Friend[s] of Disappointment[s] and Doubt[s]

Friends are people that do not let you down. Therefore, disappointment and doubt cannot let you down, because they are already there. Down.

    Perhaps these negative circumstances are not friendly. But, as dependable qualities, you can count on them. But, dependable things become constant and a type of friend.

    Am I right?

 What would Jesus Wear?

I think that he would wear nothing much until all the poor folks had some type of foot wear.

 It Could be Worse and that Is Good to Know

    I was thinking of writing a blog post called the Self Misanthrope, or subtitled something about not liking one's own actions or something like that.

    Sure, negativity crops up at times. Hopefully not too much and not too often. Trying to be realistic, and stay balanced. I looked for two offices today, that may not exist. I went to the right building without knowing it. Sort of a good chase. I thought of some feelings and looks or reactions of a couple of people from last year, and it made me feel kind of bad. We cannot please all the people all the time.

    People care about others but no one wants to be a drag to someone else. A hindrance, a discomfitter. Sometimes we can feel like a burden, or a drag, if you will. I have some contacts in worse straights than me. Straits.

    Today I thought of some of my time when living in Provo, when I was younger. I remember not being the biggest winner. Perhaps I struggled, and I coped and kept moving. Nothing that great, perhaps nothing really notable. Maybe I was sub-par? Maybe I am sub-par. Life is not a competition. But many times we do compete. Even with ourselves.

    Which brings negatives feelings. Speaking of negative things.

    My friend, from my church affiliations, is attending a different faith, doing Bible classes and regular attendance. It is more her style. She was afraid of telling me, but I gave her my voice of support.

    My friend from part time work is struggling financially. He is trying to branch out and get more work. He is doing classes to make some money. I helped him, which he says he will pay me back. We will see.

    My other friend, who texted me a lot recently, is living out of his vehicle. He has physical and health problems with all the financial issues. Life is not great for him!

    Oh, and a young man I know has a serious case of brain cancer, dealing with radiation treatment and chemotherapy. His family and friends love him dearly and this is not an easy or ideal situation for anyone.

    So, my life could be worse. 

    Although, I struggle to do all things right. Tought to be better disciplined and higher aimed. I cannot overcome and surpass that much. I try to stay even keel, which is not alway good per the general or my specific population.

    Yeah.

God Looks Down and Across

He sees us where we sit, and lay

Like Santa Claus, they say in that poem

In our comfort or our pain

Buddha would be different. Maybe?

Krishna and Vishnu other types.

My taxi driver in the big streets of the Gulf city

Was likely Hindu. A student of the pantheon.

Are we all not like him?

Maybe his name was Gupta. Or Singh.

Millions of them? I have known a few.

Others are Americans like my sister’s friends who convert, and worship and practice hari krishna.

Even in Utah.

Family in Utah. Like the sons of our stake president of , the shorter one.

Suriname and Japan, Fukuoka. One more for the future.

Where else, where will we go?

Oh, yes. God our Heavenly Father.

He sees us sleep, restless or tranquil.

The latter means quiet in Portuguese. The language of my son. And my ex brother-in-law. Who lived and loved down there for a season.

Obedience.

It is required.

My wife loves so. So beautiful.

She watches and moves.

An embodiment of God and His will and desires.

He watches, sees Yousef floundering, Rob and yet Stacey.

Folks I know.

We do what we can.

To help our Heavenly Father.

I missed church Sunday. Saw a girl named Fursay be hurt, unbeknownst to me.

We would be in church, that Sunday morning.

God sees us and hopefully loves us more.

We must love Him and His Son.

Trust Him and the Lord of all.

Suffering in Gaza, I hear in the radio. 

We Americans have other concerns.

The Holy Land and the Rocks of Haram Sharif.

I will re-read that book.

2004, published? Confusing but better than Ralph Ellison. Hateful and scorned, his invisibleness contrived.

Misogyny. Like my guy jokes at work.

He says different than he says. I mean believes.

He jokes.

Perhaps only sensible to those that know, like me.

The trainers.

“Nice footwear,” I say in the elevator.

“You have good style,” she replied.

Funny stuff on a work day.

You follow?

I barely do. But God is there.

Deep into the night, the morning. Now and always.

