here we goooooo

ooooh boy if you are reading this right now you have just entered a world of random thoughts and anecdotes. I've been off the blog-path for a while now (apologies and a shout out to my 3 loyal followers: Mom, sister, and summer roommate/good high school friend), owing mostly to the fact that I don't feel like I have anything outstandingly witty, intelligent or even interesting to say. I could talk about my trip to Lake Tahoe (thanksgiving with Jules and Jon (home friends), snowboarding, gambling, natural beauty, AWESOME) or my excursion to the Napa wine country (wine is one of my new favorite items, day wine drunk, a tractor parade, team bonding, REDICULOUSLY FUN), but it's not what I want from this journal/blog. Those would be great to write down if I plan on looking back in 20 years and remembering all I did at the tail end of the year 2009, but that won't happen for various reasons, some possibilities include, but are not limited to: The end of the world (roughly 2012), the end of the website www.blogger.com (ha I was wondering if they would make it a blue hyperlink as a form of self-promotion), or the fact that anything on the internet is not really tangible (we could wake up tomorrow and the whole internet may be gone and we'd have lost a lot worse than my journal (I wouldn't be worried about the journal)). Also, when will I remember in 20 years that, oh yea, I wrote a blog about Americorps on the website blogger.com, I should go check that out! I need a new paragraph, so I'll wrap this one up with this: I will no longer ignorantly try to impress my readers (who are all just my closest companions anyways) but instead try to go through my actual thought processes on the topic at hand. This will entertain (maybe help?) me when I am holding down a sick office job starting next fall (hopefully.)

There are a number of reasons why I'm writing this at 12:24 AM two nights before Christmas:
1. I took a hydrocorsomethingsomething (painkiller) after getting my mouth raped and pillaged this morning by misseur dentist, which may have screwed up any vague resemblance of a sleeping schedule I had.
2. The west coast time is catching up to me now (making it 9:30 PM in my head)
3. While lying in bed (I just realized this should be #1), I thought about how my psyche has been doing since "the incident" (I got slammed in the mouth with a table). And I started really thinking. I thougth about how I really felt and how I was reacting to the pain and (for lack of a less dramatic word) misery. I'll get to this later, but I decided that, if my past has proven anything, there is almost 0% chance I wake up tomorrow and write something in here that would remotely resemble what I am thinking right now. This will now get difficult because further writing will require mixing of tenses, something I've never been good at. So I'll end it at that.

Those are the 3 reasons I'm writing right now. #3 led to a tangent while i was lying down. I think all humans have inspiration now and then, but there are those who act on it and those who don't. I'm one who doesn't. I think the ones who do act on it are labeled the more artsy, creative people, while those who don't are more cut and dry, not because they don't have ideas, just that they don't find them worthwhile to document, or it's too late at night, or something or other. This thought inspired me, while fully ready for bed and trying to sleep, to go downstairs, get my computer, and bring it to my room to write. I'll lose sleep. I'll break out in zits from going to bed too late (not really sure if this is true but I needed a second argument for just going to bed.) Now it's a race against my computer's battery life.

So I had "the incident". I got too drunk and got whacked by a table. Not really a heroes reason for going to the hospital. It's accidents like these that everyone gets praised for being tough and brave throughout all the adversity. And that's what I want to do. I want people to view me as having been solemn but thoughtful, to have been very brave to come through the other side of this without much complaint. To learn something from it, and become a better, stronger person. And there are all these newspaper headlines about bravery and courage and heroics (I watch too much sports). And I want my own headline: "Boy amazingly survives tragic table to mouth injury and teaches others to do so also." This would show my toughness and resolve to the world. But when that headline doesn't exist, there's this side of you that just screams "WHYYYY DIDDD THISSSS HAPPPPENNNN TOO MEEEEEEEE???? I DON'T CARE HOW MUCH OF A WUSS I AM JUST END THE PAAAINNNNNNNN!!!! CAN'T WE FIX THIS IN A DAY WITH ALL THE NEW TECHNOLOGY? STOP CREATING SMART PHONES AND MAKE A NEW WAY TO FIX TEETH QUICKER. AAAAARRRRGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!! (You get the idea.)

And I keep going back and forth. I'll be tough as long as you notice that I'm being tough and commend me, at which point I'll be a pansy for a little while and feel bad about it inside and go back to "tough dan". Perhaps normal, perhaps animalistic (think dog.) It's frustrating that I can't always be tough, like they are in the news.

It's also not fair that when I'm in pain or want pity, I can't just be myself and have a flowing conversation. I really want to, I try so hard. But again, I'm not "tough enough". I end up breaking down and staring ahead waiting for some kind of pity or nursing the pain. My head just can't focus on anybody else when I need to concentrate on my own ailments. I'm not tough enough. Or I'm selfish. But not really. I'M THE ONE HURT! Is that selfish? I think that's why some people (such as myself) cope really badly with getting hurt to the point of needing assistance because they dont' know how to respond to people's sympathies (empathies?) very well. Some go about it in different ways than I do, but the concept is the same: There's the "want" to act normally that isn't possible, which they blame on themselves for not being "tough enough."

Another thought I had while trying to sleep earlier was how nice it feels phsyically recovering from an injury. The first relative time, whether its an hour for a cut, a day for a hangover, or a couple days for the old case of table-to-mouth) you feel no aching or throbbing is the one of the best feelings in the world. All those ailments that hampered you and brought you down are out the window. You can finally begin to live the way you used to, the normal way. This is an homage to that moment in time, when everything again feels right with the world.

I hope to keep writing like this, to grab the computer and go. Not think about it. But who knows? In the future I may decide to let the creative side in me be overtaken by the practical one. But these moments of inspiration sure are nice.

One last short thing. We all need to stop trying to "one up" each other in imple conversations. I am the worst offender. let the other guy go. Listen. Have compassion. I feel too much of human communication is conducted like a boxing match. Duck, jab, avoid. Not a good way to communicate.