Hello world!

Hello world! You know, I wish I had a nickel for every time I have seen that phrase. Programmers of the world will appreciate that. Others won’t. That’s what you call a “differentiating characteristic” isn’t it?

I won’t even pretend for a moment to know why I am starting a blog. I have resisted for so long. And, yet, I am driven to express something…and…well, this is the easiest medium to touch. My wife is a blogspert, so I’ll leave the higher reasoning to her. I just gotta be me…immortal words and all that.

I will begin by saying that these are “the reasoned drunken ramblings” of a mediocre slob. Frankly, having read a few blogs, I don’t think I have much to say. But, when the muse strikes (and the muse has been beating me incessantly about the head and shoulders lately) I am compelled to respond.

Let’s start at — oh, I don’t know — the beginning.

I grew up on a farm. Actually, I was a military brat for some years. But I truly grew up on a West Texas farm. I was raised by my grandparents and I learned the essential lessons primarily from my grandparents (the farmers in question). They weren’t perfect. They weren’t wealthy. In fact they were “farm folk” in every sense of the words. And yet they taught me all of the lessons that have made me who I am today (someone that you, frankly, don’t know yet).

I came to live on the farm when I was seven years old. It was hard at first. I was living in dire fear that my step-father would find me and…well…do more violence. Oddly enough, as I write this, you will note that I often look upon my past with “renewed” eyes. As an adult I can truly say that I see things differently. As a child…it was different. Suffice to say, my grandparents gained custody of me at seven (prolonged court battle, blah, blah, blah) and I was an instant “farm boy”. I don’t know the hows or whys, but I was somehow bestowed with a certain innate intelligence and wonder that came to uniquely shape my future. But, back to the farm. We raised sheep, maize (no, not corn), and cotton. My grandfather toiled every second I knew him. My grandmother as well. And we were rich.

Rich? Yep. I had security, food, almost anything my heart desired, support, freedom, and a sense of excitement and future. Sounds pretty rich to me. In truth, I really didn’t even know what that word meant until I was a teenager…and even then I still thought it to be true. I’m much older now and I have a new perspective on the whole thing. And I still think we were rich. I’ve come to know my grandparents as people. I am fully aware of the inherent economics of a farm. Trust me, I grew up as a rich child. What I thought of as “given” as a child came at a high cost. Those people paid an unbelievable price so that I would never know the hardship that being a “farm boy” was. Little did I know at the time but “you’re going to college” was the only payment they expected. I did. And I did very well. They created me and they passed away too soon. Not a day goes by that I don’t thank them in my thoughts for the fortitude, morals, pride, foresight, and strength that they infused within me. I am their living creation and I hold their absentee judgement as my highest standard. Dignity. We’ll get back to that.

Now that William Shatner has used the word “blog” in public forum I’m afraid that I have arrived too late. As I said, I have resisted this. But the last thing any of us want to go to our graves thinking is “I wish I’d said…”. Fair enough. Here it is. I have been a proponent of the Internet (yes, I still remember why we capitalize it) since FTP was my only porn outlet. I have obviously evolved a bit since then, but I find it sad that when it finally presented a healthy outlet for my mundane insanity, I intentionally skipped the boat.

So, all this “farm boy” talk and history will come up again, I guarantee it. But, no one likes a long-wind, right? I’ll end this by setting forth some of my beliefs. We’ll go from there.

1. War in Iraq. Wow, I start out big, don’t I? I do not see this as a war. We are now in the active stages of what I have always called “nation building”. We are involved in what Kennedy termed “a new kind of war”. There was a lot of foresight there. Am I a rabid Bush supporter? No. That isn’t to say that I’m a Bush contestor, either, though. Be careful. I learned a long time ago to use my own noggin. And that’s what I’ll do here. Are we succeeding? Yes, in my opinion. But just barely. I have enough contacts and information from the region to convince me that the vast majority of people in Iraq (and Afghanistan if you’ve forgotten) understand why we are there and support us. Our problem up until now is an old one. I blame every president since and including Kennedy (who only vaugely understood) for not getting a grip on this new type of war. What do you think of when I say “special forces”? Men in black sneaking up in the dead of night to wreak havoc upon our enemies, right? Forgive me for my expressiveness, but, that is bullshit. We have never before in our nation’s history deployed special forces at the level we are now, and never with such ignorance from the general populace. In matter of fact, we are now imposing the special forces doctrine upon all of our ground troops in this theater. The most important goal for our forces is to impress upon the indigenious people that we are there to help. Build schools, hospitals, wells, mosques, roads…whatever. We cannot (and don’t expect) to win this effort without these special acts. What pisses me off to no end is a generation of leaders (all of them, including the Bushes) that have ignored this as a primary training directive to our ground troops. Can a special forces “operator” shoot better that most? Can he clear a house in record time? Operate a huge array of explosives and act as an insurgent? Yes. Hell, yes. Is that what he is best at? No. And, sadly, not many people know that. And, even more sadly, the type of training that makes these folks good at helping people has been denied our “regular” troops for too long. So, now we have GI Johnny over there with a tricked out M4 trying to understand why a 74 year old man is defending his house with a musket. It isn’t his fault…no one told him. There is a movie that I frankly hated. Too many soap boxes. But there were a couple of good quotes. The movie was “The Siege” with Bruce Willis and Denzel Washington. Say what you will, but I think there were some introspective moments. One quote from Bruce Willis’ character was:

“The Army is a broad sword, not a scalpel. Trust me, senator – you do not want the Army in an American city.”