We thank Him.

While our ecclesiastical leader laments the upheaval of France. 

Yes, this could be some ADHD.

Poetry and a rambling mind.

God sees. 

May Rob be okay.

He doubts so much of it.

We must stay the course— with the Divine.

Dallin H. Oaks versus Pope Leo the 14th, XIV, Robert Francis Prevost

    Some talk on Christianity, or Christendom. Enough of me ruminating about who was the real Bard of the 1th century. Bard barf and rot, I say!

    Why not talk of the religions and the faiths that killed so many across Europe back then?

    Yes, the Protestants and the Catholics were quite deadly back then. Not to mention all the violence and malevolence with Muslims, from Moors to Turks.

    People blame the religions, or practice of religions, or the enforced beliefs in these "unfounded, illogical" beliefs in higher powers.

    I admit, people have done terrible, awful, horrific things in the name of Jesus, Mohammed, Allah, Yawhei, Zeus, Krishna, Vishnu... Maybe even Buddha? However, many, many deaths and tortures and systematic killing and authoritarian governments that oppress and subjugate have been in the name of economists like Marx and Engels, Mao and Pot.

    Can we blame organized religions as the main culprit of the hatred and organized suppression, abuse, all the negatives.

    Christ Himself, us Christians argue and assuage, is not of this nature. Most of us get it wrong. We do and say and act in ways that are not His. Too often throughout the history of our planet.

    Since Jesus, before, and all times in between.

    Unfortunate.

    Religion, and Christianity, get bad names. Take the Crusades of the midevil times. Not good.

    Today the U.S. and other Western nations take blame for being too Crusader-like, too Christian, borderline awful nationalist. There is the support of Israel, which is having its troubles with humanity, which is an ongoing mess...

 I Spoke of My Poems But No One wants to Hear Them

    They seem oblique or sad, but no one wants to know.

    That is my problem. No one cares.

    I know that God cares, and other audiences will care. Some day.

    Just not now.

    They care about remembering or lamenting six essays on silence from college, not the poems that I have written the last few days.

    Why should they care?

    Why do I?

    I like my thoughts on paper, as it were.

    A blog sounds blase to the regular folk.

    But art and magic lie therein.

    We shall see.

    Some day, others will say, thanks for your words.

    And that precept makes me happy.

    Tonight we have new full time missionary. 

    We love to see it, feel it, experience it.

    Excited and enthusiastic.

Alone, or solo, in solitude or lonely, even.

    The messages go boring through. Not boring, of ennui, but boring like a drill.

    A drill, like Makita or Milwaukee, that drills holes into the soothing or deep parts of our souls and makes us who we are.

    Networks and fibers of light, energy, fluids (of varying viscosity), and all those flows and passages re-connect to who we really are, what we shall be, what we are meant to be, and what is most meaningful.

    Even meaning, itself. Significance.

    Like the poems that I write.

    There for us and them, you, and me.

    

    My pronouns, as I told some soldiers Sunday, are me, you, us.

    Amen and pass the rock salt.

 Alone

    I think of extremes, when I was alone.

    When was I most alone?

    What does that mean?

    I was by myself, maybe minding my own business...

    My own business. Alone.

    When I was alone, on the beach, in the mountains, at the library, at church.

    Where were you?

    Who are you?

    Were you with me?

    Did I know you?

    Have you known me?

    

    If you knew me now, or if you knew me then,

    Then I have been less alone.

    You were kind of with me. Less alone.

    Like God.

    You were like God, with me when I was most alone.

    I was less alone.

    I have never been alone.

    Thanks for being with me.

    The highs, the lows, the times sideways, the verticals.

    In pain and joy, failure and triumph.

    Not alone.

    With me.

    You and me.

    Together.

    Alone .

    Or not so much.

    You are here.

    I appreciate that.

    See you.

    Thanks for seeing me.

    Through it all, all of this.

 Trump and Musk Can Never Kill as Many Unsuspecting Victims as Mao or Stalin...

    Or can they?

    Removning medicine and aid from many hapless souls in Africa, primarily, led to many deaths. This past year and a half. Hard to count how many. Stalin and Mao were much worse on their own citizens and those nearby.

    But The Donald and The Elon are working on it.

