Wednesday, November 4, 2026

Having enough compassion for yourself and others to stay alive a really long time

Staying alive for your wife and family I have always found pretty easy to do. But, I never found a way to stay alive just for myself. Even when I was trying to stay alive from 21 to 25 I stayed alive for my parents and friends and especially whatever girl I was going with or just dating at the time. I felt I owed it to them to stay alive (at least as long as I was dating them).

But, then everything changed when I got married and had my first child, a son. I found living for others worked for me and when I researched this I could see my forebears having families of 5 to 10 children often all the way back to about 1580 in Switzerland. So, I could see I come from a long line of Fathers and Grandfathers. This always made sense to me. Being single never really made sense to me. But, I learned a lot from dating a lot of girls and women from my age 15 to 25 when I got together with my first wife.

But, now I'm 78 years old and I mostly live on for my wife and children and grandchildren and friends since my parents are gone, my aunts and uncles are gone my grandparents were all gone by 1978 too.

Then by 2000 my cousins started dying one by one. Then my best friend from the "I AM" church passed away in 2006 then my mother and Aunt and Cousin and father in law all passed away in 2008 in one year. Then my best friend from high School that I met at age 10 died in 2011. I'm sort of grateful that most people I knew and loved died on 2011 or before because it would be much harder to lose someone really close to me now that I'm 78.

However, you likely understand this as well as I do. I met a lady in her 40s likely whose father just passed away and I remember how losing my father when I was 37 messed me up in many ways until I was 50 and almost died myself. I told her how I understood what she was experiencing and that I had already lost both my parents. And I could see it was helpful to her to know others have had to go through this level of grief and try to survive it too.

When you have good parents that are there for you in some ways losing them is like dying yourself. I first experienced this with my father in 1985 when I was 37. So, I could help my wife in 1999 survive the death of her mother too at age 74 which for her was very unexpected. I was worried I was going to lose my wife then and I would have to raise our 3 year old daughter like I had raised my son alone after he was 3 years old. Somehow my wife found the courage to stay alive for her daughter and me and her family and friends. So, this was a good thing.

But, having enough compassion for yourself and everyone you love and care about is one of the reasons people live to be 100 or more I find.

by God's Grace

The good news is that you are retired and the bad news is you are retired

getting older is better in many ways

In other ways it's not

The good news is that you are retired

and the bad news is you are retired

being retired doesn't work for everyone

You usually know within 5 years of retirement whether you can survive it

However, I guess I have been lucky. I guess I retired early enough to adapt to it.

I was always much more attached to my children than whatever I did for work.

But, for many people that's not true of them.

However, I have already been mostly retired for 28 fairly happy years. Why?

Because sometimes dealing with your health is a lot easier than dealing with doing a 9 to 5 I find

However, that's just me.

and everyone is different I find regarding all this.

I didn't catch it until now. A 4th Season of "The Diplomat" on Netflix I think came out in October.

So, I watched the first episode season 3 to bring myself up to date and then the last episode of 3 for the same reason so I could better understand what was happening in the 4th season. I think my wife and I have watched 2 episodes tonight and sort of started the 3 episode of Season 4 of "the Diplomat". on Netflix. Rotten Tomatoes give it a 93% also so it has always been very well done.

However, there was supposed to be a Season 5 but I'm not sure that's going to happen or not at this point.

why is it not possible to win any war with Iran. You would have to nuke Iran out of existence and I don't even think that would work to do what Trump wants to do. Why?

Iran is a 3500 year old civilization!

If they were going to EVER give up it would have been 3500 years ago. But, how do civilizations survive 3500 years?

They survive by NEVER GIVING UP NO MATTER HOW MANY OF THEM DIE!

This is how things have been in the Middle East all over for the last 5000 years and very few civilizations have been left intact in the middle east except for Iran and Egypt from my point of view.

So, in order to win against Iran Trump would have to not only Genocide every person man, woman and child in Iran but genocide every single Iranian person on earth.

So, since Trump doesn't seem to understand this he is about as clueless as anyone running a war ever in the history of EARTH!

Because there are civilizations where people who did this would have to genocide everyone to conquer them like Iran, China, Russia and Europe and the U.S. and possibly other countries too.

For example, in some ways Americans have not changed at all since 1776. We still are the most well armed nation on earth regarding our civilian population and our democracy ONLY exists because of this in the end and no other reason.

Why do you think that America (outside of Pearl Harbor) was never attacked during World war I and World war II.

You would have to be crazy to attack a civilian population anywhere on earth as well armed with assault rifles as ours!

