Of Asleep Visits

a blog.

[ofasleepvisits]

We bought the house with the yard and square footage. Our pool reno is taking far too long but presumably they will eventually finish. We can start saving money for our guest suite and master bath reno project.

We have work and school and soccer and plans to travel. We have grandparents we want the kids to have relationships with. We have a budget. We have exercise plans and healthy and unhealthy eating we vacillate between.

But then you say things like that you want to do something. And my natural inclination is to act like I don’t know what you are talking about. But I do know what you are talking about. Because if feels like something is missing.

Is it our jobs? Should we be doing something more meaningful with our careers? Maybe, but I am not sure that’s it.

Do we need to volunteer more? Do we need new hobbies?

It still feels like we are living our lives waiting for “after” or “someday”. I suspect that’s the problem. And “someday” and “after” may have carried as through the past decade, but now it feels they are only a decade away. So they feel more real. And they don’t seem all that great.

So why postpone today for an uncertain future? We should focus the here and now. Which leads us back to feeling like something is missing in the here and now.

I read a poem once that said life is lived in days. How can we better live in our days?

[ofasleepvisits]

Because tomorrow we may die Oh, but tonight we're dancing in the faint light

20 years ago today--well, I guess in the days and weeks leading up to 20 years ago today--I decided I was fed up with how I looked and felt.

I was very overweight. 240 pounds when I finally stepped on the scale.

I couldn’t button most of my pants. I would wear a belt and leave the top button of my pants undone. I was in college and wore the same pair of cargo pants most days with a hole in the knee.

For work at my co-op job, I found one pair pants that fit, 42W 30L I think.

I had a goatee hiding my double chin. I grew my hair out and looked like a weirdo. Everywhere on and around campus I would go, people would offer to sell me drugs or ask to buy drugs from me.

I remember that trip to Ypsilanti for St. Patrick’s Day wearing those cargo pants with the whole in the knee and top button I couldn’t button. I was with friends and was happy.

I remember driving around the streets of Clifton in my black Chevy S10, listening to Dave Matthews, being generally happy too.

But I wasn’t happy about my body. You weren’t happy with your body either.

I remember reading something about ancient philosophers’ takes on mind and body both being important. It was the first time I connected intelligence to physical health.

You were working at SparkPeople, surrounded by healthy people. And we just decided to eat better and exercise.

I will never forget that feeling of just deciding to do it and doing it.

20 years ago today we started.

It was nothing crazy, eating-wise, just cutting the crap. It felt crazy at the time though compared to our diet of fast food and soda. We simply started eating reasonably healthy food. I didn’t even cut back on alcohol.

Joe put us on a workout plan. We went to the gym on campus together. I believe we worked out 5 days per week. Pretty basic, cardio and nautilus machines.

I cut my hair and shaved my goatee.

By the summer I looked totally different. I looked and felt better. Even better in the fall. One year later, better still. It’s been fits and starts since then. But being conscious about my health has been constant since then. 

My life sort of started over 20 years ago today.

Our love is so right I won't waste a minute here tonight

[ofasleepvisits]

The Settlement Life

Rereading what is probably a decade-old listicle, “11 Warning Signs That You’re Settling For Less In Life,” and assigning myself a point value for each question.

#1 - You are always tired

0.5 / 1

Always is too strong a word for how I feel most of the time. I go in spurts. Some weeks and months I am “on it” eating- and exercise-wise and have more energy. Other times less so. But my work does feel like a slog much of the time, so most of my life is spent doing something that drains energy from me.

#2 - You keep saying “after”

1 / 1

I am only allowing myself to 1 point per question otherwise my score would be a million on this. I am 42. So is my wife. Our kids are 12, 10, and 8. My whole life is based around the concept of after. I think I have a good rationalization here. That is, we need to embrace our life with our kids for the fleeting period they’ll all be in our house. I mean, our oldest will be off to college in five years. We need to live in the now. This is all true. But why does this sort of feel like an excuse not to live the life I want to live. Embracing life with my children while they’re still in my day-to-day life doesn’t mean I do work I don’t want to do or otherwise settle for unhappiness.

