My Journey Back to ME starts with a Z

I will celebrate four years of fatherhood tomorrow morning at 7:08. Early that morning in October, I witnessed a miracle. I am forever grateful for her mom and all that she went through to get Zara from “there to here” it was a lot.... to say the least.

Four years, man where did the time go? A lifetime of memories flash in a instant.

I got married got fat I was happy I keeping up with the Joneses, like I was supposed to be. A lot has happened since the blessing of the bear. I've lost some important figures in my life, mainly mom. I miss her a lot. God does not cure cancer, chemo does. I wish her and Zara would have gotten to know each other. I miss her random letters. I miss her laugh.

I lost it this morning when I was getting her ready to go back to her moms house for another birthday party, her third in as many days. The kid is spoiled rotten but why not? She is a good kid, well behaved and deserves to be happy all the time. (within reason)

I've never cried in front of Zara before,but as i was strapping on her back pack i couldnt help it. The tears just came and this wasn't a couple of tears rolling down my cheeks. There were snot bubbles and flowing tears the whole shebang. But I couldn't stop smiling, and neither could she. I looked into her eyes and saw all that I have, not what I have lost, and once again realized she is all that I need.

I lived a very a blessed life, as weird as it is, I wouldn't change it. This is how I go back to me. This is how I found my smile. Rock bottom is always about 30 feet past where you thought it would be, but all you can do is quietly say “fuck you, and ill see you on the way back up”.

Here I am

IM UP HERE!!

4 years and 8 days is a drop in the hat

so im back to the blogs

first thing that i noticed when i logged back into my profile is that the only fact i listed when i registered this domain is that "i am a smoker", i wasn't bragging about illicit drugs cause that would have been neat amirite? No, I was actually proud of the fact that i smoked with cigarettes

As of today i have not had a cigarette in 8 months 8 days and believe me i pat myself on the back as much as possible. I have room to pat myself cause that fucking monkey is gone

I started for the same reasons that we all did, we wanted to fit in for some reason we thought we looked cool doing it, and the next thing you know it became part of my daily routine.

wake up...smoke.

open car door pull out cigarette......smoke

go on break at work.....smoke

eat ANYTHING.....smoke

someone else smoking.....smoke

talking on the phone.......smoke

after sects*........smoke

while smoking(Ross)......smoke

drink....SMOKE

these were my biggest "triggers" and i can say with no bullshit that quitting smoking was one of the easiest things that i have ever done. You are smarter than your addiction, and if you want I will help you stop shoot me an email...theadamgraves@gmail.com

It is seriously fucking retarded to give yourself cancer...stop

My next post wont be so smoker bashing, just wanted to get that out of the way

I am NOT a smoker...i am smarter than my addiction

*its for exactly what you think it is

5-3-10

The Wonder Of Having A Sister

I have a sister named Courtney. Soon to the sister formally known as Courtney, she will now be refered to as Auntie. She is mother to one of the most precious things that I have ever known, my God-daughter Madeline. My sister have had a relationship that I suppose is typical of brohter sister, as far as that goes. But Courtney has on many occasions gone the extra mile to be a better sister than I have as being a brother. I have been for the majority of my life a independent person, I was the cat of my family. I stayed away when I wanted to, but when I needed her she was always there. In high school i was depressed. I was a aqward kid with little or no social skills. Bottom line I attempted to atempt suicide (more of a cry for help than anything) my sister was in college at the time. But she came home for the weekend just to hang out with me, talk though my shitty problems and let me know that life would get better, and it did. I stood with my sister on the day that she got married, I held her child as she was baptized. She has let me know on more tht one occasion that I was important to her, and in return I have done very little, but you know what she still loves me. Look up unconditional love in the dictionary and you will see a picture of Courtney Milleson. She is a wonderful woman, who I am glad to not only call a sister, but proud to call her a friend. Thank you sister for always being there. I love you

Whats Wrong With the Norm?

