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When I got home from work today I was so exhausted I could not even think. On my way home I was thinking about how similar that feeling was to being stoned all the time. Back when I was a daily ganj smoker my high was always accompanied by a dragging lethargy that hung around my neck like an evil dwarf (wtf?).

When I got home from work today I went for a run. My usualk routine. I didn’t want to run but i did, because it’s my routine. I actually spent all afternoon thinking about how much i would enjoy running and releasing the burden in my head. I ran because to not run on the basis that I “just didn’t want to” would set a precident so that everytime i “just don’t want to” I won’t. That would lead to me not having running in my routine anymore. Ran 4k, came home and did 50 situps till I felt like puking. Trust me, it’s healthy. What’s unhealthy is that I can’t do 100 situps without puking. Those people with the ripped abs? They don’t get them from eating shit food, sitting on the couch and popping a pill they ordered from an ad they saw on tv and hoping for the best. They didn’t get them from sitting around hoping and wishing they could have what they are not willing to work for. They got them from doing situps everyday, whether they want to or not. The last 10 of the 50 are the hardest. I count outloud and envision myself in the military. The last 5 sound like this: 45.. 46… 47…. 48….. 49…… FUCK YOU!!!! I say fuck you to no one in particular. I say fuck you to the part of me that makes me think the last five can’t be done. That the pain of the lactic acid coursing through my abdomen is too great to go on. To the part of me that used to have me convinced I should have to live a compromised life and actually has the nerve to think it still has that control over me. Well… fuck you Mr. Loserface. Fuck you.

I mde Butter Chicken tonight. It took me from the time I got out of the shower around 5:45 till now, 9pm to get the ingredients and make it. It’s actually quite easy to make. I’m always shocked when I make something that tastes really good. Now that I have the ingredients I could make this dish again in probably 45 minutes, cause that’s how long the rice takes. I always burn brown rice. I need to know the secret to making rice without killing it. I also have leftovers, which I’ve gotten in to the habit of doing lately. When I make dinner I cook for two. That way if someone drops by and is hungry they can eat my leftovers, or else I can throw it in the fridge and have it for lunch the next day. It’s funny, cause I know I have heard people talking about simple concepts like ‘leftovers’ for years, but not until now have I learned this principal and tried applying it to my life. It’s a good one. Almost as good as to-go mugs with tea.

I love Lorea so much, and am not ashamed or scared to say it. The ways are endless and it is shocking to have found someone so understanding, so in harmony with my own existence.
We started talking about moving in together. We want a clawfoot bathtub. We want lots of light. Hardwood floors would be nice. I told her she can decorate, cause I don’t have the patience for it. The idea of her nesting is a great one. She’d make a good nest. It’s early yet, and I think it would be sound to sit on the idea a bit more before we commit on the domestic partnership thang.

so, all those pictures you gave me of you right before you left for mexico? I just stuck them all over my apartment. Looking at you is comforting but at the same time painful, cause i wanna reach out and touch you.

just wanna post this pid of my bod for jeff’s benefit to show him how ripped i’m getting. atleast i think, if my memory serves me that i was not quite as toned a few months ago. i guess i’m just surprised that doing something as simple as running everyday and eating properly most of the time and generally not being harsh to my body actually precipitates change – change that i can see visibly. without further adieu:

