2011-08-01 - 6:20 p.m.
Every six months or so I stop by here...
College and management have done more for me than anything other one thing. I look back on my early twenties self hoping to be amused, but I'm mostly just ashamed. The simultaneous immaturity and cruelty towards others and my relentless pursuit of the wrong people (not romantically, which I think makes it worse somehow). I made it out, though. I can look back, relieved that I'm no longer that childish adult, and wonder about the people I may have hurt.
At some point I became a homeowner and a college grad and someone's boss (21 someones at the moment, but who's counting?). I'll never eat meat again, and I've recently traded discount happy hour night for screwdrivers alone made with high-end vodka. I just put in an offer on a second house in the south, a part of the country I swore I'd never live in. I'll be commuting between two states for work. I have a paid off luxury car from Europe and another in the garage with not much to go. I pass on trips out of town if I can't find a sitter because my dogs are too good for the kennel. My 11th anniversary is in a month and I haven't messed around with anyone else in three years. Couples are breaking up around me this year...a lot of them. My mother has a new boyfriend and I did a background check on him (he failed so we're not talking much right now). I'm sitting here waiting for a collect call from a state correctional facility and hoping he knows that his bond was denied.
I say all of this because, in addition to feeling odd when I think about it, my uncle just died. The one who didn't want to live broke and barely surviving the way he grew up. The one who chose the corporate path because it paid for the life he wanted. My family is falling apart without him, and I'm growing up more week after week. I'm working on visiting my other uncle that's in prison, sending his wife money, and checking in on my cousins who just lost their Dad unexpectedly on Father's Day.
I miss him more than my own father. And I need to avoid the trap he was in, although I can certainly see why it worked for him. I wonder when he decided that he wouldn't be reborn into a different career...maybe around my age? Or younger? I want to ask him and then remember that I can't. I need to ask him a lot of things.
I'm going to have to figure them out myself now.
I'm not sure what I'm going to do with this space. Password protecting is likely, deleting is possible, but this is it. My current daily ramblings have found a new home, visible to five people only, and I plan to keep it that way. I'm also pretty active on Facebook...leave me a note if you'd like to know how to find me. I'm here today because I needed some closure, and this seemed like the best place to put an end to something.
-B-
