Apr

28

End of the day is near

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The end of the day is near and I’m trying to get these guys, here at work, out the door so I can go and enjoy the day, because it is GORGEOUS here. I’m really looking forward to my son’s Tee Ball tonight and tomorrow. He is so happy to play like the Red Sox do. I suppose I can thank his teacher for that, I’m not much of a baseball fan, and his teacher is a HUGE Red Sox fan. The biggest sporting event I look forward to in April is the NFL Draft. though the hockey playoffs used to appeal to me before the Bruins went all to hell. Ok enough of the sports rant. I hoping to talk to a few of my friends that I haven’t talked and chatted with in a bit. I just hope that they are around and available so we can talk.

On another note, been catching up on my blog reading for my podcasts and Mur Lafferty of “I Should Be Writing” made a very good post on her blog. Read the whole thing here.

Apr

28

Friday, Thank God

Filed Under Design/Art, Noteworthy | Leave a Comment

I’ve had a very good week over all. Got my review at work and I was surprised at how well it went, seeing as my boss has a habit of making my life miserable here. He is also moving me to salary, I’m thankful for that cause it means the woman that I work with, that I loath, will have less ammo to use against me. She constantly uses my time card as ammo. My boss tells me not to punch out when I leave, because on most nights I receive calls at home etc. She uses this to turn the other workers against me when they aren’t making 40 hours in a week. So I feel like a huge burden has been lifted, plus it is the first time in my life that I haven’t had to punch a time card. I finished a special edition cover for work, and I like it. I’m not sure if that is what they were looking for but it is only the first version so I have an idea for a couple of others just in case. I’ll include it after a LJ cut below. So I will also do my make up post later today after I do some online stuff for a friend of mine. I’m looking forward to the NFL draft tomorrow and my friend Phil is calling again tomorrow night so we can discuss what happened during the draft. Well thats all for now, I’ll post more later.

Here is the Special cover, let me know what you think.

Cover

See the full size image here

Apr

27

What is Love?

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What is Love? Is it something you catch, like a cold or the flu? Is it something you fall into, like a soft warm bed? Is it something to fall out of, like a speeding train? I’m just not sure. I find that feelings and emotions are something alien to me. I figure it is just because I grew up in an uncaring household as a kid. I really didn’t understand those sitcoms on TV where all the kids and the parents got along and hugged and kissed. These things I find strange. I never had a mom who would kiss my boo boos better, she would yell at me for falling down. “It’s your fault for being clumsy!” she would say. My mom and dad also never hugged or kissed. I can’t say that I loved my parents. I know that I was supposed to, I know that I had to, but I’m not sure I did. I wasn’t sure what love was. I never had any strong feelings for my parents. My dad was never home when I was a kid and when he was he was sleeping. I can’t blame him really, he never finished High School, he did the best he could to support his family. And I don’t think he could relate to me. I was always a smart kid, reading books far ahead of my grade level. I am pretty sure that I intimidated him on some level, especially when I could read better than he could in the third grade. My mom was a whole other matter. She and I never saw eye to eye and there was never any warm and fuzzy feelings between us. To this day, I feel strange just talking to her, and I actually look down on her and her mannerisms. I think I honestly don’t like her, how is that not to like your own mother. She would always treat my brother and sister the way the sitcom moms would their children but I seemed to be an alien beast to her. I would get blamed if one of them did something wrong. I came away from that relationship feeling little or nothing inside for my mom. So I never really knew what parental love was, at least not like all my friends.

It was weird for me when I started dating my wife to be. I knew that boyfriends and girlfriends were supposed to hold hands and kiss, but the only examples I had to go by were the ones I saw in movies and such. I knew that I had feelings for my future wife. I felt for her very differently than I had felt for anyone, but I really never had anything to compare it to. Was what I felt love? I know that the longer I stayed with her the more I cared for her. I was more concerned with her health than my own. I know that I always sought her approval, in everything that I did. I was hurt when I didn’t get it or when I did something that hurt her. I think that I grew to love her deeply over time but there was still doubt as I had never known what Love was before.

