Into December

I didn't see last night coming. I wasn't even supposed to be at Bible study; I was scheduled to be scoring a Stratford basketball game. But the night prior, I received word that the game had been changed to a road game and so I was able to attend Bible study group. And I'm certainly glad that I was able to do so.

After studying the second half of Colossians 3, the guys and girls departed to their respective places for quiet time, just the same as every week. David, our leader, asked for the floor, which I found a little odd, since he usually prefers someone else goes first. As he spoke, I could sense trouble in his voice and distress on his face. He told us that one of the married couples in our group was separating, and was likely going to divorce in the near future. I didn't expect it, I had no indications that anything was wrong, other than that Andrew wasn't present that week. It's strange, I haven't spent time with the two of them, but of all the married couples in the group, I felt like I related most closely to them in terms of personalities, likes, dislikes, etc. Even though we have a good sized group of about 10 or so people most weeks, when we break in half for guy/girl time, the loss of anyone feels noticeable. And losing him would be a difficult blow to recover from, between his humor and how approachable he was. And it doesn't sound right to use the past tense. But I fully expect him to not only leave the group, but possibly the Hampton Roads area in general. I've heard him often speak of his negative feelings on Virginia. This just gives him the out that he might be wanting, even if it's not through the ideal circumstances.

I prayed a prayer I've never prayed before. "God, please take away my desire to date." I'm tired of the hurt and the frustration. And the sad part is it could be almost any woman. Doesn't matter her age, her location...ok, I do care about her mental health, looks, and faith. But I can get so resentful when I see or hear about a new relationship. And I'm going so back and forth on this. I value my independence, because I've wanted it for so long, I waited till I was 35 to leave home. Know what I'm thinking it is? I'm still looking for that acceptance that I'm struggling to find in myself, and I look to a woman in order to have it. That's not a fair burden to put on a woman. If I can't accept myself, if I can't see myself as God sees me, then no human approval is ever going to satisfy me. I know this is the truth, but inside, I also know that I don't own it yet. It's not part of my core. And the sooner I can do this, the sooner I can become a more confident, content man.

Ok, I think that's enough self-reflection for one post. Now I'm going to ramble about randomness. I purchased my first Smart TV this past weekend. 43 inches from LG. It's just the right size for my living room and while it may not sound too large, upgrading from 28 inches to 43 is enormous. I've figured out YouTube. Unfortunately, I don't think it has WWE network installed, so I may have to run that either through my smartphone or computer. But I'm wondering if I need to subscribe to Netflix, hulu, Amazon prime, or some other streaming service in order to justify this purchase. I don't care about the original series; I don't have the time or interest to binge watch a bunch of series. Just give me good movies and documentaries and I'm satisfied.

Mom sent me a 3 piece table and chairs. Oh my gosh, what a headache this is turning into. The kit includes these cast bolts which are like large Phillips head screws with spiral locks on the bottom. I've already broken three and need to have a new set of hardware sent to me so I can complete the table. At least I got both chairs together inside of an hour.

Why do I do this to myself? I swore off going to road games to watch my team play. I feel as though they're not even fun anymore. As soon as my teams trail, I pretty much think it's over. It's honestly amazing that I've never been kicked out of a stadium or arena before. So now that it's the offseason and I'm bored at work, I start checking the Mets schedule and planning trips on my own and with the 7 Line Army. I'm looking at Kansas City, Cincinnati, Minneapolis, Philadelphia, and Washington DC.
Why am I doing this? It must be for the travel. I can't think of another reason that's valid.

I'm listening to the Babe Ruth biography on audio and while it's incredibly detailed, it is so hard to follow. Reading a biography that's non-chronological is fine, but when it's out of order and jumps around so frequently, it becomes much more difficult. And this is a 23 hour listen, and I'm only 6.5 hours into it.  

Virginia Jets Fans changed venues. We left Keagan's due to food quality and complaints of their regulars. Instead, we moved less than ten minutes down the road to Cali's, a small new establishment located in a strip mall. It's a sports bar that clearly used to be an Asian restaurant, since the bar looks like a sushi station. Their wings are really good, I think the chef uses rice flour to get that light crispy coating. The parking is far better, no more garages and elevators and 2 hour limits. There is certainly less ambience without the Irish vibe that Keagans provided. Also, we can't really control the volume up and down during commercial breaks like we could at Keagan's. But the viewing experience is better with additional TV's too. I think it's a positive a positive change after one week.

Well, tonight I return to the sidelines for Stratford basketball. I only hope I remember how to track the stats like I was doing before. Because there's no warmup, there's no exhibition season. It's right back into the fire tonight at 7 pm. And I'm getting paid $40 for two hours of work. A typical Friday night at Tucano's typically nets me around $45, give or take $5 either way. So I'm not on my feet and I'm working half the amount of time. It's a no brainer in my mind.

Frenetic

Work has been kind of taking over my day to day life and I really don’t even mind that. People complain constantly about wanting to go home and what day of the week it is or isn’t. It’s not that I’m in love with my jobs, but maybe they’re a convenient distraction from me being alone with nothing on my mind but my own thoughts, which are getting harder and harder to control.

