Speak up
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It's rained for a week in my neck of the woods; flooding, closed roads, the whole nine yards. The big water run off drainage canal like the one from the Jack Nicholson Movie China Town was raging with rapids. I heard there was a 6 foot stationary wave at the end right before the ocean.
The rain stopped today. My sons and I walked down to the beach; it was trashed. The water is brown and muddy and the beach is covered with bamboo sticks and tennis balls. My sons like to get the bamboo sticks and play Star Wars; I usually have to stop them from killing each other.
I found an old basket ball and I was kicking it like a soccer ball down the beach. My son and I were kicking it back and forth to each other. Sooner or later my son gave up on soccer and went back bamboo Star Wars fights. I continued to dribble the ball with my feet down the beach. Another family approached us coming from the opposite direction; A Couple with two sons. The mom had a big bag of tennis balls she was collecting she said to me, "I told my kids there would be a ton of balls here, they didn't believe me." I smiled at her and continued to dribble the ball past her. Then her son comes up to me and picks up my basket ball and runs over to his mom saying, "Look mom I found a basketball." Then I said nothing.
I was thinking that I should tell the kid, "Hey that's my basketball!" But then I thought what do I want with an old basketball. It's not that big of a deal Duke. Let it go. Then I thought fuck that little kid I should say something. Then I thought no I shouldn't. This thinking continued for a long time as my stomach increasingly tightened up.
For one thing, why do I care? Why do I dwell on such a thing? But it's a symbol of my problem. I don't speak my mind up front. I push it down and then years later it comes to the surface in messed up ways like panic attacks.
So this is just a reminder to speak up for yourself even when it's not a big deal, who knows maybe you can avoid cancer.
The rain stopped today. My sons and I walked down to the beach; it was trashed. The water is brown and muddy and the beach is covered with bamboo sticks and tennis balls. My sons like to get the bamboo sticks and play Star Wars; I usually have to stop them from killing each other.
I found an old basket ball and I was kicking it like a soccer ball down the beach. My son and I were kicking it back and forth to each other. Sooner or later my son gave up on soccer and went back bamboo Star Wars fights. I continued to dribble the ball with my feet down the beach. Another family approached us coming from the opposite direction; A Couple with two sons. The mom had a big bag of tennis balls she was collecting she said to me, "I told my kids there would be a ton of balls here, they didn't believe me." I smiled at her and continued to dribble the ball past her. Then her son comes up to me and picks up my basket ball and runs over to his mom saying, "Look mom I found a basketball." Then I said nothing.
I was thinking that I should tell the kid, "Hey that's my basketball!" But then I thought what do I want with an old basketball. It's not that big of a deal Duke. Let it go. Then I thought fuck that little kid I should say something. Then I thought no I shouldn't. This thinking continued for a long time as my stomach increasingly tightened up.
For one thing, why do I care? Why do I dwell on such a thing? But it's a symbol of my problem. I don't speak my mind up front. I push it down and then years later it comes to the surface in messed up ways like panic attacks.
So this is just a reminder to speak up for yourself even when it's not a big deal, who knows maybe you can avoid cancer.