Pit The Enemy Against Themselve and what you find is a Animal

An article in the Amarillo Globe News grabbed my attention today. The letter came from a woman in Hereford who had been viciously attacked by a Pit Bull terrier. Her small dog tried to fight her way out but the Pit was just to strong. Years of genetics had made him a far superior fighter, and he walked away from his battle. It would seem that it truly is a dog eat dog world. The woman was obviously distraught, after all a family member had been taken away from her, and she asked for revenge, she asked for blood.
The thing that she forgot that the two animals in the fight were just that,......animals. Dogs shared fires with cave-man. They crossed the seas with Columbus to the new world. They have been a part of humans lives almost as long as we have been here, but the K9 refused to be tamed. When it comes down to it a dog will always hunt to find food, and a dog will always bite when its in a fight.
How can we ask a Pit Bull to stop being a Pit Bull? Hell, we bred them, if the ferocity, or pure power of the pit bull terrier shows us anything, it is mans angst. Men had to start being men. There are no longer gunfights in the streets of our citys.. There are no longer gentleman challanging others to a "genltemans duel" Man may have forgotten how to be a man, but that is one thing animals never forget. It has been said that a pig, if released from captivity, will go feral in less than a month. A swine will go from the pink Babe like animal to the ferious motherfucker that almost killed Old Yeller, it is only a matter of time.
Now what do we do about these animals? One answer is to wipe the breed from the face of the earth. We could go door to door searching for these animals and blast there brains out. The pit bulls will all be dead, but then who amonsts us is the animal? Or we could train these animals that things have to change. This kind of violence will no longer be tollerated. the owners of these animals should be fined up the ass if an attack were to occur. It is a privledge to own one of these magestic and truly powerful animals. If an animal kills another,put it down. That is how things work in Texas.

I Just Wrote to Say I Love You

A couple of days ago I came across a song that I had not heard in years. I may have heard bits and pieces of it in elevators or passing cars, but the fact is my radio is rarely tuned to a station that plays any Stevie Wonder. And thanks to a friend of mine, Nathan and the type of society that no longer bases itself on character of integrity, but rather by the song that one has set as a ringtone that truly judges a mans gusto. He has "I Just Called to say I Love You." by Stevie Wonder set to ring when his girlfriend Chelsea calls, and I have to admit, it is sweet, there is nothing quite as amazing as knowing that somewhere in the world there is someone who cares for you, sometimes just wants to say a gentle reminder of how special you are......To just call as say I love you.
I know I am idealistic, but that is the kind of shit that I think about. So to make a long story longer I downloaded the song. As the cheesy organ started in my mind flew back twenty one years to a kid in a denim jacket, denim jeans and, a haircut that only a parent could love, sitting on the kitchen table having what would be the last discussion that I would ever have with my mom as a free man.
It was September in 1985, and that day was my first day of school. I don't remember being scared, I do think that I was a little weirded out by all of it though. My mom and I had been big pals ever since I knew what was going on, had been going on. I watched her as she exercised to Richard Simmons, (because afterwards, I got the TV!) She cooked lunch, I watched, we would go watch for my sister at lunch, drink Dr Pepper, talk, and wait for dad to come home from work. I always remember trying to pronounce his middle name, all I could ever could get out was Walrus.
Mom had been there when Michael Jackson scared my shitless, Tina Turner got me grounded from TV, and even the time that I thought someone had broken into our house to do God knows what to me and my family, it turns out it was just my dad, he had shaved as beard and I freaked out. But though thick and thin she had been there, and know I had to go hang out with someone else all day, and the idea was not sitting to well with me.
My sister always seemed to enjoy school. So from what I had heard so was a alright place. I had no reason not to want and go, I just didn't want to. As I started to listen to that song again this video started playing in my head. It was my mom talking to me, telling me that this school thing was no big deal, I was just gonna go in and before I knew it she would be back. I can still the sun shining though the sliding glass window that lead to our back yard. As our talk finished we headed to the car and started to the school. In the car Stevie was back to finish his tune, and as we headed to school the smooth-ness of his voice and the caring nurture from mom, I knew that things would OK.
Now since that day I have heard the song at least 50 times. But I didn't listen to it until this week.
"No News Years Day to celebrate...............No first of spring, no song to sing.......In fact it's just another ordinary day."
Thoughout the song Stevie covers the entire year, chronologically from New Years to Christmas, reminding us each time at the chorus, that he just called to say something very simple and very true, he just called to say I love you. His gesture was so simple that it almost broke my heart, because the more I thought about it I was still that little boy sitting on the kitchen table listening to his mom tell him that everything would be OK. No matter how far you go or how much you grow up, we are still are parents kids, and thankfully to the magic of music, and that crappy organ music, we can still be transported back to a time that had been long forgotten, be always remembered.
I think as we travel though life, much like Stevie travels though the year in his song, we need special people like our moms to call and say I love you.
Out loud I suck, but I have found a certain peace in writing, I can get a lot out banging on a keyboard, more that I even thought I had inside me. But never enough to ever sum up these these words that I write now; Mom I just wrote to say I love you!

