To be deleted later...

A friend of mine said, "you don't need January 1st to turn your life around."  While I completely agree with this statement, I also see some validity in using the first of the year as a time stamp.  I often use this time to reflect on life.  Lately, I have been thinking a lot about the concept of "duty" where it pertains to life and happiness.  I don't want to dwell on the word happiness, yet I always come back to it.  Life involves duty.  Duty often involves sacrifice.  How much must one sacrifice before they have given up entirely too much of themselves and lost any chance for happiness?

When life involves people that depend on you, you make different choices.  Children change everything in your life, whether you notice or not.  So many of my life choices have revolved around the self-taught concept of what I believe is the best for my child.  It seems that my concept might be a bit off-base.  I'm sure that therapy would have brought this to the surface way earlier, but I'm here now.  I seem to be making the choices based on events from my past.  Every single choice hinges off one thing.  I have always wanted to make sure that my son NEVER has a stepfather.  The worst thing that ever happened to me was having a stepfather. 

Does this mean that I should suffer through a "relationship" that isn't a relationship at all just in the hope that he turns out okay, or have I done more damage by staying and allowing myself to be miserable for all these years? 

Why is it that every choice seems like the wrong one?

Last night, I received a text at about a quarter to twelve. Normally I would have had my ringer off, but I had forgotten to do that last night. It turned out that the text was from my favorite female on this planet. She requested my presence at some random bar, stating that there was a delicious beer on tap and good times to be had. Regretfully, I declined the invitation due to a lack of belief in myself as a person of worth to another human being. She then responded with a few more very enticing texts that basically made me stupid for not going.

I didn't go.

I can't.

I'm so miserable and I can't do anything about it because of this completely misguided sense of duty and purpose that I have towards my son and his mother. Yes, I know that the whole "stay together for the kids" deal doesn't work. I just have it in my head that this is what I have to do. This is my punishment for sins committed in my 20's. I made a lot of mistakes and this is what I need to do in order to redeem myself.

What the hell? That doesn't even make sense when I type it out, but here I sit. I turned down an extremely open invitation from the girl of my dreams. What I need to do is just stop allowing myself to become emotionally involved until a time when I feel that I can act upon these things.

New frontiers...

The most amazing woman that I have ever known has informed me that she is probably moving to California. I then proceeded to tell her that I would have to follow her. In that moment, I expected her to tell me that I was crazy and that I needed to stay here for the kid, the music, whatever...

She didn't.

She just smiled.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I have always thought that I would end up in California. There's something almost mystical about that place.

Crossroads.

This is certainly an interesting turn of events. I find myself without employment and I simply lack the urge to seek new. I have an incredible work ethic, but I have no urge to serve yet another company where I simply will not be appreciated or fully utilized.

I currently have my application in to transfer to Duquesne University in the fall for their accounting program and I'm starting to get more and more involved in different aspects of music. Perhaps this will all work out in the end and life won't be so bad. Sure, certain parts of life will still be bad, but there is very little that I can do at this moment to change that.

Here, I blog again on my own...

Yeah, this serves no purpose but to make me feel like I may be keeping up with this thing in some manner.

Just like old tymes

Occasionally, something will stick with me from a long time ago. Often, that thing won't be important and the other people involved have probably forgotten that they were even involved or that they said what they might have said.

In this instance, I have always remembered what someone said the first time I ever walked off a stage ofter playing guitar with a band. I was carrying my amp through the crowd and I heard someone say, "Shoulda stuck with bass."

Yeah, they were just being catty and probably just an asshole, but it always stuck with me. I knew that I would never be awesome on the guitar, but I liked the guitar, damn it. I prefer the sheer amount of noise and chaos that a guitar can summon.

With that being said, I realize now that my place has always been in the rhythm section, arranging the tunes, polishing the parts that others have written. It is my place to take parts and hopefully transform them into something better than just riff salad. I find myself playing drums and walking around my house with a bass on these days. It has been quite a while since I have had to actually practice bass, but this is a good thing. I'm still not quite to the level that I used to be. The time with Negative Theory had taken me somewhere completely different on bass and I doubt that I will ever get back into that kind of mindset.

Dethlehem is the first band that I have ever played bass in where I have to practice the songs at home. I used to take my bass home and just leave it in the case until the next practice session. Nowadays, I pick up the guitar and just end up putting it back in the case in favor of the bass.

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Each day seems longer than the previous. The days stretch into weeks, the weeks into months... Where are we and where are we going? Have I become lost in a role that I started to play in order to preserve myself only to find that I have become that which I previously abhorred?

Many paths stretch out before me. I am aware that I have to choose. Looking behind me, I see that the way back is blocked, the ways forward are all that remain.