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Which Believers Go To Hell First?

Yesterday’s post on my journey from the Jewish faith to Catholicism rattled a few nerves and, I think, led to some misunderstandings about my attitude toward the faith of my youth.

Mood music:

http://youtu.be/d5dd_o9lpW0

One good friend said he hoped I realized that there was much more to a Jewish conversion than getting a circumcision. Another reader said that had I been living in Germany during the 1930s and 40s, the Nazis wouldn’t care that I had converted. They would have killed me anyway.

“You are a Jew via bloodlines either Ashkenazi or Sephardic who has chosen to practice the religion of Catholicism,” he wrote. “You are a Jew and would be a dead man in Hitler’s Germany even if you converted, as well as your children even if raised Catholic. Please don’t confuse the religion with the fact that Jews are defendants from the 12 tribes + the 13th ( Ethiopian Jews ) and you may chose to leave the religion but the Blood will never change. To a anti-Semite you’re a dirty Jew no matter what religion you practice. Don’t forget it.”

So, let me make two points:

1.) The last line in yesterday’s post was not meant to insult or make fun of people. It was simply two friends having lunch and needling each other. I was curious about how circumcisions are handled when an adult converts. Sure, there was mischief in my question. But it wasn’t an effort to belittle the faith.

2.) My journey has never been about running from one faith to another. I never set out to lose the religion I was born into. My beliefs changed slowly over time, but I have never been ashamed of my Jewish roots, and I never will be.

It’s funny how we haggle over faith. Some people are certain God doesn’t exist, and they look down on those of us who have faith like we’re dumb sheep; like they are so much smarter than we are.

There are others who are certain that anyone whose beliefs fall outside their own denomination are going to hell. I remember a fellow student at North Shore Community College who was a Protestant. She told a friend point-blank that Jewish people were going to hell because they weren’t of her exact denomination. I’ve heard Catholics say similar things about non Catholics.

When I hear those bullshit declarations, I remember something my father once said about people who cling so viciously to their version of religion:

“Won’t people be shocked after they drop dead to discover it (the different denominations) all comes from the same place.”

The Catholic faith is what I most identify with. But I also think God is way, way bigger than any one denomination.

In that respect, I think my old man has it right.

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This Is No Place To Make Amends

After running the post “Bully’s Remorse” a few days ago, it occurred to me that maybe, just maybe, writing it was a mistake. Or maybe it simply didn’t go far enough.

Mood music:

[spotify:track:5rpRzNcJZqKQXk9PIjreB6]

Like many topics in this blog, I wrote it to yank another skeleton out of the closet and acknowledge that as a teenager, while I was getting bullied and should have related to others who were bullied, I just turned around and kicked around someone I thought was weaker than me.

It’s not the first regret that I’ve mentioned here. In another post, “One of my Biggest Regrets,” I wrote about a New Hampshire reporter from my Eagle-Tribune days who I was terrible to. I called her early one morning to chew her out over a story that didn’t get done, knowing full well her husband was due to have heart surgery that very morning.

It’s a recurring theme here. I tell you about someone I was a awful to, and it’s like I’m making an amends to that person.

But I’m not, really. Amends can only be made face-to-face. In that regard, I’m stuck in neutral.

This all occurred to me after a friend with her own experience in being bullied sent me this message:

—

I remember being picked on from as early on as 2nd grade all the way through senior year of high school (alternative school, you know “short bus”, “the troubled kids”) I got there by trying to kill myself. I still remember what one of the intake workers said about my overdose: “Hey, you know that could get ya killed…hahaha”… trying to relate to the poor depressed girl. I replied, “Yeah, that’s the point.

Being tormented by my peers in one of the hardest things I have tried to let go of in my life. There is a pile of abuse material, neglect, alcohol and drug addiction (of my family), homelessness, being a foster child, being locked up in psyche…etc., that I could talk about…but, somehow being alienated by the people ( your peers), perhaps even those that could of helped you in that situation, hurt, and still does.

