Quite the week...

Quite the week…

Well this has been quite the week to say the least, and not in a good way. Why does it seem like bad things always seem to come in fistfuls? It’s like some giant masturbating bad events finally lets loose and climaxes his bad week load all over your face. It’s not that I don’t expect bad things to happen, bad things happen to everyone. I just don’t know why it has to be an all or nothing sort of thing. It has to be all good, or all bad, it can’t just be a situation where we’re level and even keel with the ups and downs balancing each other out on a daily, or at least weekly basis. Let’s get this started, shall we?

First off, my Grandma passed away. Now over the last few years I hadn’t been super close to her, mostly because she was my great grandma and my immediate grandma and her had been at odds. Additionally, she hadn’t been overly well, and living in Wisconsin, wasn’t travelling quite as much. All that being said, she did still mean a good deal to me. I remember going to Wisconsin for a summer when I was little and staying with her. My uncles slept in a trailer in the backyard on Great Grandma’s massive plot of land, and actually fought to let me sleep out there with them. I remember Grandma had made sure we were well stocked with treats, and I remember her buying fireworks for us since it was the 4^th of July. Another time, we were visiting my Aunt Janet (My Grandma’s sister, and one of Great Grandma’s other daughters) while Grandma was staying with her. It was my birthday, and I wasn’t necessarily happy about being away from home for it, but Grandma made me a homemade ice cream cake, with my favorite, mint chocolate chip ice cream. I’ll always remember that. I don’t know why it made such an impression, maybe because she made it with me in mind, and knowing I wasn’t happy, or maybe because I’ve rarely had anything done for me for my birthday, but it will always resonate as one of my best birthdays. She was a very remarkable lady, her and my great grandpa lived on their land in a tent while he built their house with his hands. They lived through the Great Depression and WWII. It really is sad to think that the lady who made many of my childhood belongings, like my baby blanket is gone now.

The next item contained in the massive giant load of suck, was missing my test. This might not seem like a big deal to anyone except me, but I want to start doing my actual job. My days are so mundane with nothing substantive to fill them at work. I want to start making my money too. Don’t get me wrong, 50k is nothing to smirk at, but I will be six figures, and the quicker I start, the quicker I can start making. I don’t like sitting on my butt while I know I have clients to help and investments to make.

I’ll skip to the most recent, because the next one in the chronological order will probably be what I bitch and moan about most, but if you don’t like it, don’t read my blog. Today, I spent almost $600 for new brake pads, rotors, and registration. $600 bucks is not an astronomical amount, but man, that’s still a hefty chunk of change, and at least the registration part is something I get no tangible benefit from. Not only that, but I went there during lunch, and I expected it to be a fairly quick trip, but it ended up taking me almost three hours. Luckily, no one cares if I’m gone for a long lunch, but that’s a long time to sit and wait for them to put on new brakes, plus the cost, and it all came together to put me in quite a sour demeanor.

Finally, the worst part of the week was telling the girl that I want to pursue a relationship with, that I couldn’t spend time with her, or be around her until she can figure out what she wants. Specifically, what she wants with her ex boyfriend, and me… That was seriously the hardest thing I’ve had to do in a long long time, and there are a few reasons for that. A. We’ve spent virtually every waking moment, outside of school, and work, together for the past few weeks, and before she went to Hawaii on vacation. Seriously, it was a lot of time, and what’s remarkable, is that there wasn’t ever a time I wanted to take alone time, or got annoyed with her. Anyone whose spent a long time with me, has probably experienced my annoyances and then progressively aggressive attitude toward them after so long together. Not her though. I left happy to see her after work everyday. B. I didn’t want to get rid of her, I still don’t. It wasn’t nasty like when I told Whitley she had to get lost or I was going to snap her neck. It was a, “I have to cut you off, because I want us both to be happy together, and until you get this figured out, we’ll never be able to be happy.” It’s a scenario where I still want things to work out, and I still want to pursue something, but I can’t be the second option, or the option being settled for until the real want presents itself. I’ve been there, and done that, and it only creates resentment and hurt. If and when it happens, I want to do it right, and the pseudo way we were getting into, was only going to be a disservice to what we both could have and deserve eventually. So, of course, I drank a 750ML of whiskey, and passed out, and then worked out. Such are my coping mechanisms often times when these things arise. I’m still just not happy, and I know she isn’t either, but we will end up where we’re supposed to, and I still believe it’s together and in a situation that’s better than the crash course we were on before.

