Fish and the Wall

 

Rainbows and Tears - Native American Proverb

 

The Nut Sneezes

 

When the Sky Falls - Irish Proverb

 

Loudest Pet

 

PSY 727 “My Vantage Point”

This is my first essay for grad school tell me what you think.

3^rd January 2012

Week #1 Assignment “My Vantage Point”

            We may start with the understanding that I have an analytical mind, and that implies that I like to understand things by breaking them down into parts. It is common for me to name things because giving something a name is the first human act of understanding. For example, I place my compost in a bin to permit the vegetation to die; because these yard clippings become layers that I must then mix I call this first stage of compost “stratified compost.” When the compost is placed in the rock enclosure it becomes just compost. Likewise, when I cut wood the piece of wood I intend to use I call the “product,” and the wood I will not use becomes “scrap.” The name assignments do very little to speed my work, but still are part of my mental framework.

            A secondary point regarding my personality is that I have worked in the field of uniformed security for the last fourteen years, and that mentality translates into other areas of my life. The primary construct of the Security Officer is “observe and report” and the secondary construct is “provide an appearance of professionalism and diligence.” As a Security Officer I detour crime by making it clear that I am present, that I am watching, and that I am a force of opposition or assistance. Given these two factors you can understand that I will give you a reasonably clear analysis of who I am.

Genetics

            Genetically speaking I come from cold weather European stalk. The colors of my features are much like that of the Irish with blue eyes and reddish blond hair. You might say that I look like the typical broad shouldered Irishman. In truth my body morphology is more of the Slovak nature with fat that sits on my frame in blankets to shield me from the cold. I believe my stalk is more prone to depression as depression would serve better to survive the long cold winters. Genetically I am a creature of the cold and so can live isolated and alone for long periods.

Environment

            Environmentally I have two major circles of influence. The first of these being my work where I spend most of my waking hours and the second being my home. It is possible that I could also include another college or time with my friends, but I feel they would be best addressed elsewhere.

I work at a homeless shelter and stabilization program for people between the ages of eighteen and twenty four. I fear picking up the bad grammar and vulgar vernacular of the residents as many of the other staff members have. Speech tends to bleed into the brain through the ears and become part of thought patterns. Thus, if I speak poorly or use base language this is a result of where I work. The large number of film geeks at this facility may give me a Hollywood outlook on life. In the modern day that tends to mean that I will think somehow it will all work out. Life is so rarely like that and we go to movies to escape life.

My home environment is as disordered as my mind and is a great cause of frustration. I live with my mentally ill brother, and his gross inability to help with the housework plaices a great burden on my time. The very morning I write this I have spent two hours cleaning and would have a home that is not an embarrassment where I to spend the next two weeks at the soul purpose of banishing clutter from my abode. This is a place where something as substantial as a boot can disappear beneath the clutter. They say the desk is a reflection of the mind, but I would say the home is more encompassing. When I am right my home will be right so far as I can see.

Learned Behavior

            Where do I display learned behavior? In this regard I would have to say ‘where do I overtly display learned behavior?’ We all learned to slow down when we see a police car or to step aside when we run into dog mess. One point where this comes up in my early life is anger. I had a group of ‘friends’ who only listened to me when I was screaming so I learned to scream. They complained that I was always angry so I learned to not hang out with them. In the first case the anger response was reinforced and in the second avoiding them was rewarded with less frustration. Both of these instances are negative reinforcement or the removal of a negative experience.  

            It can be said that I have learned to keep redundant systems because I have had computers fail on me when I needed them. Likewise, I have learned to replace my clothing before it gets ratty. This came after spending two or three minutes every morning for a month sorting through the old T-shirts to find one that had a good choler. Over time it became clear that I save time by keeping things in good repair.

Unconscious factors

            Who can truly tell what is going on under their skull? I believe that my mother’s death formed an unconscious desire to stop time leading to my long time collections of useless and worthless junk. I still have my Windows 95 computer for no good reason. I scrapped parts off it a few years ago so it lies in bits on a garage shelf. I kept the old printer cables even when they stopped making printers for them and only tossed them away in 2010 as if they would have made a comeback.

            I often think that my aversion to getting drunk has something to do with my father’s drinking habits. The old man drank cheap booze and got roaring drunk. I have always felt the old man to be less than honest, and so I never drink so much that I cannot drive. You could think of this as an unconscious rebellion or simply a good idea. It had to figure into my brain at some point by way of the unconscious.

Social Influences

            I presently have both a blog and a webcomic because society says these are the in thing. Social media is a large mark of our age, and I slowly and limply participate. Participating in social trends like fashion or music has never played well with me, and I listen to the radio only to have something to do when I drive. I buy clothing that needs little ironing and washes well, but the solid saturated tones I prefer are what are provided. I would like a green shirt but as the Dickies store does not sell them so I do not buy. I could order one online, but I honestly have no need to display my individuality by dressing one way or another.

