RadicalWacko January 8th, 2010
I know I haven’t really posted on here in over a year. It’s been a strange year for me and I don’t know that I’ve absorbed it all yet. Because of this, I haven’t felt any strong urge to spill my soul in words. But a new year is always a time of reflection, a time to look back and see what you loved and lost during a period of time. I know it’s an arbitrary point in time, but if there a fixed point to use, it’s as good as any.
It’s been a year of work changes. I completed my shortest professional stint at a job, just over two years. I’m impressed that, as a libertarian, I completed over two years at a job where most of my time was spent doing state government consulting. I can certainly say that the work wasn’t for me, disinterested clients, uninteresting technology, minor accomplishments, etc. Now, I’m finally completely back being a nerd. No management, project or personnel. I thought I this would seem like a step backwards for me, but it really suits me in so many ways. I can forcefully argue every point in which I firmly believe but at the end of it all, I can relax in the confidence that the decision isn’t mine to make which has freed up an unbelievable amount of peace of mind to focus on that which not only I can control but that which is truly important to me.
Of course, I wish I had found any deep personal meaning out of this time to focus. Unfortunately, like in so many things, time does not equal wisdom. My two failed relationships this year has taken a lot of out of me. I wish I could say that I was somehow the victim of fate or malicious intent, but I have to honestly admit in every case, I just blundered through those glass houses with a pocket full of rocks and a couple of sledgehammers too boot. For this reason, I’ve been spending the last several months in “confirmed bachelor” mode.
I wish I could say that I’ve done better with my family relationships, but this has been a particularly long and stressful year with my blood relations. However, I can say, that for the first time, I really am starting to feel like my own person. Call it a dropping of illusions or even better an opening of one’s eyes, but I can really say now, probably a bit late, but I really know who I am and even better, who I want to be.
I have also found a new joy in the outdoors. I started cycling during the last year or so, after an extremely long absence. I had forgotten the joy of the sound of the wind through an otherwise quiet and still world. The smell of the city as you move from neighborhood to neighborhood, through the various segmentations of plants, trees and other plantings that mark the divisions between areas in an urban landscape. I know that a car is supposed to be the true gift of freedom of movement in America, but I still say the ability travel distance under your own power and in your own way is the true way to freedom and I’m so happy to have found it again after a long period suffering through rush hour.
As I read over this magnum opus, it feels a bit down, and I guess in a way it is. This hasn’t by any means been a great year, but it’s been an instructional one which in some ways is much better. Things have changed and I’ve changed with them. In that sense, I think it’s a resolution worth continuing. There are so many things that one can hope for in a new year, but the chance to find out more about what it is to “be you” is something always to be wished for. Yeah, of course, I’ve got the long list of standard hopes, be healthier, wiser, happier, etc. However, if I can be more of me that I am now, what more could I hope for . . .
