"...I just want to thank everybody for being so patient, and bearing with me over these last couple of years, while I figure this shit out."
 |
| "After death", "Hereafter", "Next world", the "Other side." |
I woke up at noon in the middle of a warm Californian January with intense dread. A relationship gone sour, a job that didn't meet my own standards, I could not attend college, did not have the opportunity to achieve any of my life goals, and I was stuck in California, a place that was no longer a sweet home but a sticky and warm climate of mediocrity and smugness. Despair was the sickening static state of mind that would color itself into my life; I did not think that things could get better.
There wasn't a jolt of excitement or inspiration for me to fuel on, just carcinogic umbilical cords that slowly were killing me and would not let me go. There were all these promises, an upcoming job promotion, a scheduled move to Florida with my then girlfriend, possible financial aid for school, a better social life, but in the end it all turned out to be shit and it's my fault for not trusting my instincts.
None of those plans would make me happy, but because I am my own worst enemy, I felt like that is all I deserved. I forced myself into thinking that the plan of working two jobs and few classes at a local community college was "good luck", that I would receive a higher job promotion because of my skills and knowledge, but instead proved to be a valuable resource for my employers in the static position I was in, forced myself to be with somebody I wasn't happy with because I didn't think I deserved any better, and that California was a land to which I should give allegiance to, despite the fact that it is an overpriced wasteland of delusions of grandeur with a debt that is fatter than its infestation of fake trees, supermarkets, highways, and flip flops.
And of course, I couldn't afford a car so in California that means you don't have much of a social life.
Some people are weak enough to live life passively and allow it to move them wherever the wind blows, but "those with the eyes to see" utilize willpower to carve life into the shape they want. I just needed time to "do my paperwork" if you will. I spent a few more minutes in my bed that morning and made a step-by-step list of things I needed to do in order to get to the place I wanted to be. As my mentor Boyd Rice once said, accomplishing things in life is simple, it's a matter of getting from point A to point B, but most people in the world are too stupid to take the first step.
Viciously in the coming months I attacked all the obstacles in my way. I left my manipulative girlfriend, planned a transfer into a new company with work better related to my future career, looked into better housing with the city I wanted to move into, and planned out a health and fitness plan to improve my overall quality of life. I split my feelings of obligation that I had for my friends in California and decided that the only person I should be entitled to protect is myself, others are grown people and need to make their own accomplishments/mistakes.
As with most things I get a late start on, I end up accomplishing them faster than I thought I would. Am I happy? Hell yes, happier than I have ever been in my entire life. In days in where "of late, it's harder just to go outside" I now cheerfully walk the streets of Northwest Portland and breathe in the refreshing oxygen from the abundant trees, rub my cheek against the colorful flowers reflecting the Summer sun, and flirt with the gorgeous antique homes and buildings.
So as I take a sip of this delicious latte, in my head I make a toast to all those stuck in dark places and wish them hope. Despair is a suffocating smoke that clouds up all thinking, but fight for that fucking little small dash of light in the distance. You may end up reaching it faster than you'd think.
Life, it does get better.
