Monday, October 8, 2012

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes.


When in doubt, start writing. That’s what I always used to say, five seconds ago in my brain. It’s true though, you do have to keep skills up even if it’s something you're inherently good at. In fact it might just be like much more important if it’s something you're good at. Michael Jordan would have been robbing the world if he had decided to never practice basketball. So it is with great humility, and an understanding that I am clearly as talented as a worldwide icon, that I begin my quest to better myself… to how I used to be.

When I was twelve, I thought the universe was indeed very complex because I was a nerd, but my portion of it was very small and sheltered. I thought I would have a million chances in life, untold amounts of good fortune, and probably just like the best life ever, that anybody ever had. I didn't actually realize that I was already living the same life I would be 20 years down the line. Sure I own a house now, I have a full time job, I might even be considered respectable. Well scratch that last one, but the point is I've been around, I've changed, and I don't think that all of it has been for the better.

I have been battling bad habits my entire life. When I was three, my parents sent me to a baby sitter who gave me a glass baby bottle to drink from. I don't know why someone gives a three year old a bottle, I must have been either very convincing or very klutzy, probably the later. So I come home from the babysitter with a bottle and I wanted to drink everything out of it. I remember my parents being very angry that this person had given me a bottle, because my parents had never once given me a bottle. (For some natural living hippie reason I’m sure I will find out about when I become a parent.)

Their solution to this problem was to hide the bottle from me, tell me that I “must have lost it somewhere.” They decide that no matter how much I cried and screamed that I knew they had been destroyed my precious, deny it to the bitter end. And I mean end, my father will still say he lost it, it to this day, but never could without twittering maliciously  No issues formed there at all.  I had the last laugh though, later when I was that nerdy 12 year old, I bought a glass bottle at a dollar store and drank everything out of it in my dad’s (clearly the ring leader of the whole thing) face for like a week. No issues at all.

But like I said, bad habits die hard around here. I have a few I need to overcome. I think I will use the same technique that worked for me when I stopped biting my nails and started obsessively recording all the names of the meteorologists that read the weather on the recorded DC area weather line I would call late at night and replace a bad habit with a much weirder but slightly less destructive one. I have yet to figure out what that thing is, but I am pretty confident the first step is getting window blinds in all the windows in my house. Yes, I will be that weird. I'm pretty sure that is what it will take this time.