In some years

In some years, I don't write a lot. I was looking through this 11-year-old blog and noticed that in some years I wrote a lot and others that I wrote little. I also noticed that I am the only one who sees the blog, which makes sense because I keep it pretty anonymous and don't share it with most of the people in my life. This blog is really just for me. But back to my first note (both issues are related actually), I wondered why I didn't write as much in some years, and more often than once a month in others. This is my second post of the year, and it is coming with only 25 days left of it. So, what happened? I conclude that I wasn't any more busy than I was in other years, which is what I initially thought, but rather that my writing depends on my emotional state. I tend to write when I am feeling more melancholy. Perhaps this is my outlet. Perhaps this is why the blog is only for me? It's a therapy of sorts. 

Does Blogger have an app? I'll have to look into that. I think that will get me to write more. Why do I want to write more? No one is really reading this except for myself. Ah, there it is again. I want to write for myself. I want to keep a journal. But why? What does it all matter? Why did you start this blog in the first place? Why are you here typing these words? Why are you reading them? 

Goodness, I must remember that I started this blog for a different reason. I even deleted some of those initial posts that I made a decade or so ago. I shared this blog on my Facebook page. When I had a Facebook. I wanted people to read it. But then my writing became more honest, more into my personality...more into ideas and characteristics about myself that I didn't want people to know. 

Something occurred to me just now. A reason that I write on this blog is because it helps me feel less alone. Not that I feel particularly lonely, but because I don't want to lose a piece of myself. If I forget how I felt during a time, then I lose who I was at that time. I need this to echo back to my contemporary self that "Hey, I was here writing these things, spurred on by these thoughts that YOU had. Guy." And I would say to myself, "Ah, yes. I remember that. I remember that feeling. I can try to remember what was going on in my life at that time. Yes, I see now who I was."

That is important to me. It's as simple as that. Now now. What should I be writing about, now that I have recommitted to posting more to this glorious blog of mine? I believe that I will write more stories.

Who am I

I'm a wizard. I like to learn and try new things. I'm a Christian. I love playing and watching sports, reading novels, camping, exploring and traveling around the world, listening to people tell stories, and studying languages and history. I'm grew up on a farm and now live in the downtown of a major city. I like riding my bike and helping people. Beer is good. Board games are also good. I think all people in the world deserve equal opportunity to live happily. I'm a competitor. I am stoic. I can find humor in almost anything. I judge people. I am obsessed with things being in order and organized. I am a leader and I like to plan and manage resources and people. I can't sing or dance very well. I like to cook. I wish humans were more developed in space exploration. I love my family. I admire classical philosophy. I loath modern pop music. I am loyal. I am trying to be a better person.

We are all different. I don't know how you can help.

All of the encouragement isn't enough. It actually makes me feel worse. It's the limits of their communication and reasoning. People try to help others with what they think would make themselves feel better. They think that their encouragement should make the difference. I wish it did. I feel worse because I know someone is trying to help, and I feel guilty that it isn't working. I feel bad that they fail. I don't know exactly how I handle my emotions, I just know that I do handle them. I have never been able to describe my problems in a way that it is understood by someone. I can only skirt the subject by writing about the fact that it exists. I don't mind failing as much as some people, but there are always kind people trying to encourage me. I don't know what it would feel like if they weren't there. Perhaps then I would understand the difference it made. Some people really push the idea that every person is uniquely different. Why do so many people take care of and treat other people's problems like we are all the same? 

Changed the label

In one week, I went from a 20-something bachelor to a 30-something engaged man. I don't know how I got to this state, but my decision to be here and make that change happen is a choice I made. It is a choice that I made with more conviction and confidence than any other that I have made in my life. 

Two things:

I believe that love is a choice. 
I do not believe that there is a "one" for anyone. 

I know that many cannot agree with either of these, and wonder then, how someone like me can be so assured of me making my move to ask a girl to marry me. That's okay. I'm not too concerned with what others think. I know what I know. I know that I could have resented this young woman years ago. I know what love is for me. I also know that there are other young women that I have met that had the potential to be wonderful, loving wives...and in return I would have given them all of me. But I didn't chose any of them. I chose the one that I did, and I am convinced that she is the best person for me. 

This young woman encompasses something divine for me. And I cannot resist something I believe to be a calling from a higher-power. Are there others who could have presented themselves to me in such a way? Perhaps. But that doesn't matter. Our paths have led us together and my heart, mind, and soul confirm that she is more than worth my life. 

My grandpa told me after I called him with the news that "Now the hard part begins."

Letting Things Go

I think that as everyone gets older, it becomes easier for us to let negative things go. We do not stress as much about what people think of us, we aren't as hard on ourselves on mistakes, it takes less time to forgive or forget slights, and we may even begin to shrug at some misfortunes.

I know that I feel this way now, and I can say that it is quite a relief to let go. Many negative things in life are only as powerful as we let them be. We create monsters out of those negative things, and give them their power. We do this a lot when we are children, and we continue to do this the rest of our lives. What we don't have to do, is make so many monsters. 

