We're Here. We Do Things. We're Gone.

It's the 'we do things' part that sticks out. That's the part where we make choices.

The Oscars hit me in the soft parts this time around. More than few winners (most first time nominees) told us that 'dreams can come true' and that we each should 'continue to fight for our dreams.' For a three and a half hour commercial for an industry known as The Dream Factory it's an effective and appropriate message.

What struck me is that, at this specific point in time in my life as it has unfolded, I no longer have any dreams in specific to fight for. In a conversation about finding new friends, my mother suggested I find something I’m passionate about and volunteer. My instant reaction was to disregard this but the reason behind that reaction is perhaps a bit bleak: I’m not currently passionate about anything whatsoever.

I certainly have things to do which I enjoy but nothing comes to mind when I think of something I’m excited about. There certainly is evidence to suggest that this is a result of what transpired just a year ago and that, despite the record breaking bounce back into working life I’ve made, this lack of a dream or a passionate response is just my version of depression and grief.

This isn't an alarming thing because grief and depression are not mental illnesses, they are natural coping mechanisms the mind utilizes when it needs to recuperate. I'm not of the generation that finds it cool or interesting to join in the club of the hip and depressed; it is exactly what my brain seems to need so I'm not going leap down a catastrophizing rabbit hole about it. It is ordinary like anxiety, worry, anger, fear. It's a part of the condition that is being a human being.

The question begged (at least by me) is what were my big dreams before last year? Given my marital track record, I'd hazard a guess that one of them was to find a partner in life. Not so much kids but a companion, an ally, a romance that transcended much of the twists and turns. Someone I loved and who loved me in the exact same way. Perhaps in part due to my age and in part because of the bizarre absurdist comedy of the last marriage, I'm no longer dreaming that dream.

What else? What were my big dreams when I was in my twenties? A theater. Collaboration with artists. Creating unique, wonderful shows. It was never about money or fame. It was about autonomy and birthing the new and challenging into the world. I did that. For almost twenty years. With some amazing people (and some not so amazing but present). Not to be egocentric but I was a phenomenal director and producer. I made splashes in one of the largest artistic ponds on the planet. Cool.

Today, the size of my dreams are calculated by my immediate circumstances. I have to pay rent and a car payment and make whole a few people who saved my bacon in the past year, so I work. I work as well as I can and do my very best but I'm not particularly ambitious about it. I'm not looking to get promoted or make a splash here in Wichita—I'm perfectly fine just doing the job. My priorities in Kansas haven't changed at all. I'm here to help my family with my slowly fading father.

I watched Robert Downey, Jr's documentary about his father. Sr. it's called and (spoiler) his father passes before the film is done. It's a lovely tribute, a sincere peek into his life, and an emotional ride. Downey, at the close of the memorial service, sitting on a couch, looks at the camera and simply states "We're here. We do things. We're gone." It's maybe a bit too simple and perhaps reduces the whole fucking thing to a pointless dog paddling through life but it isn't inaccurate.

It's the 'we do things' part that sticks out. That's the part where we make choices. That's the intersection between dreams and intent. We do things. Active. What things? Whatever we choose.

One of the aspects of my age that I love is the perspective that comes with time spent and mistakes made. In my current gig, I work with a cat about seven years my junior. He's an intense individual and has qualities I find abrasive. He's a name dropper. He's incredibly self important. He talks almost non-stop. He's insulting in that "I'm just busting your balls" sort of way. He is intentional in establishing his own dominance in the workplace. He lets you know how hard he works, how important he is, why you should defer to him in most cases. He predicates things he says with "I'm not talking down to you..." while talking down to you. He is almost pathological in his desire to impress everyone around him.

He's a lot like me. The mirror is held up and I'm thoroughly unimpressed and do not like that the qualities he has that make me want punch him in the nuts are the same qualities that make others want to nut-jab me. I appreciate his presence because it gives me a reason to change some of those qualities. I think that’s self-reflective wisdom but we’ll see. Making changes in the way I interact with people is doing something. My screensaver on my iMac now barks at me “STFU. If They Want Your Opinion, They’ll Ask.” It certainly isn’t groundbreaking but a start.

