Yesterday something weird happened.
I'd had big plans to relax, art, and write but instead found myself organizing my bedroom, which was 98% unpacked after my move - just a few lingering things that needed homes and annoyed my brain every time I noticed them.
I moved my dad's old Nikon and the ancient cigar box he gave me to a different dresser. Inside the cigar box is an unintentional shrine to my dad: the zippo he carried during Vietnam, an old tin photo of my grandfather, the envelope of cash he gave me to run errands for him during the pandemic, his Rigid card holder. I flipped through his driver's license, credit cards, insurance cards, veteran's discount card - all the things that kept his life running smoothly until the end.
I thought about all the times I'd seen him use those cards and how his fingerprints and skin cells still lived there.
And then I sat on my bed and thought about how much my dad would have loved this house - he adored old things and this Victorian with its wonky angles and gorgeous millwork would have made him smile (as he would say, like a jackass eating cornflakes). And then he would have told me about all the things wrong with it and how I should fix them.
He died last summer, so he didn't get to see me standing in my power and reclaiming my life after the end of a ten-year marriage. I'd like to think he'd be proud - making him proud, for some reason, feels bigger to me now than it did when he was alive. In the end, though, he was so drunk and depressed he wouldn't have noticed. I forgive him this - thirteen years of cancer will suck the life out of you.
I gathered myself and headed out the door to the dispensary. I haven't been sleeping well and am ready to try anything at this point.
On my way, I noticed an open parking spot in front of the thrift store - a nonprofit that supports folks struggling with addiction - so I spur-of-the-moment decided to go browsing. When I was leaving, there was a line at the register blocking my exit. I wasn't in a hurry so I stood there, looking around, and noticed a collection of large antique tin vehicles on the floor. One of them was an old-timey firetruck, a metal twin of the wooden one I got him for Christmas years ago.
The last house my dad rehabbed was a loft apartment inside a firehouse built in 1922. When he bought it was an empty, rectangular shell. He lived there for years without heat or plumbing, meticulously drawing plans and executing the work, mostly alone. He was thrifty, stubborn, and meticulous, so work progressed slowly.
The line cleared away so I could leave. As I walked out, a woman sitting near the register said to the cashier, "he'd be proud of you, you know."
"What?" the woman behind the register said.
"Daddy, he'd be so proud of you right now."
"Yeah, he would. He'd be in heaven to see me right now."
And this is the story of how I ended up sitting in my car on Broad Street bawling my eyes out yesterday afternoon.
How many synchronicities like this have I missed lately, grinding away at life?
Cryptolife moves fast. To stay on top of everything you need to stay plugged in 24/7. This level of commitment is encouraged and celebrated.
I can tell you from experience that this is the path to degen 0.
All of the relationships you hold dear will unsubscribe.
You will stop being able to generate alfa.
It will cost you twice as much to resubscribe to those relationships, and they will never be as good as they were in the beginning, before you bankrupted them.
You will miss all the little coincidences and synchronicities that make life beautiful and worth living.
Don't get so wrapped up in the grind that you forget that you can, and MUST walk away from it periodically.
All things crypto will survive, and possibly even thrive, without your continuous monitoring while you touch grass and stake alfa in your relationships.
