{"id":199,"date":"2013-04-25T01:01:10","date_gmt":"2013-04-24T19:01:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/?p=199"},"modified":"2021-06-17T22:42:12","modified_gmt":"2021-06-17T16:42:12","slug":"the-better-person","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/?p=199","title":{"rendered":"THE BETTER PERSON"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 What a week we’ve had!\u00a0 <\/span><\/strong>\"Scott<\/span><\/strong>When I say we, I mean the global we.\u00a0 Boston Bombings, explosions in West, Texas, thwarted terrorist plot to derail trains here in Canada, and that massive fight with my brother.\u00a0\u00a0 Oh, you didn’t hear<\/strong> about that last one?\u00a0 Well, why would I want to rehash that here?\u00a0 Because I can.\u00a0 This is my blahg and I’ll comment on whatever I please.\u00a0 Don’t worry, this won’t be all self-serving.\u00a0 There will be a connection to larger things.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Let me start with that fight with my brother Tim.\u00a0 The fight was so nasty and made me so angry that it inspired me for this blahg and put world events into perspective.\u00a0 \"THE<\/a>The photo below is the last picture taken of all 6 of my parents’ children.\u00a0The occasion was the wedding of my brother Chris and his wife Valerie.\u00a0 I don’t remember the date but I think it was 7 or 8 years ago.\u00a0 In the back row, from left to right, are Todd (2nd oldest), Chris (the youngest and the groom), Wanda (4th oldest), and Tim (the oldest).\u00a0 In the front row, again from left to right, are Dan (5th oldest) and yours truly, Scott (3rd oldest).\u00a0 Dan was married for the second time to wonderful Deb about five years ago.\u00a0 There was a photo taken at Dan’s wedding but Tim was in Afghanistan (I’ll explain about that later) so the family photo was short one brother; making the one at Chris’ wedding the last complete Henderson sibling picture.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Forgive me the side trip about the family photo.\u00a0 As mentioned, Tim was in Afghanistan during Dan’s wedding so that requires a brief explanation.\u00a0 Tim is skilled at boiler and furnace mechanics so he was employed by a private company to oversee the boiler systems on the Canadian base over there.\u00a0 I am probably selling him short in this description because I don’t know exactly what he did there but Tim is very skilled and qualified.\u00a0 At one point Dan, who is in the Canadian military was serving in Afghanistan at the same base as Tim.\u00a0 They had the opportunity to spend some time together there.\u00a0 Tim was still on a contract in Afghanistan at the time of Dan’s wedding.\u00a0 Recently, Tim had a similar contract working in Northern Canada up at Canadian Forces Station Alert<\/b> in Nunavut.\u00a0 Maybe it wasn’t there and Tim will fault me for not knowing it but it was somewhere North and remote and he was there for two or three months.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 While Tim was away, he parked his truck in my parents’ driveway facing toward the road.\u00a0 My father’s truck was parked facing Tim’s truck.\u00a0 The driveway is narrow and there is a large gazebo to the right of the driveway and a long hedge to left.\u00a0 There is no way to get another vehicle along side of vehicles parked in the driveway.\u00a0 Now, as I’ve mentioned, I’m really the only sibling who is in charge of checking in on my parents on a regular basis.\u00a0 Dan lives an hour away, Chris lives in Cincinnati about 9 hours away, and Tim normally lives in Ottawa when he’s not off working somewhere in the world.\u00a0 If you’re doing the math, that leaves two other siblings.\u00a0 To be fair, both Todd and Wanda work but they certainly don’t do as much as I do even when they are not working.\u00a0 No digs there.\u00a0 So, to get back to the current story, my mother called me a couple of weeks ago to tell me that my father’s vehicle wouldn’t start.\u00a0 I had my suspicions that it was a dead battery so when I went there, I found it was indeed a dead battery.\u00a0 Sometimes when my parents go shopping they load groceries into the back of their Ford Escape and they don’t always close the hatch completely when they unload the groceries.\u00a0 This was the case and the dome light stayed on and killed the battery.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 As I mentioned, there is no way to get another vehicle along side of vehicles parked in the driveway.\u00a0 This limited my options of boosting my father’s vehicle battery.\u00a0 I had booster cables but couldn’t get my car near the front of his car.\u00a0 The cables were not twenty feet long so the only option I had was to move Tim’s vehicle forward about five feet and to boost my father’s vehicle.\u00a0 I’ve boosted a few vehicles in my time so I knew what I was doing.\u00a0 The short version of this story is that I moved Tim’s truck five feet forward and boosted dad’s battery without incident.