Vincent Zandri's Blog - Posts Tagged "on-life"
Remember 9/11 Today and Then Move On With Your Life
The following blog is now appearing at The Vincent Zandri Vox: http://vincentzandri.blogspot.com/201...
After a divorce or a breakup or a death to someone close to you, a professional therapist will almost always suggest that you try and recall the good things about that person, then move on. Obviously you will never forget and often be reminded of the individual who at one time was very close and special to you. But now that person is gone and they are never coming back to you. The bond is broken forever. Despite the immediate and sometimes agonizing pain, the loss means one thing and one thing only: it's time to reinvent your life.
Today is 9/11, the tenth anniversary of an event that we will never nor should we ever forget, when a Mickey Mouse organization called Al Qaeda comprised primarily of murderous Islamic extremists got very, very lucky, and managed to pull off the mass murder of the century. Since that time the country and much of the world has been tossed into economic turmoil, travel by airplane has become difficult and full of security hassle, many American lives have been lost on the fields of battle in Iraq and Afghanistan, we've tolerantly learned to live with degrees of fear defined by color coded bar charts, and we've tried in every politically correct way possible to understand why Muslim Radicals might hate us so much. We've even come close on occasion to apologizing for just plain being us. Well, I'm not apologizing. I don't say "I'm sorry" to bullies and homicidal maniacs.
Other things have happened in the past ten years. Good things.
Osama, the Al Qaeda chief thug, is dead. A man who lived by the gun and died by the gun. Another thug, Saddam Hussein has been tried and hanged. We now have active counter-terrorism organizations operating both inside and outside the U.S. and in turn, we are better able to protect and defend ourselves. The internet has exploded with social media sights like Twitter and Facebook spreading messages of freedom and democracy to citizens of Egypt, Syria, Libya and elsewhere, making it just a little more difficult in this day and age for a Mafia style thug like Saddam to rule over a country of frightened people. No we didn't uncover weapons of mass destruction in his country prior to entering into the second Iraq War, but that never disguised the fact that they did in fact possess them and had used them before in the form of poison gas on innocent Kurds and had been in the process of acquiring light water for their nuclear processing plants which were being reconstructed.
But it's ten years since 9/11.
Nearly 3,000 innocent people lost their lives on that day, and we shall never forget a single one of them. While it pains my soul to try and imagine the unspeakable sorrow and horrors each of these people went through on that sunny Monday morning, these days I prefer to think about the passengers of Flight 43 bound for San Francisco who decided to re-take their hijacked plane even though it was almost certainly going to mean sacrificing their lives in the process. But somehow they knew that given the choice of being a victim or a defender, they all chose defender. They are heros and saints.
So what shall we do over the course of the next ten years?
Move on. Remember what occurred all those years ago on September 11, 2001 and move on with reconstructing your life.
No more apologies for who or what we are as Americans. We have our faults but we are a strong people whose spirit will always be one of defending the right to be free.
Be tolerant. There will be many more people of the Muslim faith moving to America who are as far removed from the murderers of 9/11 as you and I are from Charlie Manson. They just want a fair shake at living the American Dream. So part of moving on is to move on with people you might have formerly harbored a distrust for.
Be vigilant. There as many domestic terrorists at work in the United States as there are foreign terrorists who want to kill Westerners, Christians, Jews and people of color. Yup, they want to kill little children too. Let's force them out of their rat holes and put these haters behind bars.
Work harder. No one single U.S. President can bear the unspeakable burden of creating jobs for us. As Americans we've always found a way to not only to make a living, but to create new industries. Lets stop complaining, stop collecting unemployment and other "entitlements" and get the hell back to work. Now!
Fight back. It's not only probable that another terrorist attack will occur in the US, it's inevitable. And when it does, we find out the party responsible, and we don't hold back. This time we retaliate with a "police action" not with one arm tied behind our backs, but with everything we've got. We take terror to the terrorists and eliminate every single one of them in as swift a manner as possible. We send a message to the world that we will not be bullied anymore.
Most of all, we must live and re-invent ourselves as free people who love not only our country but the entire world and beyond.
Let's take today to remember the past. But then let's pick ourselves back up, dust ourselves off, and move on with life.