#3 - You blame other people

0 / 1

I mean, based on how I interpret my response to #2, I could blame my station in life. But I don’t. This question is about claiming victim status which I don’t. No one is holding me down.

#4 - You don’t think you can

1 / 1

I sincerely don’t think I can be successful at the things I’d rather be doing. This one contains a link to another listicle about doing hard things, so maybe I should read that.

#5 - You think a lot, but do little

1 / 1

All I do is think about things and not do them. That’s who I am.

#6 - You keep saying, “someday”

1 / 1

Including this and #2 is just piling on, isn’t it? But yes, “someday” and “after” are the two times I allow myself to imagine doing cool things.

#7 - You rip on successful people

0 / 1

Nope, this is not me.

#8 - You are playing small and you think it’s OK

1 / 1

Yep, this is me. There is this line an improv book about just wanting to make a house team at your local improv theater and not being able to. And the advice was to maybe have bigger goals. 

#9 - You read stuff like this

0 / 1

The “this” is a link to celebrity gossip. And while my content diet isn’t perfect, that’s not really my problem.

#10 - You are jealous

0 / 1

I think there may have been a time in my life where I was jealous of others. Maybe when I was younger being jealous of others’ athletic abilities or looks compared to mine. But it’s hard to even empathize with my younger self on that topic. Because I am not jealous of anyone anymore. Wow, never realized this about myself until this moment.

#11 - Food, alcohol, or TV are the highlight of your day

0.5 / 1

Waxes and wanes here. Sometimes, yes. Like during hectic times when I have lots of work to do that I don’t want to do, or lots of stuff around the house to do that I don’t care about, or lots of running the kids from here to there, all I want to do is have a few beers and watch YouTube. Other times, during less hectic times, not so much.

-

Final Score 6 / 11

This feels bad. I have written and reflected before about always being too comfortable to take risks. Has something changed? Is this what discomfort feels like?

[ofasleepvisits]

But I've got a blank space, baby And I'll write your name

We walk the little kids to the school bus stop each morning. I love doing this.

Years ago I would daydream of living in a more urban, walkable neighborhood and being able to walk my kids to school. What we are doing now since the pandemic forced us to work from home is not that, but it’s something. I am home and can now take that morning constitutional and it is so satisfying.

I love watching the kids walk and interact with Moxie. They tell us about the things they are going to do at school that day. They are at such interesting ages. I want to remember this way forever and it makes me sad I won’t be able to.

Driving in the car last night with Lyla, she was telling me how she “nailed it” that morning reading the news on her school’s morning news show. She is also captain of the safety patrol. She got ice cream for advancing so far in some reading program. She is so fun to listen to.

You take their pictures and social media allows us a way to go back and view them easily. We probably don’t have enough videos. But even if we tried, the kids would shut down and stop being themselves on camera.

I want to remember the way they were on the walk to the bus and the conversation in the car forever and I know I won’t be able to.

I wish I would have kept a journal or a calendar to remember things. But why? I don’t know why. I just want to remember how I felt.

Seven and a half years ago 1989 came out. I remember listening to it. It was the first Taylor Swift album I bought. Before that, for her previous 4 albums, I had only heard her singles. I remember playing it over the Bluetooth speaker in the kitchen. It became the soundtrack to the kitchen in the second half of 2014.

I remember running that half marathon in Baldwin Park in November. It was a small event with hardly anyone there, easy in, easy out. I finished with a good time for me, under 8:40 per mile. I remember waking up early. Driving the 30 minutes. Waiting for the race to start in the cold. Running for an hour and 52 minutes. Returning to my car with little fanfare. Driving the 30 minutes back home. Getting to the kitchen and seeing you all there--your dad and stepmom there too as they were in town visiting--it still being breakfast time, you all were making pancakes. I put this album on and ate pancakes with you.

I remember all that, but what were the kids like? They would have been 6, 4 and 2. First grade, VPK, and not in school yet. What were they talking about? I could go back to Facebook, your Facebook, and see pictures from that time, maybe that would jog some memories.

