Life Goals

Recently I had a conversation with a friend about legacy. We were talking about what you would leave behind after your life and what kind of lasting impact you would have. I posited that given enough time, no one would be remembered.  A bleak outlook, I know, but think about it. Here's a thought experiment.  Come up with a list of the top 100 most influential people of ALL TIME. Good people, and bad people alike can fill this list.  You've obviously got your religious icons (Jesus, Buddha, etc.), your great thinkers (Aristotle, Plato etc.), some great warriors, dictators, and politicians (Hitler, Lincoln, whomever), people in other categories... whatever. Try to come up with 100.

Got it..?

How long did that take you?  Honestly, I even had a hard time coming up with categories and people to put in them.  Could you even finish? How many people were alive within the last 100 years? How many people lived over 1000 years ago? Do you really think there was no one who is as influential to human history more than 2000 years ago? What about the caveman who invented fire? What was his or her name? Even if you were able to come up with a list of 100, a quick google search says that there have been 108,470,690,115 to have ever lived (website). Your list is .00000009% of our species' population.

Granted, I'm not a historian and don't think about things like this much. Also, you could argue that it's not the person's name that is important-- it's their work/idea/invention/ whatever... but I think given enough time, EVERYONE will be forgotten on an individual level.  No one knows WHO invented the wheel, just that it was invented (around 3500 BCE according to google). 

So personal legacy is bogus.  It's a pipe dream. You will eventually be forgotten.  

:) And that's okay. :)

But then, what is there to strive for? Why bother getting out of bed every day? Well...I would imagine there are some people who strive to be in that .00000009%.  That's great. There needs to be. But I am not one of those individuals.

What I want in my life is to make a difference to individuals. I want to help someone NOW. When I die, I want people to say, "Jesse affected me in [this way]." After that, it doesn't matter. If I can make a significant difference in one person's life, I will have been successful. 

I like to think that I have made peoples' lives better in small ways.  And that's why I get up every morning. 

j

Regret

I don't regret much in my life. Truth be told, I can only think of one specific regret and oddly, it isn't even that bad. The quick story is that one time I was supposed to be the designated driver but got sufficiently drunk and could not hold up my end of the bargain. Someone else had to drive us all home that night. I regret this because I feel like I let my friends down (they probably don't remember that instance), and worse than that, I let myself down. I hold myself to a very high standard and usually meet it. Letting myself down is why I have that one regret.

Here's the thing though. Just because I don't have many regrets, it doesn't mean everything in my life is perfect and/or has gone swimmingly. I, like everyone, have made mistakes. There are many things I wish I could go back and do over, or say more clearly, or even have go down in a different way. But the thing is, I don't regret those times. I wouldn't ACTUALLY go back and change those things. I think all of the "regrettable" times I've had in my life aren't actually regrets because they have led me to be who I am and have led me to where I am today. I've learned from all of those experiences and can (and hopefully have) become better because of them. The designated driver incident was a time I let myself down, and didn't learn anything. I knew what I was doing, knew that I shouldn't order another drink, but did anyway. That's why I regret that incident.

But honestly, despite the title of this post, my regrets (or lack there of) are not why I'm writing tonight. I'm writing because of a relatively recent conversation I had with a friend. We were talking about a memory I had and how I wish I had done something as I was leaving that day. Her response was, "that wouldn't change anything [now]." But what she didn't understand is that it's not about changing something. For me, it's about seizing the opportunity and not leaving potential experiences out there and unexperienced. It's not about how things would be different today based on a small change from months or years ago, it's about wouldn't it have been great then if I or we had done that thing.

True or untrue, I think many people regret things that they think if they changed, their current situation would be somehow better or different. As I am not unhappy with my current situation, I don't look back and think about what I could have changed to make now better. This is now, now. Everything that is happening now is happening now. We passed then just now. So live for now.

Sorry... I got thrown off by a particularly relevant Spaceballs quote. But again... My life isn't perfect. I have problems and I will be the first to admit and acknowledge my mistakes. But it's okay. I will be okay. Life will be okay. And the sun will both rise and set tomorrow.

Don't look back and wonder, "what if I had changed things?" Be grateful for now and what you do have. Remember the hard times and grow beyond them.

