I am a man of deep passions and interests. I love hard & pay close attention to those who I deem worthy of being let in the inner circle.
Two nights ago I had a dream about someone who was very important to me. Someone who wrote me a note saying we had to hell and back again and that we could get through anything together.
She said she was forever mine and yet she shares a bed with a different man.
Someone asked me what I thought about that and I said I tried not to. They asked if it was because of heartache or my being territorial.
I said it was both and it was neither. We had discussed marriage and she had talked about potential names of children.
“What does he have that I didn’t. She meant every word she said to me. She loves me and I love her.”
They asked if I was intentional in making it sound like we still loved each other and I nodded my head.
“I don’t think that kind of love ever goes away. I think it can be a bonfire or a small flame and there is a difference between loving and being in love.”
Doing The Work
I made a decision last August it was time to begin doing the work. Time to sit with a therapist and work on myself. Time to run through 55 years of life and all that I had experienced and been through.
I told him I have a very high threshold for pain and that I decided the ability to take a beating didn’t merit a need to do so over and over again.
Long time readers know that earlier this year I had a liver biopsy. Shortly after that I decided that doing the work meant I needed to focus on the whole package, the proverbial body, mind and spirit.
Met with a dietician and developed a plan that I am in the early stages of but have already used to drop 25 pounds. The joking about finding my 19 year-old metabolism isn’t happening anymore because he is on his way back home.
I am doing the work because I realized I hit a rut and that I wasn’t growing and progressing the way I wanted to.
I knew enough about who I am to know I didn’t just want more out of life, I needed more. I have a hard edge and intensity that follow me around and though I am comfortable with them I needed to ask for assistance in building a roadmap to where I want to go.
That vision has lived inside me for years but I couldn’t take half assing it anymore.
Today is my 56th birthday. I have said it in multiple places and spaces not to get birthday greetings though I am very appreciative but because it sounds old to me.
It sounds old but I don’t feel old. I don’t know how 56 is supposed to feel but if it is supposed to be middle aged I don’t feel it.
But I have never forgotten seeing my father deteriorate over time. I remember him helping to coach various teams and working with him on various projects around the house.
That is not who his grandchildren knew. They knew someone who loved them deeply took pride in their achievements. They knew a man who would travel all over the country to visit them but not one who was particularly active.
One of his best tricks was being so vibrant they never realized that he was pretty sick for years.
They didn’t have the experience of flying from LA to New Jersey not knowing if he was going to be dead or alive. They didn’t see him on a ventilator, grab his hand and tell him the plan was to see him in LA and then hop on a plane from New Jersey to LA.
But I did and I obviously remember it like so many other important events in my life.
I fooled myself for a while into thinking exercising every day would be enough to prevent repeating Dad’s mistakes. But after I had been doing the work I realized it was time to go the distance and to work on my diet.
Time to accept that even if I don’t feel older I can’t rely upon a 25 year-old body to get me through everything.
Connecting with a dietician was one of the best decisions I have made. I have a vision of where I am going and I am well on my way.
Who Didn’t Say Happy Birthday
Couldn’t decide whether to put a question mark or a period on that subhead because I can write about both.
I can tell you some people who are important to me didn’t say a word and some I hardly think about did.
That is not unusual or strange, it is something many people share in common. Some of those who didn’t wish me a happy birthday are people like my father who aren’t here anymore.
I don’t get his off key singing in my ear or others like my grandparents either. But not all the people I notice are missing are deceased.
Some are very much alive and living their lives but I can’t tell you much about how or what they are doing. We’re apparently not speaking.
Are they angry with me? Did I do something and if so, could we talk it out and get past it? I don’t know.
Could I reach out to them and ask? Probably but I haven’t even though I have wondered how they were.
Some of it is my anger. If you make big decisions unilaterally and expect me to be happy that may not always work for me. It is disrespectful.
Could they reach out to me? Sure, I don’t see why not. Perhaps they haven’t because they don’t know how to do it now or maybe they don’t care.
Either one is possible.
Sometimes you say goodbye forever and sometimes you say it for a time. I figure we’ll keep walking down this road a little longer and we’ll keep doing the work.
Our paths may yet cross again. In the interim I am doing the work, that whole body, mind and spirit thing. I am growing and focused on turning that vision from thought to reality.
If you want to catch up on past posts click here.
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