Moving Forward, Today Is A Gift

I, oh, so love this movie.

My wife and I recently separated, as such, it is a topic that people I run into actively (and usually awkwardly) avoid or it’s the first thing they ask me about, these people are either gushing their love and support repeating that everything will work out like some sort of cult chant that they expect me to join in on in order to keep me from throwing myself off the top of a building and down to the streets below, or they simply want all the dirty details. Sometimes these people want both.

The detail desirers are generally disappointed as I only share the most basic aspects of the separation, if I share any. The others only seem to become mollified, to some degree, if I actually do repeat that “everything will be okay,” and so I do, not for me, but for them. They feel better that way. I already know things will turn out, I know that I’m where I’m supposed to be right now and that I’m doing what is needed.

I’m not saying that there aren’t days that are harder than others, or days where I don’t feel utterly alone despite being surrounded by family. My life has taken on a drastic change, this is normal and I recognize that. I also know that nights are worse, because generally speaking, night is when you actually are alone in bed with nothing but your tired mind and your own thoughts and all the what ifs.

But I can’t focus on the what ifs, not the ones that concern my past. The things that have happened have already happened, life becomes simpler and more enjoyable once you can accept that fact and move on. That’s what I’m trying to do. Move forward. Move on. Remembering is okay, dwelling on the past, isn’t. What ifs hold you back, I want to move forward.

I don’t want to be stuck living in my past because living in my past will make me miss the present and I very much want to be living and experiencing my present.

One of my favorite quotes is from DreamWorks Kung Fu Panda when Master Oogwei says, “Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That is why it is called the present,”

It’s a very true and very wise statement.

Today is a gift.

What will I do with it?

What will you do with it?

I want to live my dreams. Some of those dreams feel a little out of reach at the moment, others feel very out of reach but I’ll keep striving to accomplish those dreams so long as they don’t interfere with my child’s well being.

Everyone I talk to seems to feel like I should be depressed, stressed or angry. It seems I’m expected to be having a hard time and to be negative and hating life.

I don’t.

I love life. I want to enjoy it. Just because I’m separated and in the process of a divorce doesn’t mean I can’t do that. That doesn’t mean things are easy, because they aren’t. Change generally isn’t.

But I really can’t complain about my life and at the moment I don’t want to. I have a wonderful family and a beautiful child. I’m working on making my dreams come true so I can do what I love and support myself while I do. I’m fighting to be able to support myself and my son right now.

I’ll keep fighting and I’ll keep moving forward and I’ll continue to focus on those silver linings in the storm clouds for the very simple reason that I want to live and enjoy living. So I’m choosing to enjoy it.

How about you? How are you using today? Do you find that in hard times you can enjoy life? Can you continue moving forward? If so, how do you go about it? Do you have any suggestions for others who find it’s harder to do so? For those of you who don’t or can’t, what gets in the way? What holds you down during times like these?

Change

There have been a lot of changes going on in my life as of late and, not surprisingly, they've leaked over and affected on-goings and projects I've been working on. I decided that it would be a good idea to allow those changes to reflect here on the blog.

I started this blog with the intention of writing about, well, mostly writing. In a way it turned into more of a diary I rarely used. I'd feel guilty about writing posts if they didn't have to do with writing or my current projects, I know that sounds ridiculous, but it's true. I felt like, because I wanted to be a writer, then I should have a blog about writing filled with reflections on the craft.

I felt that way because I'd seen many others do it, I'd read "rules" where it said you needed to it.

What a bunch of garbage.

I love reading, I love reading about the craft of writing, but mostly I love writing and to be perfectly honest, pigeonholing myself into a corner where I felt like I should only be writing about how to write or what I was working on was, to say the least, stressful. It wasn't fun.

So I didn't blog.

That changes now.

I'm going to write whatever I feel like writing. I'll share it with you and you can read it if you'd like. If you enjoy what you read, share. Tell people about it.

As the new introduction to the page states, this is where I'll share an open and honest view of life. That's a broad subject and I'm going to enjoy all of it I can, otherwise, why blog?

I am naturally careful of the things I say and write because I don't like contention, I don't like to offend or upset people, but you know what? I've learned something and it's finally starting to sink in. If you try and please everybody you won't be happy. Just that simple.

So if I have something I need to say, I will.