    Perhaps they learned their lessons in cruel ways of sentencing innocents to death, suffering, privation, and ignominious demises?

    Do I make this up? Fairy tales? False news. Fake, phony, Holden Caulefield?

    Most Americans are racist, I have decided. Why? Because we are ignorant of most of the world's outsiders, and we are woefully ignorant or negligent when they suffer and die. Palestinians, Africans of all the countries. Most Latinos. We buy the illegal drugs while the southern masses suffer.

    Or here locally, mostly people of color are those that deal with the most violent crimes. Those that suffer and die from the illicit products and poisons of our time.

    Oh, the men and women who make us suffer!

    Dictators and elected officials, either way. And our apathy towards all of them.

    What would George Orwell and Aldous Huxley say? Or Clarke and Asimov? How do they think of our attitudes and actions? Or non-actions?

    Or any person with a logically thinking brain.

    If you are anti-humanity, you are racist. You hate and hurt our human race.

 Solitude

    Some people crave it.

    I suppose I do.

    I need it.

    However: sometimes it gets to be a lot.

    So, we look for attention in different ways.

    Or, we look for some kind of solace. 

    Within or without solitude.

    Being alone can be completely different than being lonely.

    Free solo, or trapped.

    

    Where are you?

 I Got Secrets

        I just turned old. I am trying to keep it a secret to some. (And I think that I have succeeded). When I was maybe 51, 52, I would get spam calls on my landline, them asking me my age. I would say a few years ahead, testing the waters, sort of.

    

    The spam and scam calls, I would not tell them the truth. I was telling types of lies. Or, keeping some secrets. We do not want to tell and share all our personal things and secrets that we keep.

    Not exactly right or good to do...

    But we collect more and more over time.

    

    

 The Loneliness

 Over all the times it’s me more alone than not

Rather than surrounded by others

Or clinging to a lover’s embrace

I ran today, I mean yesterday

We went up then down the road

Me alone, enough, quite a bit

At first the worst, then decreases, decreased

I collected Conan

The super version of me, us, humanity

The lone wanderers

Like the funny, silly Groo

The Wanderer

From my comics

And my past

So often times lonely

So I recount

It through tales

To reconnect with others

And stave off the alone time

No longer isolated

But loved and almost beloved

Thinking of those by themselves outside in the cold.

Not my words

 This world is the garden of life...The true paradise, but we have been blinded and complacent and complicit in the wholesale rape and slaughter of its wondrous bounty.. Steadily turning paradise into a place more suited for the adversary than for all the wondrous diversity of life we once had...No other creature we know of commits these collective acts of self defilement and self annihilation. And as a direct result, all life in the garden of healing bounty... either suffers greatly and/or perishes...

 Homeless Among Us

 Because of Church affiliations I have known some homeless folks.

Elmer, no: Wilmer. 

Tim.

Robert.

Over the years, we learn about them and try to help them.

How much can we do?

I have tried to help.

2004,

2020?

2026.

What can we do?

We give away some food and physical aid.

Some see the Church of Jesus Christ, or most faiths, as too soft and ineffective to really help and inprove their lots.

Discuss. 

Pity, and Wallow, and Shame

 Lâstima, y tristeza, y vergüenza

I was thinking of these things

Feeling these things

Remembering

Reflecting

Talking, or texting with my friend who is in far worse shape

I communicate with him

Drawing away from my own islands of sorrow

Smaller in comparison

Count up the good

My favorite Players per NBA Team, 2026

    I will start with my number one player favorite in the NBA. It is now in 2026, but he may become my all-time favorite. He went to my school in Provo, Utah, brought glory and good vibes to it, and I will love him forever for what he did for the school and what he said about my Church and the Book of Mormon. As far as I know, he is quality as a person from beginning to end. His confidence is not hubristic. He is well grounded, kind, nice, and a winner.

    AJ Dybantsa (1). I may get a jersey of his, which I have never done for any player in the NBA, NFL, and only once in the MLB. (Tim Raines). I am almost 56 years old. Big NBA fan since 1986.

    Go Wizards! You are likely my new favorite team. Go Wiz.

    Who would be next?

    Pacers? 

