The OFFICIAL Unofficial Achewood Message Board
Trivial Pursuits => People & Places => Topic started by: side_show on August 02, 2006, 05:17:09 am
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Three years! I'm thinking fondly of all of you, and all the happy and sad times that have come to past. The "Dying" thread speaks to some of that, but it's pretty recent.
So come on tell us, what were the best and worst personal highlights in the past 3 years?
Worst: The arthritis thing, realizing the whole drug thing had gotten out of controle, my mom's mental health problems and the effect it has on everyone else.
Best: Getting my play accepted for full production in T.O., realizing that I'd been off drugs for over a year, getting our house, the relationship with my SO getting better and better, finding out I'm going to Indonesia for free & getting on the track to wellness.
There's actually a lot more of the good stuff that I could list. Basically life is a pretty sweet fruit for me, and the bad stuff is all stuff I know I can shoulder.
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best: dating a girl who loved me. dating another girl who I think also does. graduating. getting my license. turning 18. getting the guitar of my dreams. meeting an entirely new group of friends. And another one. Getting into the college I want to go to. buying lots of albums. and CDs. my cousin being born. getting great roles in a variety of plays. the second time my favorite teacher almost made me cry. oh, and, discovering miss julia "hobo-#####" N. And TOUAMB, too. this one time when I explained to the bitch-ex-girlfriend how much she was hurting me, and she started crying (I'm sorry, but after all the shit she pulled, she deserved it. I wish I had written it down or recorded it or something, because it was beautiful.) spending the summer at Cornell, and meeting some of the closest friends I've ever made. proving to my english teacher that I wasn't a sexist. starting to love the South. and sweet tea. and cheerwine. and saying "y'all." kissing 2 girls, one of whom I thought beautiful at the time, the other of whom actually is beautiful (I am sorry that this sentence sucks). realizing that it wasn't that my friends hated me-- they just hated my girlfriend. late night freak-outs where I love everything and listen to music and play my guitar and send everyone I know in this city a message asking them to be in my band and write amazing songs that I can never remember the next day. this one girl has the most perfect rear I have ever seen, and I saw her in the hall every single day for the last year (seriously. i am not the guy to drool over things like this, but it was intense).
worst: the first girl cheating on me multiple times, and then dumping me. I'm kind of getting a wierd uncomfortable feeling about dating the second one. getting kicked out of a band by my two best friends. the guy my girlfriend cheated on me with was one of the same best friends. losing my best friend due to this. my one-act play being cancelled. lots of stupid stress due to procrastination and irresponsibility. the first time my favorite teacher almost made me cry. this job is pretty bad, but not the worst. this time when my neurologist said that I might have OCD, and then did not explain it at all, and I was freaked out for a while. the time my english teacher called me a sexist. not really the past 3 years, but during the past 3 years was the end of me being in love with a girl who didn't love me for like... 3 years. during this period, I was a horrible whiny bitch, even more than I am now. late night freak-outs where I convince myself that I don't really love my girlfriend, that I'm a horrible manipulative boy, etc.
so, yeah. high school.
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Things that sucked in the past three years:
Moving (twice)
Truck getting stolen
House robbed by house sitter and druggy homeless friends while we were on the mainland
Quitting a job I loved because they wanted me to move where I didn't want to go
Having to put the cat I've had since 1990 down
My jeep blowing the head gasket
Things that ruled:
Daughters number two and three being born
Recovering my truck myself
Finally starting to feel like a part of a community in HI
Oldest daughter being in a great parent-involved school
learning how to rebuild the engine on a jeep
Finding and developing my personal Faith and discovering the power of prayer (and letting go and forgiveness)
Really feeling cared about by people who don't have to care but just do
Marriage is getting SO GOOD I don't know how it could get better but I'm excited to find out
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Things that sucked:
Anything I did for money
Things that ruled:
Uh, who has time to look back. Don't Look Back, Like Dylan in the Movies
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Best: Getting accepted at Smith, the college of my dreams. Graduating from high school; winning the American History Award, given by my favourite teacher; achieving High Honours (a step above Head's List; no grade lower than an A -, with an A average). Having a 3.97 GPA in my first semester at college, and making Dean's List for the year. Meeting a few good friends at Smith. TOUAMB. Meeting someone who has become an irreplaceable part of my life. My current internship in the Human Genetics department at a local university.
Worst: Getting dumped after an almost three-year relationship. Terminal health problems that are currently plaguing two of my family members.
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Best: TOUAMB. Meeting someone who has become an irreplaceable part of my life.
Meeting you probably wouldn't be on my best list, Hobot, but I appreciate you mentioning me. ;)
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ALSO: I started doing this, but the "Best" category only had three things in it, while the "Worst" had 19 before I had to stop and ask to be held.
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Wow, this is actually a pretty intense thread! See, most of what's been listed above has been mentioned in passing, and in some occassions dwelled upon, but it's pretty powerful to see everyone's humanity swinging out there in the breeze.
I forgot one major bad thing, and one good thing: a friend dying of cancer, and ending a friendship with someone toxic.
Ash, I know that you've mentioned before that things have been rough for you recently, and certainly you list shows that, but I just wanted to aplaud you - your presence here has always been a joy, and you're a tough bird to boot.
Also, Jough, I hope someone was there to hold you. And I hope it wasn't Misterqueue.
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Also, Jough, I hope someone was there to hold you. And I hope it wasn't Misterqueue.
*waggles brows*
but no really...
Bad: Breaking off a friendship with one of my two best friends at his wedding. (Not publicly or anything but that was the last time I saw him.) Picking my mom up after she had been attacked from an abusive relationship and further the plant she worked at closing down. A good friend getting their car smashed to bits by a drunk driver (luckily not themselves). More stuff to me personally than I'm willing to openly admit here.
