"the conflict"

it begins formally today

i literally don't have the half hour to do a decent post

posting will be pretty spotty this month

i feel like a ship that has a pump that is slowly losing the battle with the water coming onboard - stuff is getting tossed my way faster than i can deal with it all. the usual confusion of the first part of a conflict. in about a week it will be smoother and much of the stuff will be dealt with or just won't matter because it wasn't done in time - such is the way it happens

i feel like when i exercise - the first part it is kind of shitty - your muscles are complaining and don't want to work, and then it gets smoother and you start to enjoy the body feeling and you hit your stride.

that's how i feel - like i'm hitting my stride. it's game day for just over four weeks - every day, every waking hour.

the adrenaline rush is incredible. there's nothing like it. at least in my world - strategy, tactics, media, marketing, conflict, subterfuge - and minutes can count.

i was born to this world

and while it may have permanently altered me in some ways - made me a little different - it's still one serious fucking rush.

i was pretty anxious about preparations over the last couple of months. a lot of responsibility dropped on my lap because a couple parts of the organisation (volunteer) literally collapsed in the lead up to the conflict. there is also the possibility of a higher conflict overlapping with ours - and some of the people we had been promised from other regions of the country are spoken for in their home regions - so we lost some outside human resources. i had to go recruit some of the retired folks to come back for one more. some of them are cranky with our current client group (who are responsible for the withering of the organisation - hence the crankiness of the old ones) - but because i am old blood (my family helped found the movement) i can talk to them in the old ways with the old language - and find the buttons to push to get them to come out and work one more for the cause.

this is the most responsibility i've ever had in a conflict. many things i can let slide and be sloppy - but this event is not one of those. my concern for quality in regard to the conflict borders on the obsessive. i was worried that i was not up to snuff. it's funny, but talking to the old ones and the retired folks to bring them back to fight one more has filled me with a lot of confidence in the job i am doing. these are people whom i've known since i was born (literally) and they don't mince a whole lot of words... you know - the whole bullshit walks thing...

i briefed them on what i'm doing, and on what other true believers inside the org are doing - they said i was doing pretty good. these people fought the good fight. some were thrown in jail in the 30s and 40s for being activists. some were beaten by gangs of men with axe handles when they tried to organise the movement (really), or lost jobs and had family members threatened (even my sister when she was 5 year old - my family was threatened with guns in the '60s [before i was born] - i personally got beat up in school). surviving such experiences bring about a purity of purpose and language. they persevered and succeeded - for decades now. when they say i'm doing OK - i know i'm doing OK.

it's game day for just over four weeks

the IT and rapid response units (my groups) are primed and ready.

if we pull this one off - it'll make history - literally

game day