Dominant Moves

From the Philadelphia Enquirer (via Military.com), a story of "veteran homelessness":

After a 30-year military career in which he earned three graduate degrees, rose to the rank of colonel, and served as an aide to Pentagon brass, Robert Freniere can guess what people might say when they learn he's unemployed and lives out of his van:

Why doesn't this guy get a job as a janitor?

Freniere answers his own question: "Well, I've tried that."

Freniere, 59, says that his plea for help, to a janitor he once praised when the man was mopping the floors of his Washington office, went unfulfilled. So have dozens of job applications, he says, the ones he has filled out six hours a day, day after day, on public library computers.
So Freniere, a man who braved multiple combat zones and was hailed as "a leading light" by an admiral, is now fighting a new battle: homelessness.

Then again . . .

Freniere, like many of his fellow down-on-their-luck veterans, does not match any hat-in-hand Hollywood image of homelessness. He receives an annual pension from the military of more than $40,000.

His struggle to find a job after retiring from the Air Force collided with the end of his marriage nearly two years ago. Unable to return to the home he shared with his estranged wife, and faced with expenses including bills for two sons in college and debts that mounted when he maintained a nicer lifestyle, he took up a nomadic existence.

Maybe not!

Parenthetically:

Over chips and salsa at a Baja Fresh in King of Prussia, he spent more than four hours engaged in a rambling conversation in which he quoted Dante, Andrew Jackson, and the novelist Leon Uris. He touched on his hobbies, from painting to playing guitar to learning new languages.

Freniere, who said he had been found to have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder, said he earned the nickname "Lightning" in the military for his constant motion and ability to talk anyone's ear off.

Okay, but I've seen officers use "constant motion" to communicate, "I'm way too busy with things way more important than you to actually stop what I'm doing, look you in the eye, and have a conversation. But trot along after me if you must, which will force you into a submissive frame." It's transparently a dominance move, and among such moves above-average in its discourtesy.

Come to think of it, talking someone's ear off might be a dominance move too, especially when no one has asked you a question about what you're talking about.