The Sweet Up and Down

I move on Saturday. I move to my own house with my fiancee and son. I am freakin' excited and am anxiously waiting for Saturday to get here so we can get our stuff into that house. I've been thinking a lot recently about growing up, having responsibilities and basically being an adult and whoever said that high school are the greatest years of your life is an idiot and needs to be shot. High school sucked compared to this moment in my life. (In all honesty, high school sucked period.)

I'm not a big fan of MySpace although I use it constantly and check it everyday because somehow MySpace always seems to draw drama and I am not a fan of drama because it's usually associated with someone else and I want to keep your drama away from me because drama is contagious. I'm proud of the few friends I have on MySpace and occasionally attempt to acquire more. Especially if they don't have a Facebook profile. From about July to August 2007 I was friends with this girl, Vanessa who was my ex-girlfriend's roommate. After she discovered I was friends with her Vanessa quickly deleted me and we both moved on. Well, I contacted her again because I like the girl. She was nice and I would listen to her life story which reads like a modern-day Dickens tale. She accepted my request and for a month everything was fine then inexplicably she deleted me again. No warning. No explanation. Nothing. I don't know what happened there but I figured two times your out. But when it happened my brain just kept asking "Why do you care?" And aside from the reason cited above, I had no other reason. I wasn't going to send a message asking why or anything but I found it very strange.

Also, way too many people are getting married and having babies. I keep forgetting that I have entered the prime marrying age but it still unnerves when I see someone I know getting married. Or, what I really hate, when I just discover it without being warned. I tend to handle change better when it's within my own spectrum but when it's change adjacent to me and I either have to deal with it or interact with it, I don't do so well. I guess what I'm saying is that I want things to change, I just want them to be gradual changes that don't amount to much right away. Or just ask me for my Change Request Form and I will email one to you. You can just fill it out and I will either approve or deny it.


The final Calvin and Hobbes strip always makes we long for the days of childhood but when I really think about it, "let's go exploring" is probably how Randy and I will end our time together if it should ever come to that and with kids, house stuff, work and family, there is no time for exploring and out of everything from my childhood, that is what I miss most of all but I'll get into that tomorrow.

~Brian

Have you ever noticed how simple, everyday things play an important part of your life? I grew up in a neighborhood where there wasn't very many trees and they ones that were around were still in the process of growing so they were all still small. When I was about ten, my friends and I went down to a nearby creek. Near the creek was a tree, a long dead tree that had no branches and was described by one of my friend as "Jesus Christ hold up his arm and giving you the finger". We'd spend quite a lot of time and the tree was always within view. After I moved to Baldwin, the tree was cut down when Lawrence grew further south.

In Baldwin, there was another tree I became somewhat attached to. It was right next to an abandoned house on the highway. It appeared to be slightly damaged but it was still alive because it grows leaves every year. After I moved back to Lawrence, the house was bought and torn down in order to build the new intermediate school but the tree was left standing which made me happy but it stands all alone on the property. I still look at every time I drive by and have stopped by a couple times.

Atop Mound Cemetery there are three trees on the east edge. When I go there to think, I sit next to one of them. There is a pine tree, a regular oak tree and the obligatory dead tree with one protruding branch.

From Mound you could see for miles--about ten miles in either direction on a clear day--and it's my own private spot. Sadly, the tree has been cut down so only a stump remains and there is some idiot arguing with me that the cemetery is a gateway to Hell so hopefully nothing happens to ruin such a quiet and pristine area of the county.

In Pottawatomie County there stands the Louis Vieux Elm Tree which was once the largest in the state and the country. Sadly, Dutch Elm disease, lightning and even vandalism have ravaged the tree to near death. And one day when I was exploring the countryside and hiking through an isolated part of Clinton Lake, I discovered this tree standing alone on a hilltop.

I ended up staying there and resting for a while because I had walked a pretty long way from where I parked my car. I'm glad this tree is still around and that the Army Corps of Engineers didn't cut it down.

I think we all take trees for granted. Sure, I waste a lot of paper but at least I do use it and I try not to throw it away because I use it for the stories I write. Maybe this year I'll get more into Arbor Day like that bird in those annoying commercials from long ago.

Until next time, I remain...
~Brian