Cal.E. got her phone two days in a row. I guess she has been extra good. She has some interesting information to share.
D.: How are you, Cal.E.? What is going on in rehab?
C.” Well, d.c., I found out an interesting fact. Did you know that there are undercover cops on Facebooks’ Messenger?
D.: I did not. I am guessing that I am not the only one. How did you find that out?
C.: Well, one of my fellow “addicts” got caught scamming people in the state of Texas. He (although his profile said he was a she) tried to scam an undercover police officer. He was sentenced to ten years in a Texas Correctional Institute. He feigned being an addict to come here instead. He will still must serve the remainder of his sentence in prison in Texas, (where it is very hot, with no air conditioning) though, once he is let out of here.
D.: How did he get caught?
C.: Well, he tried to scam a photographer (who was really an undercover cop), pretending to be a promotor. Once he asked for money of any type, he was DONE! Some of the officers pose as lonely old men “looking for love” or authors. They sometimes use family members who have very public profiles to help them. I would be very careful whom I tried to scam if I were on Messenger, or any other social media. One never knows to whom s/he is talking on social media!
D.: Indeed, Cal.E. Indeed
And now, Chapter six of Beyond the Thirteenth Mile; The Iron Man Chronicles
CHAPTER 6
WHITE PICKET FENCES
Bike leg, mile fifty-six: I am starting to cramp in my legs and stomach. I do NOT think that I should have eaten those power bars and drank that energy drink yet. It was too much for my digestive system to overcome, since I am putting most of my energy into riding this bike. I hope my G.I. tract recovers by the end of the race. There is steak at the finish line. That will help me recover faster from this race.
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Most people would think that these bikes, since they cost so much, are not worth the money. In some people’s opinions, paying so much for a bicycle is a lot like putting a white picket fence around one’s yard. It is pretty, but it is not worth the price and effort. It is strictly ornamental.
I disagree, after having to ride old, bottom-of-the-line bikes in my first few races. These bikes are definitely NOT just ornamental. They are extremely important equipment in which a serious triathlete must invest.
I remember being locked in wheel-to-wheel with that (female) All-American in a sprint distance triathlon in Greater Houston on this bike. That was fun until her six-six husband (also an All- American) came whizzing by us on HIS bike. That couple put a lot of money into their bikes. The way they both rode, their bikes were NOT just ornamental, like white picket fences... .
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My job, at times, requires me to work around picket fences. While their aesthetic quality cannot be argued, their usefulness can. Getting equipment entangled in a picket fence is almost inevitable, and I truly question whether a three-foot picket fence can deter a 150-pound Great Pyrenees from doing, basically, whatever he pleases.
This, I thought, as I surveyed the white, picket fence, ( as I pulled my hose away from it) is similar to most of the relationships I've had since my divorce. All of them seemed to look right, for some reason or another, but, deep down, none were. One relationship spanned a period of seven years, although we never dated for over three months at a time. On the surface, it seemed to be the ideal situation for us both, having several similarities in our backgrounds (as well as both being avid football fans. My “friend” could determine what coverage the defensive backfield was employing on a regular basis while watching a game. This is something only someone with a well-trained eye is able to do).
In the end, though, our personalities were too different. Perhaps, it was just a case of bad timing, or, in reality, we had just set differing goals for our lives. That, in the end, was the deciding factor. (I later learned that this person had decided against having any more children, stopping at one. Since I desperately wanted a family, it was fortunate that the relationship never really blossomed. The Lord DOES work in mysterious ways.)
At the other end of the spectrum, I met a sweet, smart, absolutely gorgeous lady (inside and out) one month after my divorce; we became friends and started dating three months later. My first inclination was to run as fast as I could in the other direction. Not only did she have a daughter the same age as Ali, she also had the same first name as my ex-wife! As time went on, and I developed feelings for both, it became harder and harder to let them go. It took a long time to get acclimated to not having both around, because they had been a large part of my life. Unfortunately, I had gotten involved with someone else before my grieving process was over and ended up hurting someone who was very dependent on me in a lot of ways. She was not pleased, to say the least, when I opted to end our engagement.
Most of the women had health problems, which fed my "caretaker" personality. By the time I had ended my engagement to Josie, I was more than a little discouraged. I felt the need to take myself "out of the loop" for a year. That one year stretched into two. In the meantime, I had gotten interested in endurance sports. Since most of my friends were female, dating was put on the back burner. The friendships at least satisfied my desire for female companionship.
There was one person, however, who seemed to pop up on a consistent basis. Nicole was, at first glance, the classic person with which I always seemed to find myself involved in a relationship. She was a single parent, (being recently divorced), and probably looking for the type of security that I couldn't offer at that time.
I had, I thought, nothing to lose, save for some of my time (already in short supply), as well as some more of my ability to trust someone in a romantic relationship. Add to these two things the inevitable confusion that will almost always surface at the genesis of any relationship, and you understand my dilemma. That being the inevitable question, "is anything or anyone worth all of this?" The answer, of course, is that life is a risk. Every morning you face the possibility that something life-changing (or even life-threatening) can happen during the course of a day. A Dear John letter coming in the mail (or your email account, or, perhaps, a text), an accident, or getting fired from a job can all be rather daunting. In the case of an athlete, a blown-out knee, a sprained ankle, or some other misfortune suffered in training or competition can all be draining as well, as I can tell you from personal experience. When you take into account all of the many, many days when none of these things happen, though, you must figure that, for the most part, the odds are in your favor.
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