Is this like the 5th degree?

Once upon a time (Well, December 15th), an Immortal Matriarch was interviewed and passed her interview on. Sometime later (ok...it was January 6th), my friend Devyl posted her own interview and I asked to be included in the questioning tree. These are the questions she asked me, and the answers I have come up with.

1. Other than losing someone you love (or seeing someone you love get hurt) or dying before you have completed your life's missions ... what is your biggest fear?
Poverty. Now, I don't mean being poor. I've been there; I know how to get through that and learn good lessons along the way. There was a time that I was sharing a trailer with 2 of my best friends and we had a grand total of 1 can of corn in the house for sustenance. I don't fear being in that situation again. I dread not having the corn - not having the trailer. Even now, I know I'd be ok, but I will not let my family go through that.

2. Scenario: You can rewind up to 20 years and have up to six weeks to spend with one person without it affecting your present life. Do you take the opportunity, who do you choose, and what do you spend the time doing?
I'm severely tempted to say something about getting laid a lot more, but...I think I would go back and have some long conversations with one of my dear friends (either M or J). M is not in a very good place right now, and a lot of it stems from what turned out to be a bad decision some time ago. I would like to go back and help him to find a better path forward. J has, I think, been lost for some time. I'd love to go back and help her find who she really is and where she's really going before some of the pain she has experienced.

3. Compose a song using lyrics from other songs ... you must have (at least) 16 lines.
I'm sorry. I have to cop out on this one. I tried...I tried for the better part of 3 weeks to come up with something coherent. I won't quit trying, but I really feel like I need to get this post up. But I promise, when you least expect it: BAM! Song II - Electric Bugaloo.

4. Choose a moment in your life that you feel set you on your current course, and describe the moment and what it meant to you.
This is where we see the "It's a Wonderful Life" sort of lesson. If I can choose only one moment that put me where I am today, it'd have to be the moment when J broke up with me. At the time, it was a horrible, devastating moment. I'd have shot people to make it not happen. I was hurting enough several months later that when my friend M asked if I could come out to California to live with him and his wife, I jumped at the chance. It was there - faced with no job prospects, a home that was soon to go away, and a drifting soul - that I decided to join the Air Force. That, of course, led to meeting and marrying S, having two beautiful boys, and living joyously today. Therein lies the duality of every event - tragic, painful, wondrous, joyful. "Each man touches so many other lives..."

5. You are one of the most brilliant people I know, and I have always been in awe of your intelligence ... and your down-to-earth, easy-going manner. You also have a beautiful and fabulous wife that I adored as soon as I met her. I have not met your sons yet, but hope to one day. This is a two-parter: How does my vision of your life compare to YOUR vision of your life? If you had to describe your life in one word, what would that word be?
I'd say you hit it dead-on. Just kidding - you're gonna go to my head. My life is. I am intelligent, but often I am unable to put that intelligence to good use. I am down-to-earth and easy-going, but often have trouble dealing with people who are less intelligent. I do have a beautiful, fabulous wife - the deluxe model (with some features I can't even talk about), but she is as human as the rest of us. My children are awesome; every day, they remind me how lucky I am to be allowed near them, but sometimes I don't want to be. As always, I am ever the contradiction. Describing my life in one word is easy: Alive.


Now...if you would like me to ask you some questions, leave me a comment saying "Interview me" (or some such). I will e-mail you five questions (questions of my choosing). You post them and your answers to your blog much as I have done with mine - and include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same way. Thus the cycle continues.