    Tyrese Halliburton (2). He brought a lot of joy, entertainment, excitement, hope, and admiration to the home-based Indiana Pacers. Took them to the finals, unexpectedly. Wishing you the best! You are a bit like Reggie Miller. Here's hoping.

Who comes in third? An underdog... Utah Jazz. 

    I will go with the L.A. Clippers next, fourth. 

    Okay, da Jazz: (I have to check): I guess I go with Lauri Markannen, because he is Finnish, not because he attended the University of Arizona. While I loved the Wildcats in 1997 for beating the vaunted Kentucky Wildcats, I am not so much a fan since. Better them, however, than Duke, UNC, Kansas, UConn, or Florida. Or UCLA, when lording it over my Indiana Hoosiers. Or BYU Cougars. Or even the Boilermakers or Utes!

    Clippers. I had to think of the state I lived in a while and which team I would derive the most pleasure from winning. Not the Lakers! Not the Warriors. Go Clips. Or even Kings.

    Rui Hachimura (4). Always impressed, I liked him with the Wizards. I like his Japanese-Beninese heritage. Go Rui!

    Next up... Hmmmm. Kings. No, I lied. Suns.

    Phoenix (5). I'll go with Collin Gillespie. I like his moxie.

    Now Kings (6). Damontas Sabonis. His dad is a legend, he is a dog. Is that two Gonzaga dudes now? Ichhh... They cannot help it. AJ will surpass them all! Go Brigham Young!

    Next,uhh... Cleveland? (7).  Sam Merrill. Represents the Church of Jesus Christ, Utah State. Second place, Thomas Bryant. Indiana Hoosier forever.

    Maybe I go...alphabetically... Nah, Atlanta. (8) Kingston Flemings. This guy is a killer, I think. Fun to watch, so forceful.

    Ok, to the order of the site. Boston. (9) Paul George. Brought some love to the Pacers. I pull for him.

    Brooklyn. (10) Egor Demin. Picked BYU for his one and done. Not his fault that his Russian murderer president Vlad the Impaler is a bad, evil, leader. Unlike Alex Ovechkin, he does not support Putin. If he does, I will drop Demin like a rock. Go Ukraine. Stay free and safe. Vladimir? Many will see you in hell.

    New York. The champs (11) OG Ananoby. Love the guy. Hoosiers.

    Philly Sixers (29) Taco Fall. The name alone. And the height. He be entertaining. (Finding my mistakes listing all 30.)

     Toronto. (12) Trayce Jackson-Davis. Four years with the Hoosiers! Thanks for trying. Seriously.

    Chicago. (13) Matas Buzelis. I like his background. I think I dislike the schools of most of the others.

    Kevin Huerter. Detroit. (14) Impressed me at Maryland. I like his style and his unconventional red hair. If that is not an under dog, I do not know what is. Bill Walton, anyone? 

    Milwaukee Bucks (15) Kel' el Ware. Hoosiers!

    Denver (16). DeMar DeRozan. De Old dog, wid the De Old School Mid De Range.

    Minnesota (17). Donte DiVincenzo. But I am curious about this new guy Rocco Zikarsky. What a name! What is in a name? With a name like that, some of us have to be fans.

    Oklahoma (18). Bennett Stirtz. Iowa guy. Hopefully a good influence to many.

    Portland (19). Deni Avdija. Israeli. Cool to see compete. What is that name? Yang Hansen has me intrigued. Chinese? Norwegian? 

    Lakers. I have hated them, historically. Too much success. (20) Sandro Mamukelashvili. May he flounder with the Lakers and bring glory to his home country. Georgia, anyone?

    Charlotte. (21) Hannes Steinbach. Studly and cool in college. He is going to eat some people up in the pros.

    Miami. (22) Tim Hardaway, Jr. I liked his dad. This guy passed up pops by 9 inches.

    Orlando (23) Franz Wagner. We like some Germans. Keeps the game honest.

    Dallas. (24) Kyrie irving. Never helped Duke much and he got handles, yo.

    Houston (25) Bogdan Bogdanovic. Love the Balkans. Shout out to the Doncic, too. Entertaining.

    Memphis (26) Richie Saunders. BYU man. Not signed yet? Get a clue, Memphis.

    New Orleans. (27) Bennedict Mathurin. He got game. I believe.

