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​FRUSTRATED? BLAME YOURSELF FOR EVERYTHING

6/1/2020

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*** I’m putting a disclaimer here, as I probably should with most of what I write. It would be easy to challenge that my premise doesn’t cover every single aspect of life. So here goes… disclaimer…. my premise doesn’t cover every single aspect of life. I know there are situations people are not to blame for. This is just one person’s opinion for what I think covers a wide swath. I understand there are exceptions.
 __________________________
 
 
Sometimes, it’s hard to be honest with someone. Maybe you don’t want to hurt them, or you don’t like confrontation, or you’re embarrassed, but whatever the reason, it can be difficult to be honest with others at times. And if you’re good enough, sometimes, you can get away with that lack of complete honesty.
 
However, by far, the most difficult person to be completely honest with, is you. Lying to yourself is easy. And if you want to believe it bad enough, you will. It can even become second nature.
 
Self-deception happens because you don’t want to believe certain things about yourself. You do something inconsiderate, ...

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THINGS THAT TICK ME OFF

4/8/2020

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Let’s talk about things that really tick me off. Why? I’m not sure, except it feels better if someone else knows them. Especially if I can get someone to jump into my emotional stew along with me.
 
For a couple of these things, my own lack of insight keeps me from understanding their reasoning. I’m sure there are reasons. And even though I recognize that, my perspective is just weird enough to amuse myself, so I’m sticking with it. With some of the other items, they aren’t amusing at all. They just tick me off.
 
One last note…I’m sure, if I thought harder, I’d discover this is just a partial list. I should put a “#1” after the title, because there will probably be a “#2” sometime in the future.
 
Here we go…
 
Issue #1 – “Frozen Butter Patties”.

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A DASH THROUGH THE DASH

3/19/2020

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(I started writing this in 2007. It's now 2020. I hope I didn't rush things)
​____________________________________________________________

The dash.
 
As a noun, it’s just a little line. As a verb, you hurry through a moment. Those two kinds of dashes are related in a way that I consider almost tragic.
 
Most people don’t think of the dash as anything except a small, insignificant little line.
 
And yet, it represents the most important thing ever known to man. 

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MY WEEKEND WITH MARLEE

3/2/2020

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Something I wrote one night way back in 2003, after getting back from a camping weekend with my daughter Marlee...
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I got back a little while ago from “My Weekend With Marlee”. The big annual once a year “Father/Daughter” tent camping weekend. The Marlee part was great. The weather part… well… part of it was pretty bad, a little was really nice, and the rest was hot and sticky. But the Marlee part overshadowed the weather, so it was okay with me. Considering the point to the whole weekend is to completely devote time just between dad and daughter, it was a wonderful time.
 
We arrived about 5 PM on Friday, and we were lucky. It was pouring. But since I’m such a fantastic forecaster, I deemed it might start raining even harder… and not stop. So we decided to make the most of it and started setting up camp in what I would consider only a slight downpour.
 
Because of my amazing forecasting talents, I had thought ahead and had taken a “groundcover” to put under the tent to separate the dry tent from the soaking wet ground. I positioned the groundcover down in just the right spot.
 
Next was the tent. Of course, by the time we went to put the tent down, the ground cover was soaked. So we tried drying it off… in the downpour. That took half the towels we had brought with us. And it only took half because we had brought extra. It also only took half because we eventually gave up trying to dry off the groundcover in the pouring rain. We now have the tent down on a soaking groundcover that’s there to keep the tent from sitting on a wet ground. Nice!

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CURB JUMPING

2/18/2020

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(Something I wrote back in 2013. When I was much less mature. Okay... who am I kidding...)
_______

CURB JUMPING
 
I enjoy a pastime called “Curb Jumping” which is a very close cousin to “Cliff Jumping". And as you know, cliff jumping is extremely dangerous.
 
I, being the dangerous man I am, fit the profile perfectly. Particularly since, being in New Haven CT, the only real cliffs I come across are curbs, which tend to mitigate a lot of the danger.
 
However, I still must feed my wild side, so every so often, I'll put on my helmet and gloves and get all my line and rope and footwear and everything on and go jumping.
 
Obviously, in a city like New Haven, finding a good curb is pretty easy, although the steeper ones... 6... maybe 8 inches... are a little harder. Of course, when you're dangerous like myself, looking a little harder for the big ones is worth it, especially when you have a reputation for danger.
 
Most likely, people look at me in awe when they see me on the weekends. I see them pointing... speaking under their breath, waiting for me to jump. Sometimes, I'll stand there... breathing deeply.... gathering myself on the edge of a particularly high curb... stoking the anticipation. Some onlookers laugh as they try to hide the fear they feel inside for me.
 
