Woosh...and a plan

That's the sound of the past month rushing by. Halloween happened.

 

Then it was over.

Er, what are you doing with that knife?

Ha, ha. Very funny.

Chaosgiving was celebrated. It's a lot like Thanksgiving, but with more people dressed up like sexy deviled eggs and pilgrims and more late night Don't Stop Believin' sing-a-longs. I'm sure there's Facebook pictures out there somewhere. After sleeping off the food coma, the leftover fruit salad was reincarnated.

Lots of bursts of sociability, and then comes the lull. This is usually the time of year when I batten down the hatches, find that me-shaped divet in the futon and settle in for far too many consecutive episodes of The Wire. If I'm lucky, I just play hermit for a few months as we move little by little into darkness.

If I'm not lucky, I lose interest in virtually everything, sleep through most weekend mornings and question my self worth through most waking hours. Granted, that stuff has the potential to come knocking at any time of year, but these short days seem to bring it out with a little more fervor.

For no known reason, this is one of my lucky years. Maybe it's the internet. I stumble across people out there doing good things, telling good stories, seeing cool places and generally convincing me that the world's worth being in. Some are writers, some are actors, some are musicians and some are complete strangers handling way more shit in their lives than I ever have, and doing it with grace and good humor. All of them have helped me see things a little differently these last few months.

I'm more accepting of my life now than I've been in a long time. It doesn't contain a few of those things that most people assume you've got to have, but I appreciate what it does have. Mostly, it's got me and I'm the lucky one who's in charge of making me happy. If that means going to New York on a whim, so be it. And if it means packing up and heading out to watch the daylight disappear on another continent, well, alright, let's do that.

I parted on bad terms with two cities a lifetime ago, thanks to some reasonable immaturity and some misguided sentiment on my part, so I'll go visit them and see how we get on now that I'm grown up (ha!). Then I'll head to a new land where good friends have settled. These are my plans. They make me happy. I'm not sure how long this renewed interest in the world will last, so I'm just going to run with it as long as I can. Ready?