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absolutwade.com, where we poop creatively.

July 2009 Archives.

welcome

Wednesday,  29 JULY 2009
nate.jpgYesterday, my son left back for Oklahoma. He was here for over a month in New York City. The trip to the airport was a bit depressing but I kept us talking and concerned with our path to the airport so for the most part, it was an everyday event until we were sitting at his gate, waiting for him to board. I was trying to be okay but it was just killing me to see that kid get on a plane to go away from me and for who knows how long 'till I see him again. In this economy, I haven't been able to get back every couple of months like I used to. This last gap of time was equal to the amount of time I went without seeing him in Australia.

Today, I started a new contract job that will last a few weeks and I think both sides are still looking to see how the fit goes. I like the people there and the the walk is pretty nice so I hope it does work out.  But today, my first day to work there, there was an 89% humidity which caused me to show up drenched with sweat. During the first meeting my eye did the allergy blood fill thing, and on the way home, it poured down rain down on me.  Despite the cool rainstorm view from the 44th floor in a lower Manhattan office and a cool thunderstorm today, I'm so sick of the rain. Yesterday and today I have felt like a truck ran over me, probably from the emotions I have been dealing with.

I have dealt with a lot of emotions  and life altering events over the past year, one after another, after another. I have done all this with a smile on my face and a positive attitude while some days screaming a bit inside. But for one month, one really good month, I had my son here to remind me what is really important and make everything else seem a bit less significant.  This awesome kid who means more to me than anything, sit next to me, and be that piece of hope I so urgently needed. It was exactly what I needed. And just like that, he was now gone as well. It really hurt. He knows that he is a source of strength for me, I kinda like that he knows that.

I will be fine, I always land on my feet, sometimes you just need some time and a big change to come along.  I'm ready for the change.

Wednesday,  22 JULY 2009
My family moved around a lot when I was a kid. I was born in Alabama, lived mostly in Oklahoma and finished up my High School education in Colorado. Last weekend was the Chickasha High School class of 1989 reunion and this coming weekend is the Durango High School class of 1989 reunion. Both of which I had tentative plans to attend but thanks to the economy, I have had to cancel on both.

I didn't really go to any 10 year reunions because I honestly would not have not have even known anything about it. And frankly, would have had a hard time remembering most of the people there.  When you have to adapt to as many environments as I have, you have to make room for new faces and names to index over the old ones. This isn't to say the old ones weren't important, but you prioritize to the now when you have to get to know a whole new school of people four times over, not including two universities and two branches of service as well as countless jobs.

As I said, I didn't go to the ten year reunion in Chickasha, but I was invited by a friend to attend the homecoming football game that many of the reunion alumni were going to. I saw a few people there I vaguely remembered and talked to a few of them for a bit, but there wasn't a big impact really. I had a pretty good job then, but was in a rut as far as life giving me everything I was wanting out of it.

So twenty years, holy crap!  It had been twenty years since graduation and that's a long time. But as people were connecting on FaceBook and showing pictures of them and now and all the fun group pictures in High School, It occurred to me it had been much longer for me. My friends and acquaintances were still 9th graders in my eyes because that was when I last saw most of them.  People I once knew had gone on living and growing when I left that school and there was the evidence. Despite your brains best effort to make you think those people are still the same from when you last saw them, they were busy having their lives and growing as people too.

In the end, my moving around so much had a few effects on me, it made able to adapt to new surroundings, but in return, it made me lose a bit of my past. It also made me lose a piece of me that roots itself in it's past. These people, no matter how distant now, had a big impact in forming my opinions on the world and how I see things. In all the places I went to. And yet in my ability to adapt I had nearly dumped all those memories years ago.

I'm thankful for the social media networks for giving that to me, for letting me have my past back. To reconnect to people I knew for years, or for a brief time of my life that was important to me. I'm happy to reconnect to these people and see they aren't the same kids I last saw either. It's been enlightening on many levels and it's given me back a piece of myself.