And then.... as they wait... holding their collective breaths.... I raise my arm.... my signal that I am about to leap.... the adrenaline rushing through me.... silence around me.... they stare.... I am so dangerous to them.... and then... I leap. A rush of air inevitably hits my face as I leave the confines of mother earth. Ploop.... I hit the street and raise my hands in triumph!
 
The onlookers are, as always it seems, speechless. I have done it again.

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POLITICS AS SPORT

2/7/2020

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Politics have become a game of sport, where one side constantly tries to defeat the other, in a competition that can't truly be won unless everyone wins. As fans, rooting for the other side's failure, is like hoping the other team's stadium implodes while you're sitting in it.
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DREAMFLIGHT

1/30/2020

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May a warm wind come down from the skies, whisking you away, taking you on a journey through the stars, across universes untraveled.
 
While you ride in the warm arms of the wind, may you see spectacular glitter, and colors unimagined.
 
May you be swept to the edge of the universe, traveling through time and space to galaxies never before traversed, wishing upon shooting star after shooting star, hearing the silence of nothing go by. The sky around you black and seemingly shiny, with billions of tiny lights in the distance, each becoming extraordinary large as you sail by silently with a speed unmeasured in the vastness of night space.
 
May you see life, beautiful life, intelligent, loving, playful, and always friendly, as you speed your way through time, and may the warm winds hold you and give you comfort as you ride your trip of a lifetime.
 
Colors unimagined, bright and deep, play like fireworks upon the black canvas around you, silent, quiet, yet filling you with a wholeness you have never felt in your life. A strange new sense invades you and gives you comfort, making you smile involuntarily, nodding to yourself as you go.
 
And may the warm wind bring you around and down once again, setting you gently in familiar surroundings, all knowledge gained, senses aroused, fulfilled, yet home again as you open your eyes.
 
 A dream? Real?
 
You gain a better sense of your surroundings, acknowledging your life as you know it, and realize while you have just experienced something extraordinary, something you will never forget and will be able to experience again and again without ever being able to fully describe, maybe even to yourself, you also realize that you are earthbound, never having left your comfortable existence.
 
You sigh, somewhat disappointed, deciding you need to raise yourself and move. As you do, you gaze downward toward your arm, as some fine, powdery star dust falls off and lifts in the breeze.

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LIVES

1/23/2020

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I once had a free-for-all, heart racing, crazy, fishtailing spin out, from one side of the highway to the other and back, going sixty five miles per hour, while trying to avoid another driver who had just had an accident. I remember the violence in my car, my hands flying across the wheel trying to regain control. My coffee, and everything on my front seat and storage compartment, flying past my face and around me. I ended up regaining control and driving home without a scratch.
 
I know, in my heart, that I could have easily died that day.
 
Very often, when you’re involved in a car accident, you cross over from a point of trying to avoid having the accident, to acknowledging it’s going to happen. Although I never stopped trying to regain control of my car, I did reach that point where I knew I was going to hit the cement barrier separating the other side of the highway from mine, and I just could not see any way I wasn’t either going to hit it and flip over, or hit it and fly over to the other side.
 
And yet… I didn’t. I don’t, to this day, understand how I didn’t, but I did not.
 
Now, I’m much more spiritual than I am religious, but in the direct aftermath of that event, and even to this day, it just completely feels like God slid his hand between that cement barrier and my car, cushioning the blow, and redirecting my car the other way.
 
So I wonder…
 
Cats have nine lives.
 
But people, …people just die.
 
Now, I understand that there are always exceptions to what I’m about to propose, including newborns and the very innocent young, but could it be that maybe, just maybe, humans have a certain amount of lives too, like cats, and we actually use up our lives before we die?
 
No one ever really counts how many times they’ve almost died. We never know how many of our own lives we’ve used up. I’m sure there were times you didn’t know just how close you came to dying, so you didn’t know it was one of “your times”. We probably aren’t aware of some of them, since they’re not always as dramatic as a car accident. The cancer scare, the silent heart attack, the time you had that surgery and didn’t die of a blood clot, or that time the peanuts didn’t kill you. Maybe it was that time your intuition told you not to argue with someone, not knowing he had a gun and would have used it, or the time you were eating lunch in your car and started choking. You coughed it up and finished your lunch. All of those times could have gone the other way, but they didn’t. Maybe you used one of your lives, and just didn’t know it.
 
All those times when someone well-liked and respected passes away, and the family is crying and wondering why bad things happen to good people… maybe it doesn’t have as much to do with how good or bad you are, as much as how many of your own lives you’ve used up. Death happens to all kinds of folks. There doesn’t seem to be any correlation between whether or not you’ve led a decent life. Could it be that there’s a certain amount of times humans can be in a situation where they probably should have died and didn’t, and when those times are used up, THAT’S what determines when we die?
 
Maybe it’s as simple as those who don’t use up their lives are the ones who die of old age.