GET ZANDRI BOOKS: WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Moonlight Rises
After a divorce or a breakup or a death to someone close to you, a professional therapist will almost always suggest that you try and recall the good things about that person, then move on. Obviously you will never forget and often be reminded of the individual who at one time was very close and special to you. But now that person is gone and they are never coming back to you. The bond is broken forever. Despite the immediate and sometimes agonizing pain, the loss means one thing and one thing only: it's time to reinvent your life.
Today is 9/11, the tenth anniversary of an event that we will never nor should we ever forget, when a Mickey Mouse organization called Al Qaeda comprised primarily of murderous Islamic extremists got very, very lucky, and managed to pull off the mass murder of the century. Since that time the country and much of the world has been tossed into economic turmoil, travel by airplane has become difficult and full of security hassle, many American lives have been lost on the fields of battle in Iraq and Afghanistan, we've tolerantly learned to live with degrees of fear defined by color coded bar charts, and we've tried in every politically correct way possible to understand why Muslim Radicals might hate us so much. We've even come close on occasion to apologizing for just plain being us. Well, I'm not apologizing. I don't say "I'm sorry" to bullies and homicidal maniacs.
Other things have happened in the past ten years. Good things.
Osama, the Al Qaeda chief thug, is dead. A man who lived by the gun and died by the gun. Another thug, Saddam Hussein has been tried and hanged. We now have active counter-terrorism organizations operating both inside and outside the U.S. and in turn, we are better able to protect and defend ourselves. The internet has exploded with social media sights like Twitter and Facebook spreading messages of freedom and democracy to citizens of Egypt, Syria, Libya and elsewhere, making it just a little more difficult in this day and age for a Mafia style thug like Saddam to rule over a country of frightened people. No we didn't uncover weapons of mass destruction in his country prior to entering into the second Iraq War, but that never disguised the fact that they did in fact possess them and had used them before in the form of poison gas on innocent Kurds and had been in the process of acquiring light water for their nuclear processing plants which were being reconstructed.
But it's ten years since 9/11.
Nearly 3,000 innocent people lost their lives on that day, and we shall never forget a single one of them. While it pains my soul to try and imagine the unspeakable sorrow and horrors each of these people went through on that sunny Monday morning, these days I prefer to think about the passengers of Flight 43 bound for San Francisco who decided to re-take their hijacked plane even though it was almost certainly going to mean sacrificing their lives in the process. But somehow they knew that given the choice of being a victim or a defender, they all chose defender. They are heros and saints.
So what shall we do over the course of the next ten years?
Move on. Remember what occurred all those years ago on September 11, 2001 and move on with reconstructing your life.
No more apologies for who or what we are as Americans. We have our faults but we are a strong people whose spirit will always be one of defending the right to be free.
Be tolerant. There will be many more people of the Muslim faith moving to America who are as far removed from the murderers of 9/11 as you and I are from Charlie Manson. They just want a fair shake at living the American Dream. So part of moving on is to move on with people you might have formerly harbored a distrust for.
Be vigilant. There as many domestic terrorists at work in the United States as there are foreign terrorists who want to kill Westerners, Christians, Jews and people of color. Yup, they want to kill little children too. Let's force them out of their rat holes and put these haters behind bars.
Work harder. No one single U.S. President can bear the unspeakable burden of creating jobs for us. As Americans we've always found a way to not only to make a living, but to create new industries. Lets stop complaining, stop collecting unemployment and other "entitlements" and get the hell back to work. Now!
Fight back. It's not only probable that another terrorist attack will occur in the US, it's inevitable. And when it does, we find out the party responsible, and we don't hold back. This time we retaliate with a "police action" not with one arm tied behind our backs, but with everything we've got. We take terror to the terrorists and eliminate every single one of them in as swift a manner as possible. We send a message to the world that we will not be bullied anymore.
Most of all, we must live and re-invent ourselves as free people who love not only our country but the entire world and beyond.
Let's take today to remember the past. But then let's pick ourselves back up, dust ourselves off, and move on with life.
GET ZANDRI BOOKS: WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Moonlight Rises
Back in the "W" Column
The following blog is now appearing at The Vincent Zandri Vox: http://vincentzandri.blogspot.com/201...
