Dos Equis

Twenty years ago today, I would be turning myself in to the Nevada County Wayne Brown Correctional Facility for the last time. It was not the last time I would be incarcerated. After my 60 day sentence for a violation of probation (of which I served my customary two-thirds time of 40 days), I still had to report to another county jail for a 90 day sentence on the charge that got me violated in Nevada County. Fortunately, due to jail over-crowding in Calaveras County, that sentence was reduced to just eight days. All those days and every other day I served in jail was a direct result of my use of drugs and alcohol. I didn’t get in trouble every time I used, but every time I got in trouble, drugs and alcohol were involved.

On this day, 20 years ago, I did not drink, and I did not use any drugs. It was not my intention. I planned on having this one last day of “getting high” before reporting to jail. However, it didn’t work out that way. I did plan to get sober from the next day forward – I had about nine months of sobriety (or clean-time, depending on which 12-step program one is aligned with) that ended in December of 2003 – and it worked. But for whatever reason, I felt I had regained the ability to “control” my drug and alcohol use. I was wrong and found – quickly – that control was not within my grasp. I needed to be separated from that “life," and, while I did not look forward to being locked up, I knew it was an opportunity.

By the time I was released from Calaveras County, I was about 60 days sober. I felt like my life had passed me by. During those nine months of sobriety, I went back to school and excelled like never before, attaining my first ever 4.0 GPA semester. However, I was in full relapse during my third semester, was arrested for my violating charge midway through it and my grades suffered accordingly. I was released after the fall 2004 semester was already underway – I could not return to school until the following spring, and I wasn’t even sure I could do that. I tried to find a job, but even that, something that was never a problem for me in the past, proved to be impossible. Without the financial support of family, I would have been homeless. I felt utterly useless, and just being “sober” didn’t feel like much of an accomplishment, especially since most of it was by force.

But, in retrospect, it was. It was because, unlike the first time when I was living in a “therapeutic environment” (i.e., a recovery home) for the first six months, I had to really want it. I did, but only because I felt I had no other choice. All my grand plans had failed me. I learned from those nine months that I could do things. The problem was that I was not back at ground zero – I was less than that. It was hard to stay the course, not throw up my arms and say, “fuck this!” I almost did, a couple of times. I managed through the holidays, pissed off most of the time, and by January, with nowhere left to turn, I returned to school. I didn’t really know where it would lead me, but it was something. With a lot of help from a counselor at American River College in Sacramento, I was able to put together a plan that would have me transferring to California State University, Sacramento after just one more semester.

I didn’t have enough college credits from just my three recent semesters at ARC, but over many years dating back to the early 80s, my forays into higher education did leave me with a variety of college credits – many were with lousy grades, but they counted. Many did not, but, combined with that one last semester at ARC, I had enough to transfer. However, while a path was before me, I still had to decide where it would lead. There were several options, but among the classes I took during that first nine months was an English writing honors class. That I even qualified, based on an assessment test I had to take, surprised the hell out of me – English was not my best subject – far from it. But, with some encouragement – and goading – I took it. It was amazing and the professor, recognizing some talent (I guess) and some deficiencies in mechanics, nurtured both. I aced the class and rediscovered a love for writing that I once resented.

My counselor suggested an English major, which I rejected. His second suggestion, however, immediately resonated with me. Journalism was also an early love. I remember with a great deal of fondness my days as a paperboy, reading my papers as I was folding them, preparing them for delivery. Journalism it was. The spring 2005 semester at ARC was a resounding success and the that fall would see my return to a four-year university after a 20-year hiatus (I dropped out of San Diego State University in 1985 with a 0.7 GPA). More importantly, at some point in the beginning of 2005, I lost the desire to say, “fuck this!” I found that continuing sobriety was, once again, working for me. And, one day, quite unexpectedly, I realized that it had been some days since I was angry about anything.

