I have a dresser in my bedroom that has been in the family for a while. I’m told my uncle used it as a boy, which makes it at least 60 years old, and I’d suspect older. There are mounting points on the back, for a mirror that I’d never Continue Reading
Most valuable, simple things I’ve learned: Almost every utility faucet, (as opposed to the ‘pretty’ faucets in baths and kitchens), has a nut right underneath the handle/shutoff. If (when) the faucet starts to drip or leak, first try tightening that nut. So far, it has solved the problem every time. Continue Reading
I’m conflicted. It was easier to deal with being a clueless fuck-up, while dating. When things fell apart, I could look and say “Wow… I was an idiot there… shouldn’t have done that.” But it seems to suck a lot more when a productive, meaningful relationship falls apart. There’s nothing Continue Reading
I think reality only punishes me for relaxing or being lazy. Thats seems to be when clients freak out and shit falls apart. But when I work hard, wether for someone else or for myself, things just… flow. No one complains to me. Nothing blows up. This does not pair Continue Reading
“What do you do when (if) you ever feel like giving up?” – theaudacityofswope There is no such goddamn thing. There is only getting up and doing it all over again, smarter and harder, until something ups and fucking kills you, because that’s the only thing big enough to stop Continue Reading
It’s hard, right now. It’s been almost a year since Heidi broke things off. And I am still living there, for various reasons. And I think we both try really hard to make the best of it. But life is life. There will be good times and bad times. But Continue Reading
In my time with Heidi, I picked up a lot of practical experience in home repair, construction, etc. And by association, the incentive to do such work. (It had never really been an issue in my life before, since I’d lived in rental space my whole life.) I built things Continue Reading
Resolutions, goals, whatnot. What do I want to do or get from the coming year. I’ll publish a photo book. I don’t know what theme there will be yet. Lots of possibilities. But I want to do something new with my photographs. So I will put together a book, and Continue Reading
I took a class–with Heidi–at the Maryland Woodworkers Club; the Fundamentals of Woodworking class. I grew up with a father who did a bit of construction/roofing here and there, and the obligatory shop classes and boy scout projects. But I was long overdue for a refresher course. I’d been to Continue Reading
In no particular order, and open to frequent revision: Rule 1: Forget everything you’ve learned. Forget whatever you saw on every TV show, movie, fairy tale, or webcast. Most of them are ridiculous, stilted, or simplistic. Real emotions and hormones are unreliable, gritty, and erratic. To think a cleaned up Continue Reading
How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single minute before starting to improve the world. – Anne Frank, (via Holly)
Okay. I admit it. I’m done with puberty. My growth spurt is probably over. I think my voice has finished changing. So at the possibly-old-but-still-immature age of 35, I went out with a friend for the sole purpose of buying some more adult clothes.* Blue jeans and black t-shirts will Continue Reading
Being a “nice guy” is like being an alcoholic, in that you’re never really cured. There’s always that little bit of something in the back of your mind, waiting to jump out and take over your life again. So I speak from personal experience, but hopefully at a distance. It Continue Reading
main reason i didn’t join army and could never succeed in big business: I can’t accept “because I say so” as a legitimate reason.
I think I’ve spent much of my life screwing myself over. Admittedly, I have the social skills of a turnip. I’m willing to chalk that up to just some twisted little genetic joke. But every attempt at self-improvement seems to have been tragically flawed. Somewhere along the way I got Continue Reading
To clear up an apparently common misconception regarding my recent post on drinking… I was: NOT complaining about people who ask me if I want a drink NOT bitching about … well.. anything NOT upset with… anyone NOT saying I would never drink Obviously the subject has come up a Continue Reading
People behave rather ridiculously if you say you aren’t drinking. They don’t care if you aren’t eating, or you aren’t dancing. But if you don’t have a drink, there must be something interesting happening. And if you’ve never had a drink, the information will travel. It will be spoken in Continue Reading
Most of the trouble I cause in my world comes from an inability to stop myself from talking. At least 95% of those instances revolve around me being agitated to one extreme or another about something. And while I well know I should keep my mouth shut when I’m worked-up, I’m not always succesful. I could argue that most of the agitation is caused by someone else making inappropriate comments in a similarly excited state. But being occasionally unable to ignore such provocations–as you would expect from any rational person–isn’t something to be proud of.
I seem to be able to better handle it in business than my personal life. But then you won’t survive long in business if you take it personally, for various reasons, (mental health, upset clients, lack of objectivity, blah blah blah). And I’ve found that even when a client does go off the deep and attempt to take me with them, if I just keep quiet and wait a day or two, cooler thoughts will prevail without any intervention from me.
Failure is being without resource or hope. You have nothing and nowhere. You’re not only homeless, but literally on the streets, with nowhere to go, and no one to turn to. And you have no idea what to do to make it better.
To me, that was always the ultimate worst outcome of failure. (Sure, you can argue death would be worse, but if I died, I don’t think I’d care any more about the failure aspect. And I’m looking for real suffering, here.)
But…
Look at street people. Talk to them. Or, try to anyway. Most of the real, hardcore street people are not there because of a single bad turn of events in their life. Losing your job and getting kicked out of your apartment does not directly equate to peeing yourself and sleeping under a bridge for 15 years. I’m not trying to make any judgement call about these people except to say that they’ve usually got larger issues than a rough patch in life.
So barring extraordinary circumstances, no matter how bad the average, healthy person fails, they’re never likely to hit that perceived rock bottom.
The whole point of this is then to ask: if I simply cannot fail like I always worried, then what’s stop me from trying… anything? What have you always dreamt of doing, but you feared the worst? Well if the worst isn’t a possibility, then what’s stopping you?
I read a definition of success recently that I really like: Success is when opportunity meets readiness I think the original quote is about Hollywood, but it’s pretty universal, in my opinion. And it’s been very true about my own life. Every major thing that’s happened to me involved a Continue Reading
