I'm back!

And damn, it feels good to be back and currently mostly pain free!

Still don't know what caused it all.  It may have been Parvo.  May have been viral.  May have been an allergy.  It may come back.  It may not.

Two weeks of short term disability, a pill bottle of Tordol, and a stomach flu thrown in there for good measure later, and I'm 100% again!

Ready to come back to blogging.  I missed it actually, but perhaps a little rusty!

So they caught the Boston Bomber last night.  We were watching CNN when they got him, and it felt good to be part of that.  We watched the crowd cheer as the police confirmed that it was the guy.  We watched as Anderson Cooper tried to talk over the rising sound of a mob of happy, relieved, proud Americans walked down the street toward him, cheering and chanting "USA".  We watched the President come out and talk about it, saying how as one Nation, under God, we must now pray for the families who have lost, the ones who were injured, everyone who helped, as well as the people of Texas who had the explosion this week as well with many deaths and injuries.  He named each of the Boston victims one by one, and emotion seemed to catch in his throat when he named little Martin Richard.  Then he sighed, and said, "Overall, it's been a tough week."  It's been tough to watch, too.  The world seemed to be holding it's breath, waiting for this 19 year old to be found.

This was a sickening event, to think that someone would do this.  While I will never, ever condone or offer any justification or even sympathy for this guy who did this, it makes me stop and think, that wow, he was only 19 years old, and he could show such hatred and inflict so much pain.  And they were even discussing capital punishment last night, if the guy survives.  We are not talking about an imbecile, here, this is a 19 year old who didn't make a mistake, he took a cold calculated risk, knowing the chances of getting caught, to injure people and injure a Nation.  He knew what he was doing, no doubt.  But damn, he was only 19 years old.

It was all in vain though, really, because as we have seen time and time again, these attacks on the USA do not injure the Nation, it makes them stronger.  It bonds them as one.

But it got me thinking about was the stupid shit I did at 19.  Things that now I look back on and cringe because I clearly didn't have a lick of sense.  Well, I had some.  But not a lot.  And of course, it all pales in comparison to this guy.  There really is no comparison, except that at 19, you think you are indestructible, and that the world owes you something. 

At 19, you have enough sense to know right from wrong, even if you think you can bend each side a little bit.

At 19, you think the world is your oyster, and everything revolves around you.  It is full of promise and opportunity, and you think you can't be touched.

At 19, you think that your friendships will never end, relationships will never die, and that you can always be forgiven, and given another chance.

At 19, you still think that your family are jerks. The whole lot of them.  Although they are getting better than they were three years ago, so you can keep quiet and put up with it.  What you don't realize at 19, is that your family members are not the jerks, you are, but you aren't as bad as you were at 16, so they put up with the eye rolling and attitude.  Frankly, you're a bit of an ass, at 19.

At 19, you are right on the brink of adulthood, where people expect you to start getting serious, fortheloveofGod get yourself a job, take a shower, and give up with the pot already.  (not me, just some 19 year olds in general).  And you resist that every step of the way.

Because at 19, you want to be considered an adult sometimes, but only at your convenience.  Here in Canada, you can buy beer and cigarettes and lottery Tickets at 19, and anyone who ID's you is a dumbass because CLEARLY you are of age.  So you are an adult when you are out drinking until 4 am, stumbling around and making a complete ass of yourself.  But you are still a child when someone tries to take advantage of your drunken, idiotic state, whether it be to fight, for sex, or for money. It's obviously not your fault that those things happen, you are just a child, afterall.  And you're also just a silly child when they try to wake you up in the morning, with your bloodshot eyes, and vodka morning breath, spins to knock you on your ass, and a jackhammer in your ears, to go to a family brunch at Gramma's house.  A poor pity-me child.

You're still a child when you do something wrong, and people are blaming you for something, and some of your best friends are done with putting up with your shit, (refer back to reason two, the world revolves around you), because of course, at 19, you are likely not going to take responsibility for anything that you did wrong.  You will find some lame-ass see-through escape plan, that will shift the blame off of you, and make you the innocent victim.  Or so you think.

But at 19, even with no friends, and no sense, and a boat load of ego, you are entering into adulthood, and you - only you -  are responsible for the things you do.  Some of those things will not affect you for the rest of your life.  Some of it will.  Some of those things, you will be able to forget, move past, and create a new identity for yourself.  You might have a little baggage, because as you get into your 20's, the bigger mistakes will stay with you and you won't let yourself forget them.  But you will eventually forgive yourself for some of the stupid shit you did.  You'll eventually come to terms with the fact that if you lost some friends over these idiotic 19-year-old mistakes you made, well, they may not come back.  Eventually, you can put any embarrassment behind you.

But at least you are only doing stupid shit that you can come back from, not like this Boston Bomber.  If he survives, he will (hopefully) never walk free to make the same mistakes that your average 19 year old will make.  Because at 19, he knew the consequences, and he is most definitely not a child.  He is most definitely adult enough to may the price for what he has done.

So yes, 19 means you are an adult.  Wake up and get a job.  But you are also still a child.  You are selfish, and arrogant, and self-righteous.  You're still learning life, and making mistakes.  Those are mistakes that you need to make, sometimes, in order to get the rest of your life on track.  Hopefully the mistakes that you make at 19 are ones that you won't repeat as you get over.  And, of course, at 19, you are still an ass of the finest kind, at times.

But you'll get over it.

I did.