Writing

Writing what you know about is usually important so we don't embarrass ourselves writing about something we know nothing about in real life.

However, if you are writing fantasy it's possible that all the rules are out the window too because of different worlds and different bodies and imaginary cultures.

However, if you have never been married for example, writing about that often it will be obvious to anyone who has actually been married that you know nothing about what you are writing about.

Also, writing about raising children when you have not done that (maybe unless you have been a baby sitter) it will be obvious to people you haven't done that either.

The same thing with things like driving Cars, flying planes, driving boats or ships or Surfing or other things like this.

So, it's always better (if what you are writing is about real things in life that you write about what you know about and what you have done so that people don't laugh at you (unless you are a comedian and want people to laugh at you).

So, whenever possible I try to write about things I have experienced or know about more than anything else so in this way I don't mislead other people who might not know anything about that subject too and endanger themselves listening to someone that they shouldn't.

The "Volcano" in Hope ranch could have been on fire for 100 years people say

What it appears to be to me and others is a natural Gas Vent (not made by people) and since it likely cannot be capped off in any useful way it has been allowed (the natural gas) to burn (off and on?) for over a 100 years or more. However, since it is an "Eternal Flame" in this sense it can cause fires sometimes and with no way to turn it off (because of mother nature) it is an ongoing phenomenon that locals in Santa Barabara deal with. Could it be related to earthquakes? It's really hard to say at this point I think. However, you have to walk so far to see this I have never been there because there is no road access and more than a mile to get to from anywhere I have been on the beaches there. The easiest way to walk there likely would be Hendry's beach and walking north along the beach from there. Not exactly sure of the distance because I have never walked there but some of my kids have over the years.

The "volcano" in Hope Ranch on the Beach created a Vegetation fire with several engines and a helicopter called to put it out: California

begin quote:

News

Wildfire

Santa Barbara Firefighters Respond to Vegetation Fire Near Hope Ranch ‘Volcano’

Small Fire on Tuesday Poses Potential Threat to Nearby Structures

Fire crews were on the scene of a small vegetation fire on the bluff near Hope Ranch Tuesday afternoon. | Credit: Santa Barbara County Fire Department via X

The “volcano” on the cliffs at Hope Ranch grew active again on Tuesday afternoon, as minerals exposed in the soil got hot and caught nearby vegetation on fire. The smoke drifted as far as Santa Barbara’s Westside, where residents called the Independent to report the smell.

An engine crew was on scene, said Michael Gray, the public information officer for Santa Barbara County Fire, with three more crews and Copter 308 enroute. Roughly a half-acre of brush has caught fire, with a potential threat to the structures up top, Gray said.

The “volcano” is roughly a mile west of the Arroyo Burro Beach parking lot and access can be slow along the sand or down from above. In a spurt last April, the flames were captured reaching from the beach up to the top of the cliffs in a video.

The Hope Ranch volcano sparks whenever rock slides expose the iron sulfides and hydrocarbons in the layers of earth to oxygen, setting off a chain reaction of heat and fire. It’s not an unusual callout for the fire department: “This area has a history of recurring geological activity that periodically causes flare-ups,” Gray wrote at an X post.

Honor the Dead and the Dead will Honor you

My son who has almost died at least 20 or more times since June said this to me today on a text and I realized just how important this actually is.

The saying that might be most useful in this is:

"PRAY FOR THE DEAD AND THE DEAD WILL PRAY FOR YOU!"

which is celebrated in Hispanic Cultures like in Mexico with "The Day of the Dead" which is Halloween.

But, honoring all those who have come before you in any way that you can is helpful too.

However, first you need to honor yourself by staying alive. This is the most important in all of this.

I tried to honor my parents wishes for me and finally realized in my 20s that this was neither realistic or even really possible.

Likely it's how I got some of my unrealistic expectations. However, I likely also had unrealistic expectations for my son and maybe other children too.

Because we are all really lucky if our children survive at all.

This is really important to consider when you get realistic about just how many children die or have died in the past like when I was growing up.

Though it's said in the U.S. that IF you live to be 30 you likely will see 90. This is True!

However, it's also true that living to 78 (my age) only happened to 30% to 40% of people in the 1950s and 1960s.

However, when people meet me they usually think I'm around 55 years old because of my more youthful attitude than many older people.

As they say: Age is not a number but instead a state of Mind.

If you think you are old you are. If you don't think you are old you are not.

It's pretty much this simple really.

But, it's also important to be realistic about what you can and cannot survive too.