If you remember me from “around the neighborhood”, Bill, its probably because I was the scapegoat for a lot of other kids’ nastiness, including my own sister. So, am I crying in my tea (sorry, I don’t drink), here? I hope not. I’m doing the best to let you know how your “friend” probably felt: useless, self-hating, desperate, and alone.

I hope he was stronger than I was, I hope for you that he is doing well, and can laugh it all off.

My personal opinion is that you are making amends to make yourself feel better. If you want this person to know how you feel, that you are sorry, that you wish you had not done the things you did…..don’t write a blog about it, don’t say: ” hey if you happen to see so and so let him know I wrote a blog about him, cuz I’m so fucking cool … hire your own private detective, find the guy, meet him face to face, and make your amends. That’s being a man. Abuse creates monsters, and what children do to each other while growing up is abuse, sometimes with fatal consequences. I wonder if Columbine would of even happened if adults had a “no tolerance” reaction to any abuse, because they know, and they let it happen all the time.

—

The line that really cut me to the core was the suggestion that I wrote that post to make myself feel better.

Because in hindsight, it’s true.

Coming clean here is an important step. But I’m really not making my amends unless I’m doing it directly to the person who needs to hear it.

It’s time for me to put the process in motion.

There are many people I need to make peace with.

regret

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41 Years

Some people get depressed on their birthday. Not me. The fact that I turn 41 today is a freak of nature. But a year into my forties, I know I have more cleaning up to do.

Mood music:

Item: When I was sick with the Crohn’s Disease as a kid, I lost a lot of blood and developed several side ailments. I’m told by my parents that the doctor’s were going to remove the colon more than once. It didn’t happen. They tell me I was closing in on death more than once. I doubt it was ever that serious. Either way, here I am.

Item: When the OCD was burning out of control, I often felt I’d die young. I was never suicidal, but I had a fatalistic view of things. I just assumed I wasn’t long for this world and I didn’t care. I certainly did a lot to slowly help the dying process along. That’s what addicts do. We feed the addiction compulsively knowing full well what the consequences will be.

When I was a prisoner to fear and anxiety, I really didn’t want to live long. I isolated myself. Fortunately, I never had the guts to do anything about it. And like I said, suicide was never an option.

I spent much of my 30s on the couch with a shattered back, and escaped with the TV. I was breathing, but I was also as good as dead some of the time.

I’ve watched others go before me at a young age. Michael. Sean. Even Peter. Lose the young people in your life often enough and you’ll start assuming you’re next.

When you live for yourself and don’t put faith in God, you’re not really living. When it’s all about you, there no room to let all the other life in. So the soul shrivels and hardens. I’ve been there.

I also had a strange fear of current events and was convinced at one point that the world would burn in a nuclear holocaust before I hit 30. That hasn’t happened yet.

So here I am at 41, and it’s almost comical that I’m still here.

I’m more grateful than you could imagine for the turn of events my life has taken in the last six years.

I’ve learned to stop over-thinking and manage the OCD. When you learn to stop over-thinking, a lot of things that used to be daunting become a lot easier. You also find yourself in a lot of precious moments that were always there. But you didn’t notice them because you were sick with worry.

I notice them now, and I am Blessed far beyond what I probably deserve.

I have a career that I love.

I have the best wife on Earth and two boys that teach me something new every day.

I have many, many friends who have helped me along in more ways than they’ll ever know.

I have my 12-Step program and I’m not giving in to the worst of my addictions.

Most importantly, I have God in my life. When you put your faith in Him, there’s a lot less to be afraid of. Aging is one of the first things you stop worrying about.

So here I am at 41. feeling a lot better about myself than I did at 31. In fact, 31 was one of the low points.

But I’d be in denial if I told you everything was perfect beyond perfect. I wouldn’t tell you that anyway, because I’ve always thought that perfection was a bullshit concept. That makes it all the more ironic and comical that OCD would be the life-long thorn in my side.

I just recently quit smoking, and I’m still missing the hell out of that vice. I haven’t gone on a food binge in nearly three years, but there are still days where I’m not sure I’ve made the best choices; those days where my skin feels just a little too loose and flabby.

