How I Got Here
after years of reading others' journals/blogs/message board rants, i decided to give in to peer pressure and do what all the kool kids do; put my thoughts out on the interwebnetthingy. is it because i have esteem issues and i need the positive feedback of others in order to garner some semblance of self-worth? no. is it because i'm trying to lose weight, stop doing drugs, or break into the porn industry (three separate journals that i currently read) and i want everyone to follow along with my epic struggle to see how strong i am and yaaaay me? no. (although if i were a porn actor, my name would be johnny seed). is it because i'm a narcissistic stooge that is so goddamn astoundingly funny that it would be a sin to withhold my gift to the world? precisely! i'm funny like a clown, i'm here to amuse you; to make you laugh - just don't tell me to go home and get my fucking shine box.
no, none of those are the real impetus. i suppose it has more to do with the large number of life-changing events that i've gone through in the past four years. it has spurred some need to get it all down on a permanent medium. i'm too lazy to keep a private journal. the attention whore in me would sometimes only do something if there was a potential audience. this forum also allows me to update my family without making ten different calls or emails. how am i, mom? just point your browser to www.toolazytocallhisownmother.org. there you can find what my porn name would be if dad were bigger in the pants and had passed along said trait to his progeny. love ya, mom!
the things that have happened to me over the past four years are as follows. prior to this, i was single, lived alone, slept until noon on weekends, and drank too much. one of those is still true, but i'll let you guess which one.
december 2000 - i propose to my then-girlfriend. shockingly, she says yes. had she said no, i was going to return the ring and put the money down on a boxter. alas, no boxter.
april 2001 - i move in with aforementioned girlfriend-cum-fiance (heh, cum fiance - starring johnny seed). we live in a two bedroom apartment above either a speaker salesman who works out of his home or a mostly deaf ex rocker who is laying down tracks for his new speed metal album. the dude is fucking loud. christ on a cross i had forgotten how much i hated apartment living until i wrote that.
december 2001 - i wed my beautiful bride.
january 2002 - we purchase a home that was currently being built.
june 2002 - we move into that home and thus begin our lifelong relationship with mortgage debt and the panic of owing a bank about three times what you make in a year. we're still going out, staying up and sleeping late at this point. all is bliss.
june 2003 - in the midst of going off zoloft for the first time in three years, i attempt to battle my reappearing depression by buying my wife a puppy for her b-day. he is a silly little beagle pup that we name huckleberry. the sleeping in stops here, to return only briefly down the road. he does not lift my depression, but rather compounds it. i'm such a creature of routine and habit that such a major upheaval was tough to say the least. however, it did give us an introductory course in "being soley responsible for another living being", which is a prerequisite course for Adulthood 101.
july 2003 - we find out that we are pregnant. because our lives hadn't changed enough, we wanted to add another wrinkle to the mix. yes, we were trying to conceive. i got back on zoloft. immediately.
march 2004 - our little bundle of joy is born. he's a bouncing baby boy and is everything we had hoped for. i won't lie and say it's all peaches and cream, but when the nurse in the delivery room handed our boy to my wife for the first time and she looked at him through tear-filled eyes and told him in a shaky-with-happiness overload voice, "hey little guy", the waterworks started with me (a guy who had probably cried twice in the past four years - thanks zoloft) and i realized that all i'd ever need was in that room. you've just witnessed one of many run-on sentences that i'll offer up.
to recap, that's a wife, a house, a dog, and a baby in four years. i try to have at least one major event each year.
so here i am now. i'm a happily married father of two - one being an eighteen month-old beagle and the other an eight month-old boy who is starting to provide as much joy as he is work. people with children will hopefully understand the truth to that seemingly harsh statement. at first, babies run a deficit. they're like plants. you feed them and water them and make sure they're clean and dry, but they don't give a lot back. slowly but surely, their personality starts to take shape and suddenly you don't dread three hours alone with them.
i think that's enough of an opener. i promise that most of my entries will not contain as much sap. my intent is to remain as sap free as possible. as a matter of fact, most of the content here probably shouldn't be read by children. well unless the child is like i was, which is to say, having an absolutely filthy mind and thus being able to handle my potty mouth.
here's my disclaimer; i will make MANY punctuation and spelling errors. and i have this annoying habit on not using caps. if either of those get under your skin, you'd probably best stay away. otherwise, hope you enjoy (all five family members that will comprise my "audience").
see you soon and happy thanksgiving.