Scale and how I don’t get it.

I’m in an industry where scale, proportion, and everything relating to size…. matters.

Sorry, that just came to me.  I had to.

But I hadn’t realized it has only been 18 months since I posted to this blog.  What happened around this blog… Seems like an eternity ago.  It actually feels absolutely insane to me that such little time has passed between now and my last post.  It brings some perspective to me: that what has happened is not the end of the world, that things move on, that even though I feel like I have wasted so much precious time – it hasn’t been that long.  I guess there has been so much change that the time seems ridiculous – when it hasn’t really at all.

• I had fallen in love.  Hard.  But, it wasn’t returned.

• I quit my job of 8 years to start my own company.  I was immediately picked up by another company, which didn’t work out.

• I started again.  In solitude and sadness, I tried to push on, and somehow I have.
• I got a new dog.  He belongs to my old dog.

You know, now that I write all of that over-dramatic bullshit, it doesn’t sound like a lot.  I live in the same place, but I don’t even feel like the same person I was… Only 18 months ago.I guess I am going through a period of huge transition in a short time without really realizing it.  I have done that before, when I was 20-22.  I have noted that I have been doing a lot of the same things since then.  I’ve been doing Yoga for 12 years.  Had the same this for 12 years, same that for 12 years.  I guess I will be looking back 12 years from now saying the same crap, but different things.  Periods of transition are where life happens.  I guess it is happening now.  You never really notice when it does.

And so, when I look at this last post, a mere 18 months ago, I think about how much has changed, and I’m actually amazed.  I guess what I’m trying to say is: I thought I had stopped living.  turns out: I haven’t at all.

 

Edit: Silly me.  I didn’t even see this earlier post, which I did… Not to long ago!  August still seems like an eternity ago.  Wow.

What have I done today. For that Matter, What have I done this month?

So here I am – two days in a row; but today I have nothing really to talk about.  I guess I am a bit lost today.  Nothing really seemed to happen to me today – I woke up, went to meetings, networking events, went on a date, and came home.  Seems pretty simple.

That troubles me a bit.  In reality, many things happened.  In a single 24 hour period, so many things happen to us internally, externally, and the like – yet, at the end of the day, sometimes we don’t walk away with anything.

So I’ll back up – what happened today?  What can I walk away with?

Well, I guess I made a decent decision on my personal real estate front.  I’ve decided I want more of it.  But until today, I had never made a plan.  It’s a simple plan, and there’s not too terribly much to it, but by a random chance, I came up with something that I can actually take action on.  To simplify, I have one home right now.  I got it with an FHA loan.  I want to rent it out and get another home.  However… If I rent it out the way it is, it won’t cash flow… it will barely break even or worse.  So: even though it sounds like a “no shit” to anyone else, I decided to throw in enough money to get out of the FHA over leveraged category, lower my P&I (not to mention get rid of my mortgage insurance premium – do I still pay that?  I don’t even know) then guess what?  The rents will support this as a cash flowing asset.  THEN I will move on to the next one.

I have the money to do that I just wasn’t thinking like that.  I was actually looking at buying something else.  However…  I didn’t think through with what I already had.  There’s more to it, details, why’s, and all of the rest… but that’s not what is important for this post.  What is important is – that is one thing I got out of today.

I need to focus on living.  Living is simply paying attention.  What is happening around me?  What am I doing?  What happens to me?  Its frustrating to think that one can go through a whole day, week, month… without understanding what has happened, without feeling it… without experiencing it.  Really, that’s what al of this is about: experiencing existence.  Yet, we get all tied up with our fancy cars and houses and other crap to the point that we don’t even experience anything any more.

Seems like I need to simplify.  Simplify your surroundings and distractions to… experience the surroundings and distractions.  I think I’ve been trying to simplify for about… I don’t know 10 years.  So far things have gotten more complex.

“What are you up to these days?”

I got a lot of that this weekend.  “Work,” I would reply.  That’s really it.

Although, that’s not it.

Now, when someone asks you that, I know they don’t want to hear a full on update of your sex, social, professional, spiritual, financial, artistic, and whatever else-life.  But, it kind of depresses me that the only response I can come up with is:

Working.