This whole post is terribly cliche and so I will end with another cliche movie quote:

"Your life is an occasion. Rise to it."

j

Where to Go

So I've been thinking a lot recently about where to go from here. All things considered, life is pretty good. I have a stable, secure job where I make a hefty salary that keeps me comfortable, I bought a house a few years ago that is worth almost double what I paid for it, i have a pretty decent group of friends, family is moving to this part of the country and will only be an hour away, and I have fun and travel and do all the things that I want to be doing.  So why this feeling of restlessness?  Why is it that I was seriously considering moving back to the east coast soon?

If I'm being honest, there are 3 main reasons and one over arching reason that I sort of now think is the real answer. First, there's family. More specifically, my grandparents and my niece, Caitlyn.  As they get older, my grandparents are all starting to not do as well both physically and mentally. I would say that of my entire family I'm closest to my paternal grandfather so
this really bothers me. I want to be there with and for them all three of my living grandparents in their final years. So there's that. Then there's Caitlyn, my niece. My FIRST niece. I don't know if I will have more nieces or nephews (or for that matter, kids of my own) but as of right now, I just have the one. I want to be there with her as she grows up. I want her to know who I am and I want to have a relationship with her. As of right now, the last time i saw her, she thought i was a stranger and cried almost instantly when my sister left the room and it was just me and her. The psychology major in me is thinking of Ainsworth's Strange Situation Experiment, but that's for another time.

Secondly, there were my friends that I left behind. This year, there was a rather large incident that echoed through the entire friends group, and I felt this sense of regret that I couldn't be there to help anyone through it. Most of all, it affected 4 close friends, but as I said, the ensuing fallout affected the entire group. I have this strange feeling of obligation towards my friends and although I did what I could for all parties affected (e.g. being there for them emotionally and to talk through the issues), I wasn't actually there FOR anyone.

Lastly, there's the girl. There's always a girl. I constantly think about what could be (or at least could have been). Ultimately, we agreed that it doesn't make sense for us to try to date or whatnot because of the 2000 miles between us, but that doesn't stop me from thinking, "man she would love this" or "can't wait for the next time i'm back her way", and for that matter, having feelings for her (however compartmentalized they may be). As it stands, she's the only person I have a picture of on my desk at work and the only person I talk to every day.  She's also the one person I go out of my way to see every time I've been back East.

The thing about these reasons is that really, they're just excuses. Validations in my head to do something that I really don't need to do.  And like excuses, they're easy to see through or undermine. For instance, my grandparents are only going to live a few more years (probably) and then i'll be in a place that I don't want to be. I want to be there for Caitlyn but I don't need to be. She has parents and other uncles and I can be that uncle that she travels to see in a cool destination city when she's older. My friends are doing fine without me and like most things, they've settled a bit with time (they're still hard but definitely better than they were). I can't move back for a girl when the future is so unsure. Will I still be into her when I get there? Will she be into me? Will one of us be dating someone else? These are questions without answers and I can't let her be the only thing I'm moving back for.

And so I guess there was a fourth reason. Something that is really overarching and is related to me feeling all of these things. As I said in the intro, that thing is restlessness. I feel like my good life has become boring and monotonous. I want to shake things up and do something different. I've been all over the country this year with various people, and that's all well and good and fun, but it's not enough. I have friends, I have a movie theater basement, I have all the things I could want, but I'm so BORED with my life. I felt this same way for a couple years before I left CT, and it's what drove me to move to CO in the first place. I still hold that it was the best decision of my life but I'm starting to feel the same way again. What else is there??? Why is nothing ever enough and why do i always seem to want MORE. Am I just a restless soul who needs constant stimulation and new environments to be happy? I am happy...just restless. I could be happier. Maybe I just need a girlfriend who I don't get bored with in 6 weeks. I don't know. All I know is that I'm glad I finally figured out what is REALLY going on. The first step is admitting and identifying the a problem, right? Sigh. Step one...check

j

New Place and Pair Bonding

It's been a while internet. Last time I posted I was not a HOMEOWNER. This time, I most certainly am and let me tell you something, it's been a helluva ride already.

