Woke up feeling great a little before the alarm clock, body is a little soar (in the good way) from the last couple days of exercise, i wont be at the gym for lunch today, but i will go climb the 7 floors to the tower 2 times mid day, for now hot shower then...
Breakfast
They say breakfast is the most important meal of the day, i love breakfast food, but to me it should be more of a lunch or dinner, and the protien smoothie is the way to start the day...
Todays Smoothie Included:
Whole Milk
V8 Fusion Pomegrante Cranberry
1/2 Lemon
Heaping Scoop of Whey Protien
2 Teasponns Prebiotic Fiber Powder
1 Banana
Frozen Mixed Berries
Honey
Mid Morning Snacks
Ive been snacking on grapes and cherries and just had an apple
One Snapple Green Tea
when i finish the green tea i will refill my 72 ounces of water to be drank in todays office sitting
Lunch
For Lunch I had stir fried venison with mixed peppers and carrots, stir fryed in olive oil, over garden rice
Midday Exercise
Since this was a non gym lunch day I decided to climbe the 7 story tower at work twice
afternoon snack
For an afternoon snack I continued munching on Grapes and Cherries and had an apple
After Work Workout
15 Minutes on Eliptical 1.2 miles 120 calories burned (according to machine)
Kettle Bell Lifts (3 sets 8 to 10 reps)
* Squats 35 lbs held center
* Side Raised 20lbs single arm
* Between leg Swings 35 lbs
* Tricep Overhead Lifts
Bicep Curls
Tricep Extensions
Leg Press
Leg Curl
Deltoid Extensions
Lateral Pulldowns
Dinner
This is where i deviated, deciding that I will go completely meatless next week, i went ahead and went for 6 Hot Garlic wings and a ceasar salad at Coach's to watch the Turtle Races
Retrospective
Felt great all day, I definitely felt heavier after eating the meat both time, maybe there is something to those saying you need to be completely meatless to detox, we will find out next week. The workout felt great, had much more energy than I have experienced in a while.
After the workout I chilled on the couch for 30 minutes prior to going to watch the turtle races at COachs. I think actually going out and participating in the social activities without drinking was an important step to making this into a more long term beneficial detox. Not that I havent and dont go out without drinking other times, just that I believe forcing myself to go out and still participate / enjoy myself during the detox without the things we typically associate with enjoyment that poison us was definitely a plus because it helps to break the psychological cues.
Went to bed at 1130, passed out fast no time fighting sleep that was for sure.
Curious to see how day 4 plays out...
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Monday, January 30, 2012
Day 2...
I am not sure how I am going to go about keeping logs of the exercise and eating habits. Perhaps in a more checkbox or catalogged fashion, but for now I will just list things out in the blog.
Woke up this morning feeling stuffed up a bit, the hangover hung around for 1 more morning I suppose.
Decided to heat up the bathroom and shower in a sauna type atmosphere, there is something about the steam that just seems to flush the negative out and make you feel better, music is also important, i always listen to the radio in the morning while showering, im pretty sure i sing out loud quite a bit, not sure what the roommates think of it, but its a great way to start the morning,
BREAKFAST:for breakfast i started out going back to my homemade breakfast smoothie routine, ive slacked off of this pretty bad in the last 4 months.
ingredients include
Whole Milk (local farm fresh milk from Kroger they even take the glass bottle desposits back and give you $2)
V8 Fusion (fruit and veggied medley, i would do better to use fresh veggies and fruits but time wise its hard to store and juice the number of fruits and veggies that they have pre packaged, i make look to see if there are better natural options, but this is a step in the right direction)
100% Whey Protien (i add a healthy overflowing scoop of this, i was told by a personal trainer once to make sure i use pure why protien, as males should not over utilize soy or risk getting to much estrogen)Orange Juice (minute made 100% juice, it was what was in the fridge)
Pomegranate Juice (the brain function deep purple bottle, again it was in the fridge)
Honey (100% natural bees honey from Kroger, nothing over fancy in a bottle that looks like a bear)
Frozen Mixed Berries (its a mixed berry frozen bag, serves as the ice for my smoothie without watering down the flavor)
I am going to follow this with a bottle of Snapple Green Tea to start my morning.
I also have a 74.4 oz water bottle at my desk, i plan on filling this and making sure i have drank it all by the end of the day (if not more) keeping water flowing through the body should help to flush quickly
im using a few herbal supplements to aid in the process as well;
Fenugreek and Thyme was recommended by some hippie lady who was talking about energy fields, it is supposed to help keep the sinus cavities mucus thinned, seems to work really well
Probiotic and Prebiotics A Daily Regiment of to get balance back to the digestive system that has been damaged by years of antibiotics to thwart sinus infections
Zinc
Vitamin C
Fish Oil
Midday Exercise:
When you day job constitutes sitting at a desk and rotting your body away, mid day exercise can be very important to promoting some balance of health.
11am i had scheduled physical therapy for my shoulder recovering from an old motorcycle crash i never really built my body back up for. It has been going great and my mobility and strength have greatly improved over the last month.