 So that’s been my week thus far, and I know it probably doesn’t sound terrible to a lot of you, but man is it wearing on me. It really has my mind in a terrible state, and I just can’t rationalize my emotions away yet. I’m so pissed off I really want to break shit, or punch something, but I’m also so sad, which just makes me want to do nothing and go comatose, and then I’m also super motivated, and I want to be productive. This must be what my Grandma Charlene feels like with all the voices in her head pulling her in different directions. Hope your week is better, if not, I sympathize.

Great Days!

I have had some of the most amazing past few days, and I'm not ashamed to admit it. I've spent the majority of my every waking moment, and many of my unconscious ones, with the most amazing and brilliant girl I know. It's kind of funny, the old adage, "It's always darkest before dawn" seems to be a proverbial truth.  Often times it seems to be the ability to endure through the rough that allows you to accept and experience the good.

I was having a conversation with Drew the other day, about sharing in the agony of defeat with the teams that you root for, being a crucial component to also sharing in the highs of victory. I've come to realize, this is a fairly global truth. In order to experience the happiness of success, you have to be willing to face the prospect of defeat. If you're not vested, if you're apathetic, then you don't care what the outcome is. For Drew, I used this analogy: If you didn't care about Alex (his girlfriend), then you wouldn't mind when she's sad, you wouldn't care when things go wrong with her parents, it wouldn't matter if she moved to Indonesia for all you'd care, but you've taken a vested interest in her. You've allowed for her to be every bit a part of your life as your family and close friends. It's because of that, that when you know she's struggling you care, you want to do something to fix it. Allowing yourself to be affected like that doesn't mean you only get that burden though, it means you also share in the gifts of happiness that are afforded to her. It's why when she succeeds, you feel a sense of pride and accomplishment as well. It's why she's able to make you happy, and why she's able to make you sad.

Marriages and relationships that don't work, so often seemed to be caused by a lack of ability for one party to affect the other. When one side becomes apathetic to the happenings of the other, you lose the mutual interest in the well being of the relationship. It's no longer an equal commitment, it's suddenly a lot more pain for one person, while a lot less for another. I guess that's what makes relationships such a worthwhile pursuit. They're scary, they're fragile, they're intimidating, but they're amazing, they're unparallelled in happiness and disappointment. They cause euphoria, and crippling pain.

I still don't know what I'm in, haha, and while the confusion is often times frustrating, if I take it at the level I explained, the litmus test tells me, I feel pain when something upsets her, and I feel great satisfaction when something makes her happy, and what more really can I ask for?

Debate

So guess who's going to Berkeley! If you pointed two thumbs at this guy, you'd be correct, but should probably not point with your thumbs because you look like a moron. Since I decided to move on with my life and try to give up on the girl I really want, I decided to fill my time with something more productive and try going back and being involved in the Debate Community. I have to say, its been amazing. So many of the same people I used to see on a regular basis, and so many people I'd forgotten whose company I used to love. Not only that, but it gives me a time to listen to people engage in a constructive dialogue. Not only the debates themselves, which are often times extremely educational and stimulating, but the people involved in the community are a group of people with some of the sharpest and most open minds I know.

