an obsession.

i suddenly realized the other day that i might just be obsessed with love.

when i think of my future, one of the things i always picture is a perfect family. people who know me well understand that my parents divorced really early in my life. and while i do not hold any grudge against my parents, i was without a the stereotypical family for a long time. i lived with my mom and she work extremely hard to make sure we had every single thing we needed. i cannot express my level of gratitude and love for my mom. and i still feel terrible for the times that i was a bad kid. my dad was there in a different way, but nonetheless important. they taught me different things and for them to raise their kids to be who they are in the given situation is nothing short of amazing.

still, i missed out on a lot: family vacations, time spent with each parent, etc. so i feel like i need to have all that when i'm the parent to make for it. which is where i find my obsession. i want to find love so badly so i can not only have that one person i belong with, but also so we can raise a family in the way i didn't get to experience.

i listen to a lot of Ben Folds songs (and will be attending a concert this Saturday) and a few of his songs have messages about love, but in a way that scares me. in "kylie from connecticut," he sings of a woman who is married with kids but will always deeply love someone else. she still has his phone number and letters and pictures and calls him. in "the luckiest," he wonders if two people who are meant to be were born many years apart and live down the street from each other would know they are soul-mates across time. in "from above," two people go throughout their lives for years always missing each other. it's not as if they are unhappy, they just feel as if something is wrong.

anyone of these situations would completely devastate me. but it's not like i would know they were happening. i fear that the love i want won't happen. i fear that the whole situation will be out of my control. i fear that i will make a mistake and ruin everything.

someone brought up an interesting point to me the other day: maybe things work if you do them the right way. and as obvious as that sounds, i do know that people tend to be impatient people and want things a lot faster than they are sometimes allowed. maybe that's my lesson in all of this. taking the correct steps will lead me to the love i want. i have tried so many other ways to be happy and maybe it just depends on the steps you take. maybe that's the way a lot of things work...

goodnight, world.

[500] days of nothing.

this post may be happy. it may not. i'm up in the air about it right now.

first, just so everyone knows, Purdue is still wonderful. it is not that the campus has changed in any way. i still see the same things i once loved, but i suppose i just see them differently. my first and foremost priority here at school is to get an education (which is why i didn't choose IU). but there were other reasons i wanted to come back. i missed friends and i missed my organization. it just seems now i have neither of those things to look forward to. sure, i'm in Rocky Horror again, but there's only so much that wobbling around in platform heels can do to make a person feel fulfilled.

i supposed fulfilled is the word du jour. i don't feel like anything i have is enough for me. i have few friends here. true ones, that is. and now come to think of it, i don't know if i even have a best friend (strike that, i do. my brother is my best friend. but he isn't exactly here). i used to see people every day and kept up with their lives and they kept up with mine. they worried when i didn't show up to class when i usually do and all of that. but i can honestly sit through most of my classes and not say a word. who am i to talk to? the empty seat next to me? the girl who hates me because i told her Green Bay was gonna trash New England when they play?

i choose the title of this blog in particular because of my incredible lack of a girlfriend. again, i understand the silliness of such thoughts, but come on, even super-independent adults think about what it would be like to have someone. and i wonder too. i don't envy couple i see for having happiness. which i think is a big difference between me and other hopeless romantic individuals. i'm glad they have happiness because most of them probably deserve it. they work hard at being wonderful, attractive, friendly people (of course, sometimes they are definitely not any of these things and still manage, but that's a select few). so i don't exactly have the bitterness a lot of single people have. i don't like i'm entitled to a relationship because everyone has one. that's childish thought. i do think that i present myself in a way that should warrant a relationship. sure, we can't all be my brother, but we must play the cards we are dealt. i see relationships as happiness and happiness is something i struggle with a lot. i wish i meant more to people.

i fear i may be entirely too judgmental of my friends. they are flawed, true. but so am i. they accept me but i sort of try to change them? i don't know if that's the best wording. i do try to make them better people. i want them to be optimistic and morally sound and caring and overly considerate. a lot of them are this way, i suppose. i also know that i could change a few things about myself, too. but it's a whole lot easier taking someone else's constructive criticism than your own.

well, that's kind of all i got right now. which is a lot of what's been bugging me lately and such. and even though a lot of this is me complaining that i don't have certain things, i do recognize the things i have. and these people i keep in contact with and they know i would do anything for them.