It's simple, but it's not easy. I think that every individual's path to understanding how to let things go is different. Mine for example, was purged in my youth. Other kids at school were very hard on me, and I was harder on myself still. I was very self-conscious, and though I was strong academically, I spent more of my time worrying about trying to get other kids to like me at school than anything else. I found something to fear in many aspects of my day-to-day existence: That I wasn't good enough at a sport, that I looked like a dork, that someone would push me around in the hallways, that my family was poor, that my artwork would get too much praise from the teacher, that someone would call me names, that I would sound too smart in class, that people would make fun of where I lived and the cars my parents drove, that I didn't wear the coolest clothes, that my handwriting was bad, that I was Catholic, that I had Jewish heritage, that... All of the things that were me, that identified who I was, I tried to hide and pretend weren't there. I couldn't let go of caring about all of those things, and it made a lot of my childhood miserable. 

Now I'm not complaining about my youth, I loved much of it, and was blessed with more than I ever could deserve. What I didn't have was the ability to let go. It was unfortunate that I went to a small town school; I didn't have friends that supported me and I wasn't comfortable letting myself open to identifying with anyone for fear of being made fun of. I taught myself well to hide. I pulled all of those monsters around with me on a tight chain, and hid them. Perhaps in a way I built fake monsters by not being myself: I tried to wear the clothes the other kid did, I kept quiet when I knew answers, I made excuses to avoid playing sports, I hid during recess and open class periods, I made my parents pick me up late or from distant locations to avoid being seen, I tried and failed to make fun of other kids...

Instead of letting go, I defied the world and myself! When I look back at that time now, I am floored with how stressed I was as a kid. I'd like to go back to that little boy now and tell him that it will all be okay. That none of "this" matters as much as he thinks it does. That he is only creating and building up monsters. But maybe that visit to the past would be a mistake. I am very proud of myself with how I handle stress now by letting things go, and maybe it took all of that practice as a child fighting monsters to get here.

Je ne peux pas changer...

...that's just how I am.

How many times have we heard people say that? How many times have we said it to someone that finds our attitude or behavior off-putting? 

What is a person really saying with the remark of "That's just how I am"? Are they just saying an excuse? Or perhaps they may be saying that they do not have the motivation to change this aspect about them. It is possible that they do not want to change, or that they think that this behavior cannot be changed. Both of which go far beyond the simplistic notion that they are just stubborn. That too may be an excuse.

It is important to look at the origin of both why the person is the way they are, and why they have the idea that they are unchangeable. One thing is certain, and that is that they have accepted the way that they are in the context of saying "That's just how I am." At that point, they are saying to you, "Accept this about me, because I do, and there's nothing to be done about it." 

Maybe there is nothing to be done about it, but I find the sentiment that an individual has no confidence in any change in their-self to be a lack of willpower and focus. Why is that person behaving that way, and excusing their-self of that behavior? Was it some factor of the way that they were raised? Was it accepted by people around them their entire life so was never before challenged? Was it a factor motivated by an event? The possibilities aren't really what I'm getting at. I find it curious that people accept themselves in a situation with behavior that is usually not positive, and yet hold others to a different standard where they do not accept the behavior of others. 

We cannot truly understand all of the intricacies for why others act the way that they do, but I think that we should be open to change. We aren't losing our identity by changing behavior, we are taking control of ourselves. We are revealing our identity of power, wisdom, and determination to improve, and we will creatively adapt that to ourselves in our own way. 

Baseball

Baseball is just a game. It's strange how a game can have so much meaning for a person...or a family...or a community...a city...a nation. The game has a power that draws people in so much that they love it whether the game loves them back or not. People give the game all that they have. They pray for it. They defend it. They cry, they laugh, and they rage about even the smallest detail of it. To some, it means everything. I am one of those.

Baseball is my grandpa at the age of 72 hitting fly balls to my cousin and I as kids on a hot, Texas, summer afternoon. It's fighting back tears at the end of the season in little league where I learned to accept loss. It's avoiding sports radio or TV after a heartbreaking loss. It's playing catch with my dad outside after he got back from work. It's my grandma's stories of heckling and flirting with Pete Reiser, Duke Snyder, and Dixie Walker at Ebbet's Field. It's pretending to be Nolan Ryan while pitching. It's socks rolled up into balls and bases made of furniture in games played with my brother and sister. Baseball is what stopped my classmates from making fun of me at school. It's the "temple" that I go visit when I want to be alone. It's lining up buckets and mattresses at the barn, to throw at 200ft away to practice long-toss. It's hating the New York Yankees. It's habits and superstitions. It's sleepless nights caused by missed opportunities. Baseball is stick-bats, stone-balls, and candy-wrapper bases on the playground. It's long socks and a new cap and belt. 

It's scars from diving for catches. It's the smell of a field of cut grass and the leather of a glove. It's Eric Nadel's voice at night in my dad's truck. It's 3 hours that bore most people but have me on the edge of my seat. It's Michael Young. It's batting cages for hours with my teammates. It's the reason my family had lawn chairs (so they could watch me and my brother play). It's a brotherhood of friends that I made in any American city that I have lived in. It's disappointment. It's coaches telling me that I have the "green light". It's player's cards and plastic cups from the ballpark.  It's girlfriends never understanding why I would breakout of my stoic nature for a game. It's watching Neftali Feliz strike out Alex Rodriguez to go to the Texas Rangers' first World Series. It's spending two years with shovels in our front pasture building a ball field. It's a game I've played every year of my life since I was 5. It's not blaming the umpire because there were countless other chances to succeed on my own. Baseball is my first love, and I will never be unfaithful to her.