B-I-F-F-E-D

YEAH! I finally have something to blog about that isn’t about feeling crappy… Well actually, that’s not entirely true, but not about feeling crappy emotionally!

Inside the mind while rollerblading today.

Panting, picking up speed, good pace today. Not bad for not having been on blades in a while.

Small curb ahead for the parking lot, just like last time now, pick one foot up and set the other down over the bump.

One foot up…

Other foot… eeks…

{Sound of other foot slipping on pavement at 20 mph}

{Quick breath in.}

Crap.

{Body rotating from vertical to horizontal}

This is going to suck. {looking down to pavement as body lunges sideways}

Road rash? Skinned knee? {body continuing to hurtle towards impact}

Will I tumble and roll?

{GRUMPH, SLAM}

{The sound of flesh impacting road surface}

[Dust settles in and around the body skidding to rest]

I want to lay here for a while. Will anyone notice?

This pavement is extraordinarily hot, perhaps I need to quickly get up.

Body Check, Palms, dirty, but no open wounds, knees, open wounds, loads of gravel, back, ok, but adrenalin still pumping, pride, damaged but fixable – SHIT someone coming, did they see me? Crap it’s Nan from the office, play it up like it didn’t hurt.

Best get on with it, pick it up and move it along man, no pain no gain.

Said to self aloud, “No better way to get on with it than to continue blading…”

Mind to self, shut up, that freaking hurt.

To Nan, “That didn’t hurt.”

Nan looking confused…

Ok, I’m off to take a soaking hot bath and ease the pain in my side and back… Have a freaking great day. Cheerio!

Still Waiting...

So this is the first weekend alone. No I'm not trying to dwell. I'm not as weepy as I was - thankfully, I'm not sure my co-workers can take it anymore anyway. Yesterday felt good and soon enough, I will have a new PC and a webcam so I can at least see my sweetie - I want the "nickel tour" honey, spare no expense!

I do have a list and I was on the fence about taking off to go skydiving today, but the thought of driving two hours to the nearest drop zone and spending the cash to get reacquainted with the sky, BY myself, just doesn't seem like as much fun. Certainly my to do list isn't my sole resource of entertainment, so here I sit, Saturday morning. I was up WAAAYYY to late and WAAAYYY too early. It's strange, I'm just not tired. I used to be in bed by 10 at the latest and now I'm lucky if I'm in bed by midnight. Last night I stayed up until 2am. I think it's nerves...

Sorry I haven't posted any pics lately, I haven't at all felt inspired to get the camera out for some reason, maybe that's what I will do today. I guess I need to get myself out of the house for that though.

Have a great Saturday and weekend... Sorry it's not a more thrilling post... Finding it a challenge to sit and write, but I know I need to. Bo is SOOO right about being and staying in touch with blog friends, sometimes all it takes is a simple post just to let everyone know you're still hanging on there. Thanks!

Helluva Ride

I've been an emotional trainwreck for the past 30 hours or so. It's been a helluva ride. Tearful farewell, lonely return home. I am thankful I had our best friend Tamara to help me see Tia off, I needed the support. Whoever says this is easy is full of crap. This sucks and if I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't. Thinking I'm a strong, emotionally balanced male, I was a tad off! I guess it's only natural to miss one's significant other, but I didn't know how tied we really are until now. I miss her smiling face, her gentle touch and the smell of her hair. I know I will be with her soon, but certainly not soon enough. Know anyone who wants to buy a house?

We did share an incredible last night together. We went out, courtesy of my current employer, to our favorite outdoor dining facility at sunset. A place called O'Leary's. It's a total dive restaraunt, cheap food and expensive cheap wine. We bought a bottle. Then we went to the place on the beach where we had our first "date" and sipped the remaining wine, watching the daylight turn to night, feeling the wind on our faces, the sand between our toes.

In all of our years of being married, I have to admit, the kiss before we departed, in my opinion, was the best kiss of our entire relationship. Our first kiss, then our wedding day kiss would follow closely. The second best kiss HAS to be the time when I kissed her after graduation. My parents were in the audience and when they saw me grab Tia and plant a HUGE kiss on her, my mom asked my dad, "Who's that??!!!???"

I don't know if you know or not, but Tia asked me to marry her on our third date and two weeks later, we were married!

