Color and Shoes

Walking home tonight I saw a girl, as one often does on the street, and she was mostly ordinary, unremarkable, with one exception. She had on a bright orange scarf. The color seemed to say to me "I'm having fun, life is awesome." It was just a scarf, on just another girl, but together, they were extraordinary.

I had been thinking about going back to my mis-matched Chuck's for a few weeks now. Partially motivated by my desire to re-find my own roots. Partially motivated by my upcoming high school reunion. Partially motivated to have a shield again, something I could deflect a stranger's dislike unto. And today, partially motivated by the need to have color, the need to look fascinating in a very simple way - a way that says "life is awesome".

Zappos will be sending me two pairs in short order, a navy blue and a light blue pair. I figure it'll be a good start, and something bold enough to achieve my goal, but subtle enough I can wear them at the office.

Just a Thought

I wonder if the crazy shit that went down in the Bible was just a sign of the times. "Oh my wife? She, uh, got turned into a pillar of salt, you know how that goes." is like the modern-day equivalent of "Sorry I didn't get that party invite, the internet must've eaten it."

Then again, maybe not.

Women and Danger

I missed out on doing some things because I was busy doing a lot of other things. Friday and Saturday I was scheduled to be a volunteer at a Ruby on Rails Outreach workshop. Ruby on Rails is the programming language I use at work to write web applications. This particular workshop was targeted at women and was being held at sfCUBE.

sfCUBE is something between community space and a start-up incubator. I was hoping I'd run into someone there who could give me a better run-down of the business, but just being in a place like that made me get off my duff and write an executive summary (cover letter to a business plan) for my library idea (if you want to read it, just ask and I'll share the Google Doc with you, I could use the feedback). So now I have an executive summary, something I could put in the hands of someone who would want to fund my endeavor. It makes my start-up idea much more dangerous than it was a month ago because now my ideas exist on paper.

Alas, no one was at sfCUBE for me to talk to, so that remains on hold for now. Friday night was install night, where w e got all the ladies' laptops set up for Saturday. Saturday I was a TA, helping people when the fell behind, explaining things that I felt like got glossed over during the breaks. It felt good to volunteer, and it felt good to use Rails to do it. So I've made good progress getting my volunteer life back on track.

Today I went to Crissy Field nearest the GG Bridge which was a new part of the park for me. I was there for a coworker's birthday party, so there were a lot of people I knew from work. I had to leave around 3:30 to make my way to rock climbing with Lara who brought her friend, Marie, to join us. After a few hours of climbing artificial rock, we headed out for tapas at Ramblas, which is a pretty tasty tapas place, and I always like tapas because you can try like half their menu at once.

Thus a busy weekend. I wrote the first part of a business plan, made a lot of progress in getting myself back to who I want to be, and spent all of it with people I enjoy.

Dump

Two weeks ago, I got to see Wicked with Miss Lara Owen. It was an awesome show to me because it was campy, and serious, and had flying monkeys, and most importantly I had great company to reflect and laugh with. Shows are meant to be shared and I was glad I didn't see it alone as I had initially planned. It reminded me of two things, the first was that I really enjoy the theater, and the second was when I went to see some community theater with the Dickersons. Those two always know the fun things to do.

Women have the hot pants for Eric the vampire in True Blood which give me no small amount of angst. Eric is the blond, good looking vampire who is a total scumbag. Do they go for Bill, the gentleman vampire who swore off drinking human blood? No. They swoon for the ass hole who has deals in deception and manipulation. Women are crazy, but more accurately, I should say that I'm jealous.

Speaking of TV, go watch Battlestar Galactica. I am not a cylon.

I feel a little rebirth in me. I broke out the brightest colored clothes I had and my propeller beanie and went to a euchre picnic on Sunday. With the foul-mouthed jokes and knowing people well enough that I didn't have to ask wht they did for a living or what they've been up to the last X months... it felt like high school, or rather, I felt like the me I was in high school. I may buy some mis-matched Chucks in the near future.

Step Two: Volunteer

This Friday and Saturday I'm going to teach people (women specifically) how to set up their laptops as a development environment and then how to write a simple web application.