Time is passing me by and I can’t take it. The kids keep growing. We just found out Lyla has a condition where she’s growing so fast that it hurts. And isn’t that quite the microcosm of our lives right now?

[ofasleepvisits]

Second Prize is a Set of Steak Knives

Alarm sounds at 5:30 a.m. It’s still dark outside.

On the way out of the bedroom, I quietly unplug my laptop on the floor next to the bed and take it along with my pajamas from the top of the dresser. I exit the bedroom, opening and closing the door gently.

Now in the living room, I grab the book I’ve been reading from its resting place on the ottoman and keep moving toward the kitchen.

I pass the kitchen briefly and enter the family room, set down my laptop and book, put my pajamas on, and turn on the lamp that hangs over the sectional couch.

Back to the kitchen to start the coffee. Quick trip to the bathroom once the coffee is on, then back to the family room where I grab a blanket and push in the cushion from the chaise portion of our sectional that always gets out of place.

Read a chapter of the book while the coffee brews. Today happens to be another Haruki Murakami magical realism novel that I only loosely understand but very much enjoy reading. Recently though I prefer what I think of as light non-fiction. Books with short chapters are great for the morning. There are always stopping places.

It’s been 15 minutes, close the book, get up, go back to the kitchen, pour a cup of coffee, then back to my spot on the sectional under the blanket.

Open the laptop, Chrome is already open to the same six or seven tabs that are always open. Click on Tumblr. For some reason Tumblr is easier to write on than any other blogging or word processing software.

I write for at least 15 minutes, hopefully 30 or even 45, sipping my coffee between thoughts.

Reward myself with a few minutes of YouTube before getting up to brush my teeth and wash my face.

Put my running clothes on.

Time to face the day.

[ofasleepvisits]

In another life...

Feels like another life but it was ours. Late 2011, early 2012, we’d been in that house on Rich Woods less than a year. We would barely be there another year before we moved again.

My memories from there are the happy ones. I know my commute was something I really hated at the time, but time does really temper down the bad memories.

Edwin and Lyla were so little. You were pregnant with Louie.

There were nice weather days, but they were few and far between compared to what we have grown accustomed to in Florida.

But when the weather was nice, we were outside with the neighbors, kids on the swing set. Or riding bikes or scooters in the cul-de-sac. Shannon yelling “slow down” at cars going 20 mph. We’d grill and eat outside when we could. I would try to teach Edwin soccer in the backyard. Sometimes I’d let Sedona off her leash out there, hoping it wouldn’t be stressful or difficult to get her to come back, but I knew it always would be.

When it was cold outside, we’d be inside. That house had so much space for the kids. The dining room was the start of our concept of “the activity room.” And “the play basement,” that was huge.

Those times in the baby phase--expanding both directions to include pregnancy and toddler phases--when you don’t have kids, those times are what you associate with what parenting is. The diapers, the bottles, the gear. The never being able to relax when the kids are awake. Always watching where they’re crawling toward.

But those times are so fleeting. You don’t know it at the time. At the time it feels like forever. But they don’t last.

We acted like it was all about the them. The babies, the kids. But really during those times, it was all about us, about our experience of caring for the little ones.

A decade later, it is in fact all about them and their fully-formed personalities and interests and idiosyncrasies. We act like now is our time--because they can care for themselves and we can finally focus on our career or our health--but their lives dominate our lifestyle on a macro level. Their school schedule, their soccer practice schedule, what they want to do for fun.

And we should embrace it being about them to a certain extent but resist what we can. Because our careers and our health are important too.

Be us against the world

[ofasleepvisits]

Weight for It

I am aspirationally Hamilton but organically Burr.

A significant number of my decisions in my life can be better interpreted by inaction over action. And I could sit here and list out the ways that this has been the case and how it has impacted my life, but that doesn’t matter. I love my family and don’t feel like playing the second guessing game. I just want to be less Burr moving forward.

