Lions are Prowling The Streets

 I often wonder where my head is at during different parts of my life. Before social media and a lot of other internet hangouts, its hard to look back and see what I had going on unless I remember specific events or happen to be actively writing in my journal.

But post social media years its an easy correlation to see if I was happy or sad. I've noticed I, probably like a lot of people, tend to post on social media more when I'm depressed or alone. If I look back over the years and view posts on different networks I notice that when I was single I would post more often. Not always posts about me being sad or anything, but just more in general. More pictures, more random comments, more of everything. Especially when I was alone or depressed. Why? Probably for the same reason anyone does, its a way to extend your hand out into the internet void in hopes that someone will reach back and connect with you.  

On the other side, I've noticed large blank portions where I would rarely post anything at all. Those were usually times I was either incredibly engrossed in a project or more likely in a relationship that and was too busy to post. Too busy being happy I suppose. Then things have changed over the years for sure. I just don't post much online as I used to as I've gotten older. Mostly due to the fact that I don't feel like sharing my entire life online for privacy reasons or don't believe anyone cares to know what I ate for dinner.

Most things I post in the last few years are bad jokes or small tiny life updates when I feel like pulling back the curtain a bit. But what happens when both worlds collide? I don't feel like posting anything about myself and I dont feel all that connected either. What happens when I'm super lonely all the time and am in such a funk that I dont reach out anymore?  Do I still exist? Or am I always that person sitting on the corner watching the world go by?

 Lately it feels a little like this anyway. I've gone through pockets over the last year of being content and then being really down. Being enthusiastic and being exhausted.  Optimistic and motivated and downtrodden and just depressed.

I just wish there I could remember my process of how to navigate the ups and downs like I used to so that I don't sit here alone on a Saturday night posting on a blog that is hidden away because I want to say something, but I don't honestly want anyone to read it. I guess I just always assumed that at this point in my life I wouldn't be experiencing these times of situations. I never expect life to be perfect but at least hoped to be past the feeling of being here and nowhere at once.

I think music is the answer, and I keep making 2 steps forward and 1 step back every time I pick up my guitar, but its getting there. The real question however is how will I feel once I put all of this into words and songs that I've felt for the last decade or so and don't keep it to myself anymore. Will I feel a sense of relief? Or will it leave a large music shaped hole where this project has been sitting forever now?

Time Traveling

I’ve always been a sucker for nostalgia. I think a lot of people are. My entire life I’ve been in a constant cycle of living life and thinking back to specific memories and dates in time over and over again to recognize where I’ve been and where I want to go. Sometimes this is helpful for me to better myself, sometimes it’s a little depressing when I remember things I could have done better or regrets that I still had but maybe buried deep. Overall it’s been something I’ve done for a long time but I feel like I’ve slowed down recently. Part of it is probably what I had mentioned previously about life being different now and not as many obvious chapter points to divide things up and make them easier to remember. In the last month however, I’ve done it a lot. Probably because I’m at another point in time where I can easily digest major time milestones. You know, the easy ones to remember, 5 years, 10 years etc.

The older I get the more of these I end up with since you don’t really think of too many memories when you’re too young to think about them I guess, but as you get older you end up with a decade of something that you’re self-aware of and can reflect back on. When I turned 20 I thought about most of my life prior to that. Same thing when I turned 30 I thought about my 20s.  A lot of people looked back in 2020 to 2010 or even back as far as 2000. 

For me 10 years ago in 2011 is another one of those shifting points in my life. The years surrounding it kind of mash in there as well.  So here in 2021 I have a lot of prominent memories of 2011 since so much changed and happened.  While I’ll have been married for 7 years this fall, it’ll be 10 years of dating next week. That’s crazy to me. Before this, my longest relationship didn’t even make it to 2 full years. So I feel like every step I take at this point in new territory. Same with work, I’ve never worked a job for as long as I have now either.

It’s just interesting to me that I’ve done a lot of time traveling this past month thinking about the past and have remembered a lot of things I’ve long since forgotten about. I’ve made realizations about things and pivotal moments all those years ago that I wasn’t aware of at the time that are plain as day today. It’s ironic that around the same time I started re-reading the Time Traveler’s Wife again. I hadn’t read it since 2009 probably, maybe once since then. But it wasn’t a conscious decision to go back to it, just kind of popped in there while I was thinking about the past.

Now I’m looking at this constant cycle of events and I’m noticing patterns as I get older. Cycles I seem to get into in various forms here and there and it fascinates me. It’s a full spectrum of emotions from good to bad. Achievements and failures. I think I’m in the middle of another one of those right now, but I can’t tell which end of the spectrum I’m on. I’ve made good decisions and I’ve made big mistakes. I guess time will tell where I’m at in the circle. So maybe I’ll be looking back to today 10 years from now and it’ll be a little bit clearer to me.