I’ve not really been that in to AA meetings the past month or so. My attendance began to dwindle and by this time last week i had not been to a meeting in two weeks. Over the weekend in San Fran, I went to several meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous and spoke with many recovering and recovered alcoholics/addicts. I have had a change of perspective this past week regarding meetings. I came to a realization that it is important for me to attend meetings to be of service to those addicts and alcholics that are as fucked up as I once was. I am feeling pretty fucking fortunate to be where I am today. There was a long time where I thought I was just terminally defective and that nothing i did would ever return my life to a semblance of normalcy. today i find myself in a very different spot. I am in a spot where I don’t hate myself, I wake up most days loving life, I work hard in a job i love, i like my employer and do my best to be of service to him, i have a wonderful girl whom I am in love with, i love my family truly and genuinely, financial troubles are a thing of the past because money really doesn’t concern me much anymore. I feel like anything I want to do, i can do, and that is a fucking amazing thing. I remember looking at my good friend Jeff maybe 8 months ago and thinking to myself, “that guy can do whatever the fuck he wants to do – he has confidence.” what i didn’t know at the time was that I saw in him something that I wanted and i have worked towards over the past while. and i think i am getting closer. my journey of becoming a better person will not end until i die, as with everyone. but the difference today is that I am actually interested in pursuing that journey, that i am not actively killing myself today.
anyway, back to the service thing… what changed in me over the weekend was that i came to a realization that I want to be of maximum service to my family, my friends, the people around me, my community and my world. that’s not something i would have said even two months ago. of course, words are one thing and action is what really matters. i also believe strongly that there on the path to the successful consummation of any thought or idea there is necessarily the inclusion of willingness. that is, a thought leads to words, which lead to willingness which lead to action. a thought will remain a thought and cannot become action without the willingness to do so. and that is where i am right now. immediately preceding action, in a state of willingness to be of service. and I am so totally alright with that. It is a fulfilling place to be in and of itself. I’ve spent almost a year fucking obsessed with my own recovery and now i feel compelled to help someone else, someone who might be struggling the way i struggled for two years before i finally found a path of recovery that worked for me.

i have 355 consecutive days without taking a drug or drinking.

Excerpt from an email to Lorea reprinted here…

The conference was amazing. I had such a good time. We got there Thursday morning, early early and our hotel check-in wasn’t until 11. We drove in to San Francisco over the Bay Bridge and the bay was fogged in so we couldn’t really see much of downtown. We drove around a little to get a taste and then tried to find Haight/Ashbury. We eventually asked for directions and got a map. I don’t think we actually found Haight and Ashbury, but we were all so sleep deprived and hungry that it didn’t even matter. We found a semi-gay part of town and partked the car. we walked down to a cafe and I had a smoothie and a buttered bagel while I read a printed copy of The Onion. I didn’t even known The Onion was printed. I only knew of the online version. Anna called Alcoholics Anonymous Central Office in San Francisco and found a morning meeting at 8:30am in downtown cause we had time to burn until the hotel would check us in. We got to the meeting – In the Tenderloin district. It is essentially the ghetto of ‘Frisco that Main and Hastings is to Vancouver. At first I was apprehensive to go in to this meeting but I’m glad I did. It turned out to be a really amazing meeting. The four of us were probably some of the most sober people in the room and we were all definitely the youngest and definitly the most well-dressed. At first I felt oddly out of place, like some rich kid that was squatting on a junkie’s meeting. But as soon as the meeting started I felt at home, I felt reminded that if this thing is a disease that I suffer from it just as much as the rest of these junkies and crackheads. More over, I have sober time and I know a solution to staying sober, thus placing me in a position to be of service to these people and in fact I felt obliged to be of service to my fellows. It was a pretty amazing experience, and definitely an unexpected highlight of the weekend.When we got our room, I passe out for several hours right away. I had just driven 18 hours through the night with little sleep.It was still thursday and the conference didn’t start until Friday night. It was nice having a day to readjust and relax prior to the weekend. Hmm, i’m rambling… and I still haven’t slept since driving back to Van since yesterday… maybe i’ll try to truncate this. There was a whole mucnh of meetings over the weekdn from the huge meeting Saturday night where they did a ‘sobriety countdown’ from 70 years down to 24 hours to smaller panel meetings, not to mention the Marathon Meetings that ran 24 hours a day all weekend in a conference room. Friday and saturday night there was two dance rooms, a hip hop room and a house room. The hip hop room was the most popular, but i can’t pretend I know how to dance to hip hop, and frankly ‘dancing’ to hip hop is boring and seems to be more about ego and attitude. So i got all raved out and danced my ass off for hours in the house room. Thinking of you the whole time, of course, and wishing you and I were dancing to together. So yeah, the speakers, the meetings, the dancing, being with my friends, and oh yeah… every morning i went running outside in the hot Cali sun for 30 minutes and then ate a banana in the pool and then hot tubbed then steamed. then went for breakfast with the Vanouver peeps and the Seattle peep at 10:30am. It was such an amazing way to wake up every morning. Wish i could always do that.