Since then, I have only been away from an academic institution for just one semester. I completed my BA in the winter of 2007 and took the spring 2008 semester off, working as a print journalist for a local newspaper. In the fall of 2008, I returned to Sac State to enter their MA program in communication studies, earning a Master of Arts degree  there. I then moved to Baton Rouge to enter the communication studies PhD program at Louisiana State University. Throughout my graduate career at both Sac State and LSU, I also taught undergraduates. While I did manage to advance to PhD candidacy at LSU, I finished there as “ABD” (all but dissertation), falling short of the PhD and coming away with another master’s degree. While that does represent a failure, it was not a decision I made lightly – and it is one I can live with.

Today, I am entering my tenth-year teaching at CSUS. I will be retiring from the job that holds the record for the longest I ever been in the same job, with the same employer and in the same career. That light that was so dim 20 years ago has been a beacon for many years now. But it is not the same as it was at five years, at 10 years or even at 15 years. I have read accounts of others who have traveled this path – often those who were already celebrities, those whose fame has enabled them to gain the access to sell their stories with greater ease. Too often, in what is, comparably, early sobriety, they simply don’t know what they don’t know. I know I didn’t. And, sadly, too often, they fall. Matthew Perry spoke glowingly about how profound his new-found sobriety was, he knew so much. Now he is dead. He didn’t know what he didn’t know.

Here's a little secret. I still don’t know - a lot. Those who have been doing this for 25 years, for 30 years, for 35 years and more – they know more. I still listen to what they have to say. It could just save my life.

Real Journalism

I've been staying out of it. It's futile, it's frustrating and, as much as I love a good argument, they are too few and way too far in between on Fakebook and in social media in general. I've tried, I've failed. However, I will offer this:

I rarely ever watch FOX News. Hold on, let me stop you right there. I also rarely ever watch MSNBC or CNN. That does not mean I think they are equal, equally evil, equally fair and balanced or equally unfair and unbalanced - I never said any of that. I just said I rarely ever watch them. Why? So glad you asked; that is, in fact, the right question. Because I already know what they're going to say - all of them. And... so do you. Watching that swill - to either be confirmed or enraged - doesn't entertain me. I will check them all out, briefly, when really big shit hits the fan, just to see if I'm still right - and I always am. I always know exactly what they are going to say.

I get my news the old-fashioned way - from newspapers. A lot of people seem to be confused about the role of newspapers, and it is somewhat understandable as those same three cable outlets have seriously blurred the line between news and opinion/editorial. They are both part of news organizations, but they are separate and distinct operations, and, for legit newspapers, they have completely different personnel and facilities. Who is legit? Some of you aren’t going to like it, but The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal are all legit. Most major market newspapers as well as many local newspapers are, too.

Straight news - page one of the newspaper (when opinion appears there, it is rare and clearly identified as such) - is just the facts, the five Ws and the H - "who, what, why, where, when and how." They are written in the "inverted pyramid" style, which means the most important facts are up front and the importance continues in descending order such that if one reads the first two or three grafs (journalist talk for "paragraph"), one can skim the tops of the stories and have the gist. While there are some editorial decisions that go into news stories - they are written by real people, after all - we, real, trained-in-the-art journalists, try real hard to present just the facts as efficiently as possible, using as few words as possible. The headline and where they are placed in the physical paper (or even if they are placed) are editorial decisions not usually made by the writer.

All news organizations also have editorial departments that do have an ideological identity. They can be labeled conservative or liberal. And... there is nothing wrong with that. That is truly what freedom of the press is all about. The ability to freely criticize our government through two of the First Amendment's provisions - freedom of the press and freedom of speech - is uniquely American. Criticizing OUR government and its elected officials is not un-American. You are if you tell people who do to "get out."

