- There are a couple of reasons that this edition is called the "recovering" edition. First is the proverbial elephant in the room, that being the anger and frustration I talked about from the last edition. I was definitely not in a good place when I talked about that stuff. Have things changed since then? Somewhat though there is probably always going to be a simmering anger due to my ongoing issues with depression but I am back from the ledge, so to speak. With the exception of a weekend in the middle of October which I'll get into later, I haven't really done all that much social-wise. For the last month or so I made a conscious decision to pull back from a lot of stuff and focus on myself. I needed to recover from all the angry turmoil I was going through and not return here at least until I did so. Part of that involved me working a Halloween seasonal retail job that just ended a few days ago...yes, that's right, my first retail job in over 15 years. Due to the nature of this particular job I had to pull back on some of my activities including DJRT until it was done. By the time it ended I was physically and mentally exhausted and I have been doing my best the past few days to recover from that exhaustion. Today is the first day I've had any sense of a "back to normal" feeling in a very long time. I still have some resting and recovering to do but I did want to let people know that I'm back from the brink. Something that's helped and will continue to for the foreseeable future is that I've been working on changing some things in my life that I've been wanting to for a long time...nothing major life-wise or affecting anybody else other than me but a lot of background stuff that needed either updated or changed outright or pulled closer to home in a couple of instances. The seasonal job helped me out with some of that and now I think I'm ready to get back to some of the stuff I love to do...dancing, DJRT, socializing, etc....and at the same time move forward with my life in general. I'm not sure where it's going short term at the moment because there's still some flux and I'm still in recovery mode but the long term is always in my thoughts especially regarding DJRT.
- Although I don't want to get into too much about the last edition, there is something from it that I wanted to touch on that I wrote about which may have seemed a little odd to include at the time...that being the "my friends being my friends" blurb. Something happened either before or after I wrote that up (I don't remember exactly when) that's related to what I talked about there which also had to do with something from an edition of DJRT I did earlier this year. Remember when I talked about a guy giving me the cold shoulder? If not, read the "cold shoulder" edition, but in that edition I really didn't get into why we had a falling out all those years ago...just that there was one. I saw him again at the club and for some odd reason internally I panicked and called some of my friends to come to the club just in case something happened. At the time I didn't know why I did that as I've never really been all that concerned about stuff happening at the club but some of my friends obliged me anyway and I am thankful to them for their support. After some time away and some serious thought I think I know why I panicked now and it's about something I came to regret over the years regarding that falling out on my end and how it led to the "my friends are my friends, period" vow.
There is a period of time between the end of the year 2000 and around the end of summer in 2002 before I started ITS and going to the Harry Buffalo where I was in a limbo of sorts in many areas of my life. Even though I just started getting help for my issues at that time, I was drinking pretty regularly, going to places that maybe I should not have and went through one of the biggest malaises I've ever had in my life. I hung out at a place called Banana Joes which was later called Margarita Mamas where I met and hung out with many different people. One of them was the guy who I talked about in the "cold shoulder" edition, a big, tall white guy named Roger (I don't usually give names but I didn't want to avoid doing that here and I wanted to note it's not about my old friend who died several years ago). We hit it off but something I noticed at the time I hung out with him is that nobody else really wanted to hang out with me. I didn't know why and I thought it had something to do with me personally or my depression. Sure they would be around me but I got the sense that I wasn't wanted, so I just hung out with Roger. One day all the avoidance really got to me and something happened...I don't remember what, but something happened where I just got angry at Roger and decided to stop hanging around him. Once I did that, people seemed to start warming up to me almost immediately and wanting to hang with me again. There were no changes in my daily or weekend routines and at the time I hadn't changed anything other than not being around Roger. Once people saw that I wasn't hanging out with Roger anymore, again, the people who were regularly around me at the time were much more friendly to me and cordial. It was like night and day and even now I don't have any real clue as to why things fell into place like that. At the time, once I started regularly hanging out with people in general again, I started getting this idea that Roger was part of the reason people weren't around me and until I really got into ITS I resented him for that. To this day I don't know if he had anything to do with that and it's a phenomenon I haven't experienced since. I came to regret the resentment I had for him at that time but the uncertainty of why things went down like that always stuck in the back of my mind. Something that may have factored into why that uncertainty was still there was that from the moment I started ITS and hanging out at the Harry Buffalo, I have not seen or heard from one single person that I hung out with from that time with the exception of four friends of mine (two who like myself started going to the Harry Buffalo and became better friends there and the other two I only became reacquainted with at the Red Fox this past year, none of whom were involved with any of this)...not one single person. It was like they dropped off the face of the earth. It was weird.