I'm watching the New York Giants play in their first playoff game since 2008 (Don't quote me on that). I haven't gotten the chance to watch much pro football the past few years because usually I spend much of the Fall in Italy. But this year I spent most of the summer in Europe which freed up the football season. Still, work got in the way and I didn't see many games, and then when my team, The New York Football Giants began to lose consecutive games, I figured they'd never make the playoffs anyway. So why worry about watching? Hell, I don't even have a TV.
But then something strange happened. Well, not strange, but important all the same.
The Giants started to peak late in the season.
They regrouped, took a good look at their mistakes, made attempts to correct them, healed their injuries, placed the past in the past and started looking towards the future. And in doing so, they started to win.
Life is like that.
Sometimes when things look like they will never be repaired or healed, you suddenly find yourself back in the winner's circle. I played football for eight years so I guess I feel comfortable with the football metaphor, and after getting my head banged up for all those seasons, I feel like I've earned the right to use it.
But to get back to my point...
Five or more years ago when I was writing the first drafts of my suspense/thriller, SCREAM CATCHER, I had just separated from my wife. I didn't have a new publisher and was barely making a living as a freelance journalist. It was during this time I took a step back and tried to reassess my life. Where had I gone wrong after having scored a major deal with a Random House imprint for two novels (THE INNOCENT and GODCHILD) and at the same time, married the love of my life, only to lose them both?
Curiously, I couldn't point at any one thing I'd done wrong, only that they had gone wrong. So how would I repair my life and get back to my winning ways and perhaps even win my love back? I didn't have the answers. But I did know this: If I made a renewed commitment to hard work and to writing the best books I could in the shortest amount of time, my publishing losses would take care of themselves and begin turning into wins. In other words, instead of brooding and reaching for a quick fix, I started behaving like a winner. This past Spring, when I sold over 100,000 e-Books of The Innocent in 60 days and it resulted in a 7 book "very nice" deal with Thomas & Mercer, I knew that I had indeed taken the necessary steps in order to get back to my winning ways.
All professional success aside, I still had my personal life to think about. My love life. I'd enjoyed some very nice and fulfilling relationships with some very good, if not exceptional women. But for some reason, none of these relationships were working out in the long term. What was going wrong? Like I did with my professional life years earlier, only very recently did I took a step back, reviewed some game tapes as it were, and decided to start becoming a new man. A man who could not only be trusted, but who could trust himself to do the right things. No one wants to be a Facebook or Twitter flirt forever, and frankly, by the time you hit your mid forties, if you still gotta rely on FB "pokes" and "winks" for your jollies, you deserve to be alone.
In the wake of my dad's sudden death, I've started spending some time with someone who used to be very close to me. Very close. We've had some very good times amidst some seriously stressful and sad situations. We're both finding one another as single, free adults with open hearts. That we are becoming friends again and more is plainly obvious. That we are taking it slow and careful is also obvious and smart of us. We're older now. More mature. But we're still very much attracted to the same things that attracted us in the first place all those years ago. You can see it and feel it whenever our eyes connect.
I guess we have every reason not to take a chance on this. We have a history together. A history that went bad. But then, love isn't sometimes risky. It's always risky. So is the writing game. The New York Giants have only inches to go in order to nail a first down. Problem is, it's fourth down. They can take a shot and "go for it" or they can play it safe and kick it away.
They're going for it.
The big bull running back barrels his way through a very mammoth and angry Falcons defensive line.
They've gone for it and they got the first down.
They took a shot, that now is resulting in a touchdown and the game lead.
Sometimes all that's necessary to becoming a winning player again in life and love is to not only learn from your mistakes, but to simply start living your life like a winner.
GET ZANDRI NOVELS: WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Scream Catcher
I'm watching the New York Giants play in their first playoff game since 2008 (Don't quote me on that). I haven't gotten the chance to watch much pro football the past few years because usually I spend much of the Fall in Italy. But this year I spent most of the summer in Europe which freed up the football season. Still, work got in the way and I didn't see many games, and then when my team, The New York Football Giants began to lose consecutive games, I figured they'd never make the playoffs anyway. So why worry about watching? Hell, I don't even have a TV.
But then something strange happened. Well, not strange, but important all the same.
The Giants started to peak late in the season.
They regrouped, took a good look at their mistakes, made attempts to correct them, healed their injuries, placed the past in the past and started looking towards the future. And in doing so, they started to win.
Life is like that.
