I’ve made a decision to rededicate myself to music.

I’m not going to start learning to play an instrument (although I still hope that at some point I’ll learn the piano).

Podcasts have taken over my life. Up until this morning I used to love them. The passive learning is wonderful. That flowing stream of knowledge gobbles up time at work. It doesn’t make you feel like your life is wasting away while doing a menial task. Marketplace, Quirks and Quarks, This American Life, The B.S. Report, ESPN’s Pardon The Interuption. Savage Love, Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me… all fun, interesting, and fantastic ways to burn away the day.

But.

It’s infoporn. And I’m addicted.

When do my thoughts get to navigate my neurons? They are subjugated too often these days. My focus is terrible. I want change.

So the music. It was a track by Rob Szabo that I heard on a CBC radio podcast that has changed my mind (irony!… I think). It’s a beautiful song (Good Son), the type I used to lilsten to all the time when I felt my life was more under control…. that’s a lie…. back when I was happier….. another lie probably.

I just want to recover some focus and clarity. When I listen to music, it’s more me. And my music tends to be melodic, fun and/or literate, usually thoughtful and beautiful. It blocks out extraneous noise and coaxes my consciousness out and provides a soundtrack for clarity. Silence would be better I suppose. But maybe I’m not quite ready for that yet. Maybe this is just a misguided Sunday morning musing. Getting back on top of the indie Canadian music scene may not be the answer to my anxiety. It could just be an attempt to emulate my younger self… but you can’t unlearn experience.

But knowing myself, I feel that it should be a significant shift in a positive direction. The right thing to do right now.
this a futile Sunday morning musing.

Ahhh the stern face that wallpapered my desktop computer for the past week and a half. If he could hold firm and defeat the Nazis, I could muster up the discipline to prepare properly and get through my immunology presentation.

It did go well. It wasn’t perfect, but it was good enough. I didn’t seize up or anything, but it wasn’t smooth and suave either. I am just so fucking relieved that it’s over.

I can now go back to this:

2025 me here: I think I had a fun wallpaper of space ghosts. Wish I still had it.

If you are going to go through hell, keep going.
     -Sir Winston Churchill

My company wide presentation is Monday morning at 8:30am. I have 30 complicated slides, and am terrified.

The 4am-5am hour is the fastest of the day. 3pm-4pm the slowest.

Al Gore kicked major ass. I don’t know why they didn’t use him as the setup directly before Barack.

I’m such a hermit.

Agoraphobic tendancies.

I’m not a misanthrope. I’m not grumpy or unsociable. I like being social. I love making connections, laughing and sharing with people.

Friends and coworkers love me. I was told twice this week that I’m charming. I get invitations to come out to gatherings, parties, bars, etc all the time. Even though I generally turn them all down.

I was invited out to a BBQ tonight and a VIP party for a semi-pro football team tomorrow night. I canceled on the BBQ for no good reason even though I really wanted to see the friend who invited me. I know I’m not going to show at the party tomorrow night, even though it would probably be tons of fun.

What the hell is wrong with me.

Barbeque Pizza, Cheap Cabernet, Spinach salad.

Roommate off of his prozac.

Week-end cluelessness.

I don’t feel like I can write publicly on this thing anymore. Not with the same voice I used to.

There was something in the news last week about writers who use “I” and “me”. How they are overly inwardly focused. According to whoever did the study, wrote the book, or whatever. These people are generally more unhappy, insecure, losers etc. Fuck. I use “I” all the fucking time. Me me me me fucking me.

I suppose the idea is that happy people write more about other people. Happiness is only real when shared. That was from “Into The Wild”. Alex Supertramp wrote it when things were going badly in his Alaskan bus. I still don’t know if I buy it.

2008

I broke up with ******. It wasn’t a clean breakup. It was a process that spanned weeks. I ripped her heart out. I know I did.

I ran from Waltham and her and moved into an apartment in Cambridge. My roommate is a young, quiet locksmith with depression issues.

I went from a Scientific Technician at a large contract organization to a Research Scientist at a small pharmaceutical company.

I started dating, for the first time at 28 years old. I had my heart hurt for the first time.

I’m still so restless. Being single doesn’t change that.

Maybe I met ****** too early in my life.

I have to move again, for the second time this year. My landlord’s house that I rent in was foreclosed on. It’s ugly. I’m not paying rent because she doesn’t own the house. She’s stealing our mail now.

There’s an exam on Tuesday that I’m not ready for. I can’t study anymore for it right now due to high anxiety and stress. I always get through these things somehow. Somehow I don’t think this one is going to be ok though.

I’m not happy right now. Usually I’m happy.