I closed on a three story townhome on Jan 14, 2015. It's got 3 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms, two living rooms, a front and back patio, and a detached one car garage. It's humungo to the point where I still don't have any furniture on the bottom floor, haha. I bought something this big for two reasons. First of all, the price per square foot for real estate in Colorado is astronomically low, at least in comparison to CT. It's a matter of public record so i don't mind telling you that I paid $179,000 for 1916 sqft which translates to a mere $93.42 per sqft. By comparison, some friends in CT bought 1491 sqft for $270,000 ($181.08/sqft). Almost DOUBLE for less space! As far as cost of living is concerned, you should stop what you're doing and move to Colorado. It won't be as easy to find a single family home as the market for those is hot hot hot, but what you do find will still be cheaper than the northeast.

Secondly, before I bought, everyone told me to buy something that I could grow into. At the time I was looking, I was about to turn thirty and was dating a great girl. The advice, coupled with those two other factors got me thinking about settling down, starting a family, and making sure that the space I was about to buy would be able to accommodate the potential increase in family size that could be a real possibility in the next five-ish years.

Turns out that the girl and I didn't work out, but that's a completely seperate blog post... The long to short of it is that I didn't feel the same way about her as she felt towards me, and we had fundamentally different views on certain big picture ideals that I felt neither of us should have to compromise. We only dated for six months and I wanted to end it before marriage was the expectation, both from her and from everyone else in our lives. She's a great person and I wish her the best in life and hope that in time, we can be friends.

But this whole scenario leads me to the second major topic of this post. Pair bonding. Relationships.

Before I moved to Colorado in 2013, I was very happy being single. I did things because I wanted to do things and because they were fun. I did things for me. I had a bevy of close friends to experience things with, but i was equally happy to do things alone. I will fully admit that I've always been and probably always will be a romantic, but I was happier to not be tied down with a relationship. And I think in itself, that drives at my point. In the past, a relationship was a burden. Something that you carry with you because of some sort of need for another person. It was a co-dependancy. I didn't want that. I've never wanted that. I still don't want that. But the change has come in the bevy of friends department. Whereas I have friends here in CO, they're not the same kind of friendships that I had in CT. To be sure, every close friendship that I had in CT was in itself, just like a typical romantic relationship. Each was cultivated over time with ups, downs, and all arounds.  There was a history with each person that was something special and was not- could not be replicated with the next person. Indeed I am very lucky to have that in my life.

That being said though. I don't have that here in Colorado. There aren't years of history between my friends and me because at this point in all of our lives, we all have that history with other people. That's not to say that we're not building relationships... It's just that at this point, the relationships that I'm building with others are for the most part, not as deeply rooted. I fully acknowledge and take some responsibility for not putting in the effort to build the deeper kind of relationships, but neither are others. People already have husbands, wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, best friends, and everything else that comes from a lifetime of living. Which leads me back to pair bonding...

Most people don't have the intricate and deep network of multiple friends that I've built over the course of my life. People have people, but I fully understand and respect how lucky I am. The search for a pair bond is the search for what I've had throughout my teens and twenties. It's the search for one other person to share things with. It's the search for one other person to experience things with. It's the search to interact with someone on a level deeper than how you connect to all the other great people in your life. We're looking for one other person to really live with. I'm glad that I left CT because now that I'm "alone" here in CO, I'm ready to try and find that one person.

Till next time, internet.

j

2 Weeks of Guests

So the last couple weeks have been chock full of fun and adventure.  I've had a ton of visitors, had some positive and potentially promising news at work, started seeing a wonderfully fun girl, and in general, I've just been having an awesome time with life.  The 50 states thing is kind of back burnered for now because the remaining states are mostly all super boring.  I am going to try to get to Alaska and Hawaii before March which will bring me down to 6 remaining states.  As for the rest of them, I'll get there when I get there. Or maybe never. I'm fine with that too. :)

So visitors...