Untitled

My jaw is on the keyboard as I type this so I apologize for the misspellings and grammatical errors that may follow suit in this entry.

Mahatma Gandhi: A man is the sum of his actions, of what he has done, of what he can do, Nothing else.

You cannot get any better than that.

I always considered myself a relatively good person. The reason for that is I only look myself in the mirror, I don’t see the ones that I hurt, because when I do that image of the good person fades to something that I would hate for my mother to see I would see a person that I never knew I became. If you take time to think about it a mirror image is a false image. Your right hand is on your left, your left on your right, but you convince yourself that this image is correct and never take the time to realize that you are a completely different person when you look in the mirror. Today I see who I am, and I feel gross.
This is the first time that I have been asked to be accountable for my actions. And I suck at it. We all do things are rarely thing about the consequences. I now can say that I am a very selfish person who rarely thinks twice. I hadn’t thought about this, and I didn’t feel bad.
I will not apologize for my actions. But instead I will say THANK YOU to the writer of the blog comment on Darwin 1. I don’t apologize for the things I have done because Marty McFly aint real, and neither is the flux capacitor I cant take back my fuck ups and as surely as I cant stop breathing. You can hold your breath forever but eventully you will take that breath and all you are left with is a headache. I say thank you because with that small paragraph you made me realize the error of my ways. .

Darwin 1 New Orleans 0

We live in weird times………….. I don’t know who said that first but I won’t take credit for it. Bob Dylan sang a song about the times and how they are a changin’. And I think that Dylan was right in the 60’s when he sang the song on the street corners, and it still holds true today.
I am confused about a certain number of things that seem to dominate the headlines on most major media outlets. Hurricane Katrina came and went this summer and left in her wake, a death toll that rivals most wars. They say that smoking is the number one cause of avoidable death in America, with obesity finishing in a close second. I think that Darwin is the big winner here, the crowd got a little more thinned out last month, and to me it makes no sense.

I grew up in west Texas, and one of the lines from my childhood that remains with me still today is “If you don’t like the weather, just wait ten minutes, it’ll change” We were in a constant state of confusion as far as the weather is concerned. I remember snow storms in early May. I remember playing basketball (shirts and skins) on Christmas day. The summer sky can be an ominous mother fucker. A pleasant day can turn fast into one filled with a deadly force and it all just depends on the high and low pressure systems that just happen to be cruising high above the West Texas landscape.
Growing up in Muleshoe I knew that if I ever heard the tornado siren, I needed to be somewhere else and fast. Even as a child I knew this. It is Holmes would refer to as Elementary.
The people in Louisiana knew for days that a storm was heading there way, they made the conscious decision to stay. I know that some critics will say that some had no way out. And to that I say. “you live in a town that on one side is the Gulf of Mexico, on the other is Lake Pontchartrain. ” water sooner or later is going to become a factor don’t you think. 11,000 people died or 1 in every 109. If a tornado would have struck Muleshoe with that kind of force, (by these numbers) 45 people would have died. Let me tell you right now. 45 people will never die together in West Texas. I would state my reputation on it.