It's great to be a part of something like that when you're so stuck in your own mind with no outlet, it gives you something to focus that otherwise internally destructive brain power on. I guess that's one of the things that drew me to it in the first place. Most people are pretty well aware that I dislike confrontation, nothing gives me more anxiety than confronting people, and potentially being in disagreement. But, with debate, people are free to express themselves and opinions, in a structured and orderly environment. When you go into a debate, you know what you're getting yourself into. You know you're engaging in something to take an opposite side. No one's feelings are hurt, and no one is upset when you disagree with them, because you're supposed to. It's what you're there for. Politics, Economics, Philosophy, Emotion, etc, they're all part of what you're agreeing to and you do so willingly. Some of my most hardened beliefs have been as a result of the dialogue had within debate rounds. Dialogue that liberated me logically and emotionally, and some of the people I've met, have been the most extraordinary people I know.

When I was a Sophomore in high school, I attended Dixie State College's Sun County Forensics Institute, and it was there that I really was given a firm grasp as to the type of family this community creates. My old debate coach Stan Banks, was not only my coach, but much more of a father figure than my own Dad often was. To this day he remains one of my closest and dearest friends, I have seen his kids grow up, I have been invited to holidays, spent weekends with the family, and consider his whole family as much a part of my family as I do my own sisters. It's the people that often times make our outlets so unique and so much a part of us that we continue to engage in them for our lives.

Sometimes I wonder what my life would be like had I not done Debate, and there's not a time I ever believe it would have been for the better. My views on women were completely changed by Debate, I don't believe in patriarchal values at all. There are very few times I ever say something shouldn't be extended to women. It changed my idea of equality in general, and made me more sympathetic to people who fight just to try and obtain the same rights that are just naturally extended to me. IE I don't use the word "Gay" or "Fag" as derogatory terms or pointed insults, because on the other end of that insult is someone who is affected by it, who simply tries to live and cope with a life that is already facing enough adversity without somebody using a term to verbally spit on you with. I don't think I'd be as concerned about the impoverished of the world had it not been for debate, or even those less fortunate here in the US. I'd be a much different person, and unfortunately, it'd likely be a lifestyle similar to that of many youth growing up in the most Conservative and religious state in America.

Not only does Debate provide all of the aforementioned benefits, but it doesn't necessarily have a shortage of potential relationships! :D I guess that's how all of my REAL relationships have begun, and thus far, they've all been pretty shitty, but I attribute that more to poor judgement on my part than I do to the female populous in Debate in general. In fact, last weekend was the Copper Classic Round Robin, and I saw one person specifically that I'd been  interested in before, but she had a boyfriend I was good friends with; come to find out, she's single now and available. Who knows? Maybe something will come from it! Maybe not... But in any case, at least it gets me involved and in a community, rather than being stuck home wishing that options that are not likely to open up, would. And to be perfectly honest, I knew that getting into it. So, why not try and afford myself the possibility of being happy?

I guess when it comes down to it, our activities definitely help shape us, and it's important to have those activities in our life. They're what give us structure and definition, they're what helps our moral compass point in some direction that isn't solely based on self, and set toward self-destruction. Our activities give us access to the people that can have some of the biggest impacts on our lives, and remain with us forever. Our activities give us something beyond ourselves as individuals to come together and interact and engage with each other through. I hope everyone has their activities like that, and that whatever it is, it continues to bring you more happiness for as long as you want it to.

Alright, I quit... Which is not a bad thing

So, most people know I've been agonizing and doing everything within my power to make something work with a girl that I've known for a long time. I am finally, and officially admitting here and now, I am defeated. Which is not necessarily a bad thing all. I've done everything within my ability to try and get something to work, and while I would have loved to have been successful in that, I know now, I just can't control this issue. If in the future something happens, I'll be ecstatic, but it won't be my doing. If something happens, it'll have to be her initiative, I've had enough of constantly being the hound pursuing the hare to no avail.

The benefits to this are that I now feel free to explore other opportunities, and lately, they've been seemingly plentiful. Additionally, women, if you didn't know, you're expensive. I mean, I'm expensive, but women are an additional expense that while worthwhile, is fairly high! I'm not mad at her, I can't really say I blame her, relationships are confusing like that.