    San Antonio (28). Dylan Harper. I like his dunks.

    Whoops. I miscounted. There should be 30 total. 

    Good enough for now...

    

    

    

    

    

    

    

        

 All - Time Indiana Hoosier Team

    Walt Bellamy, center.

    Alan Henderson, power forward.

    Calbert Cheaney, small forward.

    Steve Alford, shooting guard.

    

    Isaih Thomas, point guard.

    It would be fun to see these guys run at their primes. The guards are undersized, but I think that they would offset any defensive liabilities with their amazing offensive prowess.

    Go IU.

    Fight, fight, fight!

    Trying to get a favorite Hoosier for this season. Last season? Maybe the best scorer... but he was one and done. Typically he needs to be there longer.

    Go, my guys. Hope they can break into the Big Dance, 2027. It has been too long...

Happy Birthday, and Thank You!

    Dearest Mother-In-Law,

    This is a belated birthday wish and a letter of appreciation, as it were.

    When I think of you, many impressive things come to mind. You are a super good person for many reasons. I will explain a few of them. But know that I love you; you are beloved by hundreds if not thousands of people, living and dead, and of course God and His son and all the saints and angels. You are on the right side of righteousness, which is the best place to be. You are quite special and choice.

    Before you became a mother of eight outstanding human beings, raising them and making them the best people that I know, who all incredibly have supported and sustained me for over 26 years in my associations, marriage, and child rearing with your fourth child and our five of your multitudinous grandchildren, you were the daughter of two humble parents in Pasadena. You and your sister and three brothers grew and became pillar parts of your communities and groups, professions and associations throughout all your lives. I got to know each of them to various degrees. They, like you, are loving, supporting, and conscientious, devoted, and kind. We love all of you.

    You set yourself up for success, going to college, marrying and being committed to your family and God, your fellow members of society and your neighborhood.

    When I first met you you were working as a dutiful middle school teacher, and maybe you were teaching part time at the local junior college. I enjoyed learning about your art work and your teaching experiences, and your service to others and random acts of kindness, sometimes with little prompting. Spontaneously righteous or Christlike.

    

    Always exemplary.

    You always were welcoming in your house while I dated your daugter. Later, after I graduated from a a master's program without a job lined up in my hopeful position in the State Department, you let me, your daughter, (my wife), our first daughter and later our second daughter stay in your house for two years! It enabled us to earn and save money and pay off the graduate loans that we had accrued, live abroad and then move to the East Coast.

    You always communicated with us, sending us nice cards and birthday money and wishes. You visited us once we moved out to the East Coast, you traveled with us to Chile, you always welcomed us in your home in California.

    You have been a tremendous boon to me and my family's life. Your stalwort faith and dedication has been noteworthy, to people of all stations. President Dale Poulson, my mentor when Branch President of the Spanish Sixth Branch, always noted that you were a saint and a force of good. I concur. 

    You are a great person, teacher, artist, mother, wife, member of the faith of our people, grandmother, great grandmother, and a boon to the country and its citizenry.

    Thanks for being you and for all you are and have been.

    

    You are awesome and sweet.

    Love you forever, 

    Your 26 plus year son-in-law.

    

Demography is One of my Favorite Subjects

    But, perhaps my math was too klunky or slow.

    Too klunky or slow.

    Oh, Eduardo! How could you mistake the DeCameron for the Canterbury Tales!

    Yes, colour me guilty, as charged.

    Not tightly wound enough, not polished, but more generally vast and even vapid.

    My daughter works on the social sciences of demography now. It brings me back to my time at UCLA.

    Times of thought and promise.

    Church growth, but of little matter. The science, including math and formulas, and greater data, was not focused and concentrated enough.

    Statistics and regressions.

    Too ... widely spread, the knowledge and lack of discipline.

    Leading to perceptions and failures across the board.

    Distracted and meandering, accussing of OC, or ADHD, and all the other acronyms of sickness and lack of mental acuity, or acerbic capacities.

    All those negatives.

    Speaking of distracted, I wish to re-read the book about the Rock of Jerusalem and the books by famous authors in and around Fortaleza, Brazil.

    yes. yeah. Yay.

    

Sports are Easier, Simpler. Better Clarified, Less Messy

    Maybe that is why. Heiristics to help some avoid the harder problem sets.