Exercie there consists of:
series of band pulling motion to concentrate on the back muslces that support the shoulder,
light weight exercies focusing on those same muscles
reverse bicylce machine for arms.
I followed this with 30 minutes in the gym
15 minutes on the eliptical set to cascade
then i jumped back and fourth between 6 machines for low rows, shoulder pressed, leg extensions, chest press, bicep curl, tricep dips, and ab crunches
these were all done on machines with a lot less weight than i previously used, but its been a while since ive worked out hard at all, especially since ive re aggrevated the shoulder issues that i am now working to reverse damage on
i followed this with another set of low rows from a different machine and deltoid extensions,
this was all done in a quick move back and fourth circuit style with no rest in between to optimize the limited time at the gym
Lunch:
for lunch i had a Deli Sandwhich from Hank's Deli known as a Blue Ridge
Roast Beef, turkey, cheddar, provolone, brown mustard, mayo, lettuce, tomato, on berry wheat bread,
though this wasnt the top healthy choice, it didnt veer far from, you need the essential fats after a hard workout, and the whole grain wheat bread is much better than the processed crap you will get most places
Afternoon Snacking
Almost finished my 72 ounces of water,ive also been snacking on a bag of Natural Nut Harvest Nut and Fruit Mix, it consists of Raisins, Peanuts, Sunflower Seed Kernels, Almonds, Walnuts, Cashews, Dried Cranberries, Pressed Sunflower Seed Oil, and Sea Salt
Dinner
On the way home I stopped at SAMs club and loaded myself up on fruits and veggies. I ate a grilled chicken wrap. Mozzarella fire roasted tomato sauce, olives, mixed peppers, onions, herbed mushrooms, and bacon ( I can't be completely good),
I'm snacking on grapes now, and going to cook some venison steaks with cayenne and mixed sweet peppers here directly, will snack on one before bed and take the other for lunch tomorrow over a bed on whole grain rice.
Woke up this morning feeling stuffed up a bit, the hangover hung around for 1 more morning I suppose.
Decided to heat up the bathroom and shower in a sauna type atmosphere, there is something about the steam that just seems to flush the negative out and make you feel better, music is also important, i always listen to the radio in the morning while showering, im pretty sure i sing out loud quite a bit, not sure what the roommates think of it, but its a great way to start the morning,
BREAKFAST:for breakfast i started out going back to my homemade breakfast smoothie routine, ive slacked off of this pretty bad in the last 4 months.
ingredients include
Whole Milk (local farm fresh milk from Kroger they even take the glass bottle desposits back and give you $2)
V8 Fusion (fruit and veggied medley, i would do better to use fresh veggies and fruits but time wise its hard to store and juice the number of fruits and veggies that they have pre packaged, i make look to see if there are better natural options, but this is a step in the right direction)
100% Whey Protien (i add a healthy overflowing scoop of this, i was told by a personal trainer once to make sure i use pure why protien, as males should not over utilize soy or risk getting to much estrogen)Orange Juice (minute made 100% juice, it was what was in the fridge)
Pomegranate Juice (the brain function deep purple bottle, again it was in the fridge)
Honey (100% natural bees honey from Kroger, nothing over fancy in a bottle that looks like a bear)
Frozen Mixed Berries (its a mixed berry frozen bag, serves as the ice for my smoothie without watering down the flavor)
I am going to follow this with a bottle of Snapple Green Tea to start my morning.
I also have a 74.4 oz water bottle at my desk, i plan on filling this and making sure i have drank it all by the end of the day (if not more) keeping water flowing through the body should help to flush quickly
im using a few herbal supplements to aid in the process as well;
Fenugreek and Thyme was recommended by some hippie lady who was talking about energy fields, it is supposed to help keep the sinus cavities mucus thinned, seems to work really well
Probiotic and Prebiotics A Daily Regiment of to get balance back to the digestive system that has been damaged by years of antibiotics to thwart sinus infections
Zinc
Vitamin C
Fish Oil
Midday Exercise:
When you day job constitutes sitting at a desk and rotting your body away, mid day exercise can be very important to promoting some balance of health.
11am i had scheduled physical therapy for my shoulder recovering from an old motorcycle crash i never really built my body back up for. It has been going great and my mobility and strength have greatly improved over the last month.
Exercie there consists of:
series of band pulling motion to concentrate on the back muslces that support the shoulder,
light weight exercies focusing on those same muscles
reverse bicylce machine for arms.