I still go to my meetings, but there are many days where I’d rather do anything but go to a meeting. I go because I have to, but I don’t always want to.

And while I have God in my life, I still manage to be an asshole to Him a lot of the time.

At 41, I’m still very much the work in progress. The scars are merely the scaffolding and newly inserted steel beams propping me up.

I don’t know what comes next, but I have much less fear about the unknown.

And so I think WILL have a happy birthday.

OCD Diaries

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A Call From My Mother

It’s Wednesday morning. I’m working from home, face behind the computer. My kids and two neighborhood kids are tearing though the house, overturning everything in sight. Then the phone rings.

Mood music:

“It’s been five years,” the voice on the other end says. “Can’t we fix this?”

It’s my mother. I saw her at my cousin’s wedding two weeks ago but we largely avoided contact. We’re six years into an estrangement that I think is the result of shared mental illness.

Can we fix this?

I really don’t know.

I want to. I’ve never been happy about what happened, though I felt and still feel that the split was necessary.

Some folks think this stuff is simple. Life’s too short not to get along, they say. But life is far more complex than that. Relationships with a history of abuse? That’s one of the most complex and confusing beasts of all.

I’ve had a lot of love and blessings in my life in the last few years. I’ve come far in overcoming addictions and mental illness. Even the family discord has served a purpose. Somewhere along the way, I’ve found myself.

It would be nice if I could mend some more relationships. But I have to be careful.

At the wedding, my Uncle Bobby, the last of the siblings that included my grandmother, took me aside at one point and said life is too short to hate.

He is absolutely right.

But hate has nothing to do with it.

Mistrust, hurt feelings and deep disagreements over right and wrong? Absolutely. But not hate.

If it were about hate, all this would be cut, dry and easy.

I’ll have to do some hard thinking over this one.

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You Can’t Be Everyone’s Friend

I once wrote about an obsession with the Facebook friend count. I worried about offending people who de-friended me. Lately I realize it’s ok if I can’t be everyone’s friend. I’m even warming to the idea.

Mood music:

I’ve always had this stupid idea that I needed to be everyone’s friend. Even when I was bullying someone, I’d turn around and try to be their friend. I always wanted everyone in my family to like me, even when I was busy hating them.

I’ve carried that into adulthood and got obsessed about it with things like Facebook. This morning I glanced at my friend count and it was 1,713. I could have sworn it was 1,715 a few days ago. So I started looking around to see who might have gotten mad at me. I noticed that three relatives had disconnected from me. A year ago that would have bothered me a lot more than it did this morning.

“At least my ‘friends’ seem to be sticking around,” I thought to myself.

Sarcasm aside, I do think I’m turning a corner with this whole like-dislike thing. Slowly, it’s sinking in that I need to do a better job at listening to my own words. At the beginning of this blog is a post called “Being a People Pleaser is Dumb.” I wrote about how I wanted to be the golden boy at work more than anything back in the day, until I realized it was absolutely impossible to please everyone all the time. In fact, some people are unworthy of the effort.

I’ve had to learn that lesson all over again in the social networking world.

When people walk away from me online, I figure it’s because they don’t particularly enjoy this blog. So be it.

You can’t be everyone’s friend. You shouldn’t be everyone’s friend.

I’m slowly warming to the idea that if some people don’t like you it’s because you have the stones to take a stand on the things you believe in.

You either like me or you don’t. It’s all good.

I’m connected to a lot of people I’m not particularly fond of these days. It’s nothing personal. I just find find the whiny, woe-is-me status updates grating. Facebook is full of that stuff, along with all the self-righteous, pre-manufactured statements people wrap their arms around.

But it’s your profile.

Do what you want with it, and I’ll do what I want with mine.

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How Many Times Should a Man Say He’s Sorry? (Inspired By Kevin Mitnick)

Yesterday I wrote a post over at my information security blog about famed hacker Kevin Mitnick and how he is conducting himself in the limelight. Is he redeeming himself after a life of crime?

