18 May 2006

SOB

To make up for the lack of posts during the month of April, I will be posting entries from my journal/diary. This is from a journal entry from April 19, 2006:



I remember a quote that was shared to me by a very wise man I met while underwater. His name is Mac (short for Rick MacDonald) and was my division LPO. Been in since just after fish got in the ocean, Mac had done just about everything that you can do on a sub and in its radio room, and had been everywhere a boat can go. It was a day where everybody was grumbling about something, but we had all hit upon the XO as the source of misery. After listening to the griping, Mac picked up his coffee cup and said, "No one thinks they're a son of a bitch," and walked out of Radio. That shut us up PDQ.
Mac was right, again. We turn from our better natures, ignore the angels on our shoulders, forego the straight road for the crooked path.
I could have been better, in many situations. I need not have failed on some of the occasions where I lapsed. I might not have known better, but I should have. I was a son of a bitch, a real SOB.
I don't expect forgiveness; I'm not selfish enough to ask for it. What I want is to not have it happen again. Okay, tha's impossible: maybe not happen as often. Let me see it happening, so that I may curtail it. And if I must be a son of a bitch, let it be to those that deserve it.
I am not a fella with a lot of friends. That isn't a complaint. The friends I have are the best in the world; you will find none better. But I might have more if I had heeded Mac more often than I did. I'm sure that I'd sleep better, too.

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