Rediscovering Notebooks
Often I use this site as a kind of therapeutic writing, and I recognize that it is deeply boring to almost everyone. The act of writing in this form is something I have always deeply enjoyed. When I write there is a certain sense of finality about it. Writing about things is a chance to process them, and specify what you think. Too often there are definitions, thoughts, or ideas floating around in my head and they are fixed in a pseudo-transient state. I feel as if I have the thought all worked out, but when I try to pin it down I see that there were only ghosts of the idea moving around in my head.
Lately I have found increasingly more joy in journaling lots of small concepts. Writing about the little things that are bothering me, or the things I cannot say to anyone, the ideas that I cannot quite lock down. Not only have I been writing away my worries but I have been refining what I think of the world. Looking back over what I had written is not the point. Often times it is much less enjoyable to read than this site… and that is saying something, is it not? :P Quickly my small notebooks are filling up and it is time to look up to something a bit bigger. Sites like black cover and this post on deeplinking have led me to look for something new. A year or two ago I discovered moleskines and thought that they must be the end all be all of notebooks. I have found that saying their name either makes you sound ignorant, pretentious, or both when you pronounce it correctly, and people hate you when you try to correct them! On that basis alone I am prone to search for something new. In the course of searching I have stumbled upon Piccadilly. They have no problems associated with pronouncing their name and offer a solid set of products. Not only do they offer a billion notebook styles along with a solid “little black notebook” style (what I want), but they also are extremely affordable.
All said, I am enjoying writing, and looking forward to doing much more, but the concept of writing publicly is not as necessary. No, it never was necessary, but it was a useful outlet for both playing with websites as the urge struck and writing as the urge struck. Seeing as how my goals seem to be clearly stemming away from playing around with the website and with writing in this format. Who knows, though, things around here may go on for a good time to come.
Chapter Three
I have been encouraged a lot lately to examine what I am doing and figure out what I want to be in the future. Set some goals, do something interesting with my life. The idea of setting some grand lifetime goal is a bit beyond what I enjoy working toward. The space between is too great, and I get distracted easily. My new set of long term goals are all set to the scope of about six years. Six years give me just time enough to finish them all before my ten year class reunion.
Write a book, write a program, read 500 books, learn French, run a 100 mile ultra-marathon, and become an Ironman. While at first glance all of these things seem like insurmountable goals. Looking at them over the scope of six years, however, I can see a chance. With very little training I am attempting my first marathon this year. I am not ready at all, but I think there is a serious chance of my finishing it. Next year I could focus completely on running and complete a 50 mile and maybe even 100 mile run in the first year of pursuing goals. The next year I could do a half-ironman, mop up any running goals, and start learning french. Year three could be more ultras, and the half-ironman again, while I focus on writing a book. From this point I would still have three years to finish my book, write a program, keep learning french, and continue enjoying running in my spare time. Six years to transform me on paper. Six years to take college dropout, single, paper pushing Josh, and turn him into married, author, ultra-marathoner, programmer, Ironman, bi-lingual Josh. If I even accomplished one of these goals it would be awesome.
On top of these goals I hope to keep reading books actively. It has always been easy for me to get wrapped up in watching tv or wandering around the web. Many hours of my life have been lost to youtube and internet news. While the laughs and the information I have scavenged from those times has been important to me; there are bigger things I want to strive toward now. It is odd to look back and reminisce about the thousands of hours spent inside second life or halo. I miss those days. The guys from my clan look back and miss those days too. We have almost all moved on past them to other things. I do not doubt that this feeling will continue to follow me through many different circumstances as I get older. As for now, I relish the feelings felt through hindsight. So many hours spent playing around on the computer, and the odd thing is that I do not regret it at all. My only regret is that they could not continue on forever. Past-tense tends to be romanticized far beyond the reality of what happened. I do not feel that my backward looking view on this is all that romanticized though.
The past year of my life has been the turning of a new page, the end of the chapter. I am looking forward to all the things that I will do in this new chapter of my life. Not everything will be fun, or even enjoyable, but it will be full of blessings none-the-less. As I get older, and gain more experience I hope to not squander it, and press forward to be the best I can.
Month Left Idle
Here I go, preaching as always, about how I’m going to post at least weekly, and how it is all going to be great; then I disappear. You would think that getting engaged and deciding to, in fact, run the KC Marathon would be newsworthy events. They indeed are, but talking about their noteworthiness has been overshadowed by the demands that they have placed on me. Fussing with Ubuntu 8.10 Beta, Fedora 10 Beta, and switching ISP’s has left my connection to the web from home sketchy at best as I tinker around. Finally all seems to be righted and I can go on with my postings. Between planning a wedding, honing my focus on running, and reading a grand total of eleven books this month I do not plan to have any colossal things to say. Today I decided that I’m going to write a book. Not now or anything, but maybe in a few years I will sit down and start throwing down pages on something or rather till I’m done writing. After that I can sit down and start revising till I’ve re-written everything a few times. /me looks over the list: ironman, ultra-marathoner, husband & father, author, avid book reader. Seems like my 20’s should be an interesting time in my life to look back on. I prayed for ambition to go out and do something, now suddenly I find myself tugging the line on my end of that bargain wondering how God will see me through.
There are a few new ideas that I have spring up for the website. Who knows if/when I will see them through, but I will be sure to keep things posted for all you lovely search engine spiders that love to keep up with what I am doing. As for me, it is time to crawl into a warm bed and hope that the shower is warm tomorrow morning!