So be prepared, this is going to be a long one...
I was born in Japan, and have lived since in (in chronological order with repeats) Washington D.C.; Brazil; Oakland California; El Salvador; Oakland, California; Honduras; a boarding school in Danville, California; Bolivia; Louisiana; Maryland; Santa Cruz, California; Oregon; Croatia; Kosovo; Poland; and finally, the Czech Republic. The explanation for all this is that my father was a diplomat and, further, that in Brazil he and my mother separated (later to divorce) and I moved between them at my own choice as to whom to live with each year at around the age of eight (meaning it started to be my choice where to live at the age of eight). The first experience of the separation itself was my mother leaving with my newborn (six or so months old) to California with my sister and me staying with my father in Brazil and then moving to join my mother and sister in California to begin elementary school at the age of five. My mother had begun her first career as an ice-skating coach (she coached Kristi Yamaguchi up to about two years prior to her winning the Olympic Gold medal). I never lived in any one place for more than two consecutive years until here in Prague, where I have been over 17 years now.
My family history is a bit on the complicated side as well. I have one younger sister and two younger brothers (by a different mother). My father had a very successful career as a diplomat, eventually reaching assistant secretary of state, ambassador to El Salvador, and being named the head of important UN and OSCE missions in Europe. His intelligence, good humor and hard work carried him very far and to a great many long lasting friendships. His primary trait though is narcissism and it has both served him and hindered. I will get into the pervasive effects of narcissism in my life and that of my family in another post. Suffice to say here that my father, no matter any faults, is a good and caring person who has accomplished a great, great many things. He remarried once; that marriage lasted until my step-mother passed away from a brain tumor roughly a decade ago. She was Brazilian by birth and a wonderful story teller, mother, and person, though she and I struggled to get along when I was younger, due to my intransigent need to be the center of attention and giver of my own rules. As I aged and understood her better as well as myself our relationship became far healthier and collaborative. My mother remarried three times, though she is not married currently and does not seem particularly interested in ever finding a partner again. She believes now, and is likely right, that having been raised in a narcissistic household led to poor choices in husbands. My mother owns and runs a successful thread company and is a wonderful example of seeking and finding one's niche in life despite occasional misses. I wish I had understood as a child growing up how many things I was learning from her example and how many more I could have learned a long time ago if I had only paid attention. She, too, is a remarkable person and her love and support have been tremendously important to me through most of what I have gone through. I will try to examine my relationships with each of my closest family members in individual posts later.
My sister, who is married to one of our former step-brothers (they met as adults) and I sometimes lived together growing up and sometimes apart. I was definitely not always the best or most attentive of brothers, and my long established history (again, one I hope I have ended) of using others for myself led to her basically cutting off ties. We haven't spoken in the last five or six years. I will be looking to establish contact again soon. She has two beautiful daughters, who couldn't be more opposite in many ways--where one is introverted and prone to still contemplation, the other is extroverted and a whirlwind of physical activity. I admire them both from afar. My brothers are a good bit younger than I am, though they each possess wisdom I long lacked and sensitivities to things I spent most of my life blind to. They are each married and are fathers of young children. It is they to whom I am closest and owe many thanks for their support and love through my many trials and tribulations. The older of the two, has a newborn son whereas the younger of the two has two daughters younger than elementary school age. I truly hope I can be a better uncle in their childhood years than I was to my sister's daughters.
I, on the other hand, was married once, but it lasted for only about a year. The marriage ended when my wife and best friend discovered that each was greatly attracted to the other, and decided to see where that would lead. I have to say now, looking back, that my wife, Tereza, was right that Ken (my then best friend, at least in my mind) was the likely better partner. I, at that time, was only beginning to see through the haze of narcissism and self created illusions that surrounded me. It was very tough going, but I am glad now that it happened. I then had a relationship of eight years that ended due to my own issues with myself. I am still very close to her, and hope that we can begin anew, not where we left off, but as a new relationship, as I am a very different person today and only hoping to continue that path away from who I was becoming. That is an ongoing story that I will delve into in other blogs.
My work career has been very varied as well. I have worked in a great many jobs and will probably herein forget a few, but I will try not to, including even jobs that I did for a month or so. Anything I did for less time I will omit. I will attempt to make it chronological, but that won't be as easy as it would seem. Tennis instructor, wine server, taught a course on california wines, waiter (several times over), made phone calls to people who had purchased an alarm system, car sales, ice cream server, manufactured homes sales, humanitarian worker for NGOs, restaurant managing partner, english teacher, general studies teacher, poker professional, and writer.
I have nearly (inches or one wrong reaction away) died at least ten times, been marked for death on public radio by guerrilla groups daily, been hospitalized with a brain hemorrhage, been shot at or had a knife pulled on me, been one of the initial responders to a massacre (41 killed), been robbed and extorted, lived in luxury and been practically (I slept in a friend's truck) homeless, and have seen first-hand horrific poverty in third world countries. My life experiences have been extremely varied, and have carried with them a great many lessons, some of which I was very slow to learn from while others seared their lessons into my brain right away. These lessons are particular to me, in that others would take away other thoughts, but I believe that what I learned can and should be shared as it might at least make good fodder for thought for others.
My life philosophy and beliefs have emerged from making an endless number of mistakes, dealing with what was once (hopefully no longer) a monstrous ego (to the point of narcissism run wild), a great deal of reading and thinking, and a strong belief and love of personal freedom for all. It is this--we are all in this together and should do our best to help those in need (including animals) and strive to make the world a place in which freedom of individuals is paramount. This freedom extends to everything, so long as it is not used to hurt others. Governments, and thus the laws in most, if not all, countries have been corrupted to an extent that is almost unimaginable by moneyed interests. We are today a world, for the most part, that has been fattened up, dumbed down, stripped of our rights systematically while fooled into believing that it's for our own good, and managed by the constant application of fear. I am libertarian and environmentalist at heart, but believe that each individual should think about every single political issue relevant to him/her and decide for themselves what is the best way forward rather than the "team-think" we are pushed into where the only two teams are the republicans and the democrats. Issues have more than two sides and are often far more complex than we are led to believe.
My goals in this blog will be to expose and discuss the worst of what I see constantly around me involving health, mental health, money matters, politics, social manipulation, and even 'conspiracy' (I use the quotation marks to signify that I have a different idea of what that means than most). There will be a great deal of elaboration on things mentioned briefly above. Also, I love films and literature, so I will occasionally write thoughts on those topics as well, along with whatever else comes to mind.
I appreciate those who have made it here to the end and wish everyone well.
me about a decade ago.