Excerpts from an email to Lorea, reprinted for purposes of record keeping…

It made me really happy to hear how you’re “all about me right now”. But really, I’m not that surprised. I feel like you and I are really connected on a deep level right now, and I actually trust you – which is a hard thing for me, and I’m kinda shocked writing it cause it’s true and i have trouble trusting people. But I do. I trust you entirely. The whole time I was on my trip I didn’t once have a jealous thought about you… I totally trust you cause I know you love me, and I love you. You said you haven’t talked to any guys down there for more than like 30 seconds… I’m the same… I’m so in to you, it’s insane… There was all these girls walking around, i mean there was 1500 young sober people at this conference, all at the hotel, and there was all these Cali girls walking around and I didn’t fucking care at all… I saw them and all i could think about was you and how fucking awesome you are and how they can’t even possibly compare to you. I just felt so “taken”. I felt so “unavailable”. ANd it was awesome. It was empowering to know that I didnt have to spend my whole weekend trying to get approval/attention/sex from all these other people cause I feel so satisifed thinking about you. A few times I went up to my hotel room and took out the stack of photos you gave me and spread them all out on the bed and just gazed at you and talked to you and then kissed the photo of you in your green fuzzy sweater and then pretended to lick your back in the super hot one of you with your back all arched and wet. It was nice to remember you by. Sitting at the pool, i wanted you with me. Walking around San Fran, I wanted you with me. I would even imagine what you would say in certain situations. Haha. Is it crazy to be having internal conversations with you when you’re not there? kind of Norman Bates style… We’ll eventually get around to travelling together and i think we’ll have an awesome time.

I woke up this morning feeling pretty bad. I actually woke up in a panic. I was dreaming that today was my first day of class at some school that I was starting at. I for some reason had to bring my computer to school, my desktop, on the bus. In my dream I was rushed and panicking first thing in the morning to catch the bus on time. I had no idea how to get to the school. I had no idea what to bring. I didn’t want to miss any classes, but it was apparent I was going to. Essentially what I was filled with was a feeling of preemptive failure. I woke up 10 minutes later – 6:45am to my alarm going off. I sat up in bed. I felt like shit. I still feel kinda shitty. Haven’t been in this routine since last Tuesday. I jsut spent the last week having a kick-ass time in Santa Clara, south of San Francisco with a few of my closest friends. I actually felt so shitty this morning that I prayed and then read Upon Awakening. I have no milk for my cereal. I have a dentist appointment at 8:30am where I’m getting two teeth drilled. After that I am working until 4pm.

The honeymoon is over.

I’ve been hardcore neglecting my blog lately. I have been really busy. Since I mostly recovered from that illness of death a couple weeks ago, I havce been going non-stop. Work, hanging with Lorea, eating, rocking out, writing songs, etc. etc. I like being busy, but i also like having periods of reflection with absolutely nothing to do. I hate it at the time but i think it is those moments of perceived “boredom” and “loneliness” that make me a better person overall. interesting.

I was asked by this photographer to be in a shoot this last weekend. He essentially bailed on the whole thing and didn’t have the decency or respect to call and let me know or anything of the sort. I got an email from him last night at about 10pm ‘apologizing’. I have so little tolerance for people that cannot follow through with plans they make, cannot follow schedules set out or simply flake out. It feels disrespectful and essentially is them showing me they a) don’t care enough about others to be accountable and b) are irresponsible and cannot manage their lives. Anyway, not a very professional first impression and one that will certainly take more than an apologetic email after the fact to rectify.

I am cooking a salmon for dinner. I am hypoglycemic. My blood sugar levels seem to drop really often. Right after work is one of the worst times for me, cause it’s usually been about 5 hours since eating anything and the past 5 hours spent busting my ass. I get home and I suffer some pretty harsh consequences of having low blood sugar…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypoglycemia#Neuroglycopenic_Manifestations

but anyway, this salmon smells really good. oh yeah, that’s what i was gonna say… I didn’t run today cause i worked late, till about 6 so by the time i got home i was feeling like a big tired piece of shit. so, i got some lemon and onion and put it in the dish with butter, potatoes, tomato, pepper, salt and my salmon. i’m gonna shower now and then eat my fish. smells sooo fucking good. that’s one things smokers can’t do.

