I told myself I wouldn't mention the fact that it's been since August that I've written on this mess and the story I told in the last blog was a traumatic time about losing my gallbladder, and apparently had a second part to the story, but I'm not sure where I was going with it. Anyway, an update of my last few months, because things have definitely changed a little bit since August.
First and foremost, the feeling that overwhelms me now is happiness. For the first time in some time I really am happy. I had three different people not at the same time, over different mediums say how happy I looked recently, and so I did a bit of soul searching and realized that I really am at a good place in my life right now. And over the last few months that was something I wasn't so sure was possible. I mean, I knew it was certainly possible, but I was allowing myself until January 1st to kind of be in a funk. Not a real funk like I was sad all the time, that's the furthest thing from my mind, but a funk like not searching for my next inevitable failed relationship or just getting out and about. I was allowing myself some down-time almost. Going to hit life hard once the ball dropped screaming January 1st, 2016.
Sometimes things happen and change lifes plan for you. I've had a great friend come into my life January 17, 2015. Right after the end of my tumultuous relationship (how about that for a word?!?!) the one person who I reached out to initially after hearing that she worked in my hometown in NJ was a teacher. I thought that was cool, we became FaceBook official friends earlier that day, and I thought I would reach out to find out at which school she taught. Of course, out of the two elementary schools in the small town, she worked at the other one. The one I didn't attend, but it was still cool to know some of the same people and talking about my beloved hometown. After small talk, she said to me that she had heard through some mutual friends of my situation with my previous relationship that had just recently ended and that she, herself had been recently (within the last few years) divorced and that if I ever needed a sounding board, that she would be an ear and would listen and add any advice and support having gone through it on the other side. From that day on, a friendship grew.
I know, Mr. Blog Thing, you want me to get to the point. You must forget that I am rather long-winded on this thing and will drag this story out for a long while for dramatic effect. The friendship continued to grow. She actually had a relationship that soured right around that same time that we started talking so we were really helping each other by talking things out, getting opposite sex opinions, etc. It was a fun friendship, one that I hoped would last awhile.
Then comes April, 2015 while I was in Savannah, and was invited to a paradisaical like island in-between Hilton Head and Savannah for what was billed as a "taste of New Jersey" for Easter. Completely out of character, I do tend to be shy and quiet in uncomfortable situations, I decided to go get this taste. It was probably that day that changed how I thought of this person, but I fought it being that I was wanting to stay in my funk. A simple, yet tremendous Easter meal with a great family, followed by a boat trip back to the mainland to go to the Masters practice round and the trip was complete. Only the next few days she wanted to go to Savannah and have dinner and drinks on River St. So we did that. I spilled a beer into our shared order of fried pickles and it has been an ongoing joke ever since.
Fast forward to November when I was finally able to get back together with her for dinner and drinks back in NJ and we are where we are today. Which is me being happy. We both fought feelings, and distance and now a great friendship is continuing on the road. And it's happy. Once the distance thing figures itself out, we may be more happy, but until then, just enjoy the ride.
I say that to say that I was able to find happy in the least expected place. This is the first time in a long while, if ever, that friendship first led to something else. It's a really cool feeling to have something in life happen and want to pick up the phone or send a text to her to tell her first and have her be genuinely interested in it.
So this long-winded blog post was because I hadn't written in awhile. The last few posts have had some comedic elements in them, but for the most part were sort of melancholy. Finally I come back with a story of pure, real joy. And it's good. Who knows what the future holds, but I know you cannot put a clock on when you're ready to find happy, or even be happy. I've got a great group of friends, a great job, a great home and a great life.
I'm not going to sit here and say that I'll be back in a few days to write more, because we both know that I probably won't, as much as I'd like to. So for now, until the next time...