Mindy and I talk about what it takes to be healthy and I think of the Naval quote, “if you are so smart why aren’t you happy?” We are too old and too smart to keep eating poorly and not living life to the fullest.

What is working for me?

Running is. I am on pace halfway through March to do what I’m calling a partial Murakami, averaging 6 miles per run for 5 runs per week, thus 132 miles for the month.

Should I be digging a little deeper as what is keeping me running? I have run at least 5 days per week since August. At least 100 miles per month every month save for February where I think I was 5 short. Imagine if I had something like this in my life in terms of eating healthy or doing meaningful work.

Should I lift weights? Maybe. Does this paragraph even belong in this blog post?

What do I like doing at work? I like talking strategy more than doing the work. I am feeling a bit too blowhardy and undercooked and maybe need to cook myself or refocus my work.

Back to literal cooking, I need to do my part, just like the running I do to stay on track. I should keep similar habits at home and don’t get lured in by the false god of takeout. But which habits?

What is this blog post? Maybe I should do something about all of this and write a post about my hero’s journey. That would be a better blog post than this one.

[ofasleepvisits]

I’m not where you left me at all

Sometime in late February 2020 I coughed in my boss’s boss’s office and he jokingly asked if I’d been to Italy.

March started and we were aware of growing coronavirus concerns, but we thought life would still be normal.

Everything in our lives revolved around final preparations for our once in a lifetime trip to Spain.

Saturday March 7th

It was the second to last soccer weekend of the season. Our kids would not be attending the final games on the 14th because we would be flying to London the night before. Lyla’s coach told her to have fun in Spain and thought nothing of any chances of us not going. There was talk of coronavirus among the parents, but no one was noticeably concerned. One parent said something to me about it being like the flu so obviously we should still take our trip. The media was probably blowing things out of proportion to hurt Trump. 

That evening when the trip was finally imminent, we sat down to make final arrangements. Mindy is a planner and didn’t like that we had so many details left unaccounted for. We had the big stuff done months ago...

5 plane tickets on Norwegian Air, MCO to LGW Friday night to Saturday morning, LGW to BCN Monday morning, BCN to MCO (connecting through LGW) on the following Monday

The Hilton at near LGW for the weekend, even opting for that first Friday night though we wouldn’t be there until the morning so we wouldn’t have to wait until Saturday evening to check in

The AirBnB in Eixample in Barcelona from Monday to Sunday, the hotel by the airport for Sunday night so we could go straight there after the game, already packed in ready for our flight

And of course the 5 tickets to Camp Nou to see FC Barcelona and Messi play

...but nothing else planned. So that evening, we booked a black cab in London to take us to see the sights. I think coronavirus was on our minds, so we’d stay away from crowds. That would be for Sunday the 15th. We booked all sorts of little things around Barcelona too, the zoo, some museums, some parks, and other sights for our week there.

Sunday March 8th

I checked the weather and realized I needed some warmer clothes so I went to the mall and spent about $200 at the gap on button-up shirts and sweaters. We had bought the kids new sneakers the weekend before I think. Mindy said she’d buy some clothes the next day.

Monday March 9th

I went to work like a normal day. Came home like a normal day.

After dinner you left to go clothes shopping and I read about soccer. Champions League games were scheduled the next two days. Things were getting worse in Spain in terms of the coronavirus. There was talk of playing games behind closed doors, i.e. without fans in attendance. It sounded crazy. Mindy came home around 9p with her new clothes. I told her there was a chance of us not being able to go to the Barcelona game, the whole reason for our trip. We would know more tomorrow I said.

For the first time we talked seriously about not doing our trip.

Tuesday March 10th

I checked online first thing in the morning and it was official, the next two La Liga games would be played behind closed doors. We decided not to do our trip.

Did the heartbreak change me? Maybe

I went to work and told my boss and she seemed surprised. She said she and her family was still planning on doing their NYC trip for spring break.

FC Barcelona sent a nice email about refunds for our tickets being processed within 30 days and that felt good. Norwegian Air and Airbnb weren’t budging for now.

