Flyered Up

Flyered Up

One of the great things about sports is their ability to bring people together. When I was a teenager, I didn't have much of a social life, but I could always talk with friends and classmates about all that was going on in the sports world. When there was a major sporting event on TV -- Super Bowl, NCAA Tournament, etc. -- my friends came to my house.

I'm a lot more socially active these days, but watching sports continues to be a social event for me. Tonight, I met some friends at a sports bar to watch the Philadelphia Flyers take on the Pittsburgh Penguins in the NHL's Eastern Conference Finals. Above, I am with (from left) Susan, Marc, and Rob. We had fun, but the game left a lot to be desired -- unless you were a Penguins fan.

Some things never change -- Philly teams still let me down!

Scathed Knees And A Broken Heart

A few years ago, I briefly dated this girl. She was never my girlfriend and I was never in love with her. The relationship wasn’t going anywhere and frankly, I wasn’t that into it. So when the time came that I felt it was best for both of us to move on and find someone else, I sat her down and had "the talk" with her. She seemed to take the breakup news fairly well and agreed with much that I was saying. We were on the same page with wanting the best for one another and wishing the other well. She was going to go her way and I was going to go mine. Things were good. But when I started to walk out the door, she had some type of meltdown and lost all her dignity. She dropped to her knees and grabbed onto my pant leg, not figuratively speaking, I mean literally! She was clinging to me for dear life, like her world was coming to an end. I thought that type of thing only happens in overly dramatic Hollywood scripted movies. I would have never expected her to act like that. I never saw it coming really, so I wasn’t sure how to react. She snapped and it scared me. I tried my best to collect myself. And to collect her. I remember delivering this speech...

"Pick yourself up. Don’t ever grovel before a man, any man, including me. Be strong. Have some self-respect. You’ll move on with your life. And you’ll be ok. I promise you."

I said it in a soft but firm tone, even though I know my choice of words may have seemed rather cold. I didn’t want to be hypersensitive to her meltdown (usually a crying girl breaks me every time). The sobbing. The pleading. Inaudible words that came from her mouth. At that moment, it seemed like the best way to deal with the situation was to install strength in her while showing a deep level of compassion towards her. I helped her to her feet, brushed her off and kissed her forehead. I was nervous that if I hugged her she may sink into me again and I would never break free. I asked if I could call someone for her. I couldn’t leave her alone like this. If she could snap that quick, I was terrified that she would do something stupid if I had just left her there, like hurt herself. I was able to get one of her friends on the phone, told her briefly what was going on and she said she would be right over. We sat in silence and I waited with her until her friend arrived.

As time went on, I started to realize why she broke down like that. Her father had walked out on her when she was young. He too had sat her down and calmly explained why he was leaving. And of course it wasn’t until he actually began to walk out that door that the reality of him exiting her life actually set-in and she lost it. I can only assume that me leaving her in a similar fashion stirred up a flood of suppressed emotions from her childhood. I am thinking that her meltdown wasn’t even really about me. It was about her father. Or at least it’s more comforting for me to place blame on him instead of myself.

Daddy issues. From my experience, when a girl has "Daddy issues", 99.9% of the time it affects her adult relationships with men. I’ve seen it happen time and time again. So much so that I almost feel like asking potential dates if they have any "Daddy issues" before I get their number. If I look back at all the girls I’ve dated, every single one of the bad relationships came from girls who had "Daddy issues". And every single one of the good relationships came from girls who had wonderful relationships with their father. In fact, all of my long term relationships have been with "Daddy’s girl" types. I don’t mean "Daddy’s girl" in the sense that they were spoiled rotten, but I mean it in the sense that in their eyes, their father was the standard in which all other men were compared to. Now I’m not saying that a girl’s "Daddy issues" or lack of "Daddy issues" is the sole reason any one of my relationships either went smoothly or failed. I’m just saying that I adore a girl who adores her Daddy. To me that is a good sign. A very, very good sign. And those are the kind of girls I find myself wanting to be involved with.

I’ve always felt the importance placed upon a "father daughter relationship" is greatly overlooked in our society. And I’m sure much could be said for the "mother son relationship" as well. Despite the fact I take after my father’s side of the family (physical appearance, mannerisms, sense of humor, interests, etc), I’ve always been much closer to my mother. So much so that as a child when my parents fought, I thought that if a divorce ever took place, then I would choose my Mom to live with. People have always told me that I remind them so much of my father and my mother had always agreed with that statement. And I always took it as a tremendous compliment to be a spitting image of him. However, if a divorce were to have taken place (thankfully it never did), I wondered if my Mom would no longer love me either if I reminded her so much of Dad. It would be like living with a miniature version of him. Would she walk away from me despite the fact I wanted to stay with her? I too probably would have dropped to my knees and held onto her pant leg. I love my Dad, but choosing Mom just seemed like it would be the right decision. Because of the tight bond I have with my Mom, it shouldn’t be a surprise to me how distraught I feel when things aren’t good between us. I’m not sure why it’s really happening or what even started it, but the distance between us keeps increasing. This has been going on for a year now and needless to say, this makes me incredibly sad.