I followed this with 30 minutes in the gym
15 minutes on the eliptical set to cascade
then i jumped back and fourth between 6 machines for low rows, shoulder pressed, leg extensions, chest press, bicep curl, tricep dips, and ab crunches
these were all done on machines with a lot less weight than i previously used, but its been a while since ive worked out hard at all, especially since ive re aggrevated the shoulder issues that i am now working to reverse damage on
i followed this with another set of low rows from a different machine and deltoid extensions,
this was all done in a quick move back and fourth circuit style with no rest in between to optimize the limited time at the gym
Lunch:
for lunch i had a Deli Sandwhich from Hank's Deli known as a Blue Ridge
Roast Beef, turkey, cheddar, provolone, brown mustard, mayo, lettuce, tomato, on berry wheat bread,
though this wasnt the top healthy choice, it didnt veer far from, you need the essential fats after a hard workout, and the whole grain wheat bread is much better than the processed crap you will get most places
Afternoon Snacking
Almost finished my 72 ounces of water,ive also been snacking on a bag of Natural Nut Harvest Nut and Fruit Mix, it consists of Raisins, Peanuts, Sunflower Seed Kernels, Almonds, Walnuts, Cashews, Dried Cranberries, Pressed Sunflower Seed Oil, and Sea Salt
Dinner
On the way home I stopped at SAMs club and loaded myself up on fruits and veggies. I ate a grilled chicken wrap. Mozzarella fire roasted tomato sauce, olives, mixed peppers, onions, herbed mushrooms, and bacon ( I can't be completely good),
I'm snacking on grapes now, and going to cook some venison steaks with cayenne and mixed sweet peppers here directly, will snack on one before bed and take the other for lunch tomorrow over a bed on whole grain rice.
Sunday, January 29, 2012
day 1
i believe in AA they always tell the story of every day can be your first day or something of the nature, i dont consider myself an alcoholic by any means, i dont crave drinks, hell to be honest i dont even like the taste of beer or liqour, i do ike the taste of my blackberry wine but thats another story (speakng of which i need to get to bottling that stuff and if anyone is free i need some hands).
what i do like about drinking is loosing my inhibitions, letting lose and letting the me that feels caged up in screwed up societal norms free
and i definitely dont think that drinking is all bad, ive seen a lot of great things come from the good times with it, i do think there comes a point when people start relying on drugs or alcohol though, a point where they put more faith and let things center around the substances and not around the community and fun they are trying to use them to help flourish.
i think its a shame that we have developed a culture where people feel that they need that crutch in order to open up, in order to communicate, to feel emotions, to not feel emotions, to express theirselves, to let their spirtis be free, to dance, to love, to let their souls live freely...
and im not saying by any means that, that is everyone, some people do find their peace, and are willing to openly do things much better than others without it, but in general our society and created an environment where those things are usually only socially acceptable in those situations revolving around having the excuse of inhiberiation as their jumping point,
digressing, why is this day 1? well coming off an amazing high that was my summer / fall i was living it up in the world, i had a internal peace i had found in my soul and it was guiding me places id never dream of being, i had met an amazing angel who liked the parts of me that i liked, and who made me want to be better at those parts, she made those parts shine... i had been diving back into my writing and music, i had put together some great works that even impressed myself, and hell i was on the caribbean playing drums with michael franti on a ship playing with a family full of complete strangers who found a moment of peace and harmony with the world, my life was amazing.... and is still,
but the crazy high of the wave was bound to crash, and when it did it crashed hard, coming off of a date with my lady friend one evening i could tell she was really pulling back and i was fearing i was loosing her, i sat there one night watching sons of anarchy, when i recieved a call from my nephew, he has had troubles with drugs and the law for quite some time, and it was obvious in his voice that he was back at it, but it was also obvious that he was reaching for help, i talked to him for a bit, tried to help him get some motivation and guidance, but i knew in my heart he needed, and i needed to do more, but my mind was on my own problems and i selfishly didnt do what i knew needed to be done, a few days later i get the word that he had been in an accident, no one hurt, but most likely drug or alcohol related, and most likely sending him back off parole and possibly to jail, and it just crushed my insides as i could hear the sound of cries for help in his voice from the day that he had called so clearly repeating over and over and ....
and i began my downward spiral, i lost all that peace i had had with the world, i got mad at myself, and started a tyrade of self punishment, i said / did some things that ended up pushing the lady friend farther away, and then realizing this i started reaching out harder and harder to bring her back, and completely scared her all the way away, meanwhile i was wallowing in my own self pitty and anger to much to keep up with my exercise, and my healthy eating completely went to shit, i was not sleeping well,
meanwhile life decided that wasnt enough for me to deal with and i get a message from out of nowhere on a friday afternoon that one of my best friends and mentors growing up was found dead in his house from an apparent heart attack, this was a superman to me, a person who had many flaws, but a person who was always there when i needed them`, he was the comfort of knowing you had a 4am phone call saying he man i just fucked up bad, and he would show up with whatever you needed, be it a hug, a huddle, a gun or a shovel, you knew he was always there, and now he wasnt... and i know that sounds like a selfish statement, but it was truly what i first felt, scared to not have that safety net anymore, and this man also represented to me proof that people can change, he had really turned around his life, was committed to his family and was doing so much more than just running around and reaking havoc like we used to do so well, and to just know that something like this could happen so fast, scared me, angered me, and pushed me farther into the negative energy path that i was falling down....