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PAY IT FORWARD

1/20/2020

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Did you ever see the movie "Pay It Forward"?? Neither did I.
 
However, I do love the idea.

Whenever I do a favor for someone, I never ask for anything in return because… it's a favor. I usually tell them something like, "Just do it for someone else in the future".


Imagine... if you pay a favor back, it stops there and that's the end of it. But if you pay it forward... it never stops. Unless someone gets a little selfish and stops paying it forward.

Anyway... I love the concept. Now you must like it too. Because I've been hypnotizing you as you've been reading. Bring me some ice cream.
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Inequalities During The Holiday Season, and The Potential Damage It Can Do

12/20/2019

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This is the time of year when Santa visits. And rewards those that have been nice, and supposedly, does not reward those… as much at least…. who’ve been naughty.

There are however, a lot of families who can’t afford gifts. The children in those families may have tried really hard to be deserving of reward, and yet, to them, after the holiday comes and goes, Santa will have deemed them to be undeserving and unworthy. This concept is disturbing to me.

Kids are taught to believe in Santa, and they talk about him, as well as all their holiday gifts in the aftermath. And those that don’t get gifts are left to wonder what they did so wrong, and why they were deemed unworthy even though they may have tried to be so.

One of the many, many seeds of character building, that can go so wrong.

​It's impossible to know, but I wonder what the ripples add up to, with things like this.
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"You can accomplish great things while doing nothing".

12/20/2019

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One of the best things about having faith is that it gives you a place to store the answers when you don't have them

7/10/2019

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FEATHER IN THE BREEZE

6/7/2019

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You’re a feather in the breeze
Prodded rocking side to side
No control no direction
As you drift upon the wind
 
Jetsam on a broken shore
Empty life with hints of more
Waiting as your savior
Lifts you up to take you in
 
Transparent and so fragile
Stripped naked and confused
The tears have worn away
the underneath
 
You sacrifice your values
Give up, give in, give out
Prostrated and so
Open just to breathe
 
Fragile, cracked and broken
Jetsam floats upon the waves
Your own needs go unspoken
In your offerings to please
 
Opened with acidic hands
Your inner self wears thin
In a life of hidden winds
You’re a feather in the breeze
 
Silent tears in dark of night
Only you to hold you tight
With loss of soul in darkness
In some ungodly way
 
You cry in silent sorrow
As the sun unveils morrow
You face the waking challenge
Of pushing past the day
 
Fragile, cracked and broken
Jetsam floats upon the waves
Your own needs go unspoken
In your offerings to please
 
Opened with acidic hands
Your inner self wears thin
In a life of hidden winds
You’re a feather in the breeze
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Don't expect anything to change, if you're not going to change anything.

5/27/2019

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Maybe the idea isn't to be better than someone else was the day before, but to be better than you were the day before.

8/9/2018

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Those who feel less in control, are the ones who make the most noise.

8/9/2018

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Don’t forget… in the course of being an adult, being responsible, and carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders, to look at life through the eyes of a child, appreciate the silly, and be a little goofy at times.

5/8/2018

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The more your own opinion becomes important to how you feel about your own actions, the less other people's opinions will matter. And it will give you freedom.

4/20/2018

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STRANDED

3/30/2018

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I wrote this a long time ago.... around 2005 or so. Obviously, I'm catching up on some old writings...
_____________________________________


Day 5:
 
Dear log,
 
It has been a long time now that I have been stranded on this island that is my office. Many suns have risen and set, many moons have lit my nights. I wonder if I will ever escape.
 
Yesterday was interesting albeit as usual, somewhat dangerous. The unknown, along with the clutter, seems always to be like that.
 
I was working my way through what seemed like a large field of debris, searching for nutrients of any kind, or maybe some coffee, when I suddenly came upon a clearing. It was unusual, to say the least. As I looked across the vast wasteland that has become my tormentor, there stood in front of me a large mound, approximately 7 feet wide, 3 feet high, and 4 feet deep. It looked unnatural and I approached it with caution. It seemed almost a living being, yet so long left dormant. The mound was covered with more debris and as I approached, I could feel my heart drum a harder, faster beat within my chest. I stared upon this mound, so covered from time past, and felt the evil within. It could only mean danger. I reached my hand out, barely touching the edges of dust and cobweb soaked clutter, so long ago lost to sunlight. It lay there silently, almost daring me to come closer. I did so. With trepidation and a rising sense of danger, I moved the dust cloaked edge of debris a little more. No response. I did it again, my rising caution screaming out. Nothing. I wiped away more of the remains to find a smooth brownish textured layer underneath. What kind of aberration could this be?? It looked man made. I wiped away more, my anticipation and curiosity almost making me throw caution to the wind. I stared aghast, amazement running through my veins as I gazed upon something I could never have imagined. There in front of me was a long ago forgotten desk. A chill shot through me as I contemplated the meaning of this new discovery. Someone had been here before. As the dust slid and lifted, I could see file folders with vaguely familiar names of cases not yet finished. I slowly opened a drawer. Wow, I thought to myself... paper clips. Sticker thingies. A stamp! I could write for help!!
 
