"Fool in the Rain"

As the new year approaches, I cannot help but process the past year. I have changed, grown, and lie in a small sea of hope and confusion. The construction of this post in and of itself leaves me scrambling to determine the best way to capture the blizzard of though in my beautiful mind. I've only Led Zeppelin to focus my thoughts with.

I recently finished a non-fiction novel by Erik Larson titled, "In the Garden of the Beast". The novel was alarming in many ways. First, the perception of Jews by both Germany, the American people and much of the western world was not as I expected. Growing up in the Midwest I have little "experience" with the Jewish culture. Secondly, the sheer lewdness of one of the central characters alarmed me. I have grown up thinking as a culture we are becoming more and more devious... but it now appears that over the course of history this deviousness has always existed. We today are just finding it harder to sweep under the rug to be found another day. 

We grow up believing (brainwashed or not) that there exists one soul out there for which we should fall in love, marry and have a bazillion glorious babies. The last part is a clear exaggeration, whereas the first half has been challenged by the same novel. The lewd character, Martha Dodd, suggested she had multiple loves of her life. This naturally caused a lot of heartache among her lovers. I began to think upon my own life of "the loves of my life". I have only opened up my full soul to one man and loved him so dearly that his blatant  departure from my life was not-so-secretly agonizing. I still love him, but I also greatly dislike him. 

Then there is the current companion in my life. He has been a steadfast companion for just over a year now. The whole thing amounts to one of the strangest relationships of my life. There is a sense of constant hesitation, but a sweet underlying and unspoken comprehension. His extreme introvertism makes him an exceptional humdrum individual. Yet his mystique makes the little company he allots me insatiable. He has never caused me to be filled with the giddiness and butterflies of young love. He instead ignites the existing passions within myself, as if he knows the keys of my primary motivators. I ache for the things I love, and he merely intensifies this internal desire. In many ways he is so unnecessary in my life but incredibly significant. He is a primary clog within my internal clockwork. He in no way completes my soul, he is merely my complement. I love him, not with the drunkenness of romance and courting, but soberly. To love him not only is sound, but logical. He has challenged my duplicity of thought and action. I have grown to think and calculate more. I assess what I really want and move to not just speak but act.

The question to the next year will be if I ever confess my unflattering love and if this great awakening is to last past this temporal arena of here and now. I know I'd be more than pleased with his lasting presence. His lack of emotional expression makes me uneasy at times, but everyday I see small embers of devotion and love. Whether they exist or not is still untold.

Then there is the vast uncertainty of my financial stability. I reside in a bunker of debt with the floods of interest rates rising. It is only a matter of time before the "impending doom" no longer simply lingers but actively threatens my financial security. December has already proved to be a bad month for my checking account. I worry about being jobless, I stress about the crawling economic situation and I wonder how the coming elections will ultimately "screw me over". 

Jobs. The idea is terrifying. The rigidness of the 9-5 both appeals and frightens me. The scheduleness will focus my attention and resources. I will ultimately feel more balanced at the cost of my existent free spirit. I fear the days of staying home with a migraine or severe depression oversleeps won't cut it. I loath the thought of being clueless as to my duties or having little to nothing to occupy my work hours. I already feel the anxiety of the "what if's". 

There also exists the inner turmoil I feel with my family. At times it seems my relationship with my parents gets better. Other times the insignificant interest within my family towards me seems all too apparent. I am no longer a favored favorite. I am in ways the grey sheep. Accepted but somewhat dismissed.

People change over time. My recently married sister is not much different. Our relationship is always changing, for the better? I'm not sure. It isn't getting any worse. I know she misses me, and I do her, but the immediacy of our future togetherness is not a deep pang signalling me to go here and now.

Shortly, I will get to meet part of my extended family, aka my brother's new family. A full assessment has yet to be conducted by my overly cautious self.  I am not as naive as I once was. My brother too, I'm sure has changed. I am curious to see in what manner that five years time has done.

Family. Ah family. How terrible, yet how enduring connection of good will last.

Lastly, I have a host of friends in the past year who have gone off and married. A select few have decided to extend their families in the most natural of methods through offspring. I find myself in a daze. Perhaps this is the part of my life that remains the most confusing. With marriages, I must grow to "like" people my friends cleave themselves with. Luckily, I have yet to have a friend marry someone I hate. (Praise God!) However, marriages tend to cause good friends to drift slightly. The closeness fades, but the worth remains with some. The choking reality is the decreasing availability of human resources, while the desire for sharing and closeness remains, the opportunities die off. The old topics subside in conversation and new ones emerge, ones I am less able to understand and relate to. These things are merely a cause of concern as I have yet to figure out where my NEW place lies within these established relationships.

The new year will bring with it answers, questions, and more growth. While I am uneasy and hesitant, I trust in the end everything will be a-okay. I can merely hang on for the ride.

 I like the title. Over the past year I have gained a growing appreciation for Led Zeppelin. To go full circle it is a good thing Mr. F dumped me. He would never of approved of my love of the lengthy full-of-unnecessary-guitar-solos that is the Led Zeppelin.

For those who read my blog regularly, I wish you the best new year. In case the Mayan people are in the least bit correct, make the coming year one of your best. 

Cheers. 

  

"It’s the way I’m feeling I just can’t deny, but I've gotta let it go"

Two-thousand-and-eleven will mark my second non-family Christmas celebration. 

I'm the only one of my siblings that won't be home for Christmas. The ticket prices for a plane ride were ridiculous for Christmas time and I am not made of cash. Only after I bought my tickets to visit my brother later in the coming new year, did my parents offer to help me pay with tickets to come see them over Christmas (along with the rest of the family). After refusing to change my destination and time of my flight, my parents have been rather cold with me. It isn't my fault I make a fifth to a quarter of the salary they make and made the best financial decision for my situation. Got to love credit cards. 

I'd go see my lovely sister for Christmas, however, considering how long it has been since I've seen my brother.... 

I really wanted to start my own holiday traditions this year. I told my dad this and he laughed at me, as if being single/unmarried made me unqualified to start my own traditions. Everyone knows dad that you doubt I'll marry (You were kind enough to announce it at my baby sister's wedding and you are lucky I still talk to you), but this  doesn't mean I cannot start a small tradition of my own.

I put up my tree within the first week of December thinking fondly of my sister as I decorated it with the ornaments she made and sent me last year and ornaments I bought last year to make my tree super cute. When I was younger our family always rearranged the furniture in the living room and put up and decorated the tree together. When I switched families, my mother did the whole thing herself and I grew to miss a tradition from my childhood (despite my birth parents being "sickos"). I mailed out a bazillion Christmas cards and have received a fair share of my own.

Currently, I've been wondering what I want in a "Christmas Holiday Traditional Dinner".  I thought of going to a Christmas Eve service, as I've always loved going, I find myself without someone willing to go with me. It always feels so awkward going to church alone. I will likely at a minimum read the Christmas story from the Bible.

At a minimum, I hope my family will humor me and at least allow me to skype with them over the holiday. 

With everyone leaving town to visit family, I cannot help but feel a touch of depression. In some ways, I'm glad I won't be visiting my parents over Christmas. Being stuck in a house with the politics of 3 married couples would only make me feel more alone and isolated. I'm the odd man out. In truth I envy my siblings. I all but begged my anti-social friend who isn't leaving town for Christmas to come have Christmas dinner with me.

Christmas should be a time I rejoice at the birth of my Saviour Jesus Christ, instead I'm crying as if it were Easter.

I really need a cat.