In the last few years, I’ve started to come to grasps that my parents are no longer young. Ok, well they aren’t exactly old either, but they aren’t getting any younger. And because you can’t stop, slow down or even reverse time...I’m feeling a little panicky. I can’t even talk about, let alone write about how it would feel to lose my Mom. That is a HUGE fear of mine. And to lose her while we aren’t on the best of terms, that’s beyond heartbreaking or devastating. Words could not describe the surge of emotions I would be left with. I think in life there are some rare things that people can’t recover from. That would be one of them for me.

Mother’s Day is this weekend. Last weekend I called my Mom up and asked if I could take her out to lunch for Mother’s Day and we could hang out or do whatever she wanted. She seemed less than enthused. So I asked if there was anything else she would like to do that day – someplace I could take her, something I could get her. She didn’t say much. She never really gave me any straight answers. I can take a hint. She doesn’t want to spend time with me, or at least that is how it appears and feels. I left the offer on the table, told her to let me know. Five days later and I haven’t heard from her. I talked to my sister about this.

Me: "I offered and she doesn’t seem interested."
My Sister: "Well, maybe she’s just tired?"
Me: "Ok."

It is then that my 4 year-old niece runs in and pulls on my pant leg. In her chubby little kid hands are her pint-sized pink knee pads, a set for her and a set for me. She asks me if I will ride scooters with her. I answer without hesitation, an enthusiastic yes.

Down by the River

Down by the River

As I have said on more than one occasion on this blog, one of my favorite places in Philadelphia is the trail along Kelly Drive (and the Schuylkill River). Well, with the beautiful weather today, I decided to take my first walk (drive) of the season there.

Turns out that I had company today, as preparation was underway for the upcoming Dad Vail Regatta this weekend. That meant workers setting up tents and rowers getting in some last-minute training, as you can see in the picture above.

I didn't spend a whole lot of time out on the trail today, as I'm still not used to being in some much after spending most of the cold-weather months indoors. That, and I was really hungry. So my nurse and I stopped by an Italian restaurant on the way home and chowed down!

An Annoyance That Shouldn’t Exist

Why is it that some days I feel like I need to write? Like it’s my duty to upload a new post here to my blog. It’s so annoying and so absurd. I don’t know why I feel this "push". In all reality, nobody is pushing me to do it...except for maybe myself? I torture myself with it for absolutely no reason. Does anyone else ever feel like this or am I just some freak of nature?

With so many other things going on in my life and so little time to take care of them all, blogging should be on the bottom of my priority list. And it is, except for the fact I still feel like I SHOULD be writing something. It’s an annoyance that shouldn’t exist, but yet it does. Perhaps a big part of the problem is that I pretty much hate everything I write. I get all anal about it. I analize it. I pick it apart. I reword it. I rewrite it. I erase it. And then I do it all over again. It’s like a mild form of OCD. I think I try to be a perfectionist, but I have much that needs perfecting. It’s a vicious cycle really.

I’m driving myself insane by it. I search for flow and I ride it when it chooses to arrive. Although, it’s never consistent. It’s never perfect. It comes and goes in waves. I suppose that is what flow is all about and it’s not meant to be captured for very long. It’s intangible and if it wasn’t, it wouldn’t really be that powerful. You wouldn’t ever hear of someone writing in a fever. You wouldn’t ever hear of someone being so caught up in their words that they lose all track of time. It’s good that flow isn’t always readily available. It makes you appreciate and cherish it that much more when it does wash in.

I can’t even tell you how many posts I have left in Blogger draft. Most are painful little pieces that I’m uncertain if I can bring myself to complete. I don’t even know where to begin or how to allow it to end. I’ll just keep writing and getting lost among the senseless lines until my eyes are a blur and my hand begins to cramp. I’ll become numb, or emotionally drained, or both. I’ll start second guessing myself and debating on whether or not I should have ever strung all those words together. I’ll finally regret that I’ve given my story a voice. That’s around the time I silence it. I’ll stop writing and leave it lying dormant. It’s a power struggle like no other. The rest will be left unwritten, but the inner push to write will continue on.

She Said It, Not Me...But I Did Agree

"Girls are stupid. And I feel for you having to date us."