Otherwise you are dead like a lot of people are between the ages of 40 and 50 because they still believe that physically they are still 25 and this kills them in all ways.

So, being more realistic about everything tends to keep you alive the longest.

Also, the stresses of raising children tends to keep you alive longer especially if they remain speaking to you and caring about you the rest of your lives too.

By God's Grace

Ocean temperatures off the coast here in NorCal are 9 degrees above normal for this time of year!

Then you have the Kelvin Waves making high tides 1 foot to a foot and a half higher causing flooding now at high tides almost everywhere. Because a high tide isn't just an ocean wave the whole ocean raises (sort of like a tsunami does too) that extra foot and a half.

For example, I have been watching ponds that sometimes are rivers during rainstorms be filled with Ocean water and kelp and other seaweeds during this time of year and when it makes these ponds (sometimes rivers) this salty nothing freshwater can survive in it with it this salty either.

So, the Super El Nino Kelvin Waves are still devastating the California coastal areas ongoing every high Tide and when the next King tide happens later this month and in December and January it's going to be bad especially if there are storms like there have been lately with 11 foot waves on top of the Kelvin waves and high tides!

THE WAY UKRAINE HAS ENDED RUSSIAN PROCESSING OF OIL DOWN TO ABOUT 40% OF NORMAL IS SENDING IN 800 OR 1000 DRONES AT ONCE

DOING THIS OVERWHELMS ALL DEFENSIVE CAPABILITIES IN RUSSIA LIKE IT ALSO WOULD IN THE U.S. IF THIS HAPPENED HERE.

Did Musk get paid off by Putin to shut down Starlink to Ukraine? This is a real possibility. But, we also know the 500 million dollars Musk put into Republican advertisements didn't work either.

So, what will happen to Musk now?

I think both Trump and Musk have overplayed their hands and both could suffer from all worldwide forces right now and into the future.

They both might be screwed now in a real way!

THE WOODEN PROPELLER DRIVEN DRONES MADE IN IRAN CAN BE BUILT LITERALLY ANYWHERE IN GARAGES OR UNDERGROUND ANYWHERE IN IRAN OR RUSSIA!

IF YOU FULLY UNDERSTAND THIS UNTIL IRANIAN DRONES STOP BLOWING UP MIDDLE EASTERN OIL FIELDS AND STORAGE DEPOTS AND OIL PROCESSING FACILITIES IN THE MIDDLE EAST GAS AND DIESEL IS GOING TO COST MORE AND MORE AND MORE ONGOING.

AS A RESULT I THINK PEOPLE NEED TO PREPARE FOR 10 OR 20 DOLLAR A GALLON GAS IN THE U.S. AND EUROPE AND THROUGHOUT THE WORLD.

AND 20 DOLLAR A GALLON GAS IN THE U.S. AND WORLD WOULD DEFINITELY BRING ABOUT EITHER ANOTHER GREAT RECESSION OR ANOTHER GREAT DEPRESSION.

I THINK YOU ALL CAN SEE THIS RIGHT NOW!

There was never any way to win a war with Iran. Why couldn't Trump see this?

First of all, Look at Pakistan. Is Pakistan nuking everyone there? Even if Iran got nuclear weapons they would likely be a lot like Pakistan which is partly Shia and Partly Sunni Muslim mostly.

Iran has felt victimized by Sunni Muslims since Muhammad was alive over 1000 years ago!

So, for Iran the point of having a nuclear weapon is basically the same thing as Pakistan having a nuclear weapon.

Iran would be terrified of Saudi Arabia having a nuclear weapon by the way. That would be the real Disaster from an Iranian point of view.

But, it is sort of like India obtaining a nuclear weapon and if you study the history of the Muslims being driven out of India in the 1950s with people carrying mostly shovels and rakes killing people you might understand better where Iran is coming from too. Pakistan got Nuclear weapons because they were terrified of being Nuked by India!

And Iran wants nuclear weapons to protect themselves from Saudi Arabia and all Sunni Muslim Countries that want to kill them.

So, understanding this might help the future in the middle east if more people understood what is really going on there.

On one level Iran just wants the U.S. to leave them alone so they don't have to blow up the entire Middle East and Europe with Drones. (which would be happening now if Europe got involved in the Iran Conflict.

ONLY TRUMP WAS IGNORANT ENOUGH TO DO WHAT HE DID!

AND UNDERSTANDING THIS IS EVERYTHING IN WHY TRUMP LOST SO BAD IN THIS ELECTION1

Intuitive fred888

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