The thing that I am most thankful for is all of the people who get me and appreciate me and love me.

To my co-workers, or rather, my fellow team members, the expression that I appear to wear at work can be misinterpreted as a scowl when really, it’s determination. I think if you’re around me long enough you understand that. Despite being my own brand of hypocrite, and having my own moments of contradiction and failed attempts at rising above, I am determined to be the best version of myself that I possibly can and I just want all of you to do and be the same because whether you or I like it or not, you all share a piece of my heart.

Except you.

You know who you are.

To my in-laws, you’ve all opened your arms to me wider than I could have ever asked for. Your daughter/sister/aunt surprised you all with her tale of this Canadian boy she had just met on the internet and was to smuggle across the border and spend the rest of her life with and while you may have had your reservations (because, come on, that’s crazy) you made a place in your hearts for me, just as I have for you.

Because, come on, we’re all a little crazy.

To my family, well, you don’t have much of a choice but to appreciate me because you’re my blood, but that doesn’t mean I think any of you feel obligated to love me. I know you love me because you want to and you can’t help it, just as I love you. You are my foundation, my basement, and no matter how much you may leak at times, you’ll always be the safest place to be during a storm.

Earthquakes though?

Not so much.

But that’s why I have a wife. An amazing, understanding, caring, thoughtful, patient, beautiful woman to be my doorway when the ground starts to shake. To be my beacon of light when the seas begin to churn. To be my sunshine when it rains one too many days in a row and my rain when there’s way too much sun. I am thankful that I couldn’t sleep for the nth time that night when I crossed paths with that adorable face of yours on Livejournal. You are the best thing that has ever happened to me and you will always be the best thing that will ever happen to me because for the rest of our lives, what happens to me is because of you and the person I strive to be because of you.

You aren’t just the world to me, you are the universe.

Ever expanding.

Always blowing my mind.

And I can’t wait to explore every millimetre of you for eternity, because lets face it, extraterrestrials even use the metric system.

Thank you for being you.

I love you.

And of course, even though she can’t read this, I can’t forget the sillyface monkey nose. You’re fluffy and adorable and one strange puppyface. You’re loyal and love me unconditionally because that’s just what puppies do. I strongly believe that if you knew what a gun was, you’d be the first to take a bullet for me, and that, my canine friend, is love.

The above image was posted by a friend from my hometown who is a part of a wonderful organization that you can visit here. The image was posted on their facebook page, but it wasn’t clear whether it was posted by someone seeking justice or by the miscreants themselves.

Regardless of the intent, my first reaction was that I wanted to take a thousand mile trip to find them and exercise the possibility of becoming a vigilante. You’ve seen Dexter and The Boondock Saints? Yeah, I’m on the titular characters’ sides.

Fairly quickly, though, my blood came back down to a simmer and I came to some conclusions. First, and obviously, these two need to suffer consequences for their actions. Some who don’t place animals very high on their list of things to care much about may disagree, but in the realm of all things right and wrong, by my definition of the terms, this leans pretty far toward the former. Seeking justice, however, is not my intention for sharing this. My intention is that all of you who see this spread it around to shed light on the real issue: parenting.

Time and time again whether I’m watching the news or watching the action take place first hand, I can’t help but conclude that the biggest issue in America (and the world, for that matter) is piss poor parenting. The government seems to like to spend so much money and time worrying about things like the war on drugs and gun violence when what they should really be worrying about is why these kids are turning to drugs and guns in the first place and attempting to fix that.

And what that is is your inability to steer your children in the right direction.

I know, I know. I’m not a parent. I don’t know how difficult it is to make sure that my child flies straight and doesn’t get into a lot of trouble. I don’t realize how much influence my child’s friends have on them. I don’t realize how difficult it is to find that balance to where I’m making sure I’m keeping an eye on my kid and keeping them from making poor choices but not pressuring them into a rebellious state. I don’t know how hard it is to provide for my family and still have the energy to be the best parent I can.

Whatever.

That all might be true, but what I do know about children is that if you give them enough love and attention and positive encouragement and you’re there for them and you’re making sure that your actions are those you want to see them emulate, they’re going to turn out a lot better than if you’re practicing the complete opposite of all of those things.

To address the picture, if these two had some kind of positive influence in their lives when they were growing up, they would not be going to such extreme measures to seek attention. They would not be so heartless to turn to animal cruelty to get a rise out of people. They would be caring and compassionate towards all living things because their parents taught them to care for and respect the world around them.

Unfortunately they had none of those things and while yes, they are clearly old enough to make their own choices, they have no foundation to even begin to care to make other choices. They choose to be brutal and destructive and hateful because any other choice would go against who they’ve grown up to be which is a direct result of having terrible influence.