Wednesday March 11th

A potential vendor came to our offices to pitch my boss and me on a product I now forget what it was. He was from France and I remember shaking his hand and thinking to myself, like, maybe I shouldn’t be shaking his hand.

That was my birthday and I’d recorded the Liverpool vs Athletico Madrid Champions League game from the afternoon to watch in the evening. It’d be the last major soccer game with fans in 2020. It was fun to see Liverpool lose. A week later the game would be blamed for spreading since all the Spanish people had flown to England. Months later I don’t think anyone seriously thought that made a difference.

The president spoke that night. He talked of banning travel. We watched selfishly hoping that something he would say would help us get our money back. At this point whatever was going on in the world very much felt like something that was happening to us specifically. I was regaling coworkers with stories of misfortune about a trip of a lifetime canceled.

It was either this night or the next day that I posted on Facebook about how our trip was canceled and we may not get our money back but our family was happy and healthy and that’s what was important and whatever other trite pseudo-optimism works on social media to get supportive comments from distant family and various acquaintances.

Thursday March 12th

We got called into a conference room at work around lunch time or maybe just after lunchtime, 20 or 30 of us shoved into a conference room meant for 15 people, and told that we would be working from home until the end of the month. We could start tomorrow if we wanted. Or we could come tomorrow to gather some things then start working from home on Monday. There were some questions of whether you had to. If I recall correctly, the answer was you didn’t have to work from home if you didn’t want to, you could come to the office during the second half of March. But I may be misremembering.

But that doesn’t matter because by the end of the day we learned via email the policy was tightened to, don’t even come to the office tomorrow. Work from home starts Friday March 13th. No one come to the office until April. My boss wouldn’t be doing that NYC trip.

Friday March 13th

The day was a mix between work and dealing with the Norwegian Air. They kept hanging up on us. They refused to acknowledge the pandemic and how it would be reckless for a family to travel. Our Airbnb host was saying the same thing everything is great in Barcelona, you should still come she said via email.

One final phone call with Norwegian Air around 8p, I think our flight was a few hours later, the rep was like, what’s the problem, flight to Gatwick looks to be on time. How could you in good faith send a family on that flight? Click.

Don't show up, don't come out Don't start caring about me now Walk away, you know how Don't start caring about me now

Disputed the charge with Amex. Posted to Norwegian Air’s LinkedIn. Mindy found the CEO email address and send a message. Something worked, a few days later we got our money back. A few weeks later we got our Airbnb money back. One by one, Mindy got us all our sight seeing money we spent that weekend before the trip back.

Ironically FC Barcelona was the last to refund us because the March games ended up not being played behind closed doors but rather were “postponed,” I guess under the auspice of if they played them in summer with fans we’d be expected to attend. Didn’t matter, the rescheduled games in summer were without fans and we got refunded.

The next week

We made our best of spring break. Tried to recreate our weekend in London with food: Ale House seemed to offer the best fish and chips. Restaurants were weird. Lockdown and quarantine were sort of haphazard, masks weren’t a thing yet. By the middle of the week, everything was closing. We made “paella” and had sangria to recreate Spain. We played Barcelona’s scheduled Champions League game vs. Napoli on FIFA on the Xbox. Work started getting crazy so I really couldn’t take a legitimate week off.

The rest of the year

Eventually the pandemic went on, it quickly no longer felt like something that was just happening to us. Plenty of people had their trips of a lifetime canceled. And much worse, there were job losses and school closings. So we considered ourselves the lucky ones.

Though it took some time to survive you I'm better on the other side

And we really were and are the lucky ones. There were and are millions of people all over the world stuck at home by themselves, the whole world disrupted. Beside that missed trip and the pain of virtual school and the adjustment to working from home, our life has been fine. We just haven’t experienced the pandemic as acutely as so many people.

On a random Tuesday night, the five of us sit down for dinner. Our kids make us laugh. And we realize we are spending time with the people we most want to be with in the entire world. In ten or twenty years we would pay untold sums of money to have what we have for free right now.

