Fighting My Way to 85
Three weeks ago I went to the Doctor for a check up. After he gave me a work up, he found out that my blood pressure was 220/120 and my blood sugar was 450. These are not good numbers in any way shape or form . So I was hospitalized in order to get both of these numbers under control.
After about a week, my vitals were somewhat under control but I would have to work very hard to get my life under control. At least I know how it got out of control.
It got out of control through stress and neglect on my part . Stress because I am out of work and have been for the last three years . It is not like I have not been looking . Over the last three years I have sent out several resume's and cover letters to every organization from schools to retail establishments to no avail.  So most of the stress is caused by being out of work for so long and unable to get even one interview. So I spent most of my time eating and watching television but I have been exercising daily since March. So now I have to get my blood sugar and weight down all the way down. This means extreme measures  meaning strict control of what I eat and an increase in the amount and kind of exercise I do along with monitoring it properly.
One of the things I am doing is exercising twice a day starting at 5 am . Exercising in the morning helps to set the metabolism for the day it also gets you going for the day.  I have also started to monitor and control the amount of carbohydrates that I consume. I am working hard to eliminate as many carbs from my diet especially bread. Eliminating carbs will help lower my blood sugar and lose weight both if which I need to reach my goal of a fasting blood sugar of 85 . The way it works with type 2 diabetes is the lower your weight the lower your blood sugar. The more active you are the less likely you are to have high blood sugar.
The other day I bought a fitbit .  A fitbit is a band that you wear on your wrist it monitors the amount of exercise that you do along with caloric intake.  I am going to use this to monitor my exercise and what I eat to help me bring my numbers down . Over the next few months I will be writing about about my journey the highs and the lows until I reach my goal of 220 lbs . I hope we enjoy the ride. Me, you my bike and my fitbit.

Black Irish

I can still remember that famous line from the movie The Commitments where the main characters explained why their band should be a R and B band . He said that R and B was the music of black people in America . He said since the Irish were oppressed in Europe like blacks, were in America, that the Irish were the blacks of Europe. Years after watching that movie, I have the tendency to believe him.
Norman Mailer said in his essay The White Negro  that the Negro is the most innovative of all America. Mailer's explanation of this is because black people in America have to be innovative to survive . In Mailer's words, the negro is the true hipster because he lives on the border between democracy and totalitarianism .  So it is safe to say that American popular culture was born and still resides in black America. Jazz, Rock and Roll, the Blues and Hip Hop were born of the African-American experience . Style, language and other things like science, engineering and design are also influenced by black America.
I once took a group of students through the high school that I taught at to show them the contributions of black inventors. From the cafeteria on the ground floor to the library on the top floor each floor had something that was invented by a black inventor. So it's not just entertainment that is influenced by black America every part of what we call America has the finger prints of black America.  The same can be said for Britain, the rest of Europe and the world.
From Literature to the Sciences to Popular culture, the Irish have used their oppression to create a world that is a lot easier to live in . In how the book How the Irish save Civilization  by Thomas Cahill, the Irish saved western culture from the Huns and the Visigoths . Writers like Jonathan Swift and James Joyce gave much to the creation of the western political style. Paul McCartney along with John Lennon created a musical style that has lasted for over 50 years .
The Irish came to America and created political dynasties in cities like Boston and New York and produced a President John F. Kennedy. Writers like F. Scott Fitzgerald chronicled the 1920s and became one of America's premier writer showmen like George M. Cohan produced shows that lauded America's Patriotism .
At the same time that the Irish were doing their thing in America, African Americans were creating the Harlem Renaissance and Jazz music as its' soundtrack. Out of WWII came swing and Rock and Roll in the Fifties . While JFK was in the house and the Senate preparing for the presidency , Dr. Ralph Bunche was negotiating the Arab-Israeli conflict and won the Noble Peace Prize and Richard Wright and James Baldwin were creating the voice of Black America and Charlie Parker was creating its' soundtrack.
All of this came from the oppression and marginalization that each group was subjected to. Each group took that oppression and turned it into gold . As oppressed groups African-Americans and the Irish have gone beyond oppression and have reached our goals. We are still marginalized by the mainstream but both of us have had one of our brethren in the oval office and at the height of cultural.
The Irish are the blacks of Europe but blacks are the Irish of America.

Cause I'm Happy!!!!!

I was always taught that you can either be happy, productive and proactive  or you can be angry, unproductive and reactive. In the scheme of thing that does not give you many options but when you think about it, it does.
Warren Buffett says that his success has been based on a variety of factors including genetics, geography and time. He was born white and male in America.  He was born at a time where all of that mattered and he took advantage of the opportunities that were presented to him. With all of those factors combined, he became one of the riches men in the world instead of a guy who runs a service station. The fact that his father was a congressman and he lived an upper-middle class childhood in Omaha Nebraska during a depression that divested  many families  and killed many dreams .  Mr. Buffett took what was given to him and worked toward his success. When he was rejected, he regrouped when he was successful, he did not sit on his laurels but went on to seek his next success. I guess you could say that Warren Buffett was happy, productive and proactive. He took what he had and made his success.
When I look at myself, I also have to look at what gifts were given to me and how they can help me to achieve success. I was not born white or upper middle class. Although I was born male albeit a black male that for me is to my disadvantage. Up to 50% of all black males in America are either unemployed, incarcerated or addicted to some sort of drug. We are not seen a a good risk for anything and even if we are not one of those statistics many people think we are. With the exception of currently being out of work, I am the exception to all of the above-mentioned stats.  I do not use drugs or alcohol, I am well educated and I have never been to jail.
I could dwell on the negative, the discrimination and the lack of opportunities available to someone of my race , age and sex and out my head back under the covers but there are many factors that keep me from doing this.  The most obvious of these is that I only meet one of the above-mentioned stats and I only meet that one is  because of the current  economic situation. I am well educated with
a great deal of experience. I come from a good family that is very supportive of me and my attitude is positive and upbeat .
When I think about it yes I am a black male in America so I am not at the top of the success tree. It could be worse, I could be a black male in Brazil or a variety of Latin American or African countries or in Europe for that matter. As things go, America is one of the best places to be black. If I lived in Brazil for instance, I would probably be living on the streets in abject poverty. If I lived in France I might be living in the high-rise ghettos that blacks are relegated to. In America where our success rate is not as high as it should be , we occupy the White House and are CEO's of major corporations, have a seat on the Supreme Court and own several lucrative business and have won many high awards like the Noble Prize and the Pulitzer Prize. Maybe as a whole statistically we have not achieved as much as white men but we are not white men we are black men in a society that practices racism .
When I think about this, I feel that I have just as good of a chance at success as any man 'cause I'm happy and because I am the exception not the rule.