It's what I do every day, and yet I'm nervous as hell that I'll somehow fail. That someone will ask a question that I don't know the answer to and suddenly it'll all come crashing down that I don't really know anything. It isn't true, but that's what I'm afraid of, that's what I'm most nervous about.

Tomorrow, I'm also skipping lunch to spend time with a coworker, Adam, patching Rails. Rails is the platform on which we develop our applications. Rails isn't something we make in house, this is a big deal that is used by developers world-wide. I've never worked on an open source project, let alone something of this magnitude. My participation is two-fold. First, I get to learn about contributing to an open source project. Second, this is something work is making a push for, the higher ups have a vested interest in seeing Rails become a respected platform, and Pivotal getting its name attached to it - but when they pitched free lunch and swag, and no one bit, I decided that while I may feel under-qualified to write code, I wasn't under qualified to set an example for those more able to follow.

Step One: Swearing Off Girls

In an attempt to regain my moral footing when it comes to bedroom affairs, I'm swearing off girls. Sorry girls.

In other news, dudes are still out too.

Pieces of You

An acquaintance of mine warned me about putting too much value in the people I know. Her intention was to tell me that I need to be my own person.

I disagree.

The people I know, the ones I call friends, are people of the highest quality, people I am honored to share my life with. Those people give me strength, and they affect my personality in all kinds of ways, even those people I only know for a short time.

For instance a girl I dated for only a few weeks, she says "I know" in the context of "You like to not smell like garbage? That's crazy talk", and then she says, "I know" with a huge smile and in an almost song like tone. Now every time I'm in that situation, or hear someone say those words in an incredulous sarcastic tone, I am reminded of how that part of her is still a part of me.

It's like when I go back to Lafayette and people say "Let's kick this pig" meaning "I'm ready to go". What most of them don't even realize is that the expression comes from a fencing time before they knew who Will Read was, let alone who originally was ready to kick pigs.

So you see, I'm an agglomeration of the people that are in or have passed through my life. I draw very little distinction between the people I know and have known, and the person I am - they're virtually synonymous.

Matt Asked

So here's the answer to his question, "What have you finally started to listen to?"

1. In high school and on and off the last ten years I have joked that I'm the "eternal bachelor". I say "joked" but it was always that kind of joking where there was more truth than you wanted to let on. I think it's time to resign to the fact that it just isn't going to happen. Life keeps yelling failure at me.


2. I have these moments where I feel like I'm having a cramp, but in my chest. Making a totally uninformed guess it probably is related to a high cholesterol level. This weekend while camping and feeling winded (but not muscle sore) while hiking up Cinder Cone I realized how much I need to take better care of my body. I don't eat very well either. Today a coworker pointed out how many calories I end up drinking  throughout the day in Coke. Life keeps yelling that I'm not doing a good enough job in the health department.


3. With the addition of a niece to my family I realize how distant I keep myself from my family. I look at pictures of her and it's easy to see how she is Jon's daughter. My cousin is going to be in town this weekend. A month back I saw another cousin who was south of the city. It's literally been years since I've seen them before now. Life keeps yelling at me to do better with my family ties.


4. I see the same thing in the pictures of the Roger's new daughter. Every baby I see reminds me of how I don't have a face to look at, someone who has my nose, my chin, my squinty eyes. Knowing my birth family is more important than I want to admit it is. Life keeps yelling at me that "nature" is also important.


5. I have a business idea. The hard kind of idea. The kind that means long hours, hard work, and a "shit-ton" of risk. The kind that tries to steal a person away from tending to his health, family, or romantic life. The kind that ought to be done, but is like carrying around a uranium rod - tremendous potential, but can also destroy all that it touches if one isn't careful.
   
   I've also served in a mentor/teacher/coach role in a lot of different ways. I am happier with life when I am in those roles. I feel like I am growing most during those times.

Conclusion:  My whole life is pretty unhealthy, not to mention my ongoing moral bankruptcy, and life is telling me.

Life has Been Shouting at Me

And I've only just begun to start listening again.