That’s the point a lot of people seem to be debating. Should a man or woman who has made mistakes in life apologize in every interview, at every conference, behind every closed door?

I’m reminded of that scene in “Raiders of the Lost Ark” where Indiana Jones tells Marion Ravenwood that he can only say he’s sorry so many times. “Well say it again anyway!” she says as she slams down a tray full of shot glasses. In the same scene, she notes that everyone’s sorry for something.

We are. I’m sorry I wasted so many years hiding in my room because of fear and anxiety. I’m sorry I nearly destroyed what was left of my health with countless binges. I’m sorry I wasn’t there more when my best friend was headed toward suicide. I’m sorry I can’t get along with my mother.

We’re all sorry for something.

But when do you reach the point where you need to make your amends and get on with life? I have my half-baked theories.

In Mitnick’s case, he did his crimes and served his time. He has used his hacking skills for good in recent years. I know many people in the security community who consider him a friend.

I don’t think he needs to say he’s sorry anymore. Using his skills for the greater good is good enough to me. And as for his conduct in promoting his book, “Ghost in the Wires,” I don’t mind. If you write something, your goal is to have as many people read it as possible. I can be shameless in proliferating this blog, but I don’t apologize. I don’t write it so it’ll sit there on the Internet being read by five people a year. You can’t be useful to people if they don’t know you’re there.

Writing this thing is partly my way of paying it forward. It’s a lot more useful than repeatedly telling everyone I’m sorry for the way I used to be. After awhile, the apologies ring hollow unless they’re backed by real change.

When you change, apologies become less necessary.

If you have to keep apologizing, then you probably still have some behaviors to change.

That’s what I’ve learned about myself, at least.

OCD Diaries

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Cold Turkey Has Got Me On The Run

More than a week after I quit smoking cold turkey, I’m pissed off.

It pisses me off that other people can enjoy a drink or two, the occasional cigar or feast without letting it take over everything else in their lives.

Mood music from the debut EP of Pull Trouble From The Fire:

[soundcloud url=”http://soundcloud.com/pulltroublefromthefire/06-dead-wait”]

It pisses me off that I have to learn to behave and pretend I don’t wish I had some of what everyone around me has.

It pisses me off that I have to keep explaining to people why I can’t eat flour or sugar — ever — why I can’t have a glass of wine or a beer — ever — and why I can’t just have a cigar on the weekends and be done with it.

When I wrote about the smoking last week, a friend asked me the following question, with a comment mixed in:

“Just out of curiousity, how many cigars do you smoke? One or more/day? Do you opt for a toro (6 or 7? cigar) or a robusto? If you’re having a robusto a couple times each week (or even a toro every day), isn’t that moderation?

“While I’ve never tried them, I’ve seen how cigarettes can pull you in and you can go from one cig to a pack/day in a short time. Not that I’m condoning it, but I think an occasional cigar is like a good scotch. It a treat more than a habit.

“I’ve found that you need to pick the vices your going to ween off carefully, or it will be at everyone’s peril. Wouldn’t it be better to set boundaries so you can enjoy a vice while preventing overindulgence? Doesn’t forced moderation ultimately help strengthen the psyche (I don’t know, just asking)?

“I guess what I’m asking is whether you’re being too hard on yourself at the expense of others? As you say, you can’t do anything in moderation, but it seems you may not be able to implement a fix in moderation either. Kick the cigs. Save the cigars. Don’t be a miserable bastard!”

It’s a fair question, and he’s right that a person who is cold turkey will make others miserable. That’s why people like us are at our nastiest as human beings after we first clean up.

He is wrong when he asks: “Doesn’t forced moderation ultimately help strengthen the psyche?”

I can see where he’s going with this. Even in sobriety people like me live to an extreme. But in our world, moderation doesn’t exist.

That’s the core problem of our disease: The part of the brain that regulates moderate behavior was obliterated somewhere along the way. Therefore, it has to be all or nothing.