Though I do promise to avoid attacking others. I won't try and start fights. I won't put up with rude comments. Criticism is welcome so long as it's done in an educated fashion in order to further the conversation or bring up different views. I know people will disagree with me on things. That's okay.

But there's enough negativity in the world people. Let's play nice.

So, what about you? What changes are happening in your life right now? How are you dealing with them?

A Quick Post and Parenthesis

I have decided my life is in dire need of some restructuring. I'm going about setting goals and breaking those goals down into smaller goals, and then those into smaller steps as well. I'm doing so because as of late I've been a bit of a bump on the log. Just kind of there and mostly unnoticed. In other words, a waste of space and air. But I'm tired of doing nothing and feeling like nothing (to be fair I do care for my son, which is a big job and comes with plenty of rewards, but my son is pretty well-behaved, happy and easy to manage (I am INCREDIBLY lucky). Not that he isn't a wormhole that eats up time like rabid, mutant termites eat up wood, because he's a child and he does, but there's a lot of time in the day I could be using for other things and don't. That's what I want to change.)

 I have talked about my personal goals on this blog before. I've decided, for the time being, not to do that anymore. I will keep them secret, keep them safe. (Yes, I went there) And it's because of this.


So I won't share my goals with you fair people anymore, but I will keep you posted on what I'm doing with my writing, health, other projects I'm working on, random bits of whatever, etc. Tomorrow starts it all anew.

Early in the morning I will go for a brisk walk/jog/run (Let's be honest, I probably won't run this time (I haven't done so in quite awhile), but I will be out and about in the wee small hours) to help me prepare for some the goals I've recently set and items that have been added to my bucket list.

I feel like I have a busy day ahead of me tomorrow and am currently working on my to-do list, hopefully that will make it less daunting by creating some sort of order.

Until next time. Later!

(Oh, did anyone else notice all the parenthesis in this post? (There's a lot of them.) I even did the whole parenthesis within parenthesis (parentheception? Like that movie (dream within a dream within a (nope, might get lost (stuck inside parenthesis forever? No, thanks!) let's not go there) dream) Inception with Leonardo Di (wait, where am I? Am I out?) Caprio) thing, is that even allowed?)...

The Blue Blazes: Review

Wendig delivers another breath of fresh air in Urban Fantasy.

I loved this book, this story. It was because of the characters. They made me love it. They made me hate to put it down.

They were alive, they were real and they had souls. They had emotions, problems, heartaches and regrets. People who made one decision after another and wound up in the middle of a falling empire.

At its heart this story is about Mookie, a broken father, and Nora, a broken daughter; his love and her hate. It's about their pain and what they choose to do with it. Both are only victims of decisions; some their own, some not.

Around them is the Organization, an empire of the criminal underworld that rests on top of the world, and it's beginning to crumble and fall down around the pair's ears. He fears the change, she pushes it on.

Everyone in New York wants a bite of the apple, wants to rise from the ashes of their old world with new found power. There are those beneath the city that want their fair share as well, those who are less than human and more than monsters.

This is a wild ride filled with violence, drugs, loyalties, betrayals, monsters, assassins, the dead, the living, hate, love and charcuterie.

It's familiar, different and new in all the right ways.

I love Chuck Wendig's Miriam Black series. I look forward to the third installment.

This book, however, has made it official.

Chuck, welcome to my Favorite Authors Club.

I look forward to all future projects.

Writing, Guitar Playing and getting organized

I'm happy.

I'll tell you why.

I've recently started writing full steam again, it's the first time I've done so in a very long time. I stopped because it was hard for me to find time to do it, or that's what I told myself. Like I've already mentioned in the previous post, I'm a stay at home dad (which is quite literally the best job in the world because I get to spend all of my time with my son, at home, or wherever our adventures take us), and being a stay at home dad, or just a parent, means there's a little someone who is going to depend on you. Need to eat, have their diaper changed, be entertained, be changed again, fed again, loved and cuddled, have the random objects that have been teleported into their little mouths removed so they don't choke, along a billion other things.

In other words, they take up a lot of time and it's spread out through the entire day. I never really seemed to have time to write, at least, not really enough of it to have a good writing session. I used this, along with lots of other things, as an excuse to not write.

But I've stopped making excuses and as luck would have it, my son is now napping once a day for about three hours.

It is awesome!

I started to use nap time to write and meet the daily word count goal I set for myself at the beginning of the year.