So please, take some time and evaluate your ideas of right and wrong and whether or not you want to pass these ideals along to future generations. Take a look at the person you really are and decide whether or not you need to be a better version of yourself so that your child can be the best version of them self. Assess the direction of your moral compass and make sure that it’s pointing toward safety and not danger.

Our children may be our future, one we hope to be bright, but we are the ones who make sure that these children shine.

They say that you learn something new every day.

Wanna know what I learnt today?

That the African Western Black Rhino went extinct.

Image courtesy of CNN.

Really?

I mean, seriously? Animals are still going extinct?

Wait, what’s that? A quarter of all mammals are at risk of extinction?

A QUARTER?!

We ought to be fucking ashamed of ourselves.

Each and every one of us who do nothing to preserve the life of other species on this planet deserve to feel completely and utterly ashamed. We deserve to feel not like we’ve made someone angry, but that we’ve appalled and completely disappointed them.

We deserve to feel like we’re going to vomit every last bit of our insides all over the floor because we’re that sick and disgusted with ourselves.

I mean, this seriously pushes me over the edge.

Sure, a huge part of the problem still rests on the shoulders of poachers in undeveloped countries who are under the impression that their survival relies on the slaughter and collecting of the valuable bits and pieces of these animals, but that’s not just it.

On a day to day basis, we live in a manner that adds to this depletion of the population of certain species. We consume and digest and lay waste to so much of the natural resources this planet has to offer that we leave nothing for species other than our own and we wipe them off the face of this planet forever.

Forever.

As in, you will never, ever get a chance to see the African Western Black Rhino in person again.

Ever.

It’s gone.

I’m fucking pissed off.

Partly because I’m to blame.

As much as I’ve always loved animals, I’ve done nothing to help this preservation effort.

Partly because I had no idea.

Which I’m sure almost each and every one of you who reads this can attest to.

If something isn’t right there in our faces, we just simply have no idea.

Out of sight, out of mind, if you will.

Well you can trust me when I say that the health and well being of the remaining species on this planet will be in my heart and in my mind from now on and I will try my fucking best to be a part of ensuring that they have the chance to outlive the human race.

In fact, I’m going to take the cheque that I received from my parents for my birthday and donate 100% of it to the WWF and from now on, do so as regularly as I can afford.

And I urge you to please do the same.

There are a lot of things that are happening that are beginning to make me more and more sad and bringing me to a boiling point on a day to day basis, but honestly, not like this.

I’m past angry.

Tears are welling.

I feel sick.

I can’t honestly express a moment in my life that I’ve felt like this with regards to something that’s really happening and isn’t just something in a movie or here say or a biased point of view in a documentary.

Fact: Animals are being wiped off the face of this planet and we’re just letting it happen.

Not any more.

Not any fucking more.

Fox’s new show “New Girl” has to be one of my favourite TV shows on air right now and even more so, of all time.

You may say that it’s way too early to say that, seeing as it’s only been on for about 5 episodes, but I get this warm and fuzzy feeling every time I watch it and can’t help but fall in love with the damn thing!

Every 5 seconds I’m laughing about something and it catches me off guard.

I wonder “why am I laughing so much?”

“What have the writers done with this show that makes me feel this way?”

And I realize, while I’m sure the writers have a lot to do with it, I feel like a massive part of it is the actors. To me, it feels like these characters aren’t just characters. It feels like the actors are channeling a healthy portion of who they really are and infusing these characters with that. They aren’t trying to be funny as much as they are simply being.

At their core, they are, for lack of a better word, silly.

You know, silly.

That side that (most of) you only share with someone you’re really close to.

That side that makes you dance no matter how badly you may do so and sing just because you feel like it and do a random somersault into a jump kick because you can without a care in the world because you’re not being judged.

Only these actors, they’ve figured out a way to care less about who may or may not be judging them and don’t hide who they are and in turn, aren’t judged at all and instead they’re praised.

Or they are by me, at least, because I do care and I don’t want to. Sometimes I’ll fly off the handle and forget people are watching, but then I’m quickly reminded that they are when I get a “what the fuck is wrong with you?” glare, and I climb back in my shell, and do you know what the worst part about it is?

I give that same glare to others.

And do you know why?

Because I’m jealous.

I’m jealous that there’s this whole side of me that hardly anyone knows because I can’t seem to forget that they’re all watching and glaring and judging and ridiculing.

For those few seconds that I do manage to forget, though, I’m reminded of the first time I met my wife and we spent the day traveling around Louisville and when we stopped at this park, we just sat there basking in each others silliness and I felt so at home for the first time in forever.

Or maybe ever.

This is what “New Girl” does for me.

Makes me feel comfortable.

Warm and fuzzy.

It makes me want to hang out with the characters on this show because I know I could be myself around them.

So here’s to being me more often.

Here’s to being more often.

And here’s to rubbing off on others so that we can all share the real us and stop hiding.