In the AA Big Book on which the 12 Steps of Recovery is built, the opening chapter is called “The Doctor’s Opinion.” In it, Dr. William D. Silkworth outlines the physical defects of the disease and how it impacts our behavior. He literally describes it as an allergy. Once we take a drink or engage in a food binge, a demonic craving kicks in that shuts off the sanity switches in our heads.

“We believe, and so suggested a few years ago, that the action of alcohol on these chronic alcoholics is a manifestation of an allergy; that the phenomenon of craving is limited to this class and never occurs in the average temperate drinker. These allergic types can never safely use alcohol in any form at all; and once having formed the habit and found they cannot break it, once having lost their self-confidence, their reliance upon things human, their problems pile up on them and become astonishingly difficult to solve.

“Men and women drink essentially because they like the effect produced by alcohol. The sensation is so elusive that, while they admit it is injurious, they cannot after a time differentiate the true from the false. To them, their alcoholic life seems the only normal one. They are restless, irritable and discontented, unless they can again experience the sense of ease and comfort which comes at once by taking a few drinks—drinks which they see others taking with impunity. After they have succumbed to the desire again, as so many do, and the phenomenon of craving develops, they pass through the well-known stages of a spree, emerging remorseful, with a firm resolution not to drink again. This is repeated over and over, and unless this person can experience an entire psychic change there is very little hope of his recovery.”

The doctor uses alcohol as the example, but the same applies for all addictive behavior.

To those who think it’s weird when a man or woman can’t enjoy something in moderation, I get your skepticism. The problem — or the blessing in your case — is that your brain doesn’t work like mine. You have a gift a lot of us would kill for: The ability to realize when you’ve had enough of something.

My wife can buy a six-pack of beer and make it last two months. I wouldn’t be able to last two hours without downing it all. Then I would need more. The difference between us is one of brain chemistry.

Weening off the comfort substances was not an option for me for the simple reason that I have to have it all. Trying to have smaller amounts of something each day or week won’t work in that environment.

So I’ve had to go cold turkey.

It’s hell the first week. The second week, which is where I’m at, is one of more muted irritability.

From there, it gets easier, and we get better. Much better.

I’ll be glad when I get there after this latest round of cold turkey.

[soundcloud url=”http://soundcloud.com/pulltroublefromthefire/05-trainwrecks”]

OCD Diaries

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I Pet My Peeves Until They Become Triggers

I really hate all those pre-written, self-righteous Facebook posts. I told Erin I was going to write a post flaming all those stupid sayings.

Mood music:

“Tell me what that has to do with OCD?” she asked, giving me that stare she gives me when she’s certain that I’m full of shit.

“It’s a trigger,” I said, not really meaning it.

“It’s not a trigger. It’s a peeve. You going to go pet it now?” she asks, still giving me that stare.

She’s on to something, though.

Before I go further, let me share some of the Facebook blurbs that set me off this morning. Hold your nose and read on:

“I was RAISED, I didn’t just grow up. I was taught to speak when I enter a room, say Please & Thank you, to have Respect for my elders, lend a helping hand to those in need, hold the door for the person behind me, say Excuse me when it’s needed, & to Love people for who they are, not for what you can get from them! I was also taught to treat people the way I want to be treated! If you were raised this way too, please re-post this…sadly, many won’t, because they weren’t, and it shows~Thank you”

Then there’s this little chestnut:

I may not be the most beautiful girl or the sexiest girl nor do I have a perfect body. I might not be everyone’s first choice, but I’m a great choice. I do not pretend to be someone I’m not, because I’m good at being me. I might not be proud of some of the things in my past, but I’m proud of who I am today. So take me as I am, or watch me as I walk away! ? 

OK. I’m walking away now.

When people post this stuff, it’s like they’re telling the rest of us that we don’t respect our elders and don’t love the right people.

OK. I pet the peeve. On to Erin’s point.

I do sometimes obsess about peeves until they become OCD triggers. I think a lot of people do, but since this blog is about my own blemishes, it seemed like a good idea to put this one in the archives of insanity.