So, FOX is Red, MSNBC and CNN are Blue - no one can really argue with that (I know, some do…), but there seems to be precious little news. The NYT and WaPo are Blue and the WSJ is Red, but each paper has a distinct and distinctly separate news department. And they produce news stories. I know many who would argue with that. They are wrong and simply comparing the news stories produced accounting for the same events from the different publications will easily verify that. The problem is that too many have already deferred to the cable news model, applied that to the one that actually works and made up their minds. That, and it seems no one really reads anymore.

When it comes to editorial content, I can count on the WSJ to express a conservative view, but even though it is owned by the same guy who owns FOX News, I do not know what they are going to say – that’s why I read it. The same goes for other legitimate newspapers. Today, the Ed Board for the WSJ commented ("Ed Board" editorials express the collective editorial voice of a newspaper) on the recent report of the positive economic indicators and what they mean. While I expected them to present them in a less positive light for this administration than it would for a Republican one (they did), they also have a reputation to maintain. That means they will not take liberties with the truth. The same goes for the NYT and the WaPo. I get not balanced, but I do get fair. And I read them all. The opinion sections also contain Op-Eds and other opinion from individuals who write for these publications or are invited to contribute. Often, “red” papers will offer “blue” opinions and “blue” papers will offer “red” opinions in their efforts to be fair.

They aren’t the only newspapers I read; in this “age of information,” getting newspapers delivered to my inbox is quick and easy. I get my local news from my local newspaper, the Sacramento Bee, and from local TV news — which, remarkably, reports news. It’s not at all in depth, but if I want a 20-minute digest of what went on locally, the Five O’clock News fills a need. The point is that social media doesn’t do a thing for me. At best, it will direct me to something I might not otherwise have heard about, yet, but if it is of interest, I’ll seek out information elsewhere — from a legitimate news source. Journalism, real journalism, still matters — more now than ever.

The "Distant" Past

 Some perspective:

Time is a funny thing. When we look at big chunks of time, like decades, we tend to place it against our own personal histories to contextualize it, to make sense of it. But if that time frame is shifted just a step back, it is almost inconceivable. Try this on for size...

I graduated high school in 1981 - just 43 years ago, almost to the day. However, to even "remember" 1981, one would have to have been born around five years earlier - so, about 1976, our nation's bicentennial, coincidentally. I remember it well. That was all in the 40-45 year time frame ago. Many living today remember those days, it was "not so long ago." Of course, for many more, it was ancient history - the veritable stone-age. There were no personal computers, no internet, no cell-phones, no Fakebook, no electric cars, no streaming, etc. It was a time that only lives in history.

 

For those of us in 1981, walking across that stage, we were all born in the early 60s. But the graduating class 40 years before ours was... the class of 1941. They were graduating right smack-dab in the middle of WWII. Living in those times, for us walking that stage in 1981, was inconceivable. Those days lived only in history books and through the stories of not our parents - they were, for the most part, too young to remember

Why is this important? Because history books don't tell stories - we do. If our kids "don't understand us," it's not their fault, it's ours. It is our job to tell our stories of what the world was like, the good, the bad and the ugly - to reveal what worked, what didn't and why. Various versions of the quote, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it," attributed to George Santayana in 1905, have been repackaged by many, including Winston Churchill, who said in a speech during WWII, "Those who fail to learn from the past are doomed to repeat it." That past is revealed through art, through stories, through our elders, by those who were there.

If our kids "don't understand," maybe it's because we aren't telling our stories anymore. Maybe it's because we are too busy passing judgement on who they are to spend any effort explaining who we are - who we were. Because, for them, 1981 was just as ancient as 1941 was to us.

Finding Peace

There are a lot of things in life that used to really irritate me. They were typically things I did not understand and I would conflate that misunderstanding with some kind of a negative effect on my life. In most cases, that is not so. There are other things that irritate me that do constitute a negative effect on my life - at least tangentially. But is that irritation due to their mere existence, or of their being brought to my attention? A good argument can be made for the latter, although the existence of many of those things should irritate everyone.

