Normandy

by on June 7, 2022 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

One of the unfortunate aspects of my life a shift away from most people, is that I am forever in what most people think of yesterday, writing stuff that will show up in my tomorrow, but is your today. Because of that, I totally missed that my tomorrow was a very important anniversary. On June 6, a fleet set sail from England, landing craft hit the water, and our brave boys charged onto the sands of Normandy to begin the liberation of Europe from the National Socialists who killed millions of civilians simply because they were undesirables. Lesser races or lifestyles. People they did not want in the new and better world they were building for themselves. The brave boys of the remaining Free Nations began the liberation on June 6. We should never forget that those brave boys had the courage to stand up and fight when the call came. And those buried in Normandy paid the ultimate price for the freedom they bought so much of the world that day.

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Cancer

by on June 6, 2022 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

I spent the weekend up with mom at Our Lady of Peace, and a friends house half an hour away who graciously allowed me to sleep in his basement. Thank God. Our Lady of Peace is good for mom, I think. They certainly do seek to care for her from what I can see, and they are always quick to answer a call for help. But she is getting weaker. And due to construction, their normal one-person rooms are now shared two-person rooms. And the fire marshal has imposed rather draconian rules on what furniture is allowed in the rooms and where exactly it must be. They cannot add or move anything, and what they have is straight out of a 1980s office horror film. Uncomfortable and unsupportive. And they want visitors to wear their special thicker-than-normal masks all the time. Me. Asthma. I’ve never had to use my rescue inhaler multiple times in a day before just to be able to partially breathe, and the furniture in the rooms might as well be torture racks. I hurt. I hurt. I hurt.

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Louis

by on June 5, 2022 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

Most of the stories don’t do justice to Louis Mattioli. I get it. Most easy stories have to have a clear-cut villain. But there was nothing simple about his story. And I wasn’t always the white knight in it. I made my own mistakes, and most of the stories paper over them. One of these days, I’m going to tell the real story. They deserve that. They were Cowboys to the end, you see. I didn’t go in and heroically saved the day. I brought no justice in the final act to close out the story with a bang. It was his choice in the end. He and Natalie made it together. I did not finish it. They did. They did what Cowboys are supposed to do. They brought justice and peace to those who needed it.

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Louis

by on June 4, 2022 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

It took decades for Louis Mattioli and Natalie’s relationship to truly go bad, and by then she was caught in the cycle and couldn’t get out. They did bad things together. Bad enough that I had to go do something about it. Most of the stories about him are true to a certain extent. Exaggerated, but there is a kernel of truth in almost all of them. Even most of the stories about our final confrontation are at least partially accurate. It was a heck of a fight. He was a Cowboy through and through, and he’d gotten better over time. I was too confident, and he took advantage of that. He got me real good in fact. That was my fault. He was good. But then, that’s the point. Cowboys are always good, even when we go bad.

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Not Cancer

by on June 3, 2022 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

Well, it appears I have developed a heart murmur since the last time I saw my doctor in March. Due to that and other persistent muscle pains that have been affecting me the last month or so, my doctor decided it was time to give me a whole battery of tests. I did my Amber Heard and sent it in the mail for testing already. I’ll be giving blood for some serious testing in the morning so am fasting right now. And I’m about to get a fancy new heart monitor vest as well. I’m also going to be getting an X-ray on my left shoulder and an echocardiogram on my heart. All of this in between going up to see mom. The funny thing is, I’m actually feeling better now than I was, which probably says a few things about how badly I was feeling before…

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