Have a nice day.

http://youtu.be/_7EQlfprV9E

OCD Diaries

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Everyone Has Opinions. Everyone Has Research. Does Anyone Have THE Answer?

Readers have been sending me all kinds of articles lately about where addiction and mental illness come from and how best to recover. It’s useful and appreciated. But there’s a missing piece. A big missing piece.

Mood music:

Here’s the thing about addicts: We know all the things you’re supposed to do to get well. We know full well what is good for us and what is bad.

And when the itch takes over our brain, all that stuff doesn’t matter. We want the thing that’ll make us comfortable. In that mode, we avoid all the good stuff at all costs.

Yoga is fantastic for you and helps you learn to live in the moment. But when my head is in that other zone, there’s just no way I’m going to try it. A big fat cigar is what I REALLY want. (I just quit tobacco, which is why I’m prickly as I write this).

Fruit and veggies are terrific for you. But when the binge eater wants to binge, only the bad stuff will do. Forty dollars of McDonalds. That’s what I go for.

These are the things people just don’t understand when they try to help people like us with advice. When the addictive impulse strikes, the overriding craving is for something that’s very bad for us. Sure, gluten is bad for you. But if my binge-eating compulsion were active and I had gluten intolerance, I’d swallow all of it anyway.

Because I want that momentary feeling of rapture more than anything, regardless of the pain I know will come minutes and hours later.

That, my friends, is what escapes you when you’re trying to help me.

Now, let’s stop here for a reality check: I AM NOT going on a binge right now. I’ve been clean of that for more than two years now. Fundamentally, I am doing well. I’m going to my 12-Step meetings. I’m writing. True, I am edgy right now because I quit smoking cold turkey Friday night. But that will pass. I’m holding steady on that front, despite the constant twitching.

But I am feeling vulnerable. My disease is doing push ups in the parking lot and it’s just dying to kick my ass.

I’ve written much about how my addictive behavior is a byproduct of mental illness (OCD). But addiction itself IS the mental illness. My friend Alan Shimel sent me an article from the AP that states the case pretty well:

Addiction isn’t just about willpower. It’s a chronic brain disease, says a new definition aimed at helping families and their doctors better understand the challenges of treating it.

“Addiction is about a lot more than people behaving badly,” says Dr. Michael M. Miller of the American Society for Addiction Medicine.

That’s true whether it involves drugs and alcohol or gambling and compulsive eating, the doctors group said Monday. And like other chronic conditions such as heart disease or diabetes, treating addiction and preventing relapse is a long-term endeavor, the specialists concluded.

Addiction generally is described by its behavioral symptoms — the highs, the cravings, and the things people will do to achieve one and avoid the other. The new definition doesn’t disagree with the standard guide for diagnosis based on those symptoms.

But two decades of neuroscience have uncovered how addiction hijacks different parts of the brain, to explain what prompts those behaviors and why they can be so hard to overcome. The society’s policy statement, published on its website, isn’t a new direction as much as part of an effort to translate those findings to primary care doctors and the general public.

“The behavioral problem is a result of brain dysfunction,” agrees Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

That’s some very enlightening stuff, and it will be helpful to people going forward. But THE answer to the problem will remain elusive.

I get a lot of dietary advice lately. People read about how I don’t eat flour or sugar as part of my recovery from binge eating. And that leads to questions like this: “Have you tried a gluten-free diet?”

It’s a fair question, and the person who asked about it just wants me to be well. I suppose a diet devoid of flour and sugar is gluten free. Mostly gluten free, anyway.

But in the end, the gluten itself was not my problem. The problem was my overwhelming instinct to eat all the gluten.

The problem is about control. I have none. The sensor in the brain that tells people when they’ve had enough doesn’t work in my head. It broke long ago. So I need a set of coping tools and the 12 Steps to keep my head in the game.

That’s not THE answer, either. But it helps a lot.

Thanks for sending me the articles, friends. I might balk at some of the information, but I appreciate the spirit in which it’s delivered.