It was even harder for me once I had kids. My son was an absolute joy for me when he was born. I loved him to death, at least I thought that what I felt was love. He made me smile when he smiled, I got all warm inside when he giggled or cooed. Is that love? As he grew, and became a young man, I started to feel for him what I felt for my wife. I was overjoyed when he succeeded, I cried for him when he failed, and I tried to be everything for him that my parents weren’t for me. Then my daughter joined our family. This was hard for me because I didn’t really want a second child. My thinking was that our family was perfect and I didn’t need another child to make it complete. My wife wasn’t as sure as I and pushed to have a second child. She really wanted a girl, and I eventually gave in, even though I resented her for it, but that is for another discussion. I wasn’t sure that I wanted the new child all the way through the pregnancy. Once she was here though, things changed, I felt the same about her as I did about my son. Maybe more so. When she smiled at me the first time my heart melted. When she giggles I feel nothing but joy, like music is playing in my heart. I can say now that I love her. I love her. It took me a while to realize it, but I KNOW that I love her.

Once I felt that love, the third time in my life, it all fell into place. I had done things in my life that tried to sabotage the love I had. I believe that I did it because it was an alien feeling. Something that I didn’t understand. I now know what love is. It is something that doesn’t ask of you. It is something that just gives, and in giving, gets in return. It is circular, giving love freely allows you to receive love fully into your heart. I unfortunately took far to long to learn that lesson and I want to make sure that my kids know that they are loved completely. I want my wife to know that I love her unconditionally, even though I have hurt her in the past. I know that I LOVE her now. I love her and my kids. I understand what it means to love, even if it is still a little alien to me. I know what it is to feel love. It is what makes you warm inside. It is knowing that you are excepted even if you don’t feel that way inside. I guess the best way to put it is that love is just that, it is love. You can’t quantify it, you can’t measure it, and it is different than any other emotion that I have ever felt. It is everything, it is nothing, it is love.

Apr

27

The Devil in Diapers (repost)

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I have met the Devil. In fact she lives in the same house as me. Of course the people who meet her don’t know that she is the Devil, but I do. She is the devil in diapers. She has a way of masking her true nature, at least from all those who don’t see her all the time. For brief periods she can be the most adorable little thing you’ve ever seen or met, but whoa to the one who crosses her or tries to get her to do something that she doesn’t want to do. Then her true nature shows as bright as the burning fires of Hades. She does all of this and she is barely 10 months old, imagine how bad it will be when she develops her seducers tongue. Add that to her adorable cuteness and wham she will be controlling the world. I know what your thinking. You think that I’m crazy to think that this cute little baby girl could be the Devil in disguise. Believe me, I know what I’m talking about. I’ve seen her bring her mother and I both low with her stubborn desires. Take her sleep habits, or more to the point her “lack of sleep” habits. She refuses to sleep, she thinks that if she sleeps she will miss something. She blatantly fights our attempts to put her down for some peaceful rest. She will sit up, she will literally fight your every attempt to get her to rest. She punches, she kicks, she’ll throw her bottle across the room, and the worse part is she wants mom and dad to not sleep with her. Whoa to you if you believe for one minute that you can leave her alone and catch a few zzzzz’s. See already at 10 months old she thinks that the world revolves around her desires. Tell me that these aren’t the signs of the Beast. I search her daily for the mark of the Beast, that dreaded 666 that will appear any day now.I know that she isn’t really the devil, she is just a VERY, VERY, Stubborn baby. Unfortunately I fear that she gets that deplorable trait from me. I just think that sometimes I swear that when she plays coy and shy, just sometimes mind you, I can see the horns and the fiery glow in her eyes. Sometimes……..

To view the Devil’s site click here.

(this is a repost from my old blog, I will eventually be moving all the the stuff from there to here)

Apr

25

A little stress never hurt anyone……

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As far as my post for the day I think I’ll discuss stress. My brother today mentioned that he needed to get out of retail because it is causing him too much stress. I was in his same position a few years ago. I was working retail and was under a lot of stress, and I needed a change, or so I thought. I went back to school, and while at school started my current job. I eventually left the retail world behind, but oddly I found I had more stress in my new job. It was just different, not caused by the same issues but it was still there. I learn after nearly having a breakdown that it was a change of job that would cure my stress, it was a change in me. I’m not saying that I never have stress, I still do. I just changed the way I view it and deal with it. Stress is just like any other thing, it can be handled, just like a situation that pops up on you that you weren’t prepared for. I just view any stress as another problem to be solved. There are things in life that are far more important, at least to me, than any stress I may encounter. Little things like family and friends. It is far better to worry about them then to worry about some stress that is caused by your work or job. You need to evaluate what is important to you, and once you achieve that then you can put stress in it’s place. It isn’t something to worry about, and lose sleep over. It is a problem, whatever is causing the stress. You have to attack it like any other problem to achieve an answer.