Suddenly my hand rubbed against a small hard lump. Caution and fear once again shot through me as I jerked backwards. No movement. I slowly reached for the object again. It was gray with small button-like buttons. I pressed one. Suddenly from across the island that is my office came voices from under a large pile of 3-ringed binders and industry magazines!! I rushed over, my legs churning, held back against the currents of debris. Hacking my way closer, I shoved the dust covered binders aside, hoping to find someone alive. As I moved a baseball cap and a can of Slimfast, I saw a glow. My eyes stared in wonderment. No... I would find no one alive this day. That was too much to hope for. However, there would be communication. The AM/FM CD Tape player glowed its' digital glow as sound from a long forgotten band called "Train" wafted through the air. I barely remembered them. I have been on this island that is my office too long.
 
Some day log, I will get off this island that is my office and be set free to enjoy life as it should be. For now though, I continue on, exploring the dark danger-filled corners and long forgotten file cabinets, answering the phone, doing reviews, and the occasional wholesaler-sponsored lunch.
 
David S. Chorney
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Marlee Dating

3/3/2018

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This is something I wrote wayyyy back when my daughter was first born. Must have been sometime in 1997...
_______________________

A bunch of people who saw the pictures I sent of my new born daughter Marlee, commented on them. It made me think. I need a plan for when she wants to date. So far, I jotted down some ideas…
 
No make-up, no earrings, and no dates until she’s 30. In-home schooling too.

Every boy who wants to even talk with her has to pass a written and oral exam plus I interview his parents by gun point.

Salt peter must be present in his diet, and he must offer to do 50 hours per week of community service work around MY house until he’s known her for 7 years or until he dies, whichever comes first.

He must go through a metal detector. If he has an earring, a nose ring, or any other piece of jewelry, he must ASK me to tear if off him.

He must be a big fan of Perry Como. I am NOT a fan of Perry Como, but if HE is, I’ll feel better.

He must be regularly contributing to an IRA and know the difference between a bond, a stock, and a mutual fund.

His car can’t have any dents or dirt on it. If he ever sits outside and beeps for my daughter, he will either be shot, or he will stay sitting outside and beeping for the rest of his endangered life.

If his jeans EVER fall below the point where his hips start, I will tear them off him so fast he’ll think he forgot to get dressed, and kick him back outside.

He must insist on calling me “Sir”.

If he ever even tries to come into actual physical contact with my daughter, he’ll wish he was being slowly eaten by dogs.

He must naturally enjoy bowling, sunsets, puppy dogs and helping out in senior citizen homes.

He needs to speak at least three languages fluently, know how to write a business plan, know how to create a DNA model with Tinker Toys, and do fractional square roots in his head.

He must make me laugh. Hard. He must make Marlee laugh.

He must bring a bouquet of flowers for my wife and roses for Marlee. If he brings RED roses for Marlee before he has known her for at least 9 years, he will eat them.

He must be on time. He can be up to 30 seconds early, but he can NEVER EVER be late for my daughter. If he IS late, he should only consider ringing that doorbell with a finger he is not fond of.
 
Okay, that was off the top of my head. I will formulate the other 75% of my plan when I’m not feeling quite as relaxed.
 
Marlee’s Dad

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I Needed

2/27/2018

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I needed to imagine a grin on your face,
if just for a second or two.
The sun pouring down for a brief point of time,
falling down as to shine just for you.

I needed to dream of a mere moments lapse,
where I see your half sleepy smile.
At least I can feel I turned on the sun,
if only, if just, for awhile.

I needed to imagine a brief point in time,
where the day glow could shine down on you.
I needed to think that I could do that,
if just for a second or two.

​ - David S. Chorney
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I hope, in the future, we look back at those who hated so much, and know we used them as markers to measure who we didn't want to be

2/25/2018

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The barrier between eating healthy and weight loss, is quantity

2/25/2018

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Life is not a competition. It's a journey of discovery, most often about yourself.

2/25/2018

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May the coming year bring you all of what you need, most of what you want, and just enough struggle to appreciate it all.

2/25/2018

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    David S. Chorney

    This is where I'm supposed to write something about myself. I still have some hair left. I am still undecided which I like better, photography or painting. My four major food group are seafood, melted cheese, pasta, and Advil. I love the hunt of a finished piece of art. All quotes, essays, stories, and any other written piece on this website, are original and written by yours truly, unless otherwise noted.

    Please, share everything you can from this site. I'd like to make this site the central part of every single living person's life. And become modestly famous and fabulously wealthy in the process.  I promise to share.

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