Pages

Monday, November 28, 2005

Three weeks until ?

My mind seems so clear right now. My nerves are calm. I don't feel the anxiety I felt before. I don't feel this need to impress anyone or do anything that is not geared towards what I need to do. I also feel a better confidence within my abilities. One thought keeps pressing on my mind, "no worries."

I have a couple projects due soon, but I am pretty sure they will fall into place.

I think I will go to sleep tonight and get up extra early with a clear head on my shoulders.

Face the facts: No one lives forever. Stress, if we let it, will kill every dream. The only fools are the ones that quit too early. and - If I have Faith, I shall find my way.

Thursday, November 24, 2005

altitude

A 16-mile hike through Eldorado Canyon could not prepare me for the amount of food I shall eat today.

I will see family I haven't seen in years. And I will do it all above 10,000 ft.

It always feels better at higher altitudes.

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

Mountains

A line heard again and again: "do not what is easy, but do what is right."

And when I hear it, I am filled with such emotion, such passion. I want to burst out and scream and run in some direction to help someone, to do something worthy and make the choice myself, to turn down what is easy and do something right.

I do not doubt someday I will have this position to face, and it does not daunt me the slightest.

These past few days in the mountains were much needed. I have felt a huge weight lift from my chest as friendly faces embrace me with gestures of a better environment, a better message. I have driven through the mountains and been greeted by a girl transformed by only a couple months here. Always so sad in Illinois, she dreamt of the mountains. Now, she is here and I can see how much she has found herself. It reminds me of my first school year here.

I think it is standing in the grandeur of these jagged peaks that makes our hearts cry out for those inner ideals we believe in so much, as if society could not hold us back anymore. I know I have felt inspiration leave my side time and time again during the past few months, but it has awakened stronger than ever. It has been reborn in my mind.

I feel home when I am here and no one could know how much these mountains mean to me. They were my salvation after my father died, and the only thing that helped me to become a better man in the face of so much in high school. They were my "inner light" as Amy would say. I thought of living here so often it would almost break me daily.

These are some of my thoughts going through my mind right now, but more inner thoughts do prevail, and I am growing more towards who I really am every day. I know I am going towards what is right in life, and it does feel great. Those people who tell me I am crazy for doing what I do will never understand what it is like to see the bright sun outside of the box they live in. (metaphor)

Monday, November 14, 2005

Empty Christmas

Awww, that jolly good ol' time is approaching once again. Soon our materialistic society will explode, and it will be hard to avoid the onslaught of advertisers.

But I can't help think of it in another way.

I remember standing on lakefront in Chicago near Shedd Aquarium, the lights decorating houses on my trip up, the walk in dark near that unsettling river and holding a girl who meant a great deal to me. I kissed her with all the intensity held within my heart. I remember it sometimes as if it were yesterday. My passions overflowed within me and I could have given anything if the world would just let me be.

I remember sitting in St. Charles, Mo. going through the shops trying to find some gifts for a few special people. I chose to give my hard earned money to someone just for the simple thrill it would give me to see a smile on her face. The white horse with beautiful dark mane pulled a white carriage near the Missouri River. At that time, I sat across from it peering over the horse at all the people on the street and wondering if I could meet someone special enough to take in a carriage ride along the river.

I remember the trip I spent in Colorado. I remember my sister getting me drunk because I was upset at going back to Illinois a couple days early. I was very young then, but I still remember it with clarity.

Days long ago, I'd spend half the night awake hoping I might fall asleep and not wake up at dawn. But somehow I'd always wake up a few hours before my parents and sit impatiently in my room waiting for the sunrise to wake them. How great it was to have something to wait for, to have a new surprise waiting for you. It was always exhilarating for me.

Now, I say I have changed, but I have not. As the the holidays come closer, I have no one close to me. I think if I left it would not be so bad, but I would still walk and hope and wait for someone to come along. I'll take my small amount of money and buy the few people around me something they might like, and while I do I'll wish I was at another stage of my life. Christmas is always the hardest time to be single. I will, however, not rush into anything during the season because it means the most to me. I have been in very few relationships during Christmas (maybe two if not one.) It is the time I am the most optimistic and dream about having someone to just share a great love.

So as the time gets closer, I will get sappier. And then the New Year will come and nothing will have changed. I will be a little bit closer to graduation and real life. I think someday it will happen, but my hope does not rest in the present.

Saturday, November 12, 2005

Heads or tails

Flipped a coin, and it said, no. So I called her anyway and asked her to study for LSAT together. She said, yes. With no romantic intentions, I think we shall start after Thanksgiving break.

I had a long drawn out conversation with a girl I know from campus Thursday. We were speaking about just making the best of things, and how Carbondale wasn't the place either of us really thought we'd end up, but we were trying to make it all it could be. I told her about my Peace Corps application and how I judged everything in my life by whether it could affect my dreams for the future. We both agreed that the people we bring into our lives should never keep us away from our futures. Instead, they should only inspire us to help us become better people and bring us closer to who we really are. - Not different people!