bon nuit.

i'm not quite finished.

i've been back at good ol' Purdue for three days.

and i already have a new motto: "I'm not quite finished."

four simple words full of meaning that i have taken to represent my life. what happens when one cookie isn't quite satisfying? you get another. what happens when you do something that makes you happy? you keep doing it. what happens when life beats you down to pure depression? you tell life where to stick it.

the purpose of this motto, this goal is to remind me of not only how i need to view hardships, but also how i need to view blessings. i spent a good portion of my summer not necessarily happy. i missed people and i wanted people to miss me. it wasn't until school was only two weeks away that i finally started to realize that i have so much more left. more life, more experiences, more happiness. things didn't go my way. i'm not gonna act like a two year old and mope because i lost something. if i wasn't able to have it, then it probably wasn't worth having. there's always a bigger fish, there's always something better.

as i was visiting a friend on my first night back, we talked about the experiences in which i have put my personal feelings aside to help people. especially when it comes to a dating situation. she praised my ability to do so and said she would have a hard time doing that herself. and that lead me to thinking...why do i do that? it's not beneficial for me. oh wait. that's right. i care about helping people. i'm damn good at it. i'm trustworthy and i've been through so much that i know what is important and i'm sincere. i'm not finished helping people. i'm going to make a life out of it and that's what makes me happy.

at the ripe age of 19 years and 5 months, i had developed a sense of bitterness that someone shouldn't have at that age. i hated my job, i hated how my life had been going, i hated people who were happy. what did i have to be sad about? to be honest, i lost someone i put a lot of time and effort into. it wasn't so much that they were gone, it was that my time had been wasted and everything was worth nothing. every experience is a learning experience. what did i learn? what's worth effort and what's worth time. and how much of each to put in.

now, as i write this, i know there are bits and pieces of egoism and arrogance. but there are also bits and pieces of honesty and truth. and better yet, the subtle hints of confidence. i haven't been confident since Vietnam. i'm finding it again. it sparks a whole new everything and it's what's helped me to realize that my potential to be elite is astounding and the parts that i've experienced so far are only a beginning.

I am not finished with my life. I am not finished with my dreams. I am not finished doing what I loved.

so, to my dear friend whose twitter posts always depress me, i want you to know that at the end of the day you'll always have something: a friend in me. because i'm not quite finished trying to help you and i never, ever will be.

goodnight all.

it's friendship.

that's right. today's topic is friendship and i actually have some positive and negative things to say.

first off, i just wanna state some friendship facts i believe in:

1. texting does not make a friendship.
2. a friendship is best built upon mutual effort.
3. friends are necessary.

these three things are what we will address in today's blog post. i would also like to add that this is the perfect post to comment on and begin discussion. friendship is very different for each person so feedback would make for wonderful conversation, i'm sure.

anyway, we will begin with the first topic in that texting does not make a friendship. this is simple to understand and but not quite as easy to follow for some people. i admit i have trouble following it sometimes. there are exceptions. for example, a very dear friend of mine lives in the far away land of Wisconsin and works at a summer camp. therefore, i am forced to text her because all other lines of communication are not readily available.

we must also address a point which has come up in my life multiple times already this summer. "i don't text people first." this little excuse both saddens me and angers me. i don't know about you but if i think of someone and i want to know how they're doing, i generally do not hesitate in sending a text message. granted there are times i am currently busy and cannot text but i do my best to remember later. what angers me about it is the fact that a person can go for months and probably have someone in mind but because of their "texting first" policy, they refrain from a mere "hey" or "hello, i was just thinking about you and wanted to see how you were doing." heaven forbid you think about someone and care to talk to them. another interesting thing, those people that have given me that excuse in particular have other friends who they do text first. selective first texting. it is a friendship destroyer.

my second point is also pretty generally understood but rarely witnessed. when a person strives and strives to make plans so that another person enjoys themselves is great. but when that one person is the only one making that kind of effort, where is the friendship? where is the fairness? it disappears. soon, the one friend is merely riding the coat tails of planing creativity and reaping the benefits while the other person is being trampled. that other person will continue on making plans, for sure. why? because they want to see the other person and care to see the other person. eventually though, they give up. another destroyer of friendship.