Parenting

            If there is one thing I can say about my family it is that it was dysfunctional. Crazy has something of an attraction to itself, and I have a clear understanding that both my father and mother came from dysfunctional homes. My mother died young and as the last seven years of my knowing her she spent most of her time in a hospital or working I will move on to my primary caregiver. My father was the kind of man who would lose the argument and forget about it the next day so you would need to have the same argument over again. He was the kind of man who understood violence and only violence.

            As I was the youngest of the family and had no strength for fighting there was no way for me to win an argument. During my early life I had no means with which to change my situation and that breeds depression and anxiety. From this I took on a cynical nature and a tendency to keep fighting even when a situation is hopeless. I would imagine this would be an advantage in counseling as I will give up on no one.  Thus, the primary aspect of my personality coming from parenting is a dogged nature.

Culture

Before I am anything culturally I am an American. I believe Americans to be a people of extreme actions. Those who smoke often make a religion of it as do those who do drugs. In America we see the biggest cars, people, houses, naval ships, and so forth. As a product of that environment I love or hate things with more energy than I need.  America is a big place, and we are by nature a diverse people, but I still cannot call myself much of a Californian or Los Angelino. I would say that I have always been something of a societal outsider, so I tend to be more functional rather than imitative.

Foot Snack

 

Play Door

I recall this only in a fleeting way and by the nature of my fragmented mind I have little understanding of what made me think this was a passable journal entry for class. Then I recall I got an A++ in that class as I had completed more than one hundred percent of the class material.

This was a journal assignment that the teacher graded on the fact that it was turned in at all. I could have scribbled on cardboard and he would have accepted it without a word. It was one of five assignments that I had to do three of and I did all five.

At the time I loved theater and theater loved me. That all changed in college but as I wrote back then ‘what can you do?’

RL Neal

                                                                                                per6

                                                                       Oct\27\1995

     

This week I believe I was very productive; the majority of my time was used on erecting a door for the Latino Theater. It was a lot to endure considering it was a complete wreck but what can you do? I hope we repaint it because the paint on it has been scratched horrifically. We can't use it for the house of any well off family that’s for sure.

         

I started on the lighting for that project as well, but I think we need more red gels for the set plan but Steve can't make up his mind. He wants a very particular set up that I call "moon light and fire light".  It’s just a combination of red and blue lights but Steve thinks it’s to complicated for him it just a simple rig. Just 3 plugs but no now he just wants blue yesterday he wonted green. Someone straiten that kid out.

         

 I did some painting this week in addition to my normal bust to the wall painters. I only got one chair done. It’s not much nor is it all. I have worked at all things this week.

Sushi to Sushi

 

Drinking Varnish

 

One Good Day

Yesterday’s post was one where I explained this blog but I think this was the only one I wrote. At this point work got crazy and I was pulling eighty hour work weeks.

For those who have never been healthy gaining good health will always be hard. I spent the next weeks at this job too overworked to perform my at work workouts. Then the company lost the contract.  

On the next job I didn’t have water bottles to work out with, but I did have loads of work to do so it made no difference. Security guards are always trying to get something related to their life done at work. I’ve seen guards cook on a bbq, train togs, play instruments, nit, play video games, and run printing equipment. The level of WTF is unfathomable.  

What I did was nothing abnormal. It’s just too bad I couldn’t keep it up.

16^th December 2005

Exercises: 10 3by3 sets

Given that I must start using the specific jargon of my workouts this must be the time to explain them. I have three workout forums, my work, my home, my gym. Each has its own uses, but it is the combination of all of them that in important in achieving results.

The primary use of my work for fitness is maintenance. There are exercises that I can do at work that help me to maintain my level of fitness. The exercise I have begun with is the 3by3 or three gallon workout. You start with a three-gallon jug of water full all the way to the top and caped then you do ten pullovers, ten curls, and ten “strait up” lifts each arm.

Guess I never finished this blog. Well I never checked to see if it was posted on Myspace. Not even sure I can get into my Myspcae account any longer to check 

Duties of a Wife

Where are the Teachers?

13^th January 2012

Dear Cassi,

    

Another of the ghosts of my memory moaned today. I remember this one occasion where I was foolish enough to watch as another child was roughed up by a group his school mates. They drew no blood mind you. It was all just make believe that went too far.

    

I forget what offence this unfortunate young man committed to anger the other seven year olds. However, I know it had something to do with a contract. They surrounded him and twisted his arm but went little further than that, but the anger on his face is what I recall.     

    

They took his contract, I think it was written on notebook paper, spit on it, rubbed it on the ground and then on his face. Children can be so cruel but this happened in the school yard so the teachers are not without blame.