Good: Mom getting out of said relationship, going back to school, and getting a career instead of a job. (go mom!) Slowly growing back my wings after a bad situation to the point where I'm good to fly soon soon. Oh, also this year will go down in history as the year I found treasure.
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Bad: Losing a job that I desperately, heartbreakingly wanted to keep. Good: Finding out that that was a good thing, because I've learned so much since then that I never would have learned there. So that if I ever do get a proper permanent full time job again, I will be much, much better at it than I ever could have been had I stayed in the first job forever like I thought I wanted to.
Yeah, there is lots of other shit but I will leave it at that.
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Best: Becoming a samyaksam buddha.
Worst: One real awful night of gambling. Yeesh.
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It's been a weird three years for me.
Worst is losing the best job I ever had. Paid the most, most responsible, most fun. The ongoing financial problems that resulted suck pretty bad, too. My Mom has had some pretty serious health problems over the past year and that's been scary.
Best: I became a Jeopardy! champion. My children are reasonably healthy, happy and successful in school. I quit drinking. I'm in far better physical shape than I was 3 years ago. I work for myself now and am gradually making my practice financially successful. My marriage is still strong and I still love my wife as much as ever.
Katamari Damacy and We Love Katamari have been awfully good parts of the last 3 years too.
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Best: Becoming a samyaksam buddha.
Worst: One real awful night of gambling. Yeesh.
So, are you going to lead us all to enlightenment then somehow lose Nirvana on slots?
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ALSO: I started doing this, but the "Best" category only had three things in it, while the "Worst" had 19 before I had to stop and ask to be held.
Me too. Ask me again next year.
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Bad:
as documented back in '03 on TOUAMB, Fiance getting deployed to Iraq in March 2003. He came back after I had been writing him letters six days a week for his yearlong deployment, and my entire extended family was sending him care packages and stuff. He came back in late April 2004, and shortly thereafter called me AT WORK to tell me he was breaking everything off. Two days after that I got laid off and was devastated. I was unemployed for months and then I applied for a job in Alaska. I was terrified. They flew me up for the interview and I loved it. I accepted the job and have been here for nearly two years.
Right before I came up here I started a relationship with a guy that I have been friends with since we were in high school. We had an amazing, AMAZING run of things until I came up here. I didn't want to do the long distance thing. I still miss him bitterly, and I deeply regret hurting him. I still have retarded fantasies about moving to America's heartland to be with him. After that, I had a great relationship with a guy up here who got reassigned to a duty post in Florida and asked me to come with him. I was a HUGE jerk and dumped him for a guy that I loved in college. I wish he would have stayed up here, but he's in Florida where it's warm, he surfs everyday, and he has a rad boat. I miss him. Things didn't work out with the guy from college. I remain single today. I still miss all of them.
Good:
TOUAMB, naturally. I got to come to Alaska. I have a great job that I love. My sisters got to come up to visit me. I'm an assistant to help teach our next EMT-1 class and I'm signed up for the EMT-II class. I have lots of amazing friends that I love.
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this is a good thread for putting things in perspective.
because I basically made that list by thinking of the utter worst things, and then thinking of things that felt equally bad at the time. And it made me realize how petty some of those things were. Despite my "worst" list being quite long, I have had a good three years. Huh.
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There's an eighteen-year-old boy who lives next door to me. He was in a motorcycle accident three days ago.
He broke his left leg in two places below the knee. His left ankle is basically dust.
That's the GOOD news.
The bad news is that he sorta broke his back. There is a fractured vertebra which has a piece of bone right up against his spinal column. So if, during the next six weeks, he moves the wrong way or even sneezes too hard, he will be paralyzed for the rest of his life.
Eighteen years old.
Compared to that, every single thing that's happened to me over the past three years has been peaches and fuck*ng cream.
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that's...
wow.
I can never get over how many times in a year (or a day, even) a typical human being comes close to death. all those one-in-a-million or one-in-a-thousand things that could end your life, or horribly disfigure you, or whatever. a good reason to appreciate life, for sure.
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Man, what the hell have I been doing away from this board for so long? That was sort of mutant. Anyway...
Best: Three good years of college, with a lot of friendships and plenty of rats. Getting into graduate school and being poised to have a real career in the field I love the most. Being, in general, in a decent place with my life and health and being grateful for everything I have.
Worst: The relationship with the SO becoming very up-and-down, but mostly down. The occasional depression. My father's illness and my grandmother's death. My college GPA. Dread.
Whoooo.
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So, are you going to lead us all to enlightenment then somehow lose Nirvana on slots?
Well, there is something mildly enlightening about betting everything and losing.
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I am very late to this thread being on the road. I love it when TOUAMB gets personal. This is the good stuff.
For me...
Bad: I just lost the highest paying job i've ever had.
Good: I just lost the most boring job working for the biggest assholes i've ever had.
In other news, life is good. I'm on the road living the dream.
~Paul
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Hey Paul, have you ever read The Kindness of Strangers by Mike McIntyre? It's the authors account of his journey across America without a penny. It's pretty cool.
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I wasn't going to post anything, but now that Paul says this is the good stuff, I'll contribute.
Teh good: Birth of Catie del Vaca. Bought a house. Advancement at work. We got a baseball team. Lizzie del Vaca is growing up awesomely. Mrs. del Vaca continues to be the best wife a guy could ask for.
Teh not so good: Catie's first week in the NICU. Wife basically fired for being pregnant. House-poor. Perpetual exhaustion. I really want to go to Vegas, but can't.
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Hey Paul, have you ever read The Kindness of Strangers by Mike McIntyre? It's the authors account of his journey across America without a penny. It's pretty cool.
No, but it sounds like a good read. Is it anything like this (http://www.flickr.com/photos/pmcd9/211965190/)?
~Paul