Seven years later, an entire ocean separates us. I have been alone before. I lived alone for three years. It's a good feeling, I grew so much from being alone. This is a different type of lonliness though. It's still to early to tell how this will settle in on me. I have my art classes coming up and every one of our friends has offered me either a night of beers or dinner! PLUS, I have to get ready for our move and get our cats ready. I will be of NO LACK of things to do. But I still have an empty set of pillows next to me every night.

I've had far too much wine, and it's very late. Tia is now in New Zealand, I heard from her earlier and she is well.

I miss you honey. Wish me the best on selling this damn place! See you soon!

Quiet Saturday Morning

The guests have all left, the majority of goodbyes have been recorded and we sit in an quiet house today. It was a beautiful Farewell Party and I couldn't have imagined a better send-off for Tia. It's amazing seeing so many loved ones in one place at one time, and not having any of them be blood family.

We're a little puffy around the eyes, but probably more from lack of sleep than crying. Tears were shed, but I think for the most part, we have now come to a place of acceptance of our choice. Our friends now understand, and it's perfectly clear to us that our future dream is about to come true. We're so close now we can hardly contain it!

I know Tia will be dearly missed by many here, but we know who our friends are and know they will always be our friends no matter where we are.

Right here, right now.

I have so much to say, yet all the words run away.

Right this moment I feel anxiety. My emotional state is largely composed up of waves of feeling slightly scared, to full on panic attacks. Perhaps I am being melodramatic a bit, not clinical panic attacks, but certainly fits of anxiety.

AND I'M THE ONE STAYING HOME!

I was feeling sorry for myself earlier about not being able to go with Tia to New Zealand, after all, I have been the driving force behind this desire to move abroad. My poor wife is now completely left to my devices. OK. So we did make this decision together and she has just as much say in the matter as I do, but the fact remains, as of one week from this exact time, this very moment, my wife will have left behind everything in her life that is familiar to her.

Everything.

That thought alone sends shivers down my spine to think about it. Picking up all that there is, flying some ungodly hours to a place we're not really sure exists yet. No one to greet her at the airport, no one to drive her home, no place to immediately stay. She may as well be relocating to the moon.

I, on the other hand, get to sleep in my own bed, go to my job every day, see our cats, drive our car, eat familiar foods, see familiar people and continue on my daily routine, well minus being with the woman I love.

Clearly, I need to stop whining.

Energy to you my love. And safe travels. Our journey is taking another step. Our dream slowly coming into focus. Our new lives await us, and you have the honor of the first step.

Touching Artistic Bliss

I am neither fishing for compliments nor looking for criticism. I am merely posting my latest creative adventures (if you haven't guessed that this blog isn't about world views or world social affairs - it is about me). I am looking for your feedback. Honest opinions, artistic thoughts, criticisms, looking for anyone who may have done this type of work. I am only the medium, the transporter of the images, the creator lives within me. What do you have to say? This is the place to say it.

Reconnecting

Going through all of the stuff a person accumulates over the years, I discovered some old illustrations I had done while living in Wisconsin years ago! It brought up a number of thoughts and feelings seeing the old works. Frustration, awe, contemplation, and mostly, a desire to hold something besides a computer mouse in my hands. I may have a Bachelor's of Fine Arts from a very reputable art school, but I have lost something along the way. I studied Fine Art and Music Composition at the University of Wisconsin for three and a half years before transferring, and losing many years of credits, to the Ringling School of Art and Design. I also switched majors to Graphic and Interactive Communication which is where I think I lost myself as an artist. I am in a creative field, true, but it is spent in front of a computer, even with my photography, I spend more time in the "digital darkroom" than I do behind the viewfinder. With Tia leaving me soon, and leaving me with time on my hands, real, concentrated Bruce time, I have decided to reconnect with my old artist self again. I enrolled in a figure drawing class at Ringling School starting next month and I have also started reading a very good book called the Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. The book teaches the artist how to unblock through twelve weeks of daily and weekly lessons. ...after twelve years of suppressing that artist in me, I'm as blocked as they come...

I'm adding a note to all of this: As I came in to work, I noticed three frogs on my window. Frogs, according to the book Animal Speak, are about creativity. The number three is also significant, in numerology it is associated with creativity. Last night was a full moon AND a lunar eclipse, double auspicious AND I saw a shooting star on my morning walk. I am on my path. The Universe is speaking to me today. Loudly!