In any case, I believe that my regret about what happened with Roger combined with the fact that I haven't seen or heard from people I was regularly around then led to an epiphany for me in ITS that I hold to this day. That epiphany was that my friends were going to be my friends, period, and if people have issues because I'm friends with some particular person then they're the ones with the problem. I'm very thankful for the friends and people in my life and I don't want to take them or this epiphany for granted. I can't control what other people think or feel so if they have problems with that it's their burden to bear. With all that anger I was dealing with a couple months back, this regret was one of the things I've been angry at myself with for so long and it popped up again as I was compiling the last edition so I decided to include some of this stuff with it.
- Moving on, it looks like the Republican Party will take control of a majority of the U.S. Senate next year and have gains in the U.S. House of Representatives. For those people lamenting what happened in the elections yesterday, I can only say that the "Get Out The Vote" initiative for Democrats didn't work out all that well and it should be a priority for them to fix for future midterm elections. It was enough that it tempted me to want to jump back into working in politics again. Given my history with politics, that temptation is likely fleeting but I guess it means I can be motivated again. Some people might want to beware of that!
- Who woulda thunk that the Cleveland Browns would be 5-3 at the halfway point of the 2014 season with a chance to take a lead in the AFC North coming up with the next game? I didn't but that is the case. I may not be happy with how ugly the wins are but I'm happy with where they are right now and how things seem to FINALLY be turning around for the team. It's about damn time.
- The Cleveland Cavaliers had to institute a lottery to determine who would get single-game tickets for individual games this year. With how they're looking so far, unless they get it together in the next month or so they may be cancelling that lottery. Granted they are only three games into the season but they are looking rather sluggish for an All-Star-looking team. I hope they get it together and I think they will but I do want it sooner or later.
- Speaking of the lottery, I was able to avoid that by getting tickets for a preseason game at the Q. My friend Bob and I went up to watch them play the Dallas Mavericks, which they looked alright but since it was preseason it wasn't a full effort especially with Kevin Love and Shawn Marion given the night off. We had a good time though I was starting to get the aforementioned exhaustion from work around then which dulled my own personal enjoyment a bit. I will say this, though...it pays to go to official draft parties and events because I got free tickets to this game because I went to the NBA Draft Party at the Q back in June. It pays to be opportunistic sometimes.
- I want to congratulate my friends Dave and Sarah on getting married in mid-October. I was lucky and blessed to be able to help them out a little bit at their wedding and the afterparty at the Red Fox. It was a lot of fun and I wish them the absolute best.
- Since getting my Android smartphone a few months back, I've been playing a lot of different games on my phone...more than I expected to but I've been itching to try some since I got it. I regularly play Candy Crush Saga, Marvel Puzzle Quest, Avengers Alliance (though I think it needs updated a bit for Android) and Transformers Legends (a card game) One game that is sorta new but really good so far is called Legion of Heroes. It is the kind of game I might play on my computer or video game system and I just started it recently. There's other games that I do play but those are the big ones. I also want to note how much I've been using that phone. It has become a regular part of my life, more so than the other cell phones I've had in the past. I've used it for things I've never thought to before so it's been a blessing, for sure.
- The edition pic is something I came across randomly while surfing the net. It is a pic of the signs for some of the clubs in the South Campus bar district that used to be next to Ohio State. I went to Flyers mostly but I've been to some of the others like Coeds, Froggys and Mean Mr. Mustards. Looking at that pic I also remember my experiences at Park Alley/High Energy (my freshman year hangout...tons of good times there), Papa Joes and The Pit...interesting times I've had at those places and met a lot of interesting people, some I still hang out with or associate with now. Maybe I'll talk about those times again in a future edition but for now that pic is enough to take me back.
- Speaking of games, I came across a website that has a bunch of them online. It's called the Internet Arcade and it is a web-based library of old coin-op (remember that term?) and arcade video games from back in the day. You don't need to download anything...just go to the site, click on the game you want and play it in your browser. I haven't had the chance to check it out but I thought some of you might want to yourselves. For some of you, I expect it will take you back to some of your childhoods. Check it out.
- Song on Repeat: "Wedding Dress" by Matt Nathanson. With my friends' wedding and hearing about a lot more fall nuptials than spring or summer ones this year, I thought it would be an appropriate time to listen to this song on repeat. If I ever get married, this is one of those songs I would like to incorporate somehow into the ceremony. Of course that would depend on what my future wife would want to do, but in any case I really like this song.
- Shoutouts: Micah, Stephanie, Ron U., Melissa, Bob, Lynn, Alan, Mary, Brandon, Stephen, Kevin, Ron M., and Dave & Sarah.
That's it for now. I have been very busy as of late and I need to rest and relax for a while before I commit to anything else. I am in a better place mentally now than I have been for at least half of this year so I've got that going for me. I just hope I'll be ready for what comes next. With that I bid you all adieu. Until next time folks. Take care and God Bless.
DJ