I also did something else that helped, I sat down and wrote out a sort of schedule. I took the hours of the day and counted out how much time I was using productively to get things done. I looked at the hours my son is generally awake and those he spends asleep. I looked at how many hours I use up sleeping, how much I actually needed and thenlooked at the list of daily goals that sometimes make me feel overwhelmed. I estimated about how much time I would need for each item on the list. I compared all of it and found I had time, I just had to stop wasting it on other things and make a little more.

So I cut off everything from myself until I had my daily word count done. No TV, no Facebook, Twitter or internet in general (in fact, I actually cut a lot of it out and set goals for myself to be "present when I'm present" or in other words, not be sucked into my phone while I'm with others. I'm doing better, but still working on it) I also figured if I cut a little sleep out, I could use that extra time in the morning to help get things done.

It worked.

I woke up at 6:30 the other day and sat down and wrote. I wrote over 2,800 words. Some might look at that and scoff but I felt amazed and very proud of myself. That's over my daily word count goal and I did it all before my son woke up for the day. That left me the whole rest of the day to do a lot of other things.

I went running two miles..

Okay, jogging...

Okay, okay, I mostly just walked, but hey, I got out! My son and I actually went outside and walked around and played in the sun.

I cleaned things.

Unbelievable, I know.

I used those three hours of naptime to do other things, like look up some markets for my short stories and look into some at home work opportunities.

I did a lot that day.

Sadly, I only did it once this last week. I am not a morning person.

I repeat.

I AM NOT A MORNING PERSON.

I'm hoping to change that because I used to be and I find that the days I do wake up early, not only do I get a lot done, but I also feel better, healthier and happier.

Another thing I'm really happy about.

I started playing my guitar again!

It feels so good to play music.

I'm rusty, but I'm picking back up on it pretty quick. (Though my hand is not used to playing bar chords anymore. Ouch...). For me, playing the guitar is immensely therapeutic and helps me relieve A LOT of stress in a very healthy way. It's relaxing to just sit down and pluck at the strings and listen.

I'm currently reminding myself how to play an acoustic version of Sean Kingston's Beautiful Girls, while also learning Amanda Palmer's The Bed Song and Of Monsters and Men's Dirty Paws. They're all a lot of fun to play.

I'm seriously considering offering guitar lessons, I thought about it once before, but never did anything more than that. I'm currently looking into it, how I would go about it and what I have to offer. I would be mostly for beginners and intermediate players.

I'll post more on that soon.

SO...

What do you do to help you with your goals?
What things do you enjoy that help you relax and relieve stress?

I'm off. It'll be bedtime soon if I plan on getting up to write. Take care. Be seeing you soon.

Friendship, Myself and Regret

Over the past few months I have often found myself looking back on life. Not so much on events, experiences or missed opportunities, as on the people who I've had the honor of meeting, getting to know and in some cases, having the privilege of becoming their friend.

As I looked back at these people who've left their footprints in my soul, I wondered why they're no longer a part of my life. The answer was blatantly obvious, even as the question was formed. The reason why I don't have them anymore is because of me.

For those who don't know me, I'm not a very social person. In fact, the words: anti-social, introvert and socially retarded are all very acute and accurate descriptions of who, and how, I am. I've been told by many people that they were a little intimidated by me at first because I looked angry or upset. I'll admit that I have my bad days, as does everyone, and if I haven't had any food in me for awhile then I do get irritable, but more often than not, I'm actually quite happy.

I'm just quiet. I'm not good at small talk because for some reason my brain just doesn't grasp the concept, if I don't have something to say, something to contribute to the conversation, then I won't say anything. I won't leave your small talk question unanswered (unless I'm spaced out and don't hear it, several of my family members suspect I have ADD to some degree, this would not surprise me in the least), but I won't put forth a lot of effort to keep the small talk going, either. I think this may be because, unlike most people, silence doesn't bother me. It isn't awkward and I don't need every moment to be filled with chatter. My mind finds plenty of stimulation within my own thoughts and my surroundings.

There's more, but I think I've made my point. Being this way makes it hard for me to make friends, I don't open up until I begin to feel comfortable around those I'm with and that can take several days to a week or so, once I do open up, there's no guarantee that anyone will really like me. As I said, I'm a bit socially retarded, which can make things awkward. Of course, generally speaking, once you make friends you go out and do things with them.

