Were you part of the system of education that collected kids in masses to provide the same set of messages to many?

Hello to Jain and Zhao at HH cafeteria.

Isn’t it amazing how standardised tools like phonetics and writing put us here together to consider possibilities inside and outside this moment?

Soon, my wife’s family will gather outside the usual holiday reunions to reminisce.

States of energy driven to spin around one another because of concepts like family and language.

We don’ yet know what a person thinks when taking the last gasp for air after the heart has stopped beating.

Automatic brain stem function?

Conscious effort to stay alive one last second?

But we understand the word “dignity.”

My mother gave the world me. My mother in-law gave me her daughter, all the world to me.

My father taught me to be a man in a man’s world.

Meanwhile, I’ve adapted to gender-neutral subcultures while preserving my training which designates important, flexible roles for heterosexual men and women.

In the next two days, I’ll hear a lot of phonetic utterances centered on subcultural belief structures, mainly Christian, with philosophical differences that we can label Presbyterian, Southern Baptist, and Church of Christ.

There’ll be no war of words while we celebrate the life of my mother in-law.

If I could get my wish, I’d ask the rest of my species to take a break from arguing with and killing each other during the next 24 hours.

It’s not about me, though, is it?

For the sake of the woman who birthed my wife and raised her for 18-plus years, use the next 24 hours to hesitate before attacking someone else.

Use reason, calm and dignity to respect one another.

Imagine the person you’re with or thinking about is sitting beside you just before you take your last breath – how would you want to be treated?

Personally, I’d want you to tell me the world’s best joke and I’d hear the punchline just before my consciousness slipped away.

“Four welders walk into a funeral home to view their best buddy’s body. The first one says,…” You know the rest, of course.

Have a great day!

Thanks to Mapco; Sheila, Wendy, Julianne and restorative nurse at Southampton; Dre at Red Robin; Variety Bake Shop; Bertha and Debra of HH food services; Dr. Robert Williams; Jerrica; Howard Grimes; Bubba’s; Mr. Broome; Pat’s friends/coworkers; Earline and Joe Price; Jared Bell.