Of Pens and Swords

I will moderate these, so don’t expect to see any flings with sheep on a lovely night in here.

And yes, I fully expect to not receive any submissions. I’ll make it anonymous if you so choose by letting you email me and I’ll take out any ‘opsec’ material that may give you away.

Email me here, or post a comment. Let’s have some fun!

I could sit in the same job, and do the same shift work forever, never getting anywhere, if I really wanted to. Anybody can do that, and unfortunately, a lot of people do just that.

Since I am sort of stuck in my job right now, waiting on conditions to be right to move on, and not really learning much, it has the same negative impact on my ability to think.

But I have friends. Friends who have questions, problems, technical issues. I might not be able to solve any of them, but it gets my brain juices moving. One poses a question, and I automatically get to start thinking of any and all possible solutions that I’ve ever run across, possible problems that are site specific, so forth. These are problems that I can’t just create due to either lack of interest or lack of imagination.

I want to thank all of my friends for keeping my brain moving. I know I probably don’t return the favor as much, but then again, I don’t run into the daily technical issues that all of you do. I’m more of a manager now, and don’t get to play with the technical stuff nearly as much as I’d like to.

As you get older, you’ll lose more and more people close to you. It’s life, and it can be made into something good.
I was fortunate, or unfortunate, to learn this very early. The one thing that makes it easy for me is this:
With everybody I lost, I don’t think of how I will miss them, but how they influenced me. That influence is what keeps them alive in yourself, to an extent. Even bad influences can be made positive, if applied correctly.
I live with the sole intention of hopefully being seen as a positive influence in someones life when I die. I don’t want there to be a vacuum of pain left in my wake, but a feeling of accomplishment. Even a small accomplishment is better than none.

Don’t grieve for the dead too long, because that’s never the point. The longer you grieve, the longer you don’t look past it, look at the positive left.
Don’t feel that you’re doing a disservice to the memories of those fallen by going forward either. If their wishes were for you to never get past their death, then it was their disservice to you.
Take the good left from those who have died, and use it to paint a portion of your life colorful. Take the bad left by them as well, and use that as a warning to place in front of the paths that will come your way.

The point of life isn’t to hold someone so close that if they fall you fall, but to hold them close enough that when they fall, you can take the good and move on. One day you will fall as well. You have to remember those who will be left, and what you want to impart upon them now.

Everybody dies on the battlefield of life. Make it a good death, and make it easier for those behind you to pick up the flag and carry on.