accepted her lifestyle choice when she decided she was lesbian. Since then she went through a few deep relationships, got rid of me as a friend after 15 years and for reasons unknown slept with a male construction worker and got pregnant. He appears in many family photos I've seen via a sister. He looks nothing like the men or women to whom she ever said she was attracted. There was the one love where we talked about getting married; it was even after I knew of a bulimia and deep psychological issues which we addressing. I thought I could be there for support, she needed to keep me at bay to continue doing it.

There are dozens of interesting and unreported nights. There are scores of unfufilled romantic pursuits as well. I stopped trying for awhile. If I sound all very clinical about this, it's really the only way I can ever handle it without becoming maudlin or start slipping back down a wretched mountain. It takes a lot to get me interested now; it takes a lot to find my heart to take a stab at it. But it still happens.

Yet I remain a unabashed romantic at times. If I was selling myself to an internet dating company and agreeing to be judged purely by those false merits, I would be featured on the front page and television ads. Kids love me, I'm smart, I'm adoring and compassionate, I'm adventurous, I enjoy movies and remote camping, I'm kind, I listen. I can list forever. Each time I write a positive aspect I know is true, I think of a person who could point out a time when each one failed horribly.

This is the beginning of a series of essays. This is the middle of a life that I hope to put to page. There are no stories of war in a foreign land, celebrity nightclub tales, anecdotes about growing up in a coal mine town, or really anything of a connective thread that could resemble genre or subject matter. It's a perspective of someone who has grown up in an era in which anything was possible if we only reached for the stars--and believed that we could slowly buy ourselves into that classy lifestyle. It will be so deep that at times it will move like honey, yet I will always bring it back into a flowing river. At this point, I'm hoping that my life has reached a third--even if I can't take anymore.

How to Say 'I Love You'

I am technically stealing this headline. It was on my Google page some days ago as a Wiki article. But the phrase was so poetic, like the title of a movie or album, that I had to write about it even if the source material comes up short -- like so many internet articles that are "Top Ten" lists or other instructional bits that promise wisdom in a headline but fall short in the delivery. Upon searching Google with the exact phrase, it turns out this article has been attempted before (see here, here, here and here and even here). But what strikes me as having the potential for academic essay is in the context of the headline. The articles are usually pretty straight forward -- 'How to say the phrase in different languages', 'How to say it to your kids or spouse', some are courses of how to behave around a loved one.

But I didn't find one that effectively broadcasted what was a good way to *say* it. That remains an enigmatic, slippery topic. I admit, I've watched a lot of movies and TV shows that show people saying it (although really, they are often saying "I'm in love with you" and not the direct "I Love you". I'm not sure I've heard it in a modern song in awhile... But when is the last time you've heard someone else saying it to someone else? How about to yourself? Or from your lips? It seems such a rarity these days.

Is he Noah or are we King Canute?

I have loved U2 since I was a tween, listening to a cassette tape of "Joshua Tree" left behind by my sister's motorcycle-driving love interest. Who knew then that Bono would become ambassador to the world? He was (and is) enigmatic, sure. But a great essayist as well?

This week's "Time" magazine year-ender with it's 'Persons of the Year' is hit-or-miss intriguing but slightly more hit.

The article written by Bono about Runner-Up Al Gore is just a home run, however.

Mosquitoes in November

This would seem to be a blog post about finding those little blood-sucking insects in Wisconsin during a time they're all hibernating, right? No. If anything, that is the superficial reason for an update.

In my bathroom at home, the climate control is humid enough that a small family of fruit flies remained near a body lotion splotch and mosquitoes timidly banging against the walls. It was a strange and spiritual sight which caused me to say aloud, "mosquitoes in November".

Such an utterance is like saying Abracadabra in my brain, or Cellar Door. It hooks in there and takes root in some OCD-like corner. I wonder if the connotation of a word directly affects people's affection for it -- and such lists such as "100 Most Beautiful Words". These words roll off my tongue and yo-yo back into the brain with superfluous ease. But who actually likes mosquitoes -- or November?

But here's what the blog is about: keyword searches and the internet. There was a joke that now seems old coming out of one commercial several years ago showed a guy shutting off the computer and coming out to talk to his wife. He says "I finished it." She says, "Finished what?" He says, "the internet" (it was an advertisement for high-speed DSL)

But even the fun game of finding a word or phrase in Google that produces only one result known as "Googlewhacking" must be now nearly an impossible game. Even the nonsensical lyrics of Beck must produce multiple results. Like a tree with too many tiny roots, it seems that everyone has written everything in every variation (English, that is) possible.

On the issue of Sprawl

Today's Journal-Sentinel features a story very close to my heart and a concern for me going on ten years now: http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=680729

"When Shelly Mayer looks out the windows of her Washington County farmhouse, the signs of urban sprawl are clear.

Large, new homes dot the hillsides as more people move to the country and commute to the city. Getting on the road with a tractor and wagon loaded with hay is dangerous, as cars race past on the left and right.

Rising property values have made it too expensive for some farmers to buy or rent additional cropland.

"I am sitting here with subdivisions pretty much all the way around the little piece of land we own. It makes things difficult," said Mayer, who farms in the Town of Polk."