Scars

 

Lately I’ve been caught up in thought about a lot of things. The present and the past. It’s a norm for me to reflect on my past to asses where I am in the present to make sure I’m staying on track with my goals or perhaps to just see if I can recognize what choices led me to where I am so I can continue to make them or course correct for the future. I find myself doing this a lot more during the new year every year as I think most people do. Its an easy checkpoint to look at the previous year and make resolutions for the next.

 

For me often enough it happens more this this of year because of past experiences that felt like a new start. One of the things that has helped my memory has been breaking up my life in various grouped experiences or sections of time then placing memories into those little chapters making them easy to recall when I think about those times. I’ve stopped doing it as much in recent  years, mostly for a lack of defined moments when things sort of blur together, but when possible I do. Seeing that I’m closer to 40 now my memory isn’t what it used to me and recalling everything as clearly as I used to isn’t as easy. Its probably a sign that I don’t do it as much anymore so much like a muscle, not recalling these memories makes them fade a little.

 

Anyway, for the longest time I divided my life into various chapters so to speak somewhat like this:

 

Childhood up until my parents divorce

High School

Early college/pre Mexico 2002-2003

Mexico 2003-2005

Post Mexico 2005-2006

BYUI 2006

T3 Years/UCA/Target 2007-2008

Return To Idaho 2009-2010

Post Breakup/Moving On 2010-2014

Marriage 2014-Present

 

The last couple probably could be divided better, but it all sort of mushes together. Sometimes these chapters I divide in my head based on time, others major events, or just periods of work. Point is, early Jan/Feb/March was a big change for me for a few of these events. When I was fed up with school in late 06 and decided to move back home, I spent the first few months of 2007 starting over. When I was determined to finish school and graduate and went back to Idaho in 2009 the first few months were me starting over once again. Then at the end of 2010/early 2011 I had to make a 3^rd fresh start and figure myself out one more time.   So to say I get nostalgic in the 1^st quarter of the year is an understatement. Nearly every one of these chapters was born around the same time and usually from sort of traumatic or at least sad catalyst. Or at least kick started by one. So springtime usually feels like a feeling of rebirth for me.

 

2007 I learned to break the mold of my pre-determined life plan by I had thought up years early by dropping out of college.

2008 I learned to depend on myself and express myself for who I am

2009 I learned how to study and knuckle down to achieve my goals and started a deep relationship that defined my life for the next few years.

2010 I learned more about myself and at least the beginnings of what it means to put someone else first in a relationship and your needs secondary, at least sort of. It’s a trait I’m still working on to this day,

2011 I learned to be ok with being alone and figure myself out again while starting something new.

 

And so on and so on.

 

So what really kickstarted this was thinking about my face while thinking about this time of year. This is the same face I’ve had during all those events, but the landscape has changed and scars have taken the place of smoother textures. Both physical and internal I suppose. I think I’m just mushing up two different things here now, but I don’t care. I don’t think anyone reads this blog anymore or remembers it exists. Hell, I forgot it exists up until recently. So I feel it’s a safe place for me to just type streams of consciousness into the void for nobody to hear and that’s ok.

 When I look in the mirror I often turn my attention to my right eye. More specifically around my right eye. I still have two deep scars from where I got part of my face torn open and had to basically have mini plastic surgery to fix it years ago. I still don’t completely have feeling back in my eyebrow and its been a long time. Yet when I look at it, I remember the story behind it and the feelings and emotions around that day that accompanied the events that caused the scar. I hope it never goes away because it’s a good reminder me for various important things. I have a few scars like this on my body that I feel the same way about. My left hand has one from when I was a kid and fell down on the playground, my leg has one from when I got bit by a dog while walking my dog a few years ago. Various burn marks on my hands from working in bakeries.  I used to have more but I’ve noticed that they’ve begun to fade or disappeared altogether.

 I used to have one on my left inner arm where I scratched it helping my mom move something in the garage in late2010. For some reason while I looked at it, it reminded me of my then predicament and I decided to use it as a visual reminder for what I was going through and kept pulling on it every few days to not let it heal until it would leave a bigger scar. It’s all but gone now, but I can still see remnants of where it was and while it’s probably a good thing, it still makes me sad to see it go. Despite what it represented I feel like that scar just internalized and is still there even if I can’t see it, but I’m still working on it but that’s a story for another day.

 

Healing takes time for both the physical and mental and the scars I’ve still got both physically and mentally are here to stay and to remind me of where I’ve been and what direction to go in the future.