I am otherwise well.

I love this girl and I’m too scared to write about it.

He needs a quiet room
With a lock to keep him in
It’s just a quiet room
And he’s there

He plays an old guitar
With a coin found by the phone
It was his friend’s guitar
That he played

He’s never been in love
But he knows just what love is
He said nevermind
And no-one speaks

He thinks he drinks too much
Cos when he tells his too best friends
‘I think I drink too much’
No-one speaks
No-one speaks
No-one speaks

He plays an old guitar
With a coin found by the phone
It was his friend’s guitar
That he played

When he plays
No-one speaks
No-one speaks
When he plays
No-one speaks

we are born alone. we die alone. between that we have moments where the loneliness seems to fade and we are connected. but it is never to last.

I’m lonely.

It’s just one of those moments. I don’t consider myself scared of death. But dying alone is a frightening reality in this moment.

I just applied to UBC! So yeah, I have considered it for a while, a few months I guess and I just took the action that will preciptate change. While I don’t need to decide yet, I am considering studying phychology. It was either that or philosophy, and I think psych is more useful and practical. It’s strange, cause I have no career goal or expectation going in to this. My motivation for going back to university is one of personal gain. I have been thinking about growing old lately. I don’t want to be 40 and look back and have not accomplished this. Getting a degree is just an important thing to me that I need to remind myself that I am not a scumbag, that I can achieve great things and that I am an intelligent, thinking being. I need it to validate my existence. I expect that graduating with a BA will not really expand my career opportunities. I think careers are hard to come by no matter what. But what I will have when I graduate is knowing that I put the time and effort in to getting something and learning a great deal about a subject. After that I can still do whatever it is I want.

There is some apprehension as I write this, thinking about the future. 2010 Olympics mean a great deal of work in the trades up until then, the next four years. Right now is such a good time to get in to the trades in BC. Work is abundant and pays relatively well. Carpenter helpers and framers are making $20 under the table. But here’s the thing, while that path would guarantee me money and employment stabilty for the next few years, I would have to live everyday with the fact that I am the same as those dudes I see hammering nails and lifting wood on every constuction site I see, and have to live with the fact that I don’t have a BA and haven’t studied psych. I just want to know that I still have a brain. I don’t want to be my worst nightmare – a 40 year old living in with a mortgage on a shitty home out in the ‘burbs married to some whench, with a bunch of responsibilites aged 8-12, and my life consisting of hammering nails every day and going to AA meetings that remind me that I’m genetically defective and socialy inept. That life sounds like suicide, and it is not my picture of a healthy, comfortable life.

When I was in treatment I met a bunch of people. Some of them were young but many were older, of all ages. This was when I really starting talking to people that were 45+ other than my parents and feeling comfortable about it – seeing them as ordinary people like me. Well, I met this old guy named Sam. He must have been 65. He was in there for heavy drinking that nearly killed him and destroyed his home life. He was president of this company specializing in marine radar systems. He did very well for himself and had a nice home in Sydney (the Victoria one, not the Australia one). I talked with him a lot and we became good friends. We were on our daily walks one day, a few days before he was to be discharged and we were talking like friends do. He said something to me that I still remember.
He said, “Nick, you’re so young. So young. You are so immensely lucky to have the rest of your life ahead of you.”
Curious, I asked him if he could give one piece of wisdom to someone my age on how to have a good life, what would it be.
He said, “Go to university. Get a degree. It doesn’t matter in what. All that matters is that you get a degree. I never did, and I still regret it to this day. It expands you, makes you a fuller person, and a more aware member of the world.”
I really appreciated his response evidently, cause I don’t usually remember anything, and we had that conversation over two years ago.

I have only applied. I may not even get in, but I think it is likely that I will be accepted. My first program choice was the Bachelor of Arts. I had to pick a second choice program, and the only other thing that looked remotely interesting was a Bachelor of Fine Arts in which I selected a Major in Creative Writing. So if I don’t get in to the BA progam, i may still be accepted in the BFA program, which I would not really be so in to, but i had to have a second choice.