I’ve become quite fond of her "tell it like it is" attitude and her new found silly girl nature. And her cupcake ass isn’t bad either. So, from the girl (who I’m still keeping anonymous) that brought you this priceless Hillary Clinton comment, comes yet another gem. And I think I may like this one even better!

"Penn"ing My Name

"Penn"ing My Name

One of the reasons I wrote my autobiography was to help the medical professionals and students who take care of those of us with DMD better understand what it is like to have this disease. So I was extremely excited about my book signing today at the University of Pennsylvania bookstore, located near Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, and the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.

With many familiar faces in the audience -- doctors, nurses, physical therapists, social workers, medical students -- I read excerpts from my book. Afterward, I signed books (with assistance, of course). It was an extremely successful event -- one person even bought 10 books!

Revenge Is A Dish Best Served On YouTube?

You’ve probably already heard by now about Tricia Walsh-Smith, the gold digging disgruntle divorcee who went crazy after her millionaire husband dumped her. What she thought was a "smart move", turned out to be disastrous and most likely will come back to haunt her during the divorce settlement. And I can assure you, their divorce proceedings will not just be messy, they will be down right ugly and nasty! Tricia Walsh-Smith chose not only to vent her anger, but also air all her dirty laundry in the most juvenile of ways...by posting her "I just got dumped" meltdown on YouTube for all the world to see. Yes, nothing says class act like ripping your guy, or soon to be ex-guy, up and down over the Internet. Of course in the process, she didn’t make him look nearly as bad as her she made herself look psychotic!

Part 1 - One More Crazy Day in the Life of a Phoenix Rising from the Ashes

She claims her husband of 10 years, Philip Smith (President of Shubert Organization - the largest theater owner on Broadway), just decided one day he no longer wanted to be married to her. Um, can you blame him? Personally, I don’t see how the marriage was based on anything other than superficialness in the first place. Let’s face it. At 50 years-old, Tricia Walsh-Smith is no spring chicken, but her husband is 25 years older than her! What in the world could you have in common with a 75 year-old man? He’s bald. He can’t get his dick up. Most likely he is missing more than a few teeth. Do I need to go on? Do the words Depends, Bengay and liver spots mean anything to you? Everyone knows that to make a relationship work, you need to have things in common, activities you enjoy doing together. The only "activity" this pair could partake in together would be eating soup.

Tricia Walsh-Smith made it no secret that they weren't fucking. In fact, she actually calls up his assistant to say..."I’m filming at the moment for YouTube. I don’t know if you know, but Philip and I never had sex. But he’s got Viagra, condoms and porn movies. Just ask him what he wants me to do with them." As shocking as that may sound to some, that doesn’t really shock me due to the fact she belongs locked in a padded cell. But what does shock me is that she is actually upset about not getting to have sex with a 75 year-old man! I’m going to fill everyone in on a little something, just in case you are as clueless as Tricia Walsh-Smith. If a guy owns a box of condoms and he’s NOT using them to fuck you, he’s using them to fuck someone else. It’s a no brainer really. Nobody buys condoms just for the hell of it.

While ranting about her husband, Tricia Walsh-Smith alternated between pleas for mercy, cries of idiocy, and bouts of petty mud-slinging. And just before she heads to divorce court, she goes online and posts yet ANOTHER video! In this new video, she pulls much of the same act as last time. She pleads her case, somewhat calmly for a change, but then that quickly changes and you can almost see her mentally snap before your very eyes. It’s like a train wreck, you can’t help but watch as she pulls out her trusty Tarot cards while shouting..."Shame on you! How dare you? If this was the 16th century what would you have done, put me in the stocks and thrown rotten tomatoes at me? I am speaking my truth! But I did my cards today and look what I pulled: Courage. I will continue speaking my truth." Rrright. Just pack your shit up and get your ass out of his Park Avenue apartment already.

Part 2 - One More Crazy Day in the Life of a Phoenix Rising from the Ashes

If you can watch both of these videos in their entirety, then I applaud you because I found myself becoming highly irritated listening to her for even 30 seconds. I can’t imagine what this poor old man had to endure. I found myself wanting to choke the bitch almost instantly! And he put up with her for a decade! Now that deserves some type of an award. Perhaps the divorce papers will be that award.

Look, I understand that being dumped is never easy. It hurts and you can’t help but take it personally. After all, it is a form of rejection and rejection is meant to be taken personally. But remember, in a fit of rage, when emotions run high, it’s important to step back and breathe. Take a minute and think before you react, before you lash out. These videos will not tarnish her husband’s good name. All it is doing is making her look clinically insane. You can’t tell me that this woman isn’t angry for not being able to hold out until he kicked the bucket and she inherited his fortune. I ask you this...is she really mad that he didn’t screw her, or is she just mad because she is getting screwed out of sucking up more of his money?

It is women like her that make men never want to marry.