Rancid

  Good morning everyone,  As many of you know I'm here at my daughter's house recovering from open-heart surgery, I really don't get much to do except follow my doctor's instructions and those of the visiting nurse and physical therapist. Yeah, you need them after open heart surgery. You don't believe me? Wait until it's your turn. :-)  Anyway, the problem is that my mind starts to idle with ruminating thoughts settling in and trying to make a nest.  Many of my friends always ask me why I do not let things go. Well, I'm going, to be honest, since I do not go to the Spanish congregation anymore I do not have to worry about any backlash from them. When my family lived on Long Island and I was a child my grandfather was working on the plumbing in the basement, he left a blow torch on, and of course, I was in the basement with him. Needless to say, I grabbed a blowtorch out of curiosity and I tried to burn the floor with it, the floor was made of cement so there

Even if the changes are positive, we can appreciate that they’ve been difficult for people . There is so much to navigate, to be sensitive to in this modern world of ours. People are expected to be tolerant of things that just a few years ago were considered totally out of the mainstream. Words and descriptors, even the names of countries (or the pronunciations of the names of cities) seem to change by the day (with painful consequences if you screw them up). There is an incredible amount of news thrown at us, and no small amount of technology required to access it (to say nothing of the brainpower to make sense of it all). We’re expected to give things to our children—to meet expectations emotionally, financially, timewise—that no generation before was asked to do. This is not a controversial argument. The future is wonderful in many ways…but it’s been harder on some than others.  It’s hard to be a person in this world. Maybe not as much for you, but it definitely is for some people.

  Good day, My temporary disability  from the state  at least has been approved for the next 5 month. Therefore my conscience concerning maintaining my household as a Christian is covered.   I moved from The Spanish congregation  to my daughter’s congregation at the request of my wife so providing spiritually for my wife has been covered.  By moving from the congregation however I have established myself as a coward... no problem nobody cares, I made myself a ghost in Mt Ephraim Spanish,  giving credence that I am now a Christian in poor standing. So my wife is good. My heart cannot be repaired as expected so my lifespan has been shortened; it  takes about twice as much to regain what I lost and that goes beyond my lifespan.  What can I really do from 2 to 12 years? I do have a childhood friend in worse condition, similar surgery because of a heart defect. 5 month in the hospital. So I am well aware some are worse off than me. This is not a self pity rant, I am just looking at my optio

  Breaking news: an asteroid is hurtling towards earth and could destroy the planet. The judge rules: you have a year to get your affairs in order and report to prison for the mandatory maximum sentence. The doctor calls: you have a short time to live. The sirens sound: nuclear war has broken out and the end is near. This is going to change everything, we tell ourselves. These moments or minutes or months we have left, they will be so precious to us. We’re going to focus. We’re going to get over our fears. Say what needs to be said, do what needs to be done. We’ll finally be able,  to live and act like a dying person. Or will we? Might we instead just go right back to our phones? Bury our heads in the digital sand and pretend it’s all a bad dream, or that someone will figure it out before it’s too late? You’ve been a dying person this whole time—since birth.  What makes you think you’d suddenly shake off your stupor and get serious? Did the pandemic do that for you?  Habits die hard…ev

 I know many of you are going to call this a pity party ( if you do look up the definition) but right now I am no longer a part of the mount Ephraim congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses in Camden New Jersey so I really don't give a frack; now I can write about my health. A few years ago I started to develop what is called exercise intolerance and gait imbalance, and neurological depression.  Exercise intolerance is caused by cardiovascular disease. I did this to myself and the only person I can blame is myself. It ended up with me having a heart attack on June 8th, 2022, and was followed up with open heart surgery on September 6th, 2022 the procedure is called a CABG surgery. The initial plan was to have a quadruple bypass but under further examination, this could not be done for various reasons and I ended up with a double bypass and a stent, and other procedures to fix the heart. In all The revascularization of the heart was not done. (I can't win them all).  I can't c

  There is a beautiful passage on the last page of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s, The Little House in the Big Woods. She writes of an evening in the cabin with her family, her father playing the fiddle, her mom knitting in a rocking chair: “She thought to herself, ‘This is now.’ She was glad that the cozy house, and Pa and Ma and the firelight and the music, were now. They could not be forgotten, she thought, because now is now. It can never be a long time ago.” ”   But what does it mean? That you have to live in the very now, even when it is ordinary and quiet, because the now is very special. It is the only thing that is true. What has passed is past, and our memories of it gradually degrade and betray us. What has yet to pass is future, and as we should know by now is never guaranteed. Now is all that is real. Yet too many of us reject that gift. We continue to think of long ago. We dream of or fear a distant future. We are distracted or preoccupied and miss what is happening around us. It

  Admiral Hyman Rickover, the father of the nuclear Navy in the United States and an unsung hero in the history of the world, was once asked by a Congressman if he was prepared for the upcoming hearing in which Hyman needed to speak about a number of complex, important issues. "Yes," Rickover replied, "I shaved and put on a clean shirt." Rickover didn’t need to prepare because he  was  prepared. He wasn’t some figurehead who had to be briefed before answering questions. He knew his science and his department inside out. Because he lived and breathed his work— He also personally tested every nuclear submarine during its initial sea trial after construction.  a fighter not a fencer. A fencer has to put on armor and pick up a weapon. A fighter just has to close their fist. That should be our model too. We shouldn’t be cramming the night before a test, or frantically looking for advice once a crisis has arrived. We need to be prepared. We need to be so on top of our wor

  The surgery was a success.  As I was told prior to the operation,  There would be items they would not be able to fix. Some of the heart arteries were just too narrow to bypass or to be stented. So I got the LAD and another artery bypassed and of course, the mother of the widowmaker is stented.  The mammary arteries were in poor shape and couldn't be used. So in the end they had to use my leg veins. From each Leg.  In the end, I received a small extension of life. Statistically 2-12 years, is the usefullnes of such grafts. Afterward another evalation of the heart will occur. (of course I will see the cardiologist on a regular basis.) The surgery has been suceesfuly conluded. Lets see what's lies ahead.  

  By the time you read this, I will most likely be in surgery this morning.  I ran a test and I notice when I write to my blog, many won't even see it because of Facebook Shadow Ban. As I mentioned in my previous post, I have left the Mt. Ephraim Spanish Congregation.  I have made provisions for Norma to continue attending the Cherry Hill Congregation. Me? I really serve no purpose and would not fit into any place, I may attend from time to time. Don't get me wrong, I  usually will never miss a meeting and I have my resources. By fading away from the congregation I will not be under the pressure of attaining service privileges that JW males are subjected to. What will I do? maybe I will write, I like writing, but I will have to work around my neurological disorder to do so and there are many writing tools available for the handicapped.  I may even return to University for a 3rd Or maybe I will die on the surgery table of an unseen event. Amor Fati non? I am still In Jehovah'

 Enough of my Pity Party because my life-saving Surgery got botched for following instructions and medical orders. Surgeons are not Gods.  However today God is doing much more. Jehovah witnesses are out there trying to saves lives.  Real Human lives. I have received many images and photos and memes on such a great day, until the next plague or the Great Tribulation hits. I do not matter, the Human Race as a whole is more important to Jesus. If I was healthy enough I would be knocking on doors too.  I have done so since a child. The Bible says Matthew 24:13-14 New International Version 13 but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved. 14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.