Yeah, although I’ve been getting on the right track, something needs to be fixed.  I feel a bit one dimensional.  What am I going to do get out of this rut?  Hmmm.

How time flies.

It is almost 11:30 this evening.  I don’t know what made me log into this wordpress account – one that I haven’t even thought of in over a year, but here I am.

I took this picture 11 years ago. It was the first picture I took with a digital camera. Kind of poetic when you think about it. Or at least when I think about it.

Life can change so much in a year.  When I look back on my life, a lot had happened in a very short span – in my early twenties – and again I guess it has happened again, in my – ahem- mid thirties (as much as I would like to call them my “early” thirties, it just isn’t true any more).  So many things revolve around that time in my life – I have been doing much of what I do now – Yoga, for example – for “thirteen years.”  I feel like I’m at another turning point now, and I’ve figured this much out:

I lucked out.

We went through a pretty rough recession.  I’m not convinced it is over – rather, I think we are going to run into different problems… hopefully without the same results.  But, through some real nastiness, somehow I kept a job, even though I went through a complete emotional meltdown that lasted for nearly a year.

But I made changes, and I think everything will be OK.  I feel like I don’t deserve it, but one can’t dwell on such things.  I have hurt some people over that time, though – those you will always dwell on.

I never did these things on purpose.  Since I’m talking in great generalities, I can at least say with confidence that I never cheated, or any of that.  But… I know I hurt people.  And I don’t like it.

Nearly a year ago I saw a movie that rings true today as it did now as it probably would have thirteen years ago as it will in another ten.

The Big Kahuna.  I polished off a bottle of Colorado Bourbon during this movie with someone I know I hurt.  It is, at least in my mind, the greatest monologue of Danny DiVito’s Career.  Read this slowly, with some regard to meaningful cadence.  It gets to you.   OK, maybe it just gets to me:

I’m saying you’ve already done plenty of things to regret, you just don’t know what they are.

It’s when you discover them, when you see the folly in something you’ve done, and you wish that you had it do over, but you know you can’t, because it’s too late.

So you pick that thing up, and carry it with you to remind you that life goes on, the world will spin without you, you really don’t matter in the end.

Then you will gain character, because honesty will reach out from inside and tattoo itself across your face.

I’m not looking back – I’m looking onward.  But I might actually write here once in a while again.  I’ll leave you with this.

Moving forward alone

Image of the superconducting Supercollider under construction in Waxahachie, Texas, 1991-ish.

Sometimes I am completely surrounded by people, but I am also completely alone.  I’m sure everyone gets that feeling.  I’m in the middle of a big paradigm shift at my company – currently I am running financial models for two different operations scenarios, and I have to keep relatively quiet about it while I figure it out.

Lean and mean… That’s what I’m planning on doing with this shop: rewrite the old business models, bringing our value in where it matters, and outsource the rest to professionals who can do the work.

Shifting that way, however, has some nasty side effects.  People will leave or be asked to leave… Some may stay – but in the end that will be their choice, not mine.  Times are changing, but obviously this is not working.

The tough thing is – I don’t have anyone to bounce ideas anyone off of.  I never have really experienced the concept of a mentor, and now, amongst other times in my life, is a time where I could really use one.  I’ve faced all of these challenges alone and it is no different, but I’m just tired of it.

 

Lies, Lies, and More Lies

The above picture pretty much summarizes my week.  It turns out that the enemy at work has been the one closest to me.  I’ve been told others were “conspiring against me,” but it was the one who I trusted, gave responsibility to, and had faith in who was the true culprit.  To identify her as the problem is emotionally taxing; I guess because I had so much faith in her.

The sad part is she didn’t know how well she could have had it.  The good part (for me) is that I am, indeed, her boss, and the problem can be solved with rather straightforward measures.  Still, it pains me.  She did a good technical job, but she almost got me to the point of leaving because she blatantly mislead me for her own agenda.  Sigh.

Epiphanies…

…do not work the way you think.  But one can think what they’d like if it brings them peace.

Aren’t weekends supposed to be easier?

I can’t see the bottom yet. That’s good, right?

News that my business is in serious trouble.

 

I put out feelers for other employment, I already have several responses.  And that was from emailing four guys.

 

Downloading my business problems on Friday to someone who doesn’t want to hear it.