If someone buys - and drives - an ugly car, like the new Tesla truck, I do not have to find it visually appealing. I do not have to understand why others might. I do not have to understand how anyone could justify buying one... I do not have to "get it." It's none of my business. The same goes for an infinite number of other personal choices ranging from dress, to music, to sexual orientation to gender preference - it does not affect me and why I would care in the least makes no sense. Yet, some of those issues (some, we all have our "some" - I don't get Priuses, but that's just me), used to irritate me. In the past, they irked me to the point I'd be compelled to make commentary about it on social media. I'd get community support validating my position, helping me believe that mine was the right side of decorum, the other side would fade into historical ambivalence.

But it didn't matter. None of those things (not mine, not yours) directly affect my life. They are simply the choices others' are making about their lives, living in a free country. However, there are other things that do affect us and should elicit some type of response, even if it's just a mental note of what to do at the ballot box. No one likes our tax-dollars wasted. No one likes politicians skimming off the top. No one likes the powerful subjugating the powerless. These things affect us all. Personally, as a state employee, I am sensitive to the stereotype of the state employee being paid for a 40 hour work week when they actually put in far less. The reality is that the vast majority put in an honest work week for an honest week's pay. But there are those few who do not, sometime flaunting it publicly, perpetuating the stereotype.

And, of course, there are gray areas. Not in terms of personal gray areas - we are all pretty sure what are public matters that affect us all and what are not - the grayness comes into play in the areas I believe are personal choices that have no affect on me versus the same ones you think are public and a direct affront to you. I cannot resolve this. I can say this, however: My list of things that affront me is considerably shorter than it once was. Considerably. As a result, my life is more peaceful, more serene and brighter. I have also, almost as a side-effect, gained a greater degree of empathy. I wasn't looking for that, but it's not a bad thing. I also wasn't looking to pare down my list, I was simply looking for peace - this was one way in which I have found it.

#ride

Bringing the World Closer

I don't "rank" my friends. I do not have a best, a second best, third best, etc. friend nor do I have any "BFFs" (and, in the words of my dearly departed little brother, "forever is a long-ass time"). Even if I did, I would avoid such labels. Every relationship - friendship or otherwise - is unique. Each has its own combination of characteristics that makes it the only one like it in the history of forever (and, again, that's a long-ass time).

However, there are certain characteristics that can be used to make broad categories. But even the word "friend" is not so concrete. Some people view every single one of their Fakebook friends as an actual friend. I am not here to argue that they are or are not (I don't care, have 5,000 friends, it's your life), but I can say with certainty that all of my 2,000+ Fakebook "friends" are not real friends. In fact, most are not (if you have to ask, you already know the answer).

Further, among them, there are those who are friends, but friends who, if I had some particular urgency, I could count on them to be conveniently unavailable. There are others who I know will drop everything if I needed them. That does not make one group "better" friends than the other, but there is a qualifiable difference in those relationships. In fairness, I am, to others, both. I will drop everything for some and would not for others. Does reciprocity play a role? I'd be lying if I said it didn't, but it's not everything. I'd be there for some who I know would not be for me; I don't know why.

It seems that certain aspects of human interaction, and human connection, and human relations, and relationships, have been diluted with the advent of social media. We are - in what amounts to a nanosecond compared to the whole of human history - all of a sudden provided with the tools to connect with everyone, everywhere, all the time. Not every connection is equal, not all are special, not all need to be "nurtured" and, certainly, not all need to be cherished. And all those "social media influencers" who are "interacting" with you do not have a relationship with you - you are their markets.

This hyper-connectivity is not sustainable. The cracks are already showing, the bottom will, eventually, fall out. Only AI can maintain the number of relationships that the "age of information" has made possible. Those who try to keep up will spend all their time doing only that - they will always be left trying to catch their breath. I was onboard with all of it once, I thought it was cool, it would make the world a better place and bring us all closer. But all of it, even something as innocuous as text messages, has left me rethinking what all this "bringing the world closer" has really done.

Exactly the opposite.