i was spending to many nights turning to the bottle and asking it to help me solve my loneliness, which it never seems to do, they say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results, and id say that was likely the case for this month, intensifying bad energy by piling on more bad energy, i got myself very sick with a sever sinus infection, followed by a stomach infection, and when i finally started feeling better i rejoined a gym got myself an amazing workout one morning, decided to go meet some friends after since i was feeling great and they were at the bar watching the basketball game,
had a few beers there, tasted so good as i was thirsty from the workout, they decided to go bar hopping, i joined, and many beers and 7 hours later it was what should be the end of the day, but instead i wanted to go fill up the lonely hole that was in me, so i ordered rounds of shots, drank some redbull and got my buddy to go downtown, where i seemed to be hell bent on causing havoc and doing more harm to myself, i dont remember much from the night, the one thing i do remember is that i was just compounding that negative energy throughout it, it wasnt the positive vibe that im used to riding, and when i knew i was in that mood, i should have never let myself go out and try to drink my way out of it,
so that brought me to doays hangover, and todays realization, or todays rationalization, or better yet todays allowing myself to see the obvious, that i need to uncompound all of this negative energy, i need to detox my soul of the negative that has inhibitited it, i need to clean out my body, and i need to get right between my own head and my soul, i decided to get back to my old goal of learning to dance sober, im going to challenge myself to a month long detox, filled with lots of exercise, lots of healthy eating, lots of time spent with myself and my fiddle, and lots of refocusing on getting right with my soul,
luckily i picked the shortest month of the year, and im heading to new orleans on the 28th, so ill set that as the date for when i can break back out of this commitment, and reward myself, and ill challenge myself to spend a month cleaning up after the mess ive made inside and outside of myself, its going to be a challenging month, but im going to keep on writing, keep on retrospecting
post from here forward will be more direct and more to the point of the day, i just felt the need to rant out the full path of what brought me here (this time) and where i am trying to go with this journey, its going to be an interesting experiene to say the least, filled with lots of challenges, but i will persevere and hopefully learn a lot from this, and make some positive changes that i can use to help not only myself but others around me as well, my goal here isnt to stop partying, to stop going out and having fun, my goal is to instead learn to let myself do that more often without hiding being the cloak of intoxication, my goal is to let my soul find a way to shine outward and to clean out the negative that has infected me, my goal is to get healthy in all aspects, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually
and my goal is to share this experience with those i love so that others can learn from the lessons that i will be teaching myself....
what i do like about drinking is loosing my inhibitions, letting lose and letting the me that feels caged up in screwed up societal norms free
and i definitely dont think that drinking is all bad, ive seen a lot of great things come from the good times with it, i do think there comes a point when people start relying on drugs or alcohol though, a point where they put more faith and let things center around the substances and not around the community and fun they are trying to use them to help flourish.
i think its a shame that we have developed a culture where people feel that they need that crutch in order to open up, in order to communicate, to feel emotions, to not feel emotions, to express theirselves, to let their spirtis be free, to dance, to love, to let their souls live freely...
and im not saying by any means that, that is everyone, some people do find their peace, and are willing to openly do things much better than others without it, but in general our society and created an environment where those things are usually only socially acceptable in those situations revolving around having the excuse of inhiberiation as their jumping point,
digressing, why is this day 1? well coming off an amazing high that was my summer / fall i was living it up in the world, i had a internal peace i had found in my soul and it was guiding me places id never dream of being, i had met an amazing angel who liked the parts of me that i liked, and who made me want to be better at those parts, she made those parts shine... i had been diving back into my writing and music, i had put together some great works that even impressed myself, and hell i was on the caribbean playing drums with michael franti on a ship playing with a family full of complete strangers who found a moment of peace and harmony with the world, my life was amazing.... and is still,
but the crazy high of the wave was bound to crash, and when it did it crashed hard, coming off of a date with my lady friend one evening i could tell she was really pulling back and i was fearing i was loosing her, i sat there one night watching sons of anarchy, when i recieved a call from my nephew, he has had troubles with drugs and the law for quite some time, and it was obvious in his voice that he was back at it, but it was also obvious that he was reaching for help, i talked to him for a bit, tried to help him get some motivation and guidance, but i knew in my heart he needed, and i needed to do more, but my mind was on my own problems and i selfishly didnt do what i knew needed to be done, a few days later i get the word that he had been in an accident, no one hurt, but most likely drug or alcohol related, and most likely sending him back off parole and possibly to jail, and it just crushed my insides as i could hear the sound of cries for help in his voice from the day that he had called so clearly repeating over and over and ....