As everyone who knows me, knows Whitley and I were together much longer than we ought to have been, so faulting someone for trying to figure relationships out is obviously something I've failed at harder than most. It's a hard line to try and ride, to figure out when it's simply a rough patch, or when it's a fundamental problem with the relationship. To figure out if you've changed, your partner's changed, or you both have. To figure out if it's you over reacting, or the action was actually something worth being upset about. People try to get through life as best they can. Nobody goes through life hoping to fail, and hoping to get hurt or be hurt, they simply try to get through as best as they can, and for all my faults, I feel very inept in being judgemental about her trying to do what makes her happy.

People are selfish beings for the most part, but that's an aspect of being human. Your natural incination is to take steps to your own happiness. I think what makes great people great, is when they figure out ways to do that, while satisfying the need for happiness in others. It's what allows great teachers to be great teachers, and great fathers to be great fathers. It's what allows for people to gravitate to you, and for you to embrace and respond in they way they require, and find happiness in that for yourself. I hope one day I am that way, at very least, I hope one day I'm that way for one person.

New Years Resolutions

What's it with New Years that began the trend of change? Do you feel a sudden urge of productivity and self realization from December 31st to January 1st? Doubtful. You are virtually the exact same person when you wake up with your drunken hangover from the night before as you were prior to going out the night before. The turning of the calendar rarely gives an insight and some sort of epiphany that wasn't contained there before. Whether it's losing weight, being a kinder person, being more outgoing, etc, you knew it was something you wanted to do even before the special day at the end of the year. So, what is it that makes for New Years to be such a special time? What makes the one time of year the perfect time to make a change?

Perhaps the reason New Years is such a perfect time is because we have a reference. When you take down the old calendar and put up the new one, it is for the most part blank. Completely tabula rosa. Which for those who do not know, is Latin for blank slate. Your blank slate affords you the opportunity to do anything with the upcoming year. Nothing is built on to keep your year from being bad, because nothing has happened yet. It gives you a symbolic fresh start, and for a psyche wanting to be motivated to make change, the appearance of a blank slate can be exactly what is needed to achieve.

Not only is the year blank, but it is defining. Your New Years resolution is judged from your progress on January 1, to December 31. It doesn't change, you can't extend the calendar to compensate, it is finite. You've either succeeded or failed based on you measure of success in a defined allotment of time. And a year. Well, a year is plenty of time to achieve so many goals. You want to lose weight? Well people have made extraordinary gains in a year, hell, people do that in 90 days, thanks to p90x. You want to have a better job? Well jobs don't take a year to obtain something better. You want to learn piano? Well, it takes a long time to perfect, but to learn, and to make progress, you can make leaps in a year. The year sets a beginning and an end, a starting line, and a finish line; the year sets your criterion for determining success.

Failure. Anyone ever wonder why people fail so often at their New Years resolutions? I know I typically do, but they're always resolutions we make for self-betterment. Why do we neglect, or fail to obtain what we realize to be a bettering of ourselves? Is it because it is too difficult? Is it because it takes too much discipline? Is it because we lack thee fortitude to endure? Probably. Probably all of the above, and much more. I know my problem is personal strength and conviction. So, why not make that a resolution? Why not working on bettering the parts of ourselves that are weakest, that facilitate our abilities to better in other facets? Courage, kindness, love, compassion, communication, etc are all characteristics that allow for us to obtain other resolutions, while lending ourselves to be better at a core and extend that betterment to other portions of our lives.

My resolutions? I have a few for sure. I definitely have a few I know I am likely to fail. I suppose my real resolution is to identify the core of my resolution, and figure out how to achieve improvement on that. For instance, one of my resolutions is to find someone to be a good partner to. That's a very surface oriented goal, but at the heart, it's more about improving my ability to be outgoing so that I can actually find someone and act selflessly for them. It's about learning to be more loving, and prioritizing another's needs over my own wants. It's about being a more emotionally effective communicator, so that my counterpart can be open and expressive with me. See? The resolutions aren't just what we say we're going to set out to do, it's about a core of ideals, practices, and characteristics the reside within those resolutions.