I enjoy going out and having fun, but I also love just hanging out at home with a good book. I don't mind being alone and actually prefer it most of the time.

Not to mention, I'm married and on top of that I have a son. A beautiful little boy who happens to be my pride and joy. Literally the light and life of my world. He also keeps me incredibly busy. Sometime last year, after becoming unemployed, my wife and I switched roles, now she works and I'm a stay at home dad (anyone who says this isn't work isn't a parent) and I love it. It can be exhausting though and takes up most of my time. I have a life of my own and like so many others, get caught up in it all too much.

The bad side to all of the above is that while making friends is hard, keeping them is ridiculous. Or at least, maintaining a close friendship. Over time, they kind of just fade away. There a few people who I will always consider friends, no matter how long it's been since I last saw them. These are the people I've been looking back on as of late.

I know that one of these friends was married not too long ago and I hear he's happy, for which I'm very grateful. Another, I know almost nothing about, it's been years since we last spoke and we parted ways on terms that weren't all that great. I don't think this person really considers me a friend anymore and I doubt they'd have any desire for me to be one again, but I will always consider myself a friend to this person and if a day come when they need me, I will be there. That goes for all of my friends, but for these two doubly. They've had more of an impact on my life then either will ever know and both helped me through a difficult time in my life.

I hear about the first every now and then, the two of us drifted away after I met my wife but we continued talking at work, then I lost my job. Months before I'd gotten a new phone, lost his contact info and never bothered to get it again. I should. I don't think it would be very difficult in his case.

As for the other, I've only heard a couple bits here and there from my sister. All I really hope is that this friend is happy because they deserve nothing less. I'd love to reestablish that friendship, but I worry the bridge is burnt, that they wouldn't be happy to see me and that I might do more damage than good.

This post is starting to go on a little long so I'll wrap up.

I wouldn't be who I am today if it weren't for them, and to each of them and to anyone else I may have hurt or neglected.

I'm sorry.

I'm trying to be a better person. A better friend.

If you've read this, I want you to know.

I miss you, I love you and hope you are well.

Recent Fuss about Libraries

Just recently there has been an uprising of authors and readers in defense of libraries and their usefulness. It was caused by a successful author who is best known for his Horrible Histories series, Terry Deary.

He is quoted as saying libraries "have been around too long", are "no longer relevant" and that they've "had their day."  He believes they are a "drain on taxpayers and authors"

Of those who have responded to this I think Neil Gaiman's was one of my favorites when he stated that Deary was "selfish & stupid, short-sighted and sad" but "mostly selfish". John Scalzi also offered up his two-cents about libraries and how, in no small way, they have made him who he is.

Read about it here: http://whatever.scalzi.com/2013/02/23/a-personal-history-of-libraries/

On that note, I'd like share my first memory of being in a library and how libraries, like so many people have pointed out over the last week or so, have turned me into a reader.

It was in Grand Junction, Colorado, I was very young and in the 1st grade. I loved books back then, or rather, I loved to have books read to me. I wasn't fond of actually reading, but I loved the pictures. My teacher at school had read us a book called Even Steven and Odd Todd and I had loved it. I thought it was brilliant and I wanted it. I wanted to read it for myself. I asked my mom if she'd get it for me and she took me to the library. I had my heart set on that book, but to my disappointment the library didn't have it. I was told, however, that I could take home any book in the building. I remember looking around and thinking that that was a lot of books.

It wasn't until a few years later, during my sixth grade year that my love of reading exploded into a literary gorging of words. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone was the book that started it all, from there came all things Star Wars, I specifically remember reading Timothy Zahn's trilogy and loving every word. My dad then introduced me to Tom Clancy and Clive Cussler and I eventually found many. many more. I own a small bookshelf overfilled with books, the one's I could afford and some I probably couldn't but bought anyway. I have read, hundreds upon hundreds of books (if not thousands) and that would have been impossible for me to do so if it were not for the libraries.

I love libraries, they've helped shape me and they've done the same to countless others. I used to spend hours at the library reading, writing and studying. The library is home for those who seek knowledge, entertainment and access to things they otherwise don't have. I'm very thankful for libraries and librarians, even the grumpy ones who never seemed to like me, because they always had an answer or could find one, and were always brimming with great suggestions.

Read the original interview with Terry Deary here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2013/feb/13/libraries-horrible-histories-terry-deary