and i began my downward spiral, i lost all that peace i had had with the world, i got mad at myself, and started a tyrade of self punishment, i said / did some things that ended up pushing the lady friend farther away, and then realizing this i started reaching out harder and harder to bring her back, and completely scared her all the way away, meanwhile i was wallowing in my own self pitty and anger to much to keep up with my exercise, and my healthy eating completely went to shit, i was not sleeping well,
meanwhile life decided that wasnt enough for me to deal with and i get a message from out of nowhere on a friday afternoon that one of my best friends and mentors growing up was found dead in his house from an apparent heart attack, this was a superman to me, a person who had many flaws, but a person who was always there when i needed them`, he was the comfort of knowing you had a 4am phone call saying he man i just fucked up bad, and he would show up with whatever you needed, be it a hug, a huddle, a gun or a shovel, you knew he was always there, and now he wasnt... and i know that sounds like a selfish statement, but it was truly what i first felt, scared to not have that safety net anymore, and this man also represented to me proof that people can change, he had really turned around his life, was committed to his family and was doing so much more than just running around and reaking havoc like we used to do so well, and to just know that something like this could happen so fast, scared me, angered me, and pushed me farther into the negative energy path that i was falling down....
i was spending to many nights turning to the bottle and asking it to help me solve my loneliness, which it never seems to do, they say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results, and id say that was likely the case for this month, intensifying bad energy by piling on more bad energy, i got myself very sick with a sever sinus infection, followed by a stomach infection, and when i finally started feeling better i rejoined a gym got myself an amazing workout one morning, decided to go meet some friends after since i was feeling great and they were at the bar watching the basketball game,
had a few beers there, tasted so good as i was thirsty from the workout, they decided to go bar hopping, i joined, and many beers and 7 hours later it was what should be the end of the day, but instead i wanted to go fill up the lonely hole that was in me, so i ordered rounds of shots, drank some redbull and got my buddy to go downtown, where i seemed to be hell bent on causing havoc and doing more harm to myself, i dont remember much from the night, the one thing i do remember is that i was just compounding that negative energy throughout it, it wasnt the positive vibe that im used to riding, and when i knew i was in that mood, i should have never let myself go out and try to drink my way out of it,
so that brought me to doays hangover, and todays realization, or todays rationalization, or better yet todays allowing myself to see the obvious, that i need to uncompound all of this negative energy, i need to detox my soul of the negative that has inhibitited it, i need to clean out my body, and i need to get right between my own head and my soul, i decided to get back to my old goal of learning to dance sober, im going to challenge myself to a month long detox, filled with lots of exercise, lots of healthy eating, lots of time spent with myself and my fiddle, and lots of refocusing on getting right with my soul,
luckily i picked the shortest month of the year, and im heading to new orleans on the 28th, so ill set that as the date for when i can break back out of this commitment, and reward myself, and ill challenge myself to spend a month cleaning up after the mess ive made inside and outside of myself, its going to be a challenging month, but im going to keep on writing, keep on retrospecting
post from here forward will be more direct and more to the point of the day, i just felt the need to rant out the full path of what brought me here (this time) and where i am trying to go with this journey, its going to be an interesting experiene to say the least, filled with lots of challenges, but i will persevere and hopefully learn a lot from this, and make some positive changes that i can use to help not only myself but others around me as well, my goal here isnt to stop partying, to stop going out and having fun, my goal is to instead learn to let myself do that more often without hiding being the cloak of intoxication, my goal is to let my soul find a way to shine outward and to clean out the negative that has infected me, my goal is to get healthy in all aspects, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually
and my goal is to share this experience with those i love so that others can learn from the lessons that i will be teaching myself....
Saturday, August 6, 2011
perspective..
welp its been a hell of a week, good, bad, ugly,
Ive danced, sang, laughed, cried, rocked out until my body literally collapsed in a heap. I met so many amazing people, some that I hope will be friends for a long time, and if nothing else the memories made will last as long as my brain is capable of remembering i suppose.
One wouldn't think that within the last 7 days so much could have occurred, but it has, and always does in my life. The high's of going to Dewey, hanging with the most down to earth, yet up in the stars people that I can ever find (and both statements are true and not contradictory if you understand Dewey).
Yes we drank ourselves silly, but it wasn't just the alcohol, it was more of the atmosphere that makes Dewey so great. Amazing music, such an open and inviting town, very small and community oriented, yet very accepting of those who just want to totally let loose and be in the moment. That is Dewey a city of moments, many forgotten, but enriched within ones soul forever is the awesomeness that commences.
I would go into details, and I will in another post that is specifically about the Dewey Adventure. But right now want to focus on the comedown. See a comedown from Dewey is inevitable. When one rocks out for 3 days straight, many times forgetting to eat, never really sleeping, and drinking more than most people from "the normal world" would consider humanly possible, a crash back into reality following is to be expected, and you can expect it to be painful. It usually takes about a week to settle back into reality, and that's if you dint end up getting sick which could compound it even worse.
Well I was fully prepared for this week to be the Dewey comedown, but I guess God wanted to test my boundaries and not only smack me in the face with the back from Dewey reality, but slug me with another double whammy right off the bat. On the car ride back I was checking my facebook to see some horrible news about a friend who had had a freak accident while working on cutting down trees.
He had fallen, was put into a coma, with major damage, and while I'm reading about this got a text message from my nephew saying that they were taking him off of life support that afternoon. It took the rest of the ride for it to really sink in. It wasnt that he and I were very close, we shared a lot of mutual friends, hung out here and there through them, but there was always something special about him.
