Tag Archives: stupidity

Communication Breakdown, Part II

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How could he not understand?

I wrote a a post back in September about a breakdown in communication between two people who had been living together for a long time and the breakup and heartbreak it caused. Obviously, the story was not as hypothetical as it was written. Twenty nine years is a long time. I still can’t understand how he could throw it all away — especially when things were finally getting good again.

I think he tried to communicate with me today. How? Well, we had to swap trucks. Despite the fact that he told me I could keep his truck in the divorce settlement — both verbally and in writing — he changed his mind. I fetched the truck from Washington a while back. Although my lawyer offered him the keys, he ignored that and took his demand to the court. (I did mention that he had a problem with communication, no?) The result was a truck swap this afternoon. He got his Chevy back and I got my Ford back. Whatever.

I didn’t notice his attempt at communication until I got home. I was taking my things out of the truck and noticed some papers folded up under the center console. I opened them up and found an odd collection of email messages from me, as well as a tweet I wrote to @MikeTRose yesterday in response to one of his replies to me:

The emails may have been his attempt to explain why he hated me. That’s the way I saw it. But when I read the emails, I could see no reason to hate. All I could see was my attempt to communicate the level of frustration I was feeling from his actions. I loved him but he was driving me nuts.

It seems that every time I pointed out a problem with our relationship, he took it personally and just sulked about it. He kept all those old emails and printed them out and left them in my truck when we swapped trucks today. Who keeps emails from four years ago? Why the hell didn’t he just talk it out with me then? This is what I don’t understand.

We had such a freaking good life together — an enviable life. He was — note the use of past tense — a great partner. What the hell happened to him? When did he forget that life is for living?

For example, back in 2008, when I was doing helicopter tours at Lake Powell (making really good money, I might add), he scheduled a trip back to New York to visit his family. Not only did we have a dog back home that needed to be cared for, but his aged horse had become seriously ill. He expected me to drop everything and return early to watch the dog and care for the horse. My email response summarized why I thought he was being unreasonable. After all, couldn’t he have scheduled that trip for another time? I’d be home in a week or two anyway.

Is that worth hating me for? I don’t think so.

(He wound up leaving anyway. Our neighbor was present when the vet put his horse down. I came back from Lake Powell for a few days to take care of things at home. But I don’t get any credit for any of that.)

In another message, which also showed part of what I was replying to, we both lamented about feeling alone while I was away, working in Washington. Yet for years, he’d spent a full week (or more) every single month in New Jersey, leaving me in Arizona to care for the house, dog, horses, and chickens. Add that up and you get three months a year — about the same amount of time I spent in Washington that year. Later, he spent four days every week living in his condo in Phoenix — that’s more than half of his time — when I was home in Wickenburg. Yet back in 2010, he apparently expected me to sacrifice the business I was building to keep him company. I complained that I wasn’t interested in staying home to watch the animals and cook his meals, just to be rewarded with an evening of television every night.

Is that worth hating me for? I don’t think so.

The rest of the messages were in the same vein. I was working hard away from home, building my business — a business he promised to join me in. I spent a ton of money buying an RV that was big enough to house him, me, and our dog when he turned 55 (last year) and hit the road with me for half the year. I built up my cherry drying contracts and brainstormed for ways we could work together to make money. He even got his helicopter rating so he could ferry the aircraft while I drove the trailer when we were in transit.

But when the time came, he made excuses not to join me. I waited, hoping he’d change his mind. Instead, he waited for me to leave this summer, got a membership on Chemistry.com, and was sleeping with another woman a month later.

Yes, I trusted a man who let me down, cheated on me, and then lied to me. Yes, I’m a chump. Hell, I trusted him. Wouldn’t you trust someone you’d lived with for 29 years?

Is that worth hating me for? I don’t think so.

But what I still don’t understand is why he thinks he should hate me for wanting a better life for both of us. For working hard to make it happen.

And I can’t understand how he could give up on us — especially after asking me to see a marriage counsellor to help patch things up — when we were on the verge of getting everything right again. He finally had his dream job with travel for two of us and a work-from-home schedule. I could see the light at the end of the tunnel he’d been in with a long string of unsatisfying jobs. I could see blue skies and smooth air ahead.

But I guess he didn’t want the woman he’d spent more than half of his life with. The woman who’d taken care of him and made a home for him all those years. The woman who had introduced him to motorcycling, horseback riding, flying. The woman who shared her things with him — horses, trailers, jet skis. I guess it was time to dump the woman who spoke out when she wasn’t happy in favor of the first new woman who slept with him and agreed with everything he said.

Yes, baby. Whatever you want.

That’s not me. And the man who wants that is not a man I want to live with.

I just wish he’d been more of a man when he ended our relationship. A real man would have done it in person, before he started sleeping around. This man is a lying, cheating coward who can’t even talk to me, face to face, when he’s alone with me in person. Instead, he leaves old email messages hidden away in my truck for me to find and read when he’s not around.

And who hates me for reasons I still don’t understand.

An Example of the Mentality of the Losing Party

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This is just too perfect an example to pass up.