It isn't enough to reduce our time here to 'we do things.' It is also how we do things that matters. It is how we treat the people we work with and for. It is how we listen, how we react, how we progress or regress. It is how we grieve. It is how we spend the time between 'we're here' and 'we're gone' that counts—not in a legacy fashion or a historical context but in that 'what does a prisoner in a cell do to get through his sentence?'

I was reading an article not long ago about the three kinds of people who serve long-term prison sentences. The first type was he who despaired the time, languished in his cell, merely went through the days like each was a mile to walk until the end was in sight. Turns out that this type is also the type who gets out, commits more crimes, and lives out his days in segments incarcerated. The second type fights every second. He drives himself to establish his primacy in the place, embracing the natural pecking order of the prison body politic. He treats prison as a kind of society and he finds his way to fit in. This second type is also the most likely to die violently before his sentence runs out.

I want to be the third type. He knows he'll get out in time and does everything he can to get ready for that day. He keeps himself fit, he reads, he learns things like the law, other languages, and takes courses in potential outside jobs. He does things but with intention. With hope. With a sense that this sentence is just one chapter of the book. This type usually finds his way in the free world, rarely goes back, and knows something about freedom most of us take for granted.

This is not to say that I feel that my current circumstance is like a prison cell. Not at all. I have family whom I cherish, a job I truly enjoy, an apartment I could never afford anywhere else in the world. I get free tickets to concerts and events. Given my year, this is practically Nirvana. I get to have movie days with my mom, long conversations with my dad, time with my sister and I know that these are moments I will hold onto for the limited number of days I have left before I'm gone. It is to say, on a larger scale, my life is four walls, a stainless steel toilet with no lid, and a cot. Not just my life but life as a human on the planet. If you choose to believe in an afterlife—a heaven or purgatory—then the idea that life in our meat suits slowly decaying day after day is literally a body-shaped prison. One we carry around until it no longer functions and then we are set free. We're here and until we're gone, we have to do things.

Like I said, bleak.

Again, with the reading. I follow a few folks on SubStack and one of them is Jonathon Haidt. Look him up for context. He posted an article about the mental health problems exploding among teenage girls, specifically those of a liberal bent. Fascinating stuff. He cites a study about 'self derogation.' Because I am an information junkie, of course I went to the full study and read the whole goddamned thing. How does he find the time? Answer: He doesn't sleep much.

In the study (which is incredibly long and filled with charts and data that, frankly, mystified me in the same way that listening to my niece rattle of statistics about the NFL does) the Monitoring the Future dataset has a set of items on “self derogation” which is closely related to disempowerment with four statements that comprise the scale:

I feel I do not have much to be proud of.
Sometimes I think I am no good at all.
I feel that I can't do anything right.
I feel that my life is not very useful.

Frankly, the scale gave me some perspective. I have a lot to be proud of in my life. I've been a part of great theater—great theater—and helped the careers of any number of people through nothing more than sheer will and passion. I might have been an incredible asshole about it (refer to my mirror-image co-worker) but that doesn't take away the results. While few have read any of my nine books, I'm damn proud of each one. Check that one off, thank you.

I'm pretty certain that I'm often good. Not always, not every day, but mostly good. I'm apparently lousy at judging partners but otherwise I'm not a complete numbskull. I think, for the most part, I'm kind. My natural pragmatism sometimes gets in the way of the kindness but whose doesn't?

"I can't do anything right" is a child's answer. I do lots of things right. I do lots of things wrong. There's that perspective that comes with surviving my twenties.

"I feel that my life is not very useful." This is the sticking point, isn't it? Useful. We're here, we do things, we're gone but are the things we do 'useful?' That's loaded. Are those who received Oscars and followed their dreams useful? Have I been useful? Hard to say. It's one of those comments that relies on the opinions of others, I think. I hope I'm useful but I'm also, you know, still going through some shit.

I think I can be more useful once I'm done with the grieving. Once I'm past the feeling of aimlessness. Once I find something I'm passionate about.

As for that passion thing. Most of my decisions in life have been out of reckless abandon, a throw caution to the wind, leap before I look ethos. So far, I’d say I’m on the plus side of most of those decisions but not by a great margin. Living for a while a bit more cautious might be exactly what the doctor ordered (if I ever bothered going to a doctor). Take it easy on the passion thing until it finds me. It usually does. Trying to force it is a waste of the time I have here in Kansas because I have more useful things to do.