He had his vices and downside by many a means, but despite any of them, he was always there to help any friend any time he could. And he just really didn't care to settle for the normal fakeness of reality. Always liked to push boundaries, and always seemed to do his best to put a smile on the face of those around him. He reminded me a lot of myself in that, hell maybe I even picked a little of it up from him at some point.
By the time I settled in that night he had left us, and it was all slowly settling in, it ushered back memories of one of our good friends we had lost some years back to a motorcycle crash, as they were both part of a crazy motorcycle summer we had pushing limits, breaking rules, and owning our own fates.
It all just had me in a very nostalgic, sentimental place dreaming of moments past and moments lived.
I woke up in the morning and had a song stuck in my head, well really a few lines from a song stuck in my head, that really just told the rebel story of my friends lost, and the zest for life we had shared. I was already running late so I told my carpool to roll without me and I decided to ride the motorcycle in to work that morning. Already slightly speeding to make up time. The rumbling of the motor seemed to keep beat to the song playing in my head (as long as I kept the throttle twisted). The words "dreams were meant for chasing, chasing's meant for fools, fools are meant for living hard and breaking all the rules, rules bring comfort to the old and keep the younger ones in line, and lines are meant for crossing by the no good dreaming kind" (Thank you Levi Lowery) played over and over as I thought about both the friend who had just passed, and the friend that we had lost years back.
With that the throttle seemed to want to go just a little faster, I seemed to be willing to push the limits just a little more, and it seemed like I had them right beside me riding for that ride into work, which had me feeling really good... up until I walked into the office and the adrenaline buzz wore off and I realized I was back in the office and not on the beach.
I typically lock down pretty hard at these times and try to deal with everything myself. But I had met this amazing blonde the week before, she was gorgeous, smart, funny, and just seemed to have this zest for life. We clicked instantaneously, had so much in common, and went on a great date. I thought this had potential for a pretty wild ride, and more importantly a good friendship that could lead to who knows what. I decided to reach out to her while I was feeling low and see if she wanted to hang out to get my spirits back up. Well I was getting no response and starting to feel more like shit as I wallowed in my depression. I finally spoke to her briefly but she was rushing to get out of the convo, and the more I learn the more it seemed that she had another man on her mind.
As if I hadn't had enough to deal with, now I'm thinking of songs left unwritten from the beautiful moments we could have shared, and seeing that all flush down the toilet to add to the depression from the Dewey come down and loss of a friend.
It was a rough week for sure. I didn't bother telling anyone at work about either of the other depressing factors, I just let them assume it was all part of the Dewey come down, as I really didn't want to be in any conversations about it.
I faked my way through the week in many ways. Pretending to care about the really insignificant conversations that occurred at work and at home. Faking my way though looking like I cared about work, or anything that was going on outside, when really all my focus was on the depressing items, and the mess inside my head that resulted.
I was heading to the funeral home Thursday night. I decided to ride the motorcycle again, and just like before it just made everything feel just a little better. Made me feel more alive and less numb. I was feeling good by the time I hit the funeral home, I hd my nephew and his wife meet me out front so I didn't have to walk through alone, knowing they would know more people there than me. As I made my way through the hallways, I saw just as many people laughing and joking as there were crying, and I thought of how much that said about the person that was gone, and he was so able to bring smiles to their faces in life, that that was even able to carry on at his own funeral.
I managed to not tear up until I got casket side and had to go through the hugs and handshakes. Then I couldn't really hold back anymore. I gave my hugs to the family, and said my goodbye to my friend, went and tried to console some friends who were there, and then headed back to the mororcylce.
I fell asleep early that night, I kinda felt a peace around me that is kinda hard to explain. But the depression seemed to lift, and I seemed to feel less numb and more alive. Of course Friday morning starts a whole different story...
Ive danced, sang, laughed, cried, rocked out until my body literally collapsed in a heap. I met so many amazing people, some that I hope will be friends for a long time, and if nothing else the memories made will last as long as my brain is capable of remembering i suppose.
One wouldn't think that within the last 7 days so much could have occurred, but it has, and always does in my life. The high's of going to Dewey, hanging with the most down to earth, yet up in the stars people that I can ever find (and both statements are true and not contradictory if you understand Dewey).
Yes we drank ourselves silly, but it wasn't just the alcohol, it was more of the atmosphere that makes Dewey so great. Amazing music, such an open and inviting town, very small and community oriented, yet very accepting of those who just want to totally let loose and be in the moment. That is Dewey a city of moments, many forgotten, but enriched within ones soul forever is the awesomeness that commences.
I would go into details, and I will in another post that is specifically about the Dewey Adventure. But right now want to focus on the comedown. See a comedown from Dewey is inevitable. When one rocks out for 3 days straight, many times forgetting to eat, never really sleeping, and drinking more than most people from "the normal world" would consider humanly possible, a crash back into reality following is to be expected, and you can expect it to be painful. It usually takes about a week to settle back into reality, and that's if you dint end up getting sick which could compound it even worse.