\u00a0 End of story number one regarding Tim’s truck.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Now comes last week.\u00a0 We had some high winds and a tree limb went down and landed at the rear of Tim’s truck.\u00a0 My father asked me to bring in my chainsaw and cut up the limb before Tim flew home on Thursday.\u00a0 So, I went in on Wednesday and found that a lot of tree debris had fallen into the bed of Tim’s truck.\u00a0 I cut everything up and stacked the burnable size pieces off to one side.\u00a0 That left a lot of the smaller debris and the stuff that was in Tim’s truck.\u00a0 I decided the best thing to do would be to take it down to the yard waste depot around the corner from my parents’ house.\u00a0 It is less than half a kilometer away so I took Tim’s truck and emptied it and swept it out.\u00a0 I thought I was doing Tim and my father a favour.\u00a0 All in all, with going to the yard waste depot and back and moving Tim’s truck five feet to boost my father’s vehicle, I put maybe one kilometer of mileage on Tim’s truck.\u00a0 I should also add that when I boosted my father’s vehicle, Tim’s gas gauge was flashing empty.\u00a0 That means it was empty when Tim parked it before leaving for up north.\u00a0 That is significant to this story.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I stopped by my parents’ house again on Friday to check on them and asked if Tim had got in safely.\u00a0 \"MadderMy father informed me that Tim was back and he was madder than a wet hen because someone had used his truck.\u00a0 I really didn’t understand at that point what the big deal was.\u00a0 I was soon to learn.\u00a0 Tim and his girlfriend, Becky, stopped in about 15 minutes later with submarine sandwiches in hand.\u00a0 (Nothing for anyone else I might add.\u00a0 That’s an aside that I will touch on later.)\u00a0 I told Tim that if he was angry that someone had used his truck that he should take it up with me because I was the one who had used the truck on both occasions.\u00a0 I wasn’t trying to pick a fight but I might as well have put that forward as my intention.\u00a0 Tim let forth a string of threats and insults that were unwarranted.\u00a0 I tried to explain to him why I had used his vehicle but that only made him angrier.\u00a0 Becky tried to restrain him but Tim was, in my opinion, out of control.\u00a0 He threatened to hit me and other acts of violence.\u00a0 I told him that if he laid one finger on me I would call the police.\u00a0 I wasn’t going to play his game or feed into this violence.\u00a0 To this, he called me “a girl” simply because I wouldn’t defend myself.\u00a0 Craziness!\u00a0 <\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 There were other points of Tim’s anger that did not make sense.\u00a0 \"AnI was accused of putting untold mileage on his truck and emptying it of gas.\u00a0 I tried to explain about the gas gauge already being on empty and driving his truck less than a kilometer but Tim was not prepared to listen to anything I had to say.\u00a0 I even apologized for using his truck but even that was not good enough.\u00a0 He called me stupid and talked about how intelligent he was and how much his truck was worth more than anything I owned or was likely to ever own.\u00a0 Rebuttal was useless.\u00a0 I also tried to explain that it was me here taking care of mom and dad that made it possible for him to be away for long stretches of time.\u00a0 It isn’t him that is taking care of business on the local front!\u00a0 Finally, I just had to leave.\u00a0 I had promised my friend Bryan, who lives with my parents, a ride to work.\u00a0 Bryan witnessed all of this and when we got outside he asked me what that was all about.\u00a0 I told him I honestly didn’t know.\u00a0 All I knew was Tim was angry and I was even angrier at the way I was treated.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I had to stop off about an hour later at my parents’ house because I had to drop off something my mother had asked me to pick up at the pharmacy.\u00a0 By that time, Tim was gone and the house was quiet.\u00a0 My mother told me that Tim said to say he was sorry for earlier.\u00a0 I was still angry about the whole affair and all I could think to say was a variation of the speech Aunt Em gives to Miss Gulch near the beginning of the Wizard of Oz:<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong>\"Aunt<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong>\u00a0 <\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

“For twenty-three years I’ve been dying to tell you what I thought of you, and now, well, being a Christian woman, I can’t say it.”<\/span>\u00a0 Of course it would have meant more if Tim had been there and I could have said it to his face.\u00a0 He probably just would have laughed at me.\u00a0 By the way, Abbie and I went to see The Wizard of Oz in the movie theater about two weeks ago and it still holds up after all these years.\u00a0 But that’s another story and another blahg.