lastly, i wanna make it clear how important it is to have friends. and good ones, too. the ones that follow points one and two. a text from someone who hasn't said "hello" in awhile or an offer for coffee can make someone's day. without friends the fun sort of disappears in life. and (this is a bit extreme) without friends, who would come to your funeral? ;]

i'll admit i have neglected some of my friends at some point or another. and i regret the times i decided not to ask how they were or what they were up to. it is not a great feeling to have.

as a last note, remember this: do what you can for your friends. someday they will repay the favor. you'll never forget it.

talk to you soon, everyone. go text a friend.

brand new love for little things.

good morning to all you sunshines out there.

i've been meaning to post recently but they asked me for overtime on Wednesday which pushed everything i wanted to do way back. plus, Thursday i was in the worst mood ever. so now that i have a chance, let's start posting again. :]

well, first off, my bad mood had a a lot to do with this whole epic journey. there's a certain person in my life (she wishes to remain nameless, but she will know it's her if she reads this) and it has been three years since i met them. and from the moment we really became friends, i've had nothing but grand thoughts about her. she was so much of what i thought i wanted. she had a fantastic smile and these wonderfully cute cheeks. she always told me her eyes and her hair were boring because they were just brown, but i thought her hair and her eyes were just two more spectacular features. she had a great laugh and a hilarious sneeze. we could be weird (we stand in the pool instead of swim) and we could be adorable (we had a fake proposal downtown in the park). i am fairly comfortable in saying that i love this person.

but i don't want to anymore. three years of trying and i was rejected twice this summer from a girl who really likes me back, or at least told me she did. let me be clear that i understand her reasonings for saying no. it is not that i don't believe her reasoning, i simply feel that they are not as important as she claims. i have thought about the same things and understand how i feel also. three years waiting is too much.

so, i woke up that morning just angry. didn't have any particular reason. i spent a lot of time alone that day and thankfully, it helped and i may have found a solution. too much of my actions depends on this girl. i live and breath to make her happy and to seem like the sweetest guy ever. for what? well to impress, of course. but for how long? certainly not forever.

regardless of how much and like and love this person, time changes. and so do feelings.

now, when i woke up this morning, i was unexpectedly happy. i haven't seen or really talked to this girl in days and i am in such a better mood because of it. i opened the cupboard to get out the bag of coffee grounds and i just stood there smelling the scents from the cupboard. i played with my dog a little bit and gave her her breakfast. i ate trix yogurt. this is the best morning all week because i am finally feeling free.

we must learn something from these events. it is something i've preached before: when feelings like mine are involved, you cannot be demoted to a friend right away. same goes for breakups. everyone wants to try to be friends. you can't. not while those feelings are still there. one of you is still resentful and wants the other. friends can't live like that.

i am a happy person this morning. i love the little things in my life. i am learning to be free.

have a super weekend everyone. goodbye for now.

let's get started.

well. welcome to my blog. 

essentially, i came up with this idea as i was supposed to be sleeping late one night and i stewed on it for a couple of days and the idea still intrigues me.

i want to write a blog that shares my views and experiences with relationships. my purpose? well, as of know, i'm not entirely sure what could possible come of this. it could very well be a flop. but i also may find somethings about me that need changed (the latter is what i'm hoping for). you see, i have not been entirely successful. there have been clichéd dates and messy breakups but nothing has quite lasted.

in the coming months, i will explore a hefty majority of things, mainly my past relationships. i plan to go even farther back to discover deeper exigency that makes me want the things i want and why i can't find "the one." now, all of this may seem silly as i'm not even out of my teen years. "you silly little kid, why look for true love so early in life?" well mister that is just what i want to know.

i really hope you as a reader can take this as a serious matter. sure, i'll make jokes and be ridiculous if the situation calls for it. but the goal here is a change for the better. i am open to constructive criticism; i know i am not nearly a perfect guy. and to be honest, i want the truth, whether it be hurtful or not. we learn from our mistakes and i want mine to be exposed. so, conversation is welcome, opinions are valued, and learning is healthy.

unfortunately, i will not begin anything deeper this evening. but i have a theory i would like to explore here shortly. please, keep updated and hopefully i won't be the only helped out by this process.

goodnight everybody.