Thought.

Endless desert.

Drive for days.

Dreams of Trees

Sometimes you have to muster the courage to love yourself.
Sometimes you have to value and respect your dreams when no one else does.
The world, society, and people are selfish, craven entities.
They want for you what's best for themselves.
Sometimes you have to reject that to be what you must.
A tree that bows to every wind is a gnarled, stunted thing.
Sometimes you have to know that you are more when no one else sees it.


These are thoughts running through my head.  That's all.

A 2013 Throwback

Hey blog.  It's been a long time.

Today I feel healthy.  I finally made myself get up and do a short jog today.  It doesn't sound like much but it feels like moving a mountain, to undo all the laziness and blatant unhealthiness I've cultivated.  And I speculate that all those released endorphins running through my addled brain are what have inspired me to take up the keyboard again for a brief moment.  I do feel good, and like a good strong coffee, it makes me think I can take on the world.

This line of reasoning brought me back to my two New Year's goal that have, for the most part, fallen to the wayside.  Last year I felt it was important to make manageable goals, so I decided upon playing more video games and urban exploration.  The bar wasn't exactly high, but I'm pleased to say I accomplished both of those, the latter in a round about matter while making a web series, but nonetheless, accomplished.  This year, I felt it was important to create guiding principles instead.  So I struck on two important aspects with which to focus my growth and development:

1) To make the hard decisions.

I'm the kind of person who can be paralyzed by difficult decisions.  Or easy decisions.  I worry about the ramifications, the best possible outcome, and the meaning of my choice.  Even in meaningless things.  I'm the kind of person who had to read Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books with all my fingers, each holding a page where a choice had to be made, just in case.  The problem with this is that soon I was holding ten places in a small book, and not enjoying the experience at all.  And that's my point.  As I get older I recognize that I've been conditioned to feel there always is a right and wrong choice.  A black and a white, a moral and an amoral aspect to actions.  Simply put, that's not true.  The only decision that's wrong for one person with that which they feel wrong about or that which infringes up the rights and existence of another person.  I'm aiming to remedy this in my life.  To look at the things I devote my time, health, life and energies to, and make the hard decisions.  Not to anguish over the choice, but to make it and accept the outcome.  Anxiety is born of determined outcomes.  Sometimes you have to make choices that are hard, but are better for you.  And instead of shying away I'll do what I feel is best.  Sometimes you have to respect yourself and your decisions more than other people do.

2) To be open to the world and it's experiences.

It's a great big beautiful world.  Once upon a time I relished that.  I loved meeting new people, finding new experiences, cultures and ideas.  And while I don't think that's been truly lost, it has been minimized by my 9-5 (which is anything but) and my frustrations with my career and direction the last several years.  I want to build myself and find new and wonderful things that make this world worth living, and enjoying, and intellectualizing, and savoring.

So there you have my two small goals, the enormity of which is overwhelming at times.  And I know I'll fail.  Many times. I'll close off, or shy from complexities.  But the key here is recognizing that behavior and taking tiny steps to slow it.

If I can fail enough times, eventually I'll succeed.

Eons and Ages

Time passes. So quickly does it drag i'ts lumbering mass by. And those few fragmented moments we each receive, we must judge how we arrange them.

I know that if I pursue grad school, this is job temporary. I know that I am sinking a great deal into a project that garners more complexity with each passing moment, and shouldering that is a challenge. I know that there is so much to this world.

My toes touch the bottom of the pool. But barely.

I want a drink. Instead I'll go to work. Both are mind-numbing, so what does it matter?

Really Peter? More Babble?

I can't think of what to write that won't be a trip down irritation lane.

But I want to write.

But I also feel like I'm in a dark place.

Maybe not a kill-your-own-baby place, but you know what I mean. I'm not trying not to vomit my discontent all over facebook anymore, althought at least there I'm required to keep it to a few words. The blog lets me ramble at length.

But I won't.

All there is to say is that I hate my job. I hate spending 50-60 hours a week reminding myself that despite how everything feels, I really am working to live, not living to work. Add to that a couple extra hours per day in the car driving back and forth, closing every night so that I never get to see my significant other now that our schedules are completely opposite, and certainly not least of all is that fact that I am tired of just about everyone above me. It seems like management consists of saying key phrases at the right moment - of throwing out buzz words when called upon, and the rest of the time apologizing for strategies that are ineffectual. Or too effectual.

What a fucking world. I know that I'm not the first to throw this out, but in the grip of it I can't think why we do this to ourselves. Yeah, I'm howling at the wind - nothing I do will change the mentality of society and the world that some piece of green paper is the key to everything. But all I can think as I spend (waste?) my time doing this, is that there should be another way. There has to be another way.

Does that mean I should give up my job and wander the himilayas? Maybe. That's actually already in the works. Both of those. In fact - brilliance - I think that's my time frame of absolute certainty. This trip I've been slowly planning for a month-long trek next summer is the end of my days in the restaurant industry. Come what may, I'm giving it up.

I'll work in a GD coffee shop to get by if I have to. Simplify and give up on the machinations of my place in some corporate world.

Well now, I feel better. Did I say this would be short? Oh, my apologies.

I need to inject this blog with some fun again. I have few topics to discuss so that is coming.

Is it Wrong?

That I'm seriously irritated by the apathy which surrounds me?

The funny thing is, it's not even my own apathy (which is usually the case in abundance) but of people I consider important in my life.

I haven't bothered to tell but a few that I'm leaving. Only those who have taken the time to actually stay in touch or return my calls. It's funny that in all I have going on, virtually no one (save one or two rather impressive individuals) have bothered to even ask how I'm doing. That's okay. We all have lives. It's just a question of whether you wish make the effort to be included in someone else's. I'm just as guilty of this, and it's a selfish and equally guilty desire that people should rally around me as my life seems to be cruising in the turbulent lane - the one with the shredded tire, crashed Subaru and lost paint cans.

Still, this has prompted me to make a short list (a very short list) of people to see before I go. I haven't much time left.

Everyone else will figure it out. Eventually.

I'm sure this is a hypocritical entry, and I'm likely the worst kind of friend. I try not to be. I try. Perhaps we reap what we sow, right? Anyway this is just a random vent.

Pay it no heed.

Languidly Disconsolate

I feel like I'm going fucking insane. Seriously.

Life has been shit for a while now.

I keep checking my phone like it has answers. Like it will somehow provide a satisfying escape but instead just find myself checking my email or facebook for the umpteenth time.

And on the wings of a funeral I get a call that will change everything. I was nervous with anticipation but now am just pretending it's not happening.

And sure, I'm scared. It's a good opportunity, isn't it? Isn't it? I say that with hesitation. Because everything about this future I'm embracing seems wrong.

Everything except the price tag.