Fall

It's been a couple of months since I did an entry on here, so I thought I'd put up a little something while I'm on my lunch break at work.  Things lately with me have been great for the most part, and I've been determined to have a good time no matter what is going on with my life.  I did more camping in September and October, both alone and with friends and have had a lot of fun doing that. This Friday I am looking forward to a big costume party my friend Abby is having at her house, so I'm really excited about that.

I'm counting down the days until I get my new cell phone, which is called Droid. It's a new phone based on the Android operating system that is coming out on November 6th. It looks pretty incredible, and I'm going to use it for all sorts of things. It's a bit silly to be excited over a new gadget like that, and I've never been excited over getting a new phone before, but I definitely am now.

Back to work I go.

Solitude

I spent the last couple of days camping alone up at one of our state parks. The weather was really nice most of the time with just a small passing shower. The sky was crystal clear the first night, and the temperatures were in the 50's at night so I sat out by my campfire looking up at the stars. It's times like that which make a person realize how small they are in the world. The world really moves at a slower pace when I'm camping, and I just seem to lose all track of time. It feels like three days lasts two weeks, but it still feels as though it isn't long enough. That sort of time alone really gives a person time to think, but also to not think at all and just have completely random days.

I got a new haircut on Thursday, before I left for camping on Friday. I think I like it but I haven't decided yet. It was great for camping because it's super short so it was cool and doesn't bother me if it gets messy because it still pretty much looks the same. I think this is the first time I've had a new haircut in about 15 years. I guess I should have tried something new a long time ago. Still working on getting into better shape and it's working out really well. I'm down to 225 as of today, so I've dropped 35lbs now. I feel really good about myself, unlike how I've felt for the last couple years. I guess what they say is true, that you have to be happy with yourself before someone else can be happy with you. Whoda thunk it?

I head back to work tomorrow, and I realize that taking off a day here or two days there is good but doesn't really fill my need for vacation void. I think I'm going to have to take a whole week off to make that happen, but work isn't going very well right now so I haven't wanted to take that much time off all at once. I think before the year is over I'm going to have to take a whole week off and really do something fun. A friend invited me out to Colorado to stay with her and her husband, maybe I'll take them up on that and do some backpacking out there. Talk about a beautiful part of the country.

Life has its ups and downs, but it really is an incredible ride. To all my friends and family, love you guys.

Days Gone By

Normally I write at night before bed when I decide to update my journal but today it's morning. I've pretty well decided to scrap the 365 days theme, since I can't seem to remember to write every day or if I go away somewhere I can't write either.

I've spent the last month getting my head on straight after figuring out I still had some old issues to work out for myself. I took a trip recently and it really gave me some time to think, or more to the point, learn to stop thinking so much and just enjoy life for what it is. It's funny, I think people of the world could save themselves money on psychiatrists if someone would just tell them to go out and sleep in a tent for a few days and sleep listening to the wind blow, camp fire crackle and the crickets chirp. I am a little sad that it took missing out on something good for me to realize what I needed to do, but sometimes good things come around again and if it does, I'll be ready.

I find myself looking forward to the next weekend already even though it's only Tuesday. I like my job, I just like the weekends more. It looks like the rest of this week is going to be cloudy and rainy, so no camping this weekend probably but who knows, Friday night I may just decide last minute to go. Sometimes over thinking things makes you not take action even when you want to. I learned that lesson the hard way and I'm determined to live my life differently.

Time to head to work, things to do and people to see.

365 Days: Day 16

16 days have passed since I decided to write in my journal more often, but I haven't managed anywhere near that many entries. Tonight's entry will be a bit of something I wrote earlier, it just sort of happened, I don't know where it came from, and it happened while I was typing something unrelated. If you are easily offended you may want to skip it because I will be using stronger than usual language. I've added to it and edited it a little, but the majority is just as I wrote earlier.

Begin:

I want to add on a lot of muscle and get lean. I'm determined. You know what Ryan Reynolds body looked like in the Xmen WOlverine origins movie, or in the Blade movie he was in? Something along those lines. My body type probably better fits Hugh Jackman's physique in the movie though. I'm a big guy, I'm an Endo-mesomorph, I drop fat quickly and can stack on muscle if I stick with it.  I would have to be willing to commit every day at the gym, and it would take a long long time, but even in my 30's I think I could really get a decent body going on. I don't want to get skinny, I want to get built. I want to be the guys that the women at the office all run over the window to look at when random guys come to our office who obviously spend time at the gym. I'm sick of being what I am, I'm sick of being brought down to my knees in agony, I'm tired of missing out on amazing opportunities because I feel bad about myself, I'm sick of being the fat kid, I'm sick of feeling this way about myself, and I'm angry at myself for letting me become what I am now. I've fucking had it. "Every man lives and dies alone". I can count on me and only me. Family, spouses, girlfriends, friends, they all come and go. The only person I will always have with me and will always be able to count on is me.

"it's never too late to become what you could have been" is a saying I like lately. I'm tired of what I am, I'm tearing it down and in its place I'm going to build something better. I'm going to build what I should have been. I'm going to build a me who has things happen to me like what happened recently and says "Oh well, it happens" and moves the fuck on instead of falling apart like I have. I am going to become what I want, I am going to see what I really am and what I'm really made of. I'm going to stop being haunted by my past, and I'm going to stop feeling like I'm not good enough for me and that I'm not good enough for anyone else. Even when someone is willing to accept me as I am, my own negative picture of myself keeps me at a distance.  That distance means I miss opportunities of a lifetime. I'm not going to fucking miss another opportunity for something amazing.  Someone gave me the words I will live by when they said something to me a few weeks back that I've still got echoing in my head about what I should be. I will shorten those words, they will become my mantra. I WILL BECOME.

End.

365 Days: Day 13

Gaggle of Geese,
originally uploaded by DigitalChivalry.

The weekend has come and gone, and I haven't posted in my journal since Thursday night. This is day 13 of my 365 days of posting, which will in fact be less than 365 entries since I often forget.

Today's entry comes with a picture. I went and sat at the park for a while this evening, it was nice out. When I was walking back across a bridge over the water, there was a huge group of geese directly in the way. They barely even moved out of the way as I walked through them, so they clearly didn't feel threatened by humans. Odds are they were regulars at the park and were used to people passing by all the time. I didn't have a regular camera with me, but I had my cell phone so I snapped a picture. That was only a portion of the geese in the group or "gaggle". There were a lot, and they had some young ones with them sitting along the shore.

This weekend was a tough one to get through.  I read a quote tonight online that I liked which was "It is never to late to be what you could have been" which is a quote by George Elliot according to the poster who put it up. I guess that hits home for me right now, with my trying to lose weight and be what I should have been already. The losing weight and getting in better shape is going really well and it's strange because it's as if I'm feeling younger like there is a testosterone rush, but it's battling with some other pretty extreme emotions right now. Someone tonight told me to ignore my emotions and "find your inner caveman" which is not a bad piece of advice. I'm not very good at ignoring emotion, but I feel like the balls I seem to have lost years ago are reforming and they are made of metal. I will keep working on myself until they clank when I walk. I was told a few weeks back that I should work on becoming something, and that's what I've been doing for the last several weeks. Now, if I can just find where I put my wooden club, and create fire.