2023…Worse or Better?

A grown man ain’t got no time to feel sorry for himself. Around this season five years ago, I somehow managed to subconsciously pencil that into my schedule. Parent with a terminal illness among other family issues, woman problems (a woman can really hit ya good), etc. Our dissident media milieu had turned from naive fun and overnight success into watching my colleagues get ambushed in Charlottesville that summer. Let’s just call this a short list of unpleasantries.

So, essentially things were just all around not going well, and I was wallowing in how bad it felt instead of pursuing my life because the nature of this journey is that a lot of bad shit is going to happen along the way. That’s such a pathetic, pointless and highly counterproductive way to feel but maybe some guys need to feel it to figure that out.

It was a gray, drizzly winter morning and I’d been hanging out on a rural compound with some of the Identity Dixie crew. I’d usually take a back road from this location but that morning a couple of us decided to have breakfast at a diner which was near an interstate exit. Afterwards, I took that exit onto this interstate and got hit by a tractor trailer under two minutes later.

I was in the middle lane doing about 80 and it came up behind me going probably at least 90. It swung out into the far left lane to pass me and then merged back into the middle when its two back wheels were parallel to the driver’s side door of my car. To the right of me was a tanker truck of some kind. Luckily for me, this guy was paying attention and gunned it before I could get slammed into him.

It smelled like something was burning, which turned out to only be rubber grinding against the door. I didn’t realize that at the time and scrambled out the passenger side in a panic. The truck had pulled over a ways up and sped off as soon as I got out. Never got the plate. I smoked a cigarette while I waited for my car to explode and thought “par for the fuckin’ course.” I was completely fine, not even a scratch.

In hindsight, I was too mired in my own malaise to appreciate how incredibly lucky I was. It actually only occurred to me just now when I saw the same model of car (mine was totaled) in a video. “Hey, it could be worse” doesn’t sound like a very motivational statement but it really is something of which everyone should be aware. A free and healthy man has all sorts of opportunities of which he can avail himself. So many great experiences haven’t been foreclosed on if these two conditions apply to you.

I’ve had plenty of paranoid but pretty good living since that interstate incident. For instance, COVID created all sorts of work problems but that summer I found myself a place on a beach to be paranoid full time because I couldn’t go where I needed to go. A lot of people lost their jobs and businesses they’d invested their lives in because of this Satanic dystopia. But, I was on a Mediterranean beach. The worst unpleasantry inflicted on me was getting thrown in a gulag and lots of lost revenue but not enough to put me in the red.

I really don’t have anything to complain about in this regard and many others, so I try not to let my genuine greivances bog me down. Moreover, when whatever kills me comes, I won’t have the Mark of the Beast on myself. That’s peace of mind no 401(k) could ever provide. As 2023 approaches, I’m focused on all the possibilities and grateful for the good fortune I’ve had in stumbling through life thus far.

Cheer up, things could be a lot worse and potentially much better.