Sometimes when things look like they will never be repaired or healed, you suddenly find yourself back in the winner's circle. I played football for eight years so I guess I feel comfortable with the football metaphor, and after getting my head banged up for all those seasons, I feel like I've earned the right to use it.
But to get back to my point...
Five or more years ago when I was writing the first drafts of my suspense/thriller, SCREAM CATCHER, I had just separated from my wife. I didn't have a new publisher and was barely making a living as a freelance journalist. It was during this time I took a step back and tried to reassess my life. Where had I gone wrong after having scored a major deal with a Random House imprint for two novels (THE INNOCENT and GODCHILD) and at the same time, married the love of my life, only to lose them both?
Curiously, I couldn't point at any one thing I'd done wrong, only that they had gone wrong. So how would I repair my life and get back to my winning ways and perhaps even win my love back? I didn't have the answers. But I did know this: If I made a renewed commitment to hard work and to writing the best books I could in the shortest amount of time, my publishing losses would take care of themselves and begin turning into wins. In other words, instead of brooding and reaching for a quick fix, I started behaving like a winner. This past Spring, when I sold over 100,000 e-Books of The Innocent in 60 days and it resulted in a 7 book "very nice" deal with Thomas & Mercer, I knew that I had indeed taken the necessary steps in order to get back to my winning ways.
All professional success aside, I still had my personal life to think about. My love life. I'd enjoyed some very nice and fulfilling relationships with some very good, if not exceptional women. But for some reason, none of these relationships were working out in the long term. What was going wrong? Like I did with my professional life years earlier, only very recently did I took a step back, reviewed some game tapes as it were, and decided to start becoming a new man. A man who could not only be trusted, but who could trust himself to do the right things. No one wants to be a Facebook or Twitter flirt forever, and frankly, by the time you hit your mid forties, if you still gotta rely on FB "pokes" and "winks" for your jollies, you deserve to be alone.
In the wake of my dad's sudden death, I've started spending some time with someone who used to be very close to me. Very close. We've had some very good times amidst some seriously stressful and sad situations. We're both finding one another as single, free adults with open hearts. That we are becoming friends again and more is plainly obvious. That we are taking it slow and careful is also obvious and smart of us. We're older now. More mature. But we're still very much attracted to the same things that attracted us in the first place all those years ago. You can see it and feel it whenever our eyes connect.
I guess we have every reason not to take a chance on this. We have a history together. A history that went bad. But then, love isn't sometimes risky. It's always risky. So is the writing game. The New York Giants have only inches to go in order to nail a first down. Problem is, it's fourth down. They can take a shot and "go for it" or they can play it safe and kick it away.
They're going for it.
The big bull running back barrels his way through a very mammoth and angry Falcons defensive line.
They've gone for it and they got the first down.
They took a shot, that now is resulting in a touchdown and the game lead.
Sometimes all that's necessary to becoming a winning player again in life and love is to not only learn from your mistakes, but to simply start living your life like a winner.
GET ZANDRI NOVELS: WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Scream Catcher
Happy!
The following blog is now appearing at The Vincent Zandri Vox in slightly different form: http://vincentzandri.blogspot.com/201...
Remember when you were a kid, and you couldn't wait for school to let out in June? You wished away the hours, the weeks, the months, so that time would move at lightning speed and the summer would arrive early. You lied about your age or, at the very least, stretched it by proudly announcing, "I am nine and a three quarters now."
Then you get older. A lot older. Like pushing fifty older, and you start doing things to make time stop ticking so fast. Problem is, the older you get, the faster it goes. Time is indeed relative, but it is relative to age. When you're young, you are immortal and death is an incomprehensible concept at best. When you're no longer young, death seems as real as the old worn out clothing hanging in your closet or the reflection of your face staring back at you in the bathroom mirror each morning.
You don't know when it's coming. That's a good thing.
Just two days ago, 32 year old Courtney Sanford was driving on a highway in North Carolina while rocking out to the "Happy Song." The tune was making her so happy, she picked up her cell phone and snapped a selfie, posting the word "Happy" along with the digital snapshot on her Facebook timeline. Problem is, during the process of telling the world how happy she was, she smashed head -first into a truck. The truck burst into flames and she died. All time stopped for Courtney then, but at least she died happy.
