Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Thoughts on a Tuesday Eveing

I haven't written for awhile, not necessarily because I don't have anything to say.  Of course I have things to say.  Don't you know me?  I always have things to say, long involved stories often about nothing.  The problem is right now I have too much to say.  I can't even get a handle on my emotions.

I want to write about my thoughts on serving a mission (29 days.  Twenty. Nine. Days.)  but being aware of the depth and vast range of those emotions, I can't even begin to delve into them.  It's much much easier to recognize that I'm leaving, and stop there.

I'm excited mind you.  I don't want that to be a question for a minute.  I don't doubt my choice.  But humans are hardwired to fear the unknown right?  I think I wrote an essay about it way back in my AP European History Class.  And I'm adventuring into the unknown, a weird kind of structured unknown where I kind of think I know what I'm doing?  The general logistics and overall goal and all that, yeah. But the details?  No clue.  What will my companions be like?  No clue.  What's going to happen to my family, friends, and certain relationships while I'm gone?  No clue.  I mean I have trust and faith and all that, so I'm not really to ulcer level anxiety or anything but if I'm being real then yeah, there's a little bit of fear there.  (Read: TERROR)  And I could go on and on about that.  But I don't want to.  I don't want to concentrate on that.

I want to tell you about visiting my family back east, the sights we've seen, the states we've visited, my lovely and interesting relatives.  And of course the stories of finals, heavily studded with Billy BYU moments.

You know I'm a nostalgic old man right?  Papa Jim style?  Well I'm brimming with nostalgia and sentimentality, and maybe even a few fond tears and I want to talk about that.

Mostly though I want to continue the tradition I started last year, cataloguing some of the people I found in these two semesters of school.  I need to tell you about my roommates, how I'm drastically happier than I've ever been since beginning college.  But two of the most important relationships I've experienced... well I don't think I have the words for those. Here's my conundrum.

1.  These two experiences were crucial to my development and I want to do them justice.
2. I don't want to gloss over them like they didn't exist, though they turned (or may turn) out not so happily in the end.
3.  And I hate people who give mysterious allusions to an event without actually giving details.  Usually I tend to think those people just need validation from others begging to know what happened.
4. I don't want to be like that, because that's not what this is for me.  I write pretty much for me.
5.  BUT this online any joe shmoe can read.
6.  And because it's online and involves other people and is very personal, I can't really say everything I need to anyway.

So I can't NOT write about them, I can't KIND OFF write about them, and I can't COMPLETELY write about them.  I don't know.  I'm pretty sure this can be categorized as a quintessential Catch-22*

All this leads to being a little overwhelmed.  I'm tired already.  Too much to say, too little time.  But I'm going to try.  Beginning tomorrow I'll peg away at the ice block of my brain, hopefully fast enough before it melts into a mess.

Let me put it this way.
"i have come to believe that writer’s block is not so much an absence of ideas as it is a tremendously strong desire to take a nap, all. the. time.
when the desire to sleep is greater than the desire to write–to say something–that’s writer’s block.
perhaps it is that the act of writing or thinking or forming words is the very thing that overwhelms and exhausts. sometimes it’s just harder. sometimes it just costs more.
All this thinking and pondering and remembering crap has worn me right out.  So in light of that, I'm going to bed.  Sweet dreams.  I'll see ya tomorrow.

* I hated that book.  Call me an uncultured unappreciative neanderthal**.  I don't care.  Really, go ahead, do it.

**Irony: needing to look up how to spell "neanderthal"

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