[ofasleepvisits]

A True Blog Post of Safety, Inertia, and the Man Who Settled for Blindness

Man gets blinded in chemical accident at age three. Goes on to live pretty incredible life. In his mid-forties, he learns about radical new treatment to give him vision. It’s risky, but he goes for it.

Man can now see. Movement and color are fine, depth and faces are not. This frustrates him greatly but he keeps trying. Researchers determine neurons necessary to interpret depth and faces are gone. He’s on the verge of giving up but doesn’t. Decides to use his organizational and memory skills acquired as blind person to help him with depth and faces.

Story ends on a positive note. Man’s vision is not perfect, but he’s still working on it.

That’s the story of Mike May as told in Crashing Through: A True Story of Risk, Adventure, and the Man Who Dared to See, a crazy book by Robert Kurson.

And I didn’t even mention the painful injections straight into his eyeball.

I have taken so much for granted in my life. I can’t think of much in my life that could even be charitably described as “crashing through.”

At work I ostensibly want to get better at advanced analytical methods because that is the direction my industry is going. I updated my development plan accordingly. In my current job I have the luxury of space to work on these things and being encouraged to develop myself in this area.

Last week I saw a job description that would be a slight promotion, not one I would go for now, but one I could use the details of to model my development plan off of.

And I could work on those things for the next year or two. Take a few classes in data science and machine learning. Tinker with things myself. Read Towards Data Science every day on Medium. Stay on top of what’s new. Blog all about it along the way. Really dive deep.

And that would certainly set me up nicely for the next decade of my career. But I’m not sure I want the next decade of my career to move that direction. When I picture myself being happy a ten years from now, it’s not managing a team of data scientists, it’s writing.

I am not sure how to crash through to that reality. So I keep going to work. In fact, it’s time to get ready right now.

[ofasleepvisits]

Well it's all in your mind It's all in your mind Well it's all in your mind

18 years ago.

Winter/spring 2003.

Sea Change album came out the year before but I’m pretty sure I didn’t buy it until this time.

We had an alarm clock radio with a single CD player and we’d play music it on it to fall asleep.

We started playing this album and it became an every night thing. We called it the sleep mix. If I didn’t put it on, you’d ask for it. “Put on the sleep mix” or “where’s the sleep mix?” you’d say.

You’d typically be asleep before “The Golden Age” ended. That was track one. I think I usually made it to track five, “Lost Cause,” and usually even track seven, “It’s All in Your Mind,” which is still my favorite Beck song to this day.

This was ostensibly a happy time. We were young but didn’t know it. We had the apartment on Ludlow without a self-defrosting freezer. You got your job at the American Cancer Society and were able to quit CVS.

I was doing accounting still. I don’t think I was happy doing accounting though. But I kept at it and tell myself in hindsight I was better for it.

You're all scared and stiff A sick stolen gift And the people you're with They're all scared and stiff

I recently bought that green Chevy Lumina that I would drive for 10 years. I think we still had credit card debt. I wouldn’t ask you to marry me until later in the year.

We didn’t have WiFi. Or even a laptop that could have made use of WiFi. I remember watching a lot of MTV. Music videos in the morning before work. Reality shows like Real World and Road Rules in the evening.

What did we do for fun? What did we look forward to? Probably too much drinking for me.

What was my long-term focus? What should it have been?

I ask because I have these same questions now. I hope I’m getting them right though I’m not sure they have right answers.

We are probably still young, but probably still don’t know it.

And I wanted to be I wanted to be I wanted to be...

[ofasleepvisits]

Pep’s Man the City

The accomplishments are quite impressive: first Centurions, domestic treble. But it's the style that's the charm. Possessive, control the flow, no place for a rebel. Relentless pursuit, press and press and press. Don't shoot too early, pass and pass and pass. Change lineups often, we're all forced to guess who'll be starting, but we'll know he'll be class. Team costs a fortune, internet gets mad. Fans have to concede, Manchester's not red. United is boring, not that they're bad. Just City's beautiful sky blue instead. Champions League results can't be explained. Don't worry 'bout that, just be entertained.