Well I was fully prepared for this week to be the Dewey comedown, but I guess God wanted to test my boundaries and not only smack me in the face with the back from Dewey reality, but slug me with another double whammy right off the bat. On the car ride back I was checking my facebook to see some horrible news about a friend who had had a freak accident while working on cutting down trees.
He had fallen, was put into a coma, with major damage, and while I'm reading about this got a text message from my nephew saying that they were taking him off of life support that afternoon. It took the rest of the ride for it to really sink in. It wasnt that he and I were very close, we shared a lot of mutual friends, hung out here and there through them, but there was always something special about him.
He had his vices and downside by many a means, but despite any of them, he was always there to help any friend any time he could. And he just really didn't care to settle for the normal fakeness of reality. Always liked to push boundaries, and always seemed to do his best to put a smile on the face of those around him. He reminded me a lot of myself in that, hell maybe I even picked a little of it up from him at some point.
By the time I settled in that night he had left us, and it was all slowly settling in, it ushered back memories of one of our good friends we had lost some years back to a motorcycle crash, as they were both part of a crazy motorcycle summer we had pushing limits, breaking rules, and owning our own fates.
It all just had me in a very nostalgic, sentimental place dreaming of moments past and moments lived.
I woke up in the morning and had a song stuck in my head, well really a few lines from a song stuck in my head, that really just told the rebel story of my friends lost, and the zest for life we had shared. I was already running late so I told my carpool to roll without me and I decided to ride the motorcycle in to work that morning. Already slightly speeding to make up time. The rumbling of the motor seemed to keep beat to the song playing in my head (as long as I kept the throttle twisted). The words "dreams were meant for chasing, chasing's meant for fools, fools are meant for living hard and breaking all the rules, rules bring comfort to the old and keep the younger ones in line, and lines are meant for crossing by the no good dreaming kind" (Thank you Levi Lowery) played over and over as I thought about both the friend who had just passed, and the friend that we had lost years back.
With that the throttle seemed to want to go just a little faster, I seemed to be willing to push the limits just a little more, and it seemed like I had them right beside me riding for that ride into work, which had me feeling really good... up until I walked into the office and the adrenaline buzz wore off and I realized I was back in the office and not on the beach.
I typically lock down pretty hard at these times and try to deal with everything myself. But I had met this amazing blonde the week before, she was gorgeous, smart, funny, and just seemed to have this zest for life. We clicked instantaneously, had so much in common, and went on a great date. I thought this had potential for a pretty wild ride, and more importantly a good friendship that could lead to who knows what. I decided to reach out to her while I was feeling low and see if she wanted to hang out to get my spirits back up. Well I was getting no response and starting to feel more like shit as I wallowed in my depression. I finally spoke to her briefly but she was rushing to get out of the convo, and the more I learn the more it seemed that she had another man on her mind.
As if I hadn't had enough to deal with, now I'm thinking of songs left unwritten from the beautiful moments we could have shared, and seeing that all flush down the toilet to add to the depression from the Dewey come down and loss of a friend.
It was a rough week for sure. I didn't bother telling anyone at work about either of the other depressing factors, I just let them assume it was all part of the Dewey come down, as I really didn't want to be in any conversations about it.
I faked my way through the week in many ways. Pretending to care about the really insignificant conversations that occurred at work and at home. Faking my way though looking like I cared about work, or anything that was going on outside, when really all my focus was on the depressing items, and the mess inside my head that resulted.
I was heading to the funeral home Thursday night. I decided to ride the motorcycle again, and just like before it just made everything feel just a little better. Made me feel more alive and less numb. I was feeling good by the time I hit the funeral home, I hd my nephew and his wife meet me out front so I didn't have to walk through alone, knowing they would know more people there than me. As I made my way through the hallways, I saw just as many people laughing and joking as there were crying, and I thought of how much that said about the person that was gone, and he was so able to bring smiles to their faces in life, that that was even able to carry on at his own funeral.
I managed to not tear up until I got casket side and had to go through the hugs and handshakes. Then I couldn't really hold back anymore. I gave my hugs to the family, and said my goodbye to my friend, went and tried to console some friends who were there, and then headed back to the mororcylce.
I fell asleep early that night, I kinda felt a peace around me that is kinda hard to explain. But the depression seemed to lift, and I seemed to feel less numb and more alive. Of course Friday morning starts a whole different story...
