Right now, it is the middle of April 2017.  After a long and cold winter, it appeared that it was going to warm up, and the sun was going to come out.  This past week, I tried several times to sit out in the sun on the back porch wearing shorts and no shirt, in order to try to get a tan.  I look better and I feel better when I have a sun tan.  Even though the clouds came, the wind picked up every day, and the temperature sometimes dropped into the 50s during the day, I still got a tan.

Through the winter, I had been going to the West River Community Center several times each week to walk and run the indoor track.  In between laps, or after all my laps were completed, I would do six sets of pull ups, sit ups, or push ups.  My physical condition is about the same or better than it was when I was 10 years old, 16 years old, or 26 years old.  Sometimes I do feel physically older though, partly because I am heavier, and partly because I have less energy.

Because it is Spring, because I have been exercising and my health is good, and because I don’t have a wife or any children, I feel about the same as when I was 10 years old, 16 years old, or 26 years old.  I am looking forward to riding my mountain bike, going kayaking, and going to the beach.

Sometimes at night I go to a bar or restaurant in Dickinson in order to get out of the house where I live in Dickinson.  The owner of the house is about twelve years older than me, but he acts like he is in his eighties because his attitude, outlook, mental health, and physical health is so bad.  His complaining, whining, drinking, and acting like an old man starts to suck the life right out of me, and I have to get away.

I feel much better when I leave the house at night to go somewhere.  However, my good mood in getting out of the house, and it being Spring, is brought down when I get to where I am going in Dickinson.  I was used to everyone being in a glum mood this winter because it was so cold and grey.  For the past couple of weeks, when the weather has been much nicer, when I met people that were in a bad mood, I attributed it to these people having problems.

However, for the past week, when I have gone to a particular bar and restaurant, I have noticed that everyone, both the employees and the customers, are in a bad mood.  I have met some high school girls, some young women that recently got engaged, some that recently got married, and some that recently got divorced, and they are all in a bad mood.  I am sick of all these women being in a bad mood, and being no fun at all.

I know some of these women, and every one of them seems like their problems overwhelm them.  Both the customers and the employees, the young women and the older women, seem like their problems have eliminated any fun, joy, and happiness in their lives.  What they have in common, is that they all appear to be scared.  They appear to be scared about money and employment.

They are scared about money and employment, regarding themselves, their boyfriends, their fiancees, their husbands, and their ex-husbands.  They have on their mind, are they going to stay at the job they have now, are they going to make enough money, will they lose their job, will their hours be cut, will they stay in the same apartment, will they lose their apartment, will they leave Dickinson, will their boyfriend, fiancee, or husband leave Dickinson to work elsewhere?

I have known, and have been writing for a year and a half, that the oil boom is over in Dickinson, North Dakota.  I have been writing for a year and a half, what the history of oil booms in North Dakota has been.  The oil booms last for about seven years, then they go away for about twenty-five years.  I have described over and over again, that the land owners and property owners gouged all of the out of state workers so bad on housing, raising housing prices 400% to 500%, that all of the out of state workers made up their minds that they were going to leave North Dakota as soon as the oil boom was over.

I guess that this prevailing bad mood in everyone in Dickinson now, is the realization in everyone that they are going to have enormous financial problems.

Imagine this, when everyone was employed in Dickinson, and working overtime, they went and rented the apartment they could afford, bought the house they could afford, bought the vehicle they could afford, and bought the jewelry or toys they could afford.  They didn’t buy less than what they could afford, they spent up to the limit of what they could afford.  Now when people have lost their job, or are working reduced hours, how are they going to pay for everything?  What are they going to lose, and when?

Some of the people that are here now in Dickinson, moved here from Michigan, Oregon, or Idaho just a few years ago because they went broke or were nearly broke in the state where they came from.  After two years of getting back on their feet financially a little bit at a time, they can now see their financial downfall coming again.

I am not in a bad mood now, because I have been angry and disgusted at Dickinson all along, for the past six years, ever since I first came here.  I have written over three hundred blog posts complaining about Dickinson.  Every time something bad happens to me in Dickinson, I write a blog post, sometimes two blog posts a day, and then I feel better.  I saw all of this coming.  In fact, something that cheers me up, and makes me want to stay in Dickinson, is the chance to see everyone in Dickinson get what is coming to them.