    Distractions with flashy colors and personalities to pull us away, in a perhaps indulging escapism, moving us away from harder, or even better and more useful informations and knowledges.

    

    Easier to talk about the New York Knicks and the Philadelphia Seventy-Sixers than the crime rates of Baltimore or the violence perpetually wrought in Yemen or other parts of the world.

    Science and economics, topics that make our lives better, yet they are harder to grasp, to get our heads around, to entertain and amuse.

    Yeah.

    What about those Lakers this year? Too many white guys to succeed, Stephen A. Smith?

 The Man of Disappointments

    There once was a man, who did not always succeed,

    He ran into obstacles, he disappointed his seed.

    Or his spouse.

    Some times it was bosses, who found him quite lacking

    His confidence sent packing

    From day to day or year to year.

    Not achieving the overarching hopes or dreams.

    His time needs or productive outputs.

    Welcome to failure, welcome to this world.

    Mediocrity. Rejection.

    Disappointment.

    

    Perhaps too long he failed to push the right ways.

    Settling for less then, not trying hard enough.

    Not going far or fast enough...

    But he has hopes, beyond Jesus, his country,

    The dreams of all.

    He maintained those hopes.

    He himself recognized some wont of greatness within him

    Perhaps he gave up years ago

    With time and some efforts

    That he could not 

As My Stomach Turns - World Political Turmoil and Us

As My Stomach Turns - World Political Turmoil and Us. And Me.

    Things are not perfect in the world. They rarely are. Many of us are not too affected by higher prices, higher fuel costs and food, or awful credit or mortgage rates that are untenable...

    No perfections found, really. As would-be economists we need to manuever the dismal sciences of efficiencies and demands. Let's make do.

    Figure things out individually, collectively. Let the best minds decide and make choices. For the better. The betterment of all.

        Where to start? Where it ends in the Bible? In the Holy Land? Israel and Palestine. The never ending battles, debates, human rights abuses and hatreds. Unending.

    How to end it? We need a smart, dedicated, confident group of acerbic Americans or other leaders and people of sound judgment to settle the awful siituations there.

    C'mon, world.

    1. Russia versus Ukraine.

    2. Iran versus the world. To include confederate Shia proxies in Iraq, Yemen.

    3. Fighting in Congo, Rwanda, Burundi. Many people fighting over some rotten apples. (Perhaps not accurate or too simplistic.

    4. Somalia. Terrorism. Al-Shabab.

    5. Nigeria. Boko Haram.

    6. Ethiopia. Tigray tensions.

    7. What have I forgot? There are other bad issues roiling places of the world.

    8. Eco-terrorists? People who fight to save the planet, one tree or climate change prevention at a time.

    9. Fossil fuel fights. Space development and exploration.

    10. Artificial Intelligence battles.

    11. Cyber shenanigans.

    12. Electronic warfare? Not sure of the overlaps.

    13. China mapping out over Taiwan and the western Pacific.

    14. Drug cartels. 

    15. Over nationalistic causes in the sub-continent.

    16. The ice areas melting. Temperatures rising. See eco-terrorists. The cost of being greener.

    17. Did my dumb, faulty computer erase my last ones?

    18. North Korea.

    19. Mad economic schemes.

    20. Inflation and exhorbitant prices.

    21. Not replacing population.

    22. Cutting off medicine and the proliferation of HIV and malaria.

    23. Poverty.

    24. High priced education.

    25. Increased marijuana THC levels, inducing psychosis and violence.

    26. Pollution.

    27. Cheaper, greener energy. Wind, solar, geothermal. What else? Hydroelectric.

    28. Drying up of aquifers and rivers. Ice melting. Seas rise, islands and coasts inundated.

    29. Religious competition, persecuion.

    30. Radical movements. Violent or persecutory ideologies.

    31. Pornagraphy and sexual exploitation.

    32. Greed.

    33. Mental illnesses.

    34. Traffic safety and death.

    35. Cancer and other deadly and impairing diseases.

    36. Ivy league elite smugness.

    37. Pride.

    38. Unfaithfulness.

    39. Apathy.

    Ok, who cares about forty things. 

    You? Me. We should.

    Blog it.