This weekend, a movie will open in the UK about a four year old boy who died on the operating table and went to heaven where he claimed to have met John the Baptist, Jesus, and even a sibling who had been stillborn. The movie, which is said to be based on real life events, is sure to raise some eyebrows amongst those Godless folks who believe heaven is as much fantasy as Candyland. Regardless of the truth about the boy's experiences, I find the subject infinitely fascinating. What if there really is a heaven, and conversely, what if there really is a hell? I'm not a religious man, but the spiritual side of me hopes for something beyond the here and now. Only the dead know the truth.
I can only imagine that prior to his surgery, the little boy was one of those happy go lucky kids who used to exaggerate his age while wishing time would speed up so that summer would get here already. I also wonder if Courtney is in heaven or something like it. I wonder what she would have to say about her experience. I wonder if she is somehow, still happy. I can only imagine that she was trying to slow time down a little by telling the world how content she was at that very second in her life. The same exact second that the life became the death.
They say that when we die, a we lose a small amount of weight. Some attribute this phenomenon to the soul leaving the body and heading off for new horizons. I like this concept. It's somehow comforting. Death is inevitable for all of us. The only thing we have between right now and that one singular moment when the heart stops beating is time. A lot of it, or a little. But of course, the amount is relative.
The point is to live for the moment. Choose to be happy, just like Courtney Sandford did during her final moment on earth. Don't choose to be sad and bothered by life's drudgery. Look forward to summer like that little boy, but also, be happy right now. Snap and selfie, and go ahead and tell the world.
Just don't do it while you're driving.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
The Shroud KeyVincent Zandri
Remember when you were a kid, and you couldn't wait for school to let out in June? You wished away the hours, the weeks, the months, so that time would move at lightning speed and the summer would arrive early. You lied about your age or, at the very least, stretched it by proudly announcing, "I am nine and a three quarters now."
Then you get older. A lot older. Like pushing fifty older, and you start doing things to make time stop ticking so fast. Problem is, the older you get, the faster it goes. Time is indeed relative, but it is relative to age. When you're young, you are immortal and death is an incomprehensible concept at best. When you're no longer young, death seems as real as the old worn out clothing hanging in your closet or the reflection of your face staring back at you in the bathroom mirror each morning.
You don't know when it's coming. That's a good thing.
Just two days ago, 32 year old Courtney Sanford was driving on a highway in North Carolina while rocking out to the "Happy Song." The tune was making her so happy, she picked up her cell phone and snapped a selfie, posting the word "Happy" along with the digital snapshot on her Facebook timeline. Problem is, during the process of telling the world how happy she was, she smashed head -first into a truck. The truck burst into flames and she died. All time stopped for Courtney then, but at least she died happy.
This weekend, a movie will open in the UK about a four year old boy who died on the operating table and went to heaven where he claimed to have met John the Baptist, Jesus, and even a sibling who had been stillborn. The movie, which is said to be based on real life events, is sure to raise some eyebrows amongst those Godless folks who believe heaven is as much fantasy as Candyland. Regardless of the truth about the boy's experiences, I find the subject infinitely fascinating. What if there really is a heaven, and conversely, what if there really is a hell? I'm not a religious man, but the spiritual side of me hopes for something beyond the here and now. Only the dead know the truth.
I can only imagine that prior to his surgery, the little boy was one of those happy go lucky kids who used to exaggerate his age while wishing time would speed up so that summer would get here already. I also wonder if Courtney is in heaven or something like it. I wonder what she would have to say about her experience. I wonder if she is somehow, still happy. I can only imagine that she was trying to slow time down a little by telling the world how content she was at that very second in her life. The same exact second that the life became the death.
They say that when we die, a we lose a small amount of weight. Some attribute this phenomenon to the soul leaving the body and heading off for new horizons. I like this concept. It's somehow comforting. Death is inevitable for all of us. The only thing we have between right now and that one singular moment when the heart stops beating is time. A lot of it, or a little. But of course, the amount is relative.
The point is to live for the moment. Choose to be happy, just like Courtney Sandford did during her final moment on earth. Don't choose to be sad and bothered by life's drudgery. Look forward to summer like that little boy, but also, be happy right now. Snap and selfie, and go ahead and tell the world.
Just don't do it while you're driving.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
The Shroud KeyVincent Zandri