\n<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The final piece of this is that Tim called me up at home three hours later.\u00a0 I was a little curt with him because I was still angry.\u00a0 I asked him what he wanted and he said he had called up to apologize.\u00a0 I told him I wasn’t going to take this from him any longer and he could rub salt.\u00a0 I then hung up on him.\u00a0 I wasn’t specific about where he should rub the salt nor do I know what really is the meaning of that phrase.\u00a0 That was five days ago and I haven’t heard from Tim since nor do know if he actually rubbed salt on something.\u00a0 I don’t really care.\u00a0 I just want to have my say and this blahg is the only forum I have to to speak without being interrupted.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The problem with having siblings is that you fight too much or you follow your brother down a path that only ends in tears.\u00a0 Case in point is the two brothers who were allegedly behind the Boston bombings.\u00a0 One is dead and the other will be in jail for the rest of his life if convicted.\u00a0 What did they have to be angry about?\u00a0 Why were they angry at the world?\u00a0 I don’t know.\u00a0 I can only talk about the conflict between my brother and I.\u00a0 Tim might be smarter than me.\u00a0 He certainly is stronger than me.\u00a0 He’s probably in better shape than I am.\u00a0 He might even be richer than I am when you are tallying up fortunes.\u00a0 But that’s not important to me.\u00a0 What is important is to be the better person and I think that’s what this blahg is really about.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Someone can try and tear you down and hurt you but you have to rise above that and not go down that same path.\u00a0 I think I’m the better person.\u00a0 I do many things for my parents and my personal life is affected by it.\u00a0 I can’t have a regular job because I have to run errands for my parents and take them to medical appointments.\u00a0 They could probably go by themselves but, as I have learned, they don’t always hear or understand what the Doctor tells them.\u00a0\u00a0 \"Bone<\/a>That’s another bone of contention by the way.\u00a0 I hate when one of my siblings tries to diagnose my mother or father.\u00a0 They have never been to any of my parents’ medical appointments and cannot comment on what they do not know.\u00a0 I’ve been there and I’ve heard the diagnosies and recommendations.\u00a0 I’m no Doctor and have had no medical training so even I won’t comment on anyone’s medical health unless I hear it directly from the source.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It’s important for me to be the better person.\u00a0 I won’t get anything for it.\u00a0 There’s no trophy or reward but I suspect some of my siblings think that I’ll be the first to line up with my hand out when my parents’ will is read.\u00a0 I don’t care about that.\u00a0 I want my mom and dad to be around for a while.\u00a0 That’s what is important.\u00a0 That’s why I do the things I do.\u00a0 I also don’t show up at my parents’ house with food or coffee in hand without bringing them something or phoning ahead to see if they want or need something.\u00a0 My sister is notorious for that.\u00a0 So was Tim with his submarine sandwich.\u00a0 I guess I just get it quicker than my siblings.\u00a0 Let them take what they want when my parents are gone.\u00a0 I’ll take away the satisfaction that I was the better child and the better person and was there for them when they were alive.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I want to close this piece by drawing it all together to world events.\u00a0 The bombings in Boston were a terrible thing committed by terrible people.\u00a0 There were, however, great acts of heroism and compassion performed by total strangers toward the victims.\u00a0 Let’s not forget about that.\u00a0 The world is not full of all angry people wanting to tear us down.\u00a0 There are better people out there.\u00a0 Let’s celebrate that.\u00a0 Let’s all try to be the better person.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I’ll close with a poem I wrote back on June 24th, 1985.\u00a0 Forgive the strange alignment of sentences and that fact that I don’t know what the inspiration was for this poem but the words in it have never been more fitting:<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 ADVICE TO US KILLERS<\/h2>\n

 <\/p>\n

Instead of slicing<\/h2>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 others \u00a0open<\/h2>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 when you get mad<\/h2>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 – just put a small hole<\/h2>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 into yourself<\/h2>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 and let the steam out –<\/h2>\n

-boil some heavy water<\/h2>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 over your open wound –<\/h2>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 – make a potent cup of tea-<\/h2>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 – chew dandelions like dogs do –<\/h2>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 – then throw down<\/h2>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 your silly ideas<\/h2>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 of self-help<\/h2>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 What a week we’ve had!\u00a0 When I say we, I mean the global we.\u00a0 Boston Bombings, explosions in West, Texas, thwarted terrorist plot to derail trains here in Canada, and that massive fight with my brother.\u00a0\u00a0 Oh, you didn’t hear about that last one?\u00a0 Well, why would I want to rehash that here?\u00a0 Because […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[63,62,4,3],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/199"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=199"}],"version-history":[{"count":33,"href":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/199\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4794,"href":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/199\/revisions\/4794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=199"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=199"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/falseducks.com\/theblahg\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=199"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}