Many of my ultimate friends from CT/NY came to Denver for the Colorado Cup (a big tournament that is important for rankings for the club series).  The tournament was all well and good to watch, but the better part was getting to hang out with people I haven't seen since New Years.  A few of us went on an awesome hike at Brainard lake which is literally in the middle of no where. We were supposed to meet up with some other friends, but when we got to the base, we realized there was absolutely no cell reception.  So the four of us hiked along for a couple hours and took a ton of great shots.  Like this one:

CO is such a beautiful place. :)

Royal Gorge - Arkansas River, CO

View from Mount Evans

When frisbee people left, I had less than 24 hours to reset the apartment for my college roommates who came out for our annual white water rafting trip.  This trip was a very different than a lot of the trips we've been on thus far, but ultimately, a blast. The river was a lot more narrow than typical which makes for a much more technical run.  It's a lot of jutting between rocks and through white water and less sweeping from bank to bank across the river and through the rapids.   Other than that, we went to breweries and up
Mount Evans (peak elevation ~14,200').  We didn't make it up to the top because of a hail storm that we got caught in, but the views along the way were still pretty epic as you can see.

The last two things on this post will be quick...hang in there - almost done!

Work has been good because I was recently called into a meeting in which my boss said to me (and a few other people) that we have been noticed by HER BOSS for our exceptional work and he wants to meet us in order to get a sense of who we are.  So I have a presentation on why I'm so awesome in about 20 minutes.  I'm good at those... :)

Kristine is amazing and silly and a child trapped in an adult's life, just like me. She's a science nerd (works as a pathologist in a hospital detecting cancer on biopsy samples) and loves all the prerequisite things for my affections (e.g old school video games, performing arts (she danced ballet), games, superheroes, etc). She came with us to Mt Evans.  Here's a pic.

I am happy

~j

p.s more pics HERE

Land of Enchantment

Greetings from the land of enchantment, Santa Fe, New Mexico.  I took a little road trip this weekend just to get away.  I started the five and a half hour drive this morning around 9am and reached this sign about three hours later.  Santa Fe was a 2.5 hour hop, skip and jump beyond. As I was driving, I had a lot of thoughts.

First off, I was thinking about the proverbial journey of life. The literal expedition that I set out on this morning made me think a lot about what is more important; is it the journey, or the destination?  I will guess that many people have different answers to that, but for me, it's definitely the journey.  I'm happy traveling.  I'm happy in a car, driving to a new, unexplored location.  I wonder about the many mysteries that the destination holds and revel in all the goings on of getting there.  As I reflect on other trips of my life, I realize this has always been the case.  For instance... the first time I drove cross country, many of the destinations were quite boring.  Take the drive from the Mall of America to Mount Rushmore.  Leaving Minnesota, we got caught in a torrential rain storm and didn't think we'd make it to Rapid City, SD as we had originally intended. We therefore canceled our hotel room in Rapid City, but chose to keep driving, to get as close to it as we could.  The drive was an experience I will never forget. It was one of the first times I had driven in a rainstorm with rains so thick that I couldn't see the front of the car.  There was raucous laughter when one of my companions had to pee so bad (probably a combination of the rain and me, the driver, refusing to stop in it) that she got out of the car, peed on the side of the road, and got back in soaked to the bone, less than 30 seconds later.  And then, ultimately, we made it to Rapid City and tried to get our hotel room back only to find out that it had been sold to someone else.  The only room available at that late hour was the deluxe love suite of a Raddison several miles back.  It had two floors, a heart shaped hot tub, and an open shower.  It was not cheap. Haha... The next morning, after having gotten plenty of sleep for me, I woke everyone up a 8am and made them drive the rest of the way to see the mountain of Presidents.  When we got there, all we could do was say, "Yup. There it is. Take a picture.  Okay got it. Now what?"  It's not that it was a let down...it was just... not nearly as exciting as our pilgrimage from Minnesota.

Cathedral Basilica of St Francis]

I feel very similarly about Santa Fe.  I visited the Chuck Jones gallery today (which I really liked) as well as a few other galleries, an art show, Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi, and a creperie. Woo.  On the drive here, I listened to awesome music, thought about many things (including what I'm writing here), planned future adventures (Garden of the Gods, Pikes Peak, Sand Surfing at Sand Dunes National Park), and all in all, felt a joy I haven't felt since departing from CT nine months ago.  Don't get me wrong...I liked all the things I did in Santa Fe today but simply put, it did not elicit the same blissful satisfaction as just getting up and going.  Apparently, I'm the type of person that likes to go just for the sake of going.  Again, I can see how people would like the destinations more...but that's me.  I want to DO things.  I want to GO places. I want to LIVE because living is a thing worth doing.  This is something that I think a lot of people don't get, and furthermore, don't do.  Which leads me to my second point...