A lady at The Peace Corps said I have a pretty good chance of making it in. I imagine it will all come down to the interview, but I'm thinking it will go good, especially after they find out where I want to go.

I leave for Colorado very soon and am getting very antsy. I just want to get on the 777 so no one can stop me on my way. I can't wait just to be in the state again and SEE the mountains. I want to make sure they are still there with my own two eyes. haha.

Climbing club had a pretty rockin party Thursday night. There was dancing, jokes and people hanging out and having a great time. We all made asses out of ourselves, no haters though so it didn't matter. The next day we went out and showed some new people the basics, and now a few more people are addicted. I really love the idea of this club.

I remember so long ago when I would dream about climbing outdoors. It was such an chore just to find someone, and I tried all the time. I remember begging people just to take me out with them and even resorting to telling someone I had been climbing outdoors just to get outside. I ended up going up a 5.10 on my first time out and flashed it. It was at Golden and I still remember how happy I was just to be getting outdoors. I led my first climb on that day too. I didn't really care about the whole head game just because I was so happy just to be outdoors. I wish I could thank Matt for taking me. I remember when I left Colorado that we were planning on going on this crazy tour around the U.S. together. I hope he actually went and maybe someday I'll see him on a rockface somewhere, and we can speak about it.

That is the way it has been with my past. A lot of chances taken and so many good memories for it. Maybe that is why I feel so depressed sometimes here. I feel stagnant and no room for chance in my life. I can't wait until I get to get out in the real world. I want to be one of those people with a crazy story where I inspire people to be better than the world around them. I want to help people and become part of some great movement to change the world for the better. I don't care too much about making life a journey as long as it is an adventure. T'would be a great thing to live an adventure.

Thursday, November 10, 2005

A dream

I had a dream of a certain girl lastnight. It makes me want to call her. In fact, I badly want to call her, but I have no premise for doing so other than mentioning my dream.

In my dream, we were nothing more than friends. But I dreamt that I kissed her. She told me it was too soon and how I really couldn't care about her and walked away. In my dream, I just sat there confused and then woke up to my alarm going off. I know this might be my subconscious trying to convey my sense of timing with the ladies is way off, especially if I want something more secure and with a better footing from the start, but damn it I really want to call this girl just see what might happen.

I have known this girl since last spring when a friend introduced us, and she has even liked me at one point, but I was busy. I see her from time to time in the student center and always tell her I will call her, but never do. She reads many books and can converse in detail about philosophy and world events and the political idealism behind those world events. She has brown hair and glasses, and I have always secretly liked her. I have never had the courage to actually make anything of it though. Maybe tonight my hopeless romantic side will prevail, and I will succeed in discovering how far my dreams really stretch. haha.

Or I might just flip a coin, go to a meeting and call it a night and say hello to tomorrow. Sometimes I think I make life way too complicated.

Thursday, November 03, 2005

The setting

The setting sun shimmers. Golden, tangerine leaves paint a picture on swinging branches as well as the across the ground. The warm wind blows fiercly spreading the leaves across the ground and through the air. Night time comes quickly, but sitting outside reading a book as the sun sets or simply staring out and watching the leaves move in various directions, I notice maybe Carbondale is not all that bad.

When I leave, I know I shall miss this place for everything that I remember. I will be quick to forget all the bad. We are only held back by the memories we decide to keep about a certain place. Even though I know Carbondale has held me back, it has made me stronger, and in the long run I will embrace the experiences I had here.

I found a part of my journal I had while in high school. I could not have recalled the horrible times I spent pining about Colorado, or my life after high school. I had many high hopes. I know these high hopes went again on hiatus as I left school in Colorado to pursue a more fiscally responsible education. Yet, with all these memories refreshed, I still remember much more clearly of the times I spent bailing hay, riding my horse, climbing at the Silo, hanging out at the mall, or various trips with friends or the soccer team. I still remember all that. I don't forget that bad stuff, but it does not suit me to always think about it.

As I sit here writing, the sun has begun to dissipate. The leaves are losing their luster and the sky begins to shrink back and fall into darkness. The air seems to become cooler, if not at first it eventually will. The wind may pick up or it might die down, but all the beauty held there in a few moments will surely be remembered as I walk anywhere tonight. Do I often forget all this as the sun goes down about all the beauty that existed in the presence of the sun. Just because I cannot see the beauty does not mean it is still not there to be celebrated.

So in all of this I have started to lose and regain the parts most important to me. I feel I have left it too much to the people that surround me constantly and not enough to myself. I have been bent on how people perceive me for quite some time, even though it was not a big part of my life growing up. I have changed in school and sometimes, as in Carbondale, I have forgotten I have returned to that part of the country which I left so long ago as a choice.

I cannot think of it too highly, yet I can rejoice in the beauty I find here. I also must remember from whence I came and to what point I will eventually end up. So many times our paths are blocked by the setting of the sun. It does not mean that I will not go down that path, in the dark, and find myself closer when the sun rises again. I know I will not stop along my path and when I find myself again on my path, I will be that much closer.

Followers

About Me

My photo
Ambitiously enduring.