Thursday, July 19, 2007
Birthday Reflections - The Good Life
Yesterday was my birthday. I went into it a little apathetic, but I found myself sitting at a table in front of a Turkey dinner (yes in July), with my lady and my best friend. I had on new slippers and a new tank top. In the back room was a loaded pipe and a big stack of comics. Near me, was some cartoons on DVD. I was sitting so that I could see the garden that my lady and I have been working on. At that moment, I truly realized how lucky I am and how truly great of a life that I have. Lately, I’ve been feeling the stresses of money and thinking that life is pretty tough/unfair, but at that moment all that faded away and I saw that my life is pretty fucking great. Feels good to be so content. So many people took time to make my day good and just to call me and give me some nice words for my birthday, that I couldn’t help but to pause and take note of what a lucky guy I am. It’s times like this that I feel not only a overwhelming love for the people in my life, but for God as well. I don’t write about my faith a lot, because it’s very personal for me, but I’ll say this: I appreciate that the good things in my life and the joy and love I experience is purely through the grace of God. The fact that all the wonderful things in my life, stem from the love I share with my family and friends, reminds me that even though I don’t acknowledge it often enough, that love is a extension of God’s love for us. So that’s pretty cool. The fact that I am alive amazes me sometimes and that in a world where things suck for so many, I’ve got it pretty damned good.
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
A Few Thoughts
Figured I better write today. I know how I am when I let things sit to long; I never come back to them.
My life lately has been okay. I’ve been working in the yard a lot. Gardening and what not. It’s been nice. There is something really great about being a bit on the stoned side and planting some flowers, or a bush, or a shrub or whatever. My yard isn’t exactly turning into the secret garden that I would like, but that’s okay. It’s doing pretty good. Plants are fuckin’ expensive. I’m going to build a green house before next year and I’m starting my own seeds. The savings on plants in one year should pay for the green house. Plus I can give my folks and other friends who garden some plants. I’ll be like Santa only I’ll hand out ferns.
The cool thing about working in the yard so much has been the change in my interaction with the neighbors. I had this hedge made up of several tall, conical, evergreen type trees. You know what these are, anytime somebody doesn’t want to look at their neighbors they put these things up. So mine was like 8 feet tall and right along the sidewalk. It was ugly, and it was weird, but I was somehow convinced in my head that it gave me much needed privacy. I now realize that it didn’t and privacy is an illusion and not needed.
I trimmed the hedge down from about 8 feet down to 40 inches and all of a sudden all my neighbors were talking to me. It was like I brought down the fuckin’ Berlin Wall. My natural instinct was to be kind of offended and irritated, but then I thought about it and realized that there was no reason I should care if it made my neighbors happy that the big unkempt hedge was being taken down. So now I like the new openness, both in regards to my interaction with my neighbors and in regards to how my yard looks.
My and my one neighbor are have been leaning over the fence and bullshitting. He’s a lot older than me (he has kids my age), but we still find stuff to talk about. Mostly yard stuff. We talk about that a lot. Before I started doing all the work on my house, he said that he wasn’t into the yard thing. Now he says that he’s into it a little more. I like to think that it’s because of the hard work me and my lately have put in. I like that idea.
So my little slice of suburbia is feeling mighty good lately.
I’ve had this odd feeling lately though. This nagging sense of everyone perceiving me as a failure and my inability to accomplish anything. It’s really been getting me down sometimes. This one lady at my work (she thinks she’s kind of physic, which she may be, but I think she’s just smart and thinks about life as a spiritual journey) occasionally has these messages her brain gave her about me when she was out in the mountains soul searching and early this week she told me that as I go through my healing (I’m not sure what specifically I’m healing from, but I suppose we all are) that every time I make some progress the world and my self will just point out everything I am doing wrong. That’s kind of how I’ve felt like it’s been lately, every time I feel successful or happy with an accomplishment a hundred other failures or inadequacies jump into my mind. It’s a weird thing. Lately, I have these times where I just feel like the fat, fifteen year old, crying in the shower because I don’t know what wrong with me and why the world has me under a microscope. Then after a couple hours of pouting or freaking out, I feel okay. Let’s hear it for 2nd puberty!
But I’ve gotta admit, when I’m not thinking about the fact that I’m a fat ass, or that I haven’t even thought of working on my book, or that I haven’t been tying flies or as much as I am dying to go and fish, I haven’t been. I’m pretty happy. Maybe more than I deserve to be.
Maybe there’s a theme that ties all these different thoughts together, but I doubt it. But I’ve written and posted something.
My life lately has been okay. I’ve been working in the yard a lot. Gardening and what not. It’s been nice. There is something really great about being a bit on the stoned side and planting some flowers, or a bush, or a shrub or whatever. My yard isn’t exactly turning into the secret garden that I would like, but that’s okay. It’s doing pretty good. Plants are fuckin’ expensive. I’m going to build a green house before next year and I’m starting my own seeds. The savings on plants in one year should pay for the green house. Plus I can give my folks and other friends who garden some plants. I’ll be like Santa only I’ll hand out ferns.
The cool thing about working in the yard so much has been the change in my interaction with the neighbors. I had this hedge made up of several tall, conical, evergreen type trees. You know what these are, anytime somebody doesn’t want to look at their neighbors they put these things up. So mine was like 8 feet tall and right along the sidewalk. It was ugly, and it was weird, but I was somehow convinced in my head that it gave me much needed privacy. I now realize that it didn’t and privacy is an illusion and not needed.
I trimmed the hedge down from about 8 feet down to 40 inches and all of a sudden all my neighbors were talking to me. It was like I brought down the fuckin’ Berlin Wall. My natural instinct was to be kind of offended and irritated, but then I thought about it and realized that there was no reason I should care if it made my neighbors happy that the big unkempt hedge was being taken down. So now I like the new openness, both in regards to my interaction with my neighbors and in regards to how my yard looks.
My and my one neighbor are have been leaning over the fence and bullshitting. He’s a lot older than me (he has kids my age), but we still find stuff to talk about. Mostly yard stuff. We talk about that a lot. Before I started doing all the work on my house, he said that he wasn’t into the yard thing. Now he says that he’s into it a little more. I like to think that it’s because of the hard work me and my lately have put in. I like that idea.
So my little slice of suburbia is feeling mighty good lately.
I’ve had this odd feeling lately though. This nagging sense of everyone perceiving me as a failure and my inability to accomplish anything. It’s really been getting me down sometimes. This one lady at my work (she thinks she’s kind of physic, which she may be, but I think she’s just smart and thinks about life as a spiritual journey) occasionally has these messages her brain gave her about me when she was out in the mountains soul searching and early this week she told me that as I go through my healing (I’m not sure what specifically I’m healing from, but I suppose we all are) that every time I make some progress the world and my self will just point out everything I am doing wrong. That’s kind of how I’ve felt like it’s been lately, every time I feel successful or happy with an accomplishment a hundred other failures or inadequacies jump into my mind. It’s a weird thing. Lately, I have these times where I just feel like the fat, fifteen year old, crying in the shower because I don’t know what wrong with me and why the world has me under a microscope. Then after a couple hours of pouting or freaking out, I feel okay. Let’s hear it for 2nd puberty!
But I’ve gotta admit, when I’m not thinking about the fact that I’m a fat ass, or that I haven’t even thought of working on my book, or that I haven’t been tying flies or as much as I am dying to go and fish, I haven’t been. I’m pretty happy. Maybe more than I deserve to be.
Maybe there’s a theme that ties all these different thoughts together, but I doubt it. But I’ve written and posted something.
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