the least I could do

The flag is on my truck,
Has been for 12 years now,
It seems like the least I could do.

This country wasn’t built on luck,
But on perseverance and know-how,
Hard work and dedication, it’s true.

This day posts and pictures go up,
tears are shed,
memories shared,
we come together united once again.

But today is the same as yesterday,
and tomorrow,
and 12 years ago,
and 12 years from now.

Mistakes have been made,
heroes have been raised,
we’ve moved on,
we’ve stayed the same.

The flag is still on my truck,
Has been for 12 years now,
It was the least I could do

This isn’t a call to arms or anything like such,
Just me speaking from the heart, letting you know,
I’ll always bleed red, white, and blue.

the box

We call them heirloom gifts…

For the past couple years I’ve been receiving hand-me-down gifts for birthdays and Christmases from my parents.  Sometimes these are gifts from my childhood – my baby book, drawings I did in school, my sticker collection, the hospital receipt from my birth, all the letters I wrote to Santa (I’m still not sure why he sent them back to my parents, but it’s better not to question whatever magic is at play there), etc…  Occasionally, the heirloom gifts from my parents are possessions from my grandparents that they are passing along little by little.  One such of those gifts was a box full of little odds and ends.

I started to sift through that box immediately after I opened it.  I loved my grandparents and miss them greatly, and was excited to see what treasures of theirs I was getting.  At the same time, I was sad that my wife, the queen, and our little prince will never get to meet them.  A full range of emotions was bubbling away under my calm demeanor.

I began to pull things out of the box, smiling as a memory here and a memory there were shaken loose from my mind and allowed to float to the surface.  All the while, a pain in my heart and soul grew stronger and stronger.  Each new item was more painful than the last to dig out of the box.

I pulled out a couple pairs of socks my grandma had knitted and smiled thinking of the hours she had probably spent on her davenport darning them.  I pulled out a couple of the lighters my grandpa had kept in the top drawer of his dresser and wondered if had ever used them or if he had collected them after he stopped smoking.  I pulled out a pair of fancy dress gloves that were my grandma’s.  I pulled out my grandpa’s wallet, opened it, and…  Well, that is as far as I was able to get that day.

The pictures he kept in his wallet, the memories tucked safely away for his keeping, were too much for me to handle.  I put everything back in the box, thanked my parents and moved on.  I tried to fight back the tears that wanted to well up and pour down my face.

I have no idea how successful I was.

The box has remained unsorted, unreviewed, safely stowed away since that day.  Eventually I will pull it out and go through it.  Eventually I will see what other treasures are waiting for me inside.  I know I will find things in there that will make me smile, and laugh, and cry.  Eventually I will be ready to face all of those emotions.

eye of a needle stuff

Pride?  Isn’t that one of those deadly sins?  Isn’t there something about “pride” coming before the fall?  I guess that, that is mostly in reference to how we feel about ourselves.  We have pride in what we do, and that is different from someone else being proud of us…?  Perhaps?  Maybe?

I sure seem to be asking a lot of questions, don’t I?

Even that was a question…. wasn’t it?

 

“Attaboys,” “good jobs,” and “nicely dones,” I’ve had plenty.  But, having someone say they are proud of me doesn’t happen all that much.  Or, maybe I just don’t really pay attention to things like that because usually when someone says they are proud of something I’ve done I’ve felt it’s been for something normal – something that should be expected of everyone – nothing exceptional or above and beyond.

The most recent one I can remember at the moment came from my wedding, which everything seems to be circling back to this week.  My wife’s father found me after the ceremony and told me he was proud of me.

Should I be worried that I don’t have more vivid, interesting, or recent occurences of people telling me they are proud of me?

Should I be content that I know I usually meet and/or exceed people’s expectations because I know it is the right thing to do and not because I’m worried about what they think of me?

Daily Prompt: (2012) Time Capsule

Today’s Daily Prompt asks us what we would put in a time capsule from 2012. 

An intriguing question, to be sure.  Should I put items in of historic national and international importance?  Should I put items in of personal importance only?  A mixture of both?  Songs?  Books?  Knickknacks?

How big is this time-capsule?

I think items of national and international significance will probably be covered in other posts, so for my time capsule I’m going to keep it all personal.  Note, after creating the below list I was sad that I hadn’t included anything specific about my wife or the rest of my family and I was halfway through adding some additional items when I remembered I was keeping this time capsule “personal.”  So, this one is mine.  If I was going to create other capsules I would definitely include things of significance and remembrance related to my family.

….

thematticuskingdom Time Capsule contents:

Elizabeth Pass – obviously I can’t fit the whole mountain into my time capsule, so I will just throw in some photos and notes related to the experience of coming down the pass on my backpacking trip from September.  I’m including this partially because it is an experience I never want to forget: because it was amazing and because I never want to forget to never do it again.

Ultrasound photo – the wife and I are expecting our first, and we got our first look at our child back in August, tiny and perfect.  The photo embodies so many different emotions and thoughts from that first moment seeing it on the screen and hearing the heart beat throughout this whole journey.  It will be amazing to pull this out of my time capsule in the future and have all of that come flooding back.

Sierra Storm – my NaNoWriMo project from this year.  It was so much fun to write and get feedback and encouragement on from my faithful followers.  I’m in the process of editing it currently and will be sending it off to try to get it published eventually and while it won’t be done in 2012 I started it this year so it makes sense to include it in my time capsule – plus it would be fun to pull up in the future and see the difference between the first draft posted at thematticuskindgom and what it eventually became, and what I manged to write since then.

Technic Turntable – 2012 marked the year I dismantled my decks (“I’ve got two turntables and a microphone” – okay, actually I have four turntables, a Numark Mixer, a Chaos Pad, a couple microphones, a Gemini CD turntable, and a Mackie speaker) to make room for a crib and other assorted baby gear.  This year marked a huge transition in my life from the DJ I was to the father I’m going to be.  But, I never want to forget that prior part of my life and when I open my time capsule and see that turntable I will remember and relive the hours spent beat matching and blending songs together in my room and in the clubs.

The December page ripped out of a calendar with the 21st circled – I would include this final item as a reminder of how silly we can be at times, for a bit of humor, and to have me think back on all the crises the world has survived since the 21st of December, 2012.