Eighteen Years of Perspectives, Purpose & Opinion

In the fall of 2005, I was a junior at California State University, Sacramento. I was also 42 years-old and just one-year sober. My life up to that point was full of twists and turns, starts and stops, life and death, but at the time, I was full of hope - and I was excited. I was finally good at something; my mind was clear, and I was moving towards a goal I thought was forever beyond my reach. I entered with a hybrid dual major of political science-journalism, but my focus was journalism. Thanks to an English writing general education course and one magical professor, I discovered while in community college (and one failed attempt at sobriety) that I could write.

That failed attempt at sobriety turned out to be serendipitous as it changed not only my academic trajectory, but also my entire career path. However, that is a different story for another time. This is the story of The 25 Year Plan – the story of the blog that is now more than 18 years-old and holds more than 650 separate entries. One of those entries, early on, explains where the name came from, but there is no need to dig for it, I will recount it here. It is a short story.

When I went to San Diego State University back in the early 80s (when I was of “college age”), there was a euphemism for students who would take longer than the typical fours years to complete a college education. Today, a fifth year (or more) senior is called a “super-senior,” but back then, when asked about one’s projected graduation date, a response from one of “those” students might be, “I’m on the five-year plan.” It was as common as “super-senior” is today. In fact, the problem of students not graduating in four years is one that has been recognized by many universities, and measures to mitigate the problem are equally common. Because I would be much closer to 25 years from high school to college graduation, I decided that my plan would be called, über-euphemistically, “the 25-year plan.” When it came time to name my blog, it seemed obvious.

That explains the name, but not how it came into existence. Blogging 20 years ago is not what it is now. Today, virtually anything is and can be called a “blog,” and virtually anyone who publishes anything on the web can be called a “blogger.” Technically, a Facebook post is a blog post. The term comes from the words “web log,” and, at their inception, these online logs were primarily written and much longer than a Facebook status update. Indeed, Facebook was just in its infancy at the time, not yet available to the masses. Myspace was the de facto social media platform. One of the main blogging platforms was called “Blogger,” (purchased by Google in 2003) and it was free, robust and it was just beginning to expand beyond simple text-based posting.

But in December of 2005, I wasn’t looking for any of that. There were no real smart phones (no iPhones, I don’t even know if I had a Blackberry yet), social media was only Myspace and the internet was still painfully slow. I was looking at a five-week winter break and I was not exactly looking forward to it. I was on fire; I had one of the best semesters ever in school (3.94 GPA) and I was leery of too much free time. Two years early that free time, in part, derailed me, ending nine months of sobriety. One of my journalism professors was (still is) a prolific writer and used this new(ish) blogging platform to publish stuff he wrote for himself. He suggested opening an account and using it to “keep your writing fresh” over the winter break.

I took that advice and never looked back. Eventually I attracted other bloggers who read my posts regularly and I became a frequent visitor to their blogs. The community I ended up building (which sounds more purposeful than it was – it was much more organic than it was my doing) was robust, and deep, and anything but superficial. Unlike Facebook, or Myspace at the time, the things we wrote about, most of the time, had substance, they had texture – we pushed each other and learned from each other. The comments were, sometimes, mini blog posts all their own. In the early years, I wrote and posted several times per week. I wrote for the sake of writing. And, while not all of it was good (despite the overall positive feedback), much of it still holds “ah-ha” moments when I reread it all these years later.

As the internet matured and as social media like Twitter (now X) and Facebook took off, blogging, at least as it originally was, has fallen off. However, other writing platforms with a quasi-professional angle are beginning to emerge. I am present on one, The Medium and there is also Substack, and others. That community I built on Blogger is long gone, although a few of those I engaged with are my “friends” on other platforms. My writing for The 25 Year Plan has slowed to a mere trickle, my readership, while never very big, is almost nonexistent now.  However, every now and then, I will break out this old-school keyboard with the purpose of writing for the sake of writing.

And if no one reads it, that’s okay.