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Sunday, June 9, 2013; 2044

Ok, so it took me a while to get around to sitting down and writing. At first it was because I seemed to just wake up and start. I’m not even sure what I was doing actually. I tried once, earlier, to sit down and write and, before I knew it, I was out the door doing things.

It just seemed the day for getting some work done outside.

As the day moved on, I decided I would wait to write until I could light a fire in the pit. Today, they very much go hand in hand.

(I warn you now – this could be one of those very, very….VERY long ones. We shall see.)

Before I go any further, on this Sunday Night it is ‘Perfect For:’ Reading a Book; e-Book Infatuation; Brackets and Snares (iHeart Radio.)

I’m not sure where I am tonight. (In my head.) I’m not sure how I feel…about anything.

The past several days have been intriguing to say the least. Nothing intense, or special, or earth-shattering. Just a very interesting I’m not even sure I could say why.

There was accomplishment. Things got done. There was resolution. Choices were made. There was revelation. Life was reviewed.

I just don’t know how I feel about any of it.

Something definitely went wrong. Somewhere.

So terribly wrong.

I’m just not sure how I feel about it all.

I’m not sure how I feel about me.

(I know. A lot of individual sentences. Dramatic effect.)

And, yet, can one really say it went wrong?

This is where the true inner conflict begins. It’s the challenge of Faith. If you believe in Divine Forces, then you believe that those forces guide our lives. If you believe, then you believe that nothing happens that is not within the will of the Divine. And, if you believe, then you believe that the will of the Divine is always our growth, development, yes, even evolution.

I hear it all the time. I comes out in different ways, but always the same message. “God has a plan for you,” “Everything happens for a reason,” “God’s time, not ours,” “All in good time.”

So very often I find  myself asking, “What could be the plan in this?”

As I have looked back over my life, I have come to a few conclusions. First, I love life. I do. I totally enjoy the experience of living – the good, the bad, the indifferent. It is an absolutely amazing journey. There is so much beauty and wealth in any one given moment.

However, I think I have come to hate mine.

I don’t want to put too many more words to it than that. Mostly because I don’t care to relive those feelings at the moment. But also, I just don’t understand it. I don’t know how it happened…or when it happened.

I can trace it. I can pinpoint moments here and there, but overall I just don’t understand. And, maybe that is part of my problem. Perhaps I have been spending so much time and energy scouring the past for the moment to ‘set right.’

I can’t recall where I heard it or who said it. It was some television show or another. It may have even been Red Dead Redemption for all I know. But it was recent and it resonated. (Not sure I have it exact.)

“You were nothing in the past. You are only what you choose to be in the present.”

Yeah, I’m fairly certain that’s not it. But that was the point to it anyway. I need to remember that moving forward.

I can’t say who I am now. I know who I’ve been though. I’ve been many things at many times to many people. Some of them have been good. Some have been frighteningly awful. I have been far from perfect. The mistakes seem endless.

Somewhere an anger built up inside of me. Perhaps it was always there. I can tell you now that I never really liked me. I can’t think of a time when I felt whole or complete. There was nothing I did that was not done with a bit of fear, apprehension, low self-esteem.

I believe I hid it well often. But I cannot find a point in my life when I ever really felt comfortable or confident. I cannot think of a time when I actually believed there was any kind of a life for me.

I dreamed and I hoped.

But I can’t say I truly believed. I never really felt good enough. No matter what I have been doing I have always had a sense of ‘lacking.’

For those that have done shows with me, I will tell you a secret.

There has never been a show nor a role that I have taken on with any bit of confidence. I never felt right in any part. So much insecurity in every move or word. I really just faked my way through it.

But who am I now? What person shall I be? What stories follow?

It’s so hard to say.

Over the past several days I was feeling more hopeless than ever. I just couldn’t find the thing that changes it all. For so long I have been trying and fumbling, failing, flailing and faintly succeeding from time to time.

There is not one single aspect of my life that is what I would like it to be.

I’ve never felt so much hopelessness and defeat. So much hurt.

But…it is what it is what it is what it is.

And, who am I?

(Jean Valjean??)

That has forever been the most difficult question for me to answer. It matters not who I say I am today, for tomorrow a moment may come when I am the exact opposite. It is just the nature of life.

If I say I am a peaceful person, tomorrow someone may piss me off on the road. Only for a moment, but a moment nonetheless. I may quickly regain myself and bless and forgive and perhaps even laugh it off. But, for that one moment…I was not peaceful and therefore, verily, I am not a peaceful person.

I may even tell you that I am a harsh person. I might suggest that I have no mercy or compassion or even concern for your woes. Just as I truly have none for my own. It is what it is. We make our choices. Life goes on.

Suck it up!

Yet, just as quickly as I utter those words you may find me giving counsel, softening the blow of life upon another.

So who am I?

I am that I am.

It is really the only answer to that question. No matter who we proclaim ourselves to be in life, so very often we are many other things as well.

We are that we are.

But I feel I need more than that moving forward. I need an anchor. Something to remind me of who I wish to be.

Wouldn’t that make the better question anyway? Who do I wish to be?

I wish to be that guy that loves life – no matter what it’s throwing at him. I wish to remember to move slowly and find an appreciation for all. I just wish to find peace in each of the moments that I have because no matter what I may want, or regret, quite simply the moment I am in is all I will ever truly have.

I wish to have grace and gratitude. No matter what life hands me. No matter where I may find myself. No matter the successes or the failures. I just wish to enjoy it and revel in it.

I wish to say a million more things…but, for now…this suffices.