I don’t think that stops at “American”. We have brave and honorable (for the VASTLY most part) troops in Iraq. But they have not received the training needed to be a civil order force. We are learning this lesson…hopefully, before they are deployed elsewhere.

The other notable quote (from the same character) is:

“[...]tanks, helicopters. And of course, the ubiquitous M16A1 assault rifle. A humble enough weapon until you see a man carrying one outside your local bowling alley or Seven-Eleven. It will be noisy, it will be scary and it will not be mistaken for a VFW parade.”

This is, and justifiably so, our military. Yes, I understand this comment was aimed at the potential of an internal occupation, but if you think the countries that we are occupying are just sand dunes and camels, you really haven’t done your homework.

We retain enough force to saturate, overcome, and subdue any military on this planet. But, can we convice a farmer to stop storing explosives? Well, I guess we will find out. I believe that our greatest sin (I know, I don’t get to use that word…see below) as a nation is — at any point — a disregard for human life. Our troops are being taught how important this is and if you don’t believe me talk to a grunt coming back from over there. He or she has learned this the hard way. Sobering. Ours are the finest, most well trained, most dedicated troops on this planet. I support them 100%. If you think otherwise, we have a problem. Military force is just an extension of politics (thank you, Mr. Clausewitz) and I have issues there from time to time. But, as I said, be careful presuming you know where I stand.

2. While I seldom describe myself as an “atheist”, I think most Christians would put me in that category. I was brought up with “good Christian values” and I have never forgotten those lessons. However, my view of the world has been “honed” somewhat and I now prescribe to no organized religion. Does that mean I think religion is bad? No. Do I know anything about the religion that I have left behind? Oh, yes (quiz me if you like, I taught Sunday school for years). Faith is an integral part of many people’s lives and I will do absolutely nothing to disavow them of that faith. But I have very concrete reasons for not participating. I do believe in a human destiny, though.

3. I believe that the most important human force in my life is my wife. I am by no means a perfect example of humanity, but this person continues — unwaveringly — to love me. I depend on her to be my constant source of inspiration, humility, humanity, satisfaction, and happiness. She is my light.

4. I believe that domesticated animals are a human experiment in unconditional love. I often find myself more incensed by acts of cruelty towards animals than humans. They were created and bred to be companions. We should respect the power that we have wielded over nature (at least in this one aspect) and treat these creatures with the respect they deserve. Yes, yes, as humans we are masters of all we survey, etc, etc. But we invented these creatures for our pleasure and, damn it, we should treat them accordingly. It fills my heart with sadness that there are people that have looked into a helpless domesticated animal’s eyes and felt only anger and revulsion. As you may have guessed, I feel a little strongly about this.

5. I love to write. Actually, I love to communicate. Talk, write, sign, code…whatever. One of the few times I feel confident enough to write at this level is via the magical chemical elixir: alcohol (which I once lost a writing competition by misspelling). Take what you can get, I always say.

6. I love music (it seems like that should be followed by “long walks on the beach, cuddling, and children”). While I have proven time and time again that I am an absolutely inept musician, I still love the stuff. I am by no means an expert on bands or songs, but music never fails to soothe my…well, you know.

7. I believe that conscience is our own, private beacon. In any higher intelligence (what, you thought you were the only one?) you will find the irritating, beguiling, constant, forthright presence of conscience. In an earlier time in my life I found that I was operating almost entirely without any notice (or complete suppression) of my conscience. Let’s just say that allowed me the flexibility to do some fairly bad things (a la “Grosse Point Blank”) and leave it at that. But, in the end, I decided that to move on with my life I needed to define who I was. The only answers I could find had to do with my conscience. My beliefs are based primarily on Game Theory and Ayn Rand…to each their own. But here is the breakdown (for me): My conscience is (no, really, cliche aside) my guide. If I find that I am having a conflict of conscience I need to either a) stop doing what I’m doing or b) revise my inherent set of rules. You will find that option b poses a thick and thorny set of problems if you have truly thought out your “set of rules” in the first place. And, trust me, I’ve thought them out. Have you? Really? Good for you!

8. I *LOVE* technology. Funny, coming from a farm boy, eh? From the first time I soldered together a solar powered can opener to the last time I tried to uninstall Mandrake Linux (impossible, as far as I can tell) I have been in constant swoon. Does this make me a geek? Well, I’m writing a blog…you figure it out. (That’s a compliment to some of you and a horrible, horrible insult to the rest…live with it.) But, in the end, I will always love analog watches more than digital. My first modem was 300 baud. How many of you can say that? Or, for that matter, what “baud” is? I still actually remember the Hayes Instruction Set. *sigh* And, I have never — in my entire life — owned an “off the shelf” computer (although I did teach a class on COTS (Cheap Off The Shelf) redundant computing in college). I’ve actually met Peter Norton and I was a subscriber to Computes! Gazette and a beta tester of Mosaic. Ah, the good old days. So, what is this “blog” stuff anyway?

Thanks for sticking it out this far. In the future I will address: dignity, Rush Limbaugh, handheld computing, performing weddings, human ritual, what “Otter” means, and billiards. Ah, billiards.

Goodnight. And adios. Time to refresh my drink.

Otter