There’s one thing I dislike about writing this blog – hearing about people that are sick or pass away.
Now I understand since I’m the author, people are going to pass news my way be it positive or negative; I don’t have a problem with that so please, keep on sending me the information – I am happy to pass along anything whether good or bad.
But when people are sick and are struggling day-to-day it saddens me. When I get an e-mail or a phone call to tell me so and so passed away, I fight the tears. I got to thinking this morning when a friend sent me a note informing me that we lost another good one. (Details will be coming).
With all these good people passing, I’ve decided that I’m not stressing anymore! That’s right – things that get me riled up or stressed, F-it, I’m not going to lose sleep over trivial stuff. Life is too short! In other words, I’m not sweating the small stuff anymore. I’m losing my hair, so what! Gaining a few pounds around the mid-section, who cares! My team lost a game or I lost a recruit to another school, who gives a shit!
I’m moving on…
I’ve lived my life always worrying about what other people say, what I’m doing, whether it’s right or wrong. Afraid to ask for things, afraid to take the plunge, etc. Life is tough, I understand that, but we need to step back and examine things a bit closer. I think this behavior goes back to my childhood growing up on 9th avenue.
If I was going to take a shower and there wasn’t any hot water in our apartment, we never complained to our landlord. We just chalked it up. No heat, no problem – just throw a coat over you while you sleep. Feeling like the whole world has it out for you…later for that. The world could care less about me!
These days if my daughter is dressing a bit slower than normal and running behind for school, I look at my watch and get agitated and push her to go faster. “C’mon, we’ll be late!’ I’ll shout as I walk out the door. (I’ve since changed my stance with Taylor – a good friend lost his 19 year old son two weeks ago, I don’t want to lose Taylor)
Good people are not only losing their lives, but they’re losing their jobs, their marriage is falling apart and worst of all, people are sick. I feel lucky, I’m happily married to a wonderful woman, we have a lovely 10 year old daughter and I am doing what I love to do – coaching basketball and writing. We tend to let the smallest of things ruin our whole day. Someone looks at us the wrong way we take offense. Someone cuts us off on the road we are honking and giving them the finger. I once heard someone say, ‘you can have bad moments, but not bad days’. I was in McDonald’s yesterday and there was a long line of people waiting for their food. Some guy was bad-mouthing the organization for all to hear. The poor people behind the counter were going as fast as they could. I thought to myself, man-o-man, they’re trying their best.
A few months back I received an e-mail from a loyal reader, a guy I grew up with and they were complaining they didn’t like the blog anymore. They didn’t like what I was writing, etc. They also included I sounded like ‘I was preaching.’ It upset me a bit but I stepped back and said, ‘Hey, I’m going to write what I want to write, if they don’t enjoy it, they don’t have to read.”
When I started Container Diaries my intention was to bring people together from the neighborhood. I planned on keeping the negative stuff out. But when someone tells me that so and so died, I need to post it to let others know.
So please, keep me in the loop on what is happening; it’s my pleasure to spread the news. I have always encouraged anyone to write a guest blog entry for the front page for all to read on their thoughts of growing up in the greatest neighborhood in the world. So feel free to send me anything you’d like and I will throw it up on the blog.
Oh yeah, I’m not going to stress anymore…life is way too short!
(Coming tomorrow, 10 things I’m going to work on each and every day)
-SF
Hoops135@hotmail.com