[ofasleepvisits]

Somebody broke me once Love was a currency A shimmering balance act I think that I laughed at that

Sometime around the summer or fall 2012 we accepted that fact that we would move for my job. It was the right step for my career. It would just be a 3-5 year thing, then back to the corporate office in Cincinnati.

In January 2013 we learned Orlando would be a realistic option. I flew down on Super Bowl Sunday and interviewed with HR during the first half, then interviewed with several others the next day at the office. I was offered the job a few weeks later.

After a few work trips back and forth, I officially started my new job on my birthday in March. The next day I watched the Lakers-Magic game in the company suite and got to see Kobe play. In April we moved into our house in Oviedo. I remember that summer as vividly as I remember any summer. Sometime in that summer I realized I didn’t ever want to leave Florida or move back to Ohio.

In January 2014, there was a surprise restructure at work and it became evident the job I was doing in Orlando would be merged with the job another guy was doing in Tampa. By the spring, I had won out and the other guy took a job in Charlotte.

In the August I started the executive MBA program at the University of Florida.  There I met a guy who worked at very large company at a satellite office in an Orlando suburb not far from house. I didn’t realize at the time how high ranking he was at the company.

The following August, in 2015, I would join a team with that guy. In January 2016 our team was assigned to do a presentation on the Argentine banking crisis. I did most of the work and delivered a great presentation. The guy at the large company said he wanted me to work for him and would call me from time to time about jobs in his division.

In February, there was another surprise restructure at work. My job was merged with the job another guy was doing in Naples. I was informed straight away it would me. The other guy was out. So was the guy in Charlotte.

I was at the 3-year mark of a 3-5 year role. But had enough change to keep me interested. But it became clear to me, something would happen to my company or my department or my role at some point.

The next year would make 15 years at my company. I didn’t want to be forced out with this my only experience. The way I looked at it, in another 5 years, if some restructure happened at this company or another company I joined, would I rather be a 20-year vet with one place, or be a 15-year vet at one place plus a 5-year vet at another when looking for a job?

I started talking to that guy from my MBA program more seriously about jobs in his division. In January 2017 I interviewed with some important people at that company, but the specific role wasn’t right for me in my opinion. I figured that company wouldn’t work out for me.

Later that month we rented an Airbnb in Siesta Key for a long weekend. In February we went to my aunt’s in Jensen Beach for a long weekend. Although not the stated intentions of those beach weekends, it felt like we were soaking in what we could because our time in Florida was coming to an end.

I had just had my annual review at work, and we talked about moving me back to Cincinnati, about what jobs I would do. The plan was next year they’d move me back. My kids could start school in the fall of 2018 in Cincinnati.

In June the guy called me about another job at his company. I interviewed via phone with 2 people. I did the interviews from my car in a parking lot in Fort Lauderdale when I was traveling for work.

In August I had a work trip to Naples, which the family and I turned into a long weekend trip, I got the call with a job offer on the drive down. The next day I called back and accepted the job from an empty office in Naples.

I had to wait for the background check. They said it could take a few weeks. I had a previously scheduled work trip to Charlotte before those few weeks were up that I had to do. It was sort of weird because I was taking on additional responsibilities and meeting all sorts of new people I was supposed to be working with.

On a Friday, in a much shorter waiting period than a few weeks, I was about to head to the airport to fly home from Charlotte and I got the call that the background check was clear. I called my boss in Nashville to quit. When I got back to Orlando, I fielded calls from my boss’s boss and my boss’s boss’s boss. I guess I caught everyone by surprise.

I set my final day for September 1st. I made one final work trip to Cincinnati the last week of August to say my goodbyes to many of my contacts from corporate. I worked for that company for 15 years, 11 from that corporate office.

I was also able to do a happy hour with a bunch of my old friends which was nice. I haven’t been to Cincinnati since. I was able to do a happy hour with a bunch of my Florida coworkers in Tampa a few weeks later which was also nice. I have only kept up with a few via