You know, I really didn’t want to blog about politics this season. I’m sick of it. The fighting, the lies, the way our country has become divided on ideology. But when I scrolled through the content on the Tumblr site, White People Mourning Romney, I just couldn’t pass this one up. To me, it succinctly identifies what’s wrong with too many people on the right: they just don’t have a freaking clue what they’re talking about:

Stupidity is Sublime

Points:

  • Obama has been president for nearly four years. If he were going to “screw us over,” don’t you think he would have done it by now? And no, the Affordable Care Act (AKA ObamaCare) is not screwing us over. It’s making it possible for more people than ever to have access to affordable health care.
  • Obama is a Christian. How dense can you possibly be to not believe this? I suppose you want to see his birth certificate again, too. You can deny the facts all you want — as Romney did — but the facts remain the facts. The truth will prevail.
  • Australia does not have a president. It has a prime minister. As a Constitutional Monarchy, it also currently has a Queen.
  • As you tweeted your nonsense, Australia’s prime minister was a “she” (Julia Gillard) and not a “he.” And she doesn’t tolerate misogynistic bullshit like your GOP idols do.
  • And you really want to go to Australia? Where the lowest tax bracket for foreign residents for 2012/2013 is 32.5%? Doesn’t exactly fall into the GOP idea of low tax rate, does it? The reality is that the U.S. has some of the lowest taxes in the world. But that’s not good enough for you folks. It needs to be lower so we have to cut back on services and let everyone fend for himself.
  • You feel like America is no more? Well, yes, America from the 1950s is no more. This is the 21st century and things are different. If you can’t keep up with the times, you’re not likely to enjoy the real America much anymore.

Good luck moving to Australia. When they do your background check and see the bullshit you posted on Twitter (and likely elsewhere), I don’t think they’ll let you past the immigration barrier at the airport. Besides, they want people who can contribute to society, not whiners and complainers who are looking for escape from imagined oppression.

I’m closing comments on this post because, frankly, I don’t want to give visitors a place to argue about this. And I have far better things to do with my time than moderate the bullshit comments I know this post will attract.

One Pilot’s Stupidity Makes Us All Look Bad

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Helicopter pilots: choose your landing zones wisely, please.

As a helicopter pilot, one of the questions I get asked most often is: “Can you land anywhere?”

In most cases, the person asking the question is referring to the legality of landing anywhere — not the ability to land anywhere. Helicopters have the ability to land almost anywhere, but not every landing zone is legal. I address this in quite a bit of detail in a post titled “Finding a Legal Landing Zone” that I wrote back in 2009. The facts still apply.

Unfortunately, not everyone considers the legality — or even the safety — of a landing zone before setting down on it. This brief news piece linked to by Vertical Magazine’s Twitter account is a good example. The gist of the piece:

A Monticello man has been charged by Nassau County Police with landing a helicopter in a grassy area full of pedestrians near the Nassau Coliseum minutes before midnight on Saturday night.

Nassau Coliseum, in case you don’t know, is an indoor arena where the NY Islanders play hockey and concerts are held. I saw quite a few concerts there in my college days. And hockey games.

On the night in question, there were about 100 drunk kids, aged 14 to 18, wandering around the building when the idiot pilot — honestly, what else can I call him? — came in for a landing in his Bell 407. He had to abort one landing before succeeding on a second attempt. At least 20 pedestrians were walking in the area.

I don’t think I need to tell you how stupid this stunt was. Drunk kids in the landing zone? All it takes is for one of them to walk into the tail rotor to turn a fun night of teenage drinking (yes, I’m being sarcastic) into death and mental trauma. Even if the kids weren’t drunk — and the pilot may not have thought they were — they’re still pedestrians in a landing zone. You don’t have to be drunk to walk into a tail rotor, as evidenced here and here.

And it’s not just the tail rotor that’s dangerous. Although visibility around a helicopter is good, it isn’t 360°. The pilot could have struck a pedestrian on the way down — or even landed on one.

Sure — nothing happened in this case. But the cops came, arrested the pilot, and seized his helicopter. And I think he deserves everything he gets.

You see, irresponsible pilots who pull dangerous stunts like this make all helicopter pilots look bad. People connect his action to the group he’s a part of. Hence, all helicopter pilots are reckless individuals who would land among a crowd of drunk teenagers.

We know better. But does the public? Does the local government?

A few years back, the city of Scottsdale, AZ instituted a town ordinance prohibiting the landing of a helicopter anywhere except at an airport or approved helipad. Why? Because an idiot pilot decided it would be fun to land in a culdesac of his subdivision. Neighbors didn’t think it was such a good idea and complained. It went to the city council and they “fixed” the problem by making it illegal.

(Wickenburg has a similar ordinance, although a pilot can get permission, on a case-by-case basis, by talking to the police chief before landing. And the police chief can deny the request.)

My point: think before you land off-airport. Think about the consequences of your actions. Think about the safety of the people on the ground. Think about the potential for complaints.

And don’t be stupid.

Communication Breakdown

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And no, I’m not talking about the Led Zeppelin song.