 

4 hours in 100+ temperatures riding my bike

 

An unexpected visitor in an awkward looking situation.

 

Another 4 riding hours in 100+ temps this time in the sun.

 

An awards ceremony.

 

A funeral.

 

The Ex.

 

That’s my weekend in 76 words.  I am exhausted physically and mentally.  The last two have hit me pretty hard, now I can’t seem to focus on anything.  I have a lot of stuff to deal with today.  At the funeral, a well-known company called me.  I think the word about me nosing around looking for a job is out.  I did not answer.  All I want to do is go to sleep, but I have to focus.

 

Right now, I have to focus on the task of figuring out what to focus on.  What I cannot afford to do is think about how tired I am.  I have to keep moving.

A text.

My phone goes off.  Someone texted me.  Who would be texting me before my alarm clock goes off?  I didn’t check it.

15 minutes later I pick up the phone and look.

“[Her] system is shutting down.”

It is from my ex girlfriend’s father.  I know that by the time I was reading that, my ex’s mother had passed away.

It didn’t blindside me.  She was terminally ill, having been diagnosed with MS in the early 1990’s.  I guess what did blindside me was that my ex’s father chose to tell me as it was happening.  The thought of me crossing his mind during that moment… it is a hard thing to bear.

“No more pain,” he wrote.

I spent most of the morning thinking about what I should do.  I asked him if he needed anything, he said he didn’t.  I spoke to a few people about it.  I wanted to reach out to her.  Not to get back together or do anything like that – just say that I’m here.  The trick, I thought, was to make sure it didn’t LOOK like I was trying to do anything like that – my feelings are sincere.  I know she’s got lots of friends and she may be dating someone; I don’t know or care.  But in some way they are my family, too.

“Are you going to the funeral?” a friend asked.  I don’t think so – not so sure I would be welcome.  Sure, if I was invited… as my friend pointed out: “it would be weird.”  I have been in stranger circumstances.

After considering all morning, I finally opted to call her instead of texting or any other BS.  She could take my call if she so choses.  I left her a voicemail just saying I was sorry, and if she needed anything, let me know.  I got a text from a friend who was with her, asking if she could call me back – they were at the funeral home.  I replied – only if she wants to.

A few of our mutual friends have let me know about this, just in case I didn’t.  I appreciate that.  However, it just brings everything back again.

I’m not sitting in my office waiting on the phone to ring.  I don’t know what I would say if she did call, but I would do what I said – I will be here for her.  But I am sitting here mourning.  I’m thinking of moments when she would break down and cry because a song was being played on the piano – a song that her mother used to play, but couldn’t any more. Things like her mom telling me she was glad I was in her daughter’s life.  Things like times when her mom was so loopy due to medication, and others when she was as sharp as a tack, despite being mostly blind and quadriplegic. Things like traveling with her on a plane.  Things like transferring her from a wheelchair to her bed.  Things like how she faced every day with a certain pleasantness about her, despite the pain she bore.  Things like that.

The world lost a great lady today.

The Capacity

Things seem unemotional, no pleasure, but a little tinge of pain.  I hate how things can be so complicated when they don’t have to be.  The human mind does terrible things to the soul.

I don’t know why I’m writing this other than to say I have taken the path that I wish to take and there is terrible remorse.  I’ve done so willingly; intentionally.  There has been extreme contrast between what I have experienced in the last four years and what I have experienced since that chapter ended in my life.  However, right now, I can’t give back, so I let go.  Right now I just wonder if I have lost the capacity to love altogether.

A dream

I’m in a fog.  It’s cool outside…  My hands reach out.  I’m in the back of a pickup truck.  I feel around, my hands only finding the bed of the truck.  It’s white.  A compact, think.  I become aware of a presence.  It is dark.  He or she looks threatening, but I am not afraid.  It’s almost like I know who it is, but I don’t.  The silhouette seems like a black negative against the fog.

I feel myself slipping out of the back of the truck.  The truck is driving away, but I am staying still.  My hands slide along the bed until the truck glides out of my reach.  The red lights trail away from me in the fog, then fade out of sight.  Other dark figures are around me.  I’m still not afraid… Almost comfortable.  Then, slowly, they turn away from me and fade away.

Now I’m alone, feeling a great sense of loss.