    

I remember there was this green ball of snot coming out of his nose, and he thought it was blood. He fumed when he felt it and reached up then looked at his hand. It looked like his head would explode.

    

The next day it was like nothing ever happened. I have trouble understanding that now days. Then again, this was the child that showed another kid his butt on a dare. He got over it and from what I know he is doing well thought he hasn’t called in more than ten years.

Stay safe, Cassi,

Richard Leland Neal

My Prints

 

My First Computer

7^th January 2012

Dear Cassi,

    

Do you recall the first time you used a computer? I do. It was one of those Apple IIe units with dual floppy drives and a green monochrome screen. Those units were donated to schools by the Apple Corporation in a highly successful attempt to promote their product.

    

I’ve been told that this action caused the only point of domination for Apple computers in the market. Everyone new Apple, so everyone bought Apple. It worked for a spell then the spell wore off and everyone went back to PC and its Windows formatting.

    

The first time I worked on a color unit was when I went into therapy for my learning disorder. I recall the Jones Clinic rather well. They had a lab of “IBM clones” that I worked on as half of my treatment. These devices were next to useless by today’s standards but I recall them being fun.

    

After my mother died my father got me a word processor that worked better than any of those computers. That business lasted until my freshman year in high school when I got a real computer. It had a half gig hard drive and sixteen megabytes of ram. That was the going system for 1994 and I thought the world of it back then. There is no greater change in our world than the computer in the last twenty years. At least most of those are for the better.

Stay safe, Cassi,

Richard Leland Neal

The Shovel

 

You Crack Me Up

 

Sand Bees and Rain Fish

5^th January 2012

Dear Cassi,

Another of the many points of youth I can now recall is that school yard my father once called the park and how my thoughts of it changed when I became a student at that school. When I was a student at the elementary level I recall what we called sand bees buzzing along the school yard. This was a time in the nature of youth where the way the world worked was still unknown to us and we saw the sand as the birth place of these bees.

     
Some of the children would wonder how the bees would one day turn yellow and join a hive to make honey. Sand bees were black and green on our playground and we thought that all the bees of the world came from the ground of our school yard.

    
 The world can be so large and so small at the same time when you are young. All the world can fit in a thimble when you are a child and still it can be the biggest thing in all understanding.

     
Another of the things born of the sand was fish made of rainwater. It would rain, as many think it does not do in California, and some of the children would toss stone into the puddles to “make the fish jump” out of the pool.

     
There were no fish. It was just droplets of water that looked like fish to young eyes. It would never come to most of those folks that the shape of fish look like drops of water because of hydrodynamics.

     
It comes to me that some of us finally understand why the world is like this and how it came into existence. Then there are those of us who simply fail to see the importance as they grow older.  

Never let the world lose its magic,

Richard Leland Neal

Bipartisan Policy - Bernie Sanders

Books of Learning

04/21/2010

Dear Children's Books (Publisher),

What you have here is a children's picture book manuscript written in rhyme and teaching children the difference between pear the fruit and pair as in two things with some mention of to pare.

I yield to your better authority how it is all to be edited and produced. I have only the experience of reading to children as my guide in the area. I do know something of art work and printing so I can easily understand what limitations you set up. The poem is fifty-two lines but how many lines appear on one page is up to you.

I have been published three times in the past as a poet in periodicals. Once with my junior high school and twice in high school but have submitted nothing professionally.

Thank you for your time,


Richard Leland Neal

Practical Politics - Henry Brooks Adams

Evils of Life

15^th January 2012

Dear Cassi,

Another week has passed and grad school, work, and being sick come together as a pill a snake would have trouble getting down. I have little idea what to do with myself. It’s nothing new that I feel as if there simply isn’t enough time, but now the hard coughing and runny nose are getting the better of me.

   

As it has always been with me, and most folks I think, I wish I could just turn the world off and take stalk. If I had six weeks of nothing to do I would just piss it all away so turning the world off wouldn’t help. That’s what happened during my unemployment. I spent my time reacquainting with TV shows and movies I had missed.    

   

If you think I’m mad at myself your right. I let depression and despair get the better of me and now look. I’m truly no better off than I was a month ago. I will say that I’m better off than I was six months ago, and last year round this time I could hardly get out of bed.

   

Okay, so I just feel bad, and it’s honestly no big deal. I still should have all three of my comics posting instead of just one. Then I guess I’m putting too many steps in the way of getting them squared. I’m trying to seek out the spelling errors and replace the text when I have to, but I need to get all those old comics up on the new sites.

   

Sometimes, Cassi, I feel like the only real link to who I am and who I was is that old comic site that I need to ask that fair-weather friend, Eric, to take down. That old comic site is like some beacon of hope to the evils that once dominated my life.

Stay safe, Cassi,

Richard Leland Neal

Children are Growing Up - P. J. O-Rourke

What They Think of Us - Ann Landers