OCD Diaries

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Rethinking Jani Lane Upon His Death

Former Warrant singer Jani Lane was found dead last night in a Comfort Inn in L.A. at age 47. It’s unclear at this point what the cause is, but his death is making me re-think a few things about my attitude.

Mood music:

http://youtu.be/cSdvxocgbAg

I remember when Warrant came out in the late 1980s. I couldn’t stand them. Sure, they sounded good. Crunchy guitar sound. Good vocals. But it all sounded so fake. I thought “Cherry Pie” was the dumbest song I’d ever heard. Again, the sound was good. But the lyrics were stupid and the feel wasn’t real to me. Admittedly, though, I liked “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” and hated the fact that I liked it.

The band also came out at a point in the late 80s when every band was starting to sound and look alike. I decided I was too cool for it all.

I did what a lot of other metal heads did in the early 90s when the metal scene imploded under the weight of all the copycats: I started listening to so-called grunge: Nirvana, Soundgarden, Alice in Chains. My own band, Skeptic Slang, sounded a lot like the grunge we were listening to, with hints of old-school metal here and there.

I still listen to all those bands, but in recent years I’ve returned to my 80s hard rock roots. Warrant has not been part of my playlist.

I’ve seen interviews with Jani Lane over the years where he lamented writing “Cherry Pie” and took a crack at reality TV. He looked and sounded like a troubled man in those clips, and he did indeed wrestle some demons. He was recently sentenced to serve 120 days in jail after pleading no contest to a 2010 DUI charge — his second in two years.

As for his death, no one really knows what happened. We can speculate, but I won’t. I’ll just wait for the follow-up news reports.

Instead, I’m examining my own reaction to his death and what it says about me and human nature in general.

When I first saw the news an hour ago, I felt bad. I went on Youtube and started playing Warrant songs. I was thinking that they sounded much better with age, then I had a “what the fuck?” moment.

Here I am, thinking these songs sound pretty good. And I’m sneering at all the nasty comments people make about being glad he’s dead. Then I catch myself, because in my self-righteous anger I quickly remember that I used to say things about how bands like this sucked and needed to be destroyed. I’m pretty sure I’ve joked from time to time about how it would be nice for bands like this to go down in a flaming plane wreck.

That’s not nice. It’s certainly not a good fit with my Christian beliefs. But there it is.

It’s funny how we get when musicians and celebrities we don’t think much of die. I found it amusing that people were tearing Michael Jackson down in the last decade of his life because of his alleged pedophilia, yet, when he died, everyone magically forgot that stuff and acted as if Jesus Himself had been crucified again.

When Motley Crue bassist Nikki Sixx opined about Jackson being a “child rapist” and I wrote about it, the comments section of this blog descended into all kinds of name calling. Most of it came from people who love Michael Jackson’s music.

More then one person noted that Jackson was never found guilty of such things. When he was still alive, people were not defending him so ardently.

We do this stuff a lot when famous, tarnished figures die. We play up the good stuff they did and conveniently forget the bad stuff. Or, at least, we minimize the latter as some unfortunate little interlude between the acts of greatness. Richard Nixon comes to mind.

And now we’re remembering the good stuff Jani Lane contributed to the world in his 47 years.

You know what? That’s how it should be.

Everyone deserves a shot at redemption, and making music I personally didn’t care for doesn’t mean there was something wrong with Jani Lane. He wrote the music he wanted to write. It spoke to him, and it spoke to others, even if I wasn’t one of them.

The band’s success in the late 80s and early 90s happened because the music made a lot of kids happy, just as Motley Crue’s “Shout At The Devil” and Def Leppard’s “Pyromania” gave me moments of happiness during a troubled youth.

We all have our tastes and opinions. We all tend to think our opinions are better than everyone else’s.

That’s part of the human condition. We don’t just do it to celebrities. We do it to everyone. We are judgmental savages sometimes.

Rest in Peace, Jani Lane. I apologize for any of the bad stuff I said about you over the years.

OCD Diaries