The mind is a funny thing. I thought as I got older, I would get better at managing my thought processes. But instead, I constantly struggle with rejection, self-pity, and fear of losing everything that I’ve worked for. And then when I struggle to regulate my mind, I only get more upset. It’s a constant cycle of inner frustration.

Keeping myself busy isn’t going to remedy the problem and I know that. Willpower doesn’t work. To address the issue at hand, it requires something deeper than that, more core-focused than that.

Strange thing is I am feeling more and more confident at my day job. Ever since I moved away from the boss and down the hall into the office where my colleagues work, I’ve learned a lot more. The reason for that is because I’m doing the tasks that they were already doing. That’s nothing against the boss at all, it’s just that I’m now surrounded by people who are doing work that I’m doing, so it’s more relatable.

I shouldn’t be too shocked that Stratford reached out to me last month. When an employee is reliable and does their job well, the good people remember. And so, I believe it was on Halloween afternoon when the assistant athletic director called me, asking if I’d come back and do live basketball statistics. Truth be told, I’d rather do the basketball games. It’s $50 guaranteed for two hours of work. And certainly on some nights, I would make more waiting tables. But that’s for five hours of work while walking constantly without a break. And there have been many Friday nights when I’ve walked out of the building with closer to $40 or $45 in my pocket. From what I can tell, there are only four games that conflict with my restaurant shifts on Friday and Saturday nights. So to me, the choice isn’t very complicated.

Also, I applied for a freelance gig editing English papers. I’ve already turned in my paperwork and completed my sample. Although I’m a little bit alarmed that on my background check, it showed both my driving citations from the last year. Now personally I don’t think that missing a stop sign and one speeding ticket should disqualify me from earning $12 an hour by checking a student’s ability to develop a thesis statement. But we’ll see if anything comes of it.

So add it all up and I’m facing the possibility of working four jobs every week. And it doesn’t even scare or overwhelm me.

I'm getting bitter at the thought of romantic love. Almost every time there’s a new engagement or a new relationship being posted on social media, I feel ill inside. It doesn’t matter who the girl is. I don't see it changing. And I don’t want to feel that way. There is a part of me that wants to not care anymore. I have lived in the crush zone most of my life. Looking for the girl who I could have hope that something could work out. It would frequently lead to disappointment though. And almost all of the girls who I have dated, I settled for them. I thought to myself recently that life would be pretty good if I my biggest hurt in life was related to those kinds of relationships not working out. I still want and need friends. That will never change, I’m not trying to be a hermit here. Maybe all of this is why I'm pouring myself into working.

I can’t believe it took me two weeks to finally write about the Wicked 10k in Virginia Beach. Rain had been forecasted all week. I had never run a race in the rain and I certainly didn’t want to start while running the farthest I’d ever attempted in my life outdoors. On the 45-minute drive to Virginia Beach in the dark, there was some steady sprinkling, but once I crossed over the tunnel and into Norfolk, there weren’t any real problems. I had woke up at 5:00 a.m. and ate an almond butter sandwich and a banana.

I picked up my packet inside the Virginia Beach Convention Center, dropped my dry bag off at the booth, and was given a women’s shirt instead of a men’s. Of course, I didn’t think enough to check the gender. Let’s just say the neck line was down way too low for me.

I tried to run at a steady 7.5 mph, or 8 minutes a mile. The only checkpoint I had was at the halfway mark of 3.12 miles. I crossed that line at 24:37, for a 7:26 pace. By this point, I was running south on the boardwalk, past the Neptune statue, and I knew it would be a challenge to maintain that pace for 25 more minutes. But one thing I know about by Billy to run is that I'm a good finisher. I didn't feel myself speeding up, but clearly I did. Because by mile 5 I barely had anything left in the tank. I was so fatigued, that I began skipping as I worked my way on to Pacific Avenue for the last mile.

 The tricky part with the course was due to the change because of the expected weather, we weren't finishing with a straight away run down the boardwalk, we were finishing by running around the convention center of period so when I thought I was right at the end, I would have to make another turn and then another. I probably had 2 or 3 quick stops in the last half mile and I probably power walked for about 5 seconds. Eventually I got a steady jog going again and I was able to maintain that jog for the last quarter mile across the finish line. I don't even know if I saw my time, probably because I was so exhausted. But I took my banana, water, and finishing medal, of course I passed on the chocolate chip granola bar and headed inside for the party and vainly tried to catch my breath. 

Panting, I reclaimed my bag with my cell phone inside and checked for my alerts. I had two text messages, one with my midway time and then the second with my finishing time. I opened the text and I could hardly believe it. 

48:52

I thought I was going to finish around 55 minutes as I was hitting the wall. But I beat my goal over a minute. And I don't think it'll be my last 10k race. I don't know how much farther I could push my body. A 10 miler maybe, if I could learn to go slow. A half marathon, I don't know. My whole thing is they only had soup for food there. There should have been a couple of food trucks too. I gladly would have paid for a couple of sliders at that moment.

Song pick: "Quits" Gary Stewart