Checking In

"Hi. My name is Bruce and I am checking in."

I don't even know really where to begin. I don't want this to be a whine session, in fact, I don't even want this to be ANYTHING expected.

I am a list maker. A doer. I make lists for myself on Friday and expect the lists to be completed by Monday. My lists always are practical. My rule number one is "Work first, play later." My rule number two is, "It's not worth doing, unless it's done correctly." I seek out pleasure in being accountable for my time. I derive satisfaction from crossing an item from my list. If I don't get to have playtime, then I know I had a productive weekend, and, “Hey man, there’s ALWAYS NEXT weekend.”

I am a driven and responsible German-heritage, Aries male. Son of a carpenter, an incessant project man. Also son of a driven mother, who in her younger years used to get dad out the door, lunch in hand, get me taken care of and off to school, lunch in hand, care-taker of a HUGE house, did laundry, bought groceries, cooked, cleaned and never took time for herself. I inherited some hefty luggage.

I found the list of house projects this morning as I was about to embark on a project. I walked to the front door, messed with the hinges, tinkered a little with the door’s hardware, but something was wrong. I felt uncomfortable as I was thinking about working on the project. I want to repaint the door, I think it would help make our entrance look better and more upscale, maybe make a better first impression for when that prospective house-buyer comes along, but I just couldn't bring myself to grab the tool box and dig in for the day. I stepped into the studio to look for my list again, “How has it been coming… the list? Where are we here, what’s left to do before I feel right with the world and can finally go play… Oh… well, ummmm, looks like we have a number of things to accomplish this weekend, oh yeah, hey GREAT, it’s a holiday weekend, three days to accomplish things.”

As irony would have it, while looking for one list of things to do, I found another list, almost identical to the first one, then another list of other things, and soon I had turned several pages of lists of all kinds of things and NOTHING crossed off on any of them…

Then it happened. I felt a rush of blood to my head, the flushed feeling in my body, my mind spinning.

I passed by Tia in the kitchen. I think she sensed my frustration, or saw it in my crooked face.

The questions have come up again.

It starts with one thing, then blossoms into so much more. I mentioned to her that I may no longer be in the Martial Arts. I may let it go. Maybe I was looking for her reaction to it, maybe I was looking for approval to lighten my responsibilities. We talked for about a half-hour. I think we both felt the heavy thunk as the inherited luggage I was carrying fell to the floor. I have suffered for many years at my own doing, the feeling of not having enough time and being “second” in what I do. I see so many creative people, focused and driven and accomplished. They’re out there doing things I KNOW I could be good at. Then I beat myself up over the fact that I haven’t dedicated enough time to BE that good at this and that. I listed (here we go, right?) all the things I wished I could do with my life and all the things I am currently doing. I wished I could be a better designer, a flash programmer with top-notch design skills, a better photographer, a master martial artist, a feng shui consultant, a fine artist, a musician starting up a band again, a skydiver, a fix-it man around the house perfecting my living space. That’s enough work for six people and six lifetimes and I haven’t been able to do any of those things very well and frankly, I’m being pulled apart trying. I have done this to myself for long enough.

My horoscope for today was perfect: ”Time machines have yet to be invented. Or have they? If they are created one day, we will presumably be able to go back in time. So why then, can't we invite our future selves to come back and help us now? In a funny way we can - without the aid of any technology. Reach out, now, to the person you hope and intend to become. Ask the essence of tomorrow that dwells in you today for its view of the most appropriate way to proceed. Then see what wise and inspired new plan begins to emerge.” Jonathn Cainer, bubble.com

This is an important transition period. I get an opportunity to redefine who I am again AND I get the personal space I need to do it in. I will adjust to Tia leaving, have time to reconnect with myself again AND define a new existence in New Zealand. A rare opportunity is here for me now, and I feel like I just shook hands with my future self. A bit of the past, a bit of the future and my soul. I couldn’t imagine a better time ahead.

I tossed my list to the floor and right now I hear my cat in the other room batting it around. I am going to play. Unfortunately, because of work load this week, Tia has some things we need to do this weekend, so I can’t entirely play all three days, and the motorcycles need their maintenance, but today was a wake-up call. I have felt the shift coming, and it is now here.