I wonder how strange I am for wanting this lifestyle. 

When I was explaining to my coworkers on Friday about how I was driving 5.5 hours just for the sake of doing it, and with no clear motivation for doing so, they looked at me funny.  Honestly, probably rightfully so. Haha. 

On the way down here, I thought about online dating and writing a profile about myself.  It's not that I want to be dating someone (quite the opposite actually) but it seems the natural thing for a man of my age to be doing.  In fact, at 29, some would say that I should probably be in a relatively serious relationship that will ultimately turn into a lifelong commitment to another person.  Is it strange that I have no desire for that, right now? I mean I want to get married some day but right now, i'm more focused on living my life for me and not being saddled with another person, and/or a ton of new responsibilities.  It's kind of selfish, I know...but what's wrong with that?  Who says I can't do things on my own for now?  To them, I say, why not?  As a fully fledged adult, I will do what I like, when I like, with whomever I like.  For better or for worse, right now, I want to do things on my own.  Is that really such a bad thing?  Do I even care if that's such a bad thing? No.

I have lots of friends and a great deal of people that I love, and that love me.  With the comfort of that in mind, I'm going to live my life.

Thanks,

j

Being Nice

Blah blah... Haven't written in a long time, life is good, loving Colorado, snowboarding, visitors, blah.

I've been thinking about being nice and how people (myself included) are always so suspicious of it. For instance... today I brought a dozen cupcakes in for my team at work. The initial response from most people was "what's the occasion?" which is to say, "why are you being nice?" After the 11th time of saying just because, I was out of cupcakes. One person out of 12 said, "thanks. That was nice of you," before grilling me on my motivations and suspecting me of something sinister. I appreciated that.

In another unprovoked act of kindness, I sent a friend a very small Edible Arrangement. There was a bit of a mixup because I got it sent to her house and there was no one home (obviously because it was the middle of the day) so the delivery guy called her and delivered it to her work— so she knew it was coming before it got to her. That being said, she didn't actually thank me until she received it but that didn't stop her from meanwhile asking me why I sent it. Again, I responded, 'just because' and said I thought she'd appreciate it. She clearly did.

Fast forward to post nap time that evening. The blinky light on my phone alerted me to a new email which happened to be from my EA recipient. "Thanks again...why did you send it?"

A little irked (probably because I had just woken up) I (hopefully) kindly responded that it was just because and there was no ulterior motive. In her defense, the last time we saw each other, we had a personal, and some might say awkward, exchange in which I said if I didn't live on the other side of the country, I would be interested in pursuing a relationship. But I mean come on! I DO live on the other side of the country, I don't want ANY relationship right now, and sending chocolate covered fruit is not a profession of my undying love! I also don't really think these two things linked as we've talked nearly every day since that night in January with absolutely no awkwardness very little mention of that last in person meeting, and of our mutual love for both chocolate and fruit.

Now admittedly, I may not be the best at understanding or realizing when things I do appear to have romantic connotations, but given the fact that I'm 2000 miles away from the recipient, I thought I was safe from this misunderstanding. Apparently not.

But anyway... back to the topic at hand.

Why is it that people are so suspicious of niceness? Is it because it is so seldomly seen in this world? Perhaps it is a subconscious jealousy that they themselves are not being so benevolent. More likely than that, I think, could it be that when most people do nice things, they actually DO have ulterior motives which in turn make them suspicious of other people's niceties? I don't know the answer and can only speculate, but honestly, it's neither here nor there. The fact is this. I am nice because being nice is the right way to be. I am good because being good is, in itself, inherently good and right. I don't donate to charity to get tax breaks (though it is a perk), I don't volunteer so people take notice, and I'm certainly not the way I am because of anything other than the simple fact that I believe it is the right way to be. It just is. If the world would realize and adopt the inherent goodness that I believe is so clearly visible and easily attainable, wouldn't people be so much happier? It's one of the first lessons we learn in life. Be nice.

j