Imagine this scenario: A married couple have been together for many years. She’s been described by more than a few people as an “overachiever” — someone who sets many goals and then sets out to achieve them. She gets bored easily and is always looking for new challenges. He’s more laid back, generally satisfied with what he has, and often just takes whatever life hands him and makes it work for him.

In the beginning, the differences between them were minor. But as she shifted in one direction, he shifted to the other. After a long time together, she was ready to move on — preferably with him — and he resented the fact that she just couldn’t accept the status quo.

In the later years, she often brainstormed with him, usually on long car rides, about the things they could do together to make a more interesting life that relied less on the 9 to 5 grind he was stuck in. He almost always agreed they were good ideas. She thought they were on the same page.

But they weren’t. For some reason, he kept nodding but he wasn’t really agreeing. Yet he never told her how he really felt or what he really wanted. She never knew.

Then it was too late.

Communication breakdown.

Or think about this scenario: Same couple, but they’re living apart. She’s gone to her summer job for the fifth season in a row. She left early because she likes it there and can do more work earlier in the season. He doesn’t want her to go early, but he never tells her. He keeps his anger and resentment to himself.

She never knows how he feels because he never tells her. Instead, he tells everyone else, making her look downright evil for leaving when he wanted her to stay.

But he never told her. She never knew.

Communication breakdown.

Or this scenario: Same couple. He’s called her to tell her he wants a divorce. She’s surprised at the suddenness of it all — only a month before, they’d talked about him spending the summer together where she works. She’d begun planning, preparing, making room in her cramped quarters for another human being and a dog.

So when he suddenly tells her he wants a divorce, she’s shattered.

Communication breakdown.

Or how about this scenario: Same couple. They’ve talked it over in person and although she’s still shocked by the suddenness, she realizes that it really is over. She asks if it’s okay to wait until she returns home in October to take care of the formalities. He agrees.

In the meantime, he’s called her family members and at least one friend who lives where she works. She doesn’t know about this; he asks everyone not to tell her. The friend gets the wrong message from the call. He tells the wife that the marriage can be fixed. That all they need to do is get together and work on it. She’s doubtful, but he’s so sure. She starts to think that maybe he’s right. That maybe when she gets home they can talk it out and make things work.

But two weeks later, the husband contacts the wife, asking if she’s given the split any thought. She doesn’t understand — she thought they agreed to wait. What’s the hurry? But he won’t return her calls or texts promptly. When they finally speak, she’s strung out, confused by her friend’s advice and the signals she’s getting from her husband. She’s not rational on the phone. He gets angry.

Two weeks later, it happens all over again. Now she’s really upset, especially when she can’t get him on the phone right away to talk and doesn’t understand what his hurry is. And then when she does reach him, he’s nasty and hostile.

Communication breakdown.

And this scenario: Same couple. Not understanding how a man she’s loved for so long can be so hostile and mean to her and unsure of her future, the wife is completely strung out.

When she finds out about the other woman, things come to a head. She can’t sleep. She has no appetite. She cries on and off during the day with the tiniest thing setting her off. She begins seeing a grief counselor for help.

She writes him a long letter trying to explain her side of things and trying to get him to explain why he’s hurting her so badly. He doesn’t respond. This only makes things worse.

Communication breakdown.

In all these scenarios, a lot of pain is dealt out — mostly because of a failure to communicate. When will it end? That’s something the wife would really like to know.

Pity for the Foolish

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Even grown men can make dumb decisions.

This morning, as the sun rose and broke through the scattered clouds leftover from last night’s storms, I watched in awe as the golden light played on the orchard-studded hills across the canyon from where I’m living. The scene was so beautiful it almost brought me to tears.

Sunrise

But, at the same time, I was filled with an overwhelming sense of pity for my soon-to-be ex-husband.

Yes, I might be living in an RV parked on a remote hillside right now, but he’s living in a city subdivision, in a dark house surrounded by walls with a puny backyard barely big enough for our dog. And while I’m listening to my neighbor’s rooster crowing, he’s listening to the sounds of cars and the occasional siren and his neighbors slamming doors or shouting. I’ll be going out shortly on a walk to pick fresh blueberries for my mid-morning snack while my little dog Penny runs free in the orchard; he’ll be driving around in city traffic or maybe taking our poor dog for a walk along the curb in the subdivision on a leash. I’ll fly this afternoon and make some money. Tomorrow, maybe I’ll take the boat out on the Columbia River or take a hike along a creek or drive up to Chelan for some wine tasting.

Nature is right outside my door and I’m in it every day, enjoying every bit of it, working when there’s work to do, playing when there isn’t. I live well within my means so I don’t have to be a slave to someone else. But he’s caught up in the rat race, abandoning the financial security of our life together — or even his own life alone — to take on the responsibilities of a virtual stranger.

The saddest part of it all is that his current job gives him the ability to live anywhere.

He could have been here with me. I asked him to come. But someone else caught his eye and he forgot all about his 29-year investment in our relationship.

I think he would have really liked here. But it’s too late. He’s stepped into a trap and it’s sprung closed.

How can I help but pity him?