Introductions and Weaselly Justifications

Hi, I'm Ryno.  Well, not really.  But if you want an explanation then read the "Explaining this blog" page.  Either way, I feel the need to make an introductory first post. 

I created this blog for two reasons, first to share myself with those I care about.  (Read ego-stroking)  Second, I really should chronicle something about my life.  Egotistical or not, my kids will probably want the goods someday.  And at the rate I write in my paper journal, I'm on track to start recording my entry into puberty shortly before my 150th birthday.  I'm trying to do better.  In this respect I have to thank my sister Stephanie and my wife Sarah, whose blogs are the inspiration for this one.

Now back to the ego-stroking.  It's really more about guilt alleviation - probably a meaningless distinction.  You see, I am absolutely, truly and utterly horrible at keeping in touch with people.  Don't believe me?

Ben Hansen, dear friend, mentor and hero to me, has not heard a word from me since I saw him last at my mother's funeral four years ago.  Thankfully, he, like me, has the capacity to pick up a friendship that has lain fallow for years - as if we last saw each other yesterday.  Most people aren't like us.

Nolan Hall and Nikki Whiting.  They are the brother and sister I never had.  I wouldn't have bothered to survive high school without them.  If not for the fact that Nikki is infinitely more proactive about social interaction, I probably would not have seen either of them since I left the Navy seven years ago. 

Speaking of the Navy, then there's the crew of USS Hopper.  Nick Kane, Rebecca Elbare, Danny Lee, Bryce Miller, Woody Greene, John Roberson and a dozen others.  When you spend that kind of time together, friendship becomes an inadequate word.  These people were/are family.  Nick is another brother from a different mother.  But I have not been in direct contact with any of these people for seven years.  And not because they haven't tried - especially Nick.  My wife keeps in touch with a few, but not me.  (Yes, you are perfectly justified in looking down on me now)

Hell, even my own family rarely hears from me.  I might talk to my brother Robert a couple times a year.  My brother Justin might hear from me more, if only because we sometimes bump into each other via online video gaming.  Most of my family interaction is mediated through my father, whom I struggle more successfully to maintain contact with.

In every one of these cases, it isn't that I don't care.  I LOVE these people, and think about each one almost daily.  But keeping in touch is like a mental roadblock for me that introduces intense anxieties.  And I don't pretend to have a good excuse.  It is definitely pathological.  And I would know. 

Is it a fear of being judged?  Maybe partially.  But that doesn't feel right.  I think (I know) that I have major major issues with saying goodbye.  Ever since I was 4-1/2 and my grandfather/best friend/daily compadre died of cancer, I've had intense anxiety about goodbyes that I've never worked through.  In some ways I never evolved past the coping strategies of a precocious preschooler - able to understand the finality of death but not deal with the repercussions.  I wouldn't want anyone to experience the near-panic attack episodes I go through when my wife and kids go on vacation without me.  Think gory and personalized versions of those "Death on the Highway" movies from drivers' ed, playing on repeat for days inside my mind. 

I don't like goodbyes.  So if I just don't talk to someone, then there can never be one.  Okay, that's my cop-out for the day.  And this post is my mea culpa.  I suck, and I'm sorry.  I want to be better than you could possibly know, if only because there are a whole lot of people out there that I really, really miss.  Here's to trying.