Monday, April 4, 2011
classically conditioned to hold back...
a recent book i have been reading has talked about the "10 percent" of our worlds population that see things differently, a genetic predispotion to explore the subconscious, a need for challenging the norms, and feeling excitement, a distaste for man made rules and norms....
the i feel describes me to a tee...
then the book goes on to discuss how that rules and norms are built for the majority (the other 90% or seek order and structure), and powerbases are built up around maintaing the rules and order for these 90% and those of the 10% who threaten this with revolutionary, and unique ideas that threaten the norm and the power structure, are shunned, ridiculed, and scared into remission where they hide their impulses and desired actions, in order to fit in, and this creates a great discourse with their psyche's, thus leaving those like me stuck, not knowing how to express ourselves appropriately out of fear of being further ridicules because our understand and way of epression, are not aligned with whats been defined for the "normal"...
i think that this is a very relative concept as it marks me to a tee...
and can explain why i often will turn to the bottle, to hide away those in hibitors
the i feel describes me to a tee...
then the book goes on to discuss how that rules and norms are built for the majority (the other 90% or seek order and structure), and powerbases are built up around maintaing the rules and order for these 90% and those of the 10% who threaten this with revolutionary, and unique ideas that threaten the norm and the power structure, are shunned, ridiculed, and scared into remission where they hide their impulses and desired actions, in order to fit in, and this creates a great discourse with their psyche's, thus leaving those like me stuck, not knowing how to express ourselves appropriately out of fear of being further ridicules because our understand and way of epression, are not aligned with whats been defined for the "normal"...
i think that this is a very relative concept as it marks me to a tee...
and can explain why i often will turn to the bottle, to hide away those in hibitors
Sunday, April 3, 2011
walk straight, talk straight...
this past friday i went to see a local band "the soul miners" play at a little bar down the street,
this band is pretty awesome, they have amazing musicians and a great singer, and play really soulful classic R&B music,
once they get the crowd into it, people really seem to let lose, and just have a good time, i went early this time and got to lay witness to this transformational process of the crowd, and this really got me thinking...
i came upstairs before the band started, there were about 10 people in the bar total, i got the first seat at the bar, the other 2 groups of 5 were sitting at their tables, a bit of a mixed crowd between local townies and college kids, of different ages, mainly all white folk at first, though the crowd went to about 30% black as the night progressed....
when i first got there everyone seemed pretty uptight, there was little interaction beyond the groups that people had came with, everyone seemed to be doing their best to walk the straight lines they had been taught to walk, and afraid of getting shunned or looked at funny if they stepped out of this box...
when the band started playing, people started head bopping around a bit, singing along, starting to get into it, of course as the more beers progressed, the more shots were poured, eventually some people got up to dance,
there was one girl who went up to dance early, hadnt seemed to have much to drink, she was trying really hard, but looked like she had watched one of those how to dance on tape videos, she really didnt seem to be at peace with herself at all, a few girls that joined her started getting into it a bit, and they drug a guy that was with them out, you could tell he was apprehensious about going, he tried to get into it, but was really stiff, another guy standing next to me snatched the hand of a girl who was bopping along and took her to the floor, they started moving really freely to the rythm and seemed to be into it, of course the 3 rounds of shots i had seen him purchase, and the 2 tall vodka tonics she had had were playing a pretty good part in that...
before you knew it, more and more people, myself included, had had some more drinks, and got intoxicated by all the music and the atmosphere of others getting into it, as well as the great music, and we were all dancing along, it was a really cool transformation to witness, but one thought kept going through my mind, that these people really looked at peace, right with theirselves doing this, and why was it that they couldnt just do this all the time, why couldnt they even just do this earlier this night, before the rounds of alcohol, and the hours of great music, why was it that only after this could they let themselves feel so free......
this band is pretty awesome, they have amazing musicians and a great singer, and play really soulful classic R&B music,
once they get the crowd into it, people really seem to let lose, and just have a good time, i went early this time and got to lay witness to this transformational process of the crowd, and this really got me thinking...
i came upstairs before the band started, there were about 10 people in the bar total, i got the first seat at the bar, the other 2 groups of 5 were sitting at their tables, a bit of a mixed crowd between local townies and college kids, of different ages, mainly all white folk at first, though the crowd went to about 30% black as the night progressed....
when i first got there everyone seemed pretty uptight, there was little interaction beyond the groups that people had came with, everyone seemed to be doing their best to walk the straight lines they had been taught to walk, and afraid of getting shunned or looked at funny if they stepped out of this box...
when the band started playing, people started head bopping around a bit, singing along, starting to get into it, of course as the more beers progressed, the more shots were poured, eventually some people got up to dance,
there was one girl who went up to dance early, hadnt seemed to have much to drink, she was trying really hard, but looked like she had watched one of those how to dance on tape videos, she really didnt seem to be at peace with herself at all, a few girls that joined her started getting into it a bit, and they drug a guy that was with them out, you could tell he was apprehensious about going, he tried to get into it, but was really stiff, another guy standing next to me snatched the hand of a girl who was bopping along and took her to the floor, they started moving really freely to the rythm and seemed to be into it, of course the 3 rounds of shots i had seen him purchase, and the 2 tall vodka tonics she had had were playing a pretty good part in that...
before you knew it, more and more people, myself included, had had some more drinks, and got intoxicated by all the music and the atmosphere of others getting into it, as well as the great music, and we were all dancing along, it was a really cool transformation to witness, but one thought kept going through my mind, that these people really looked at peace, right with theirselves doing this, and why was it that they couldnt just do this all the time, why couldnt they even just do this earlier this night, before the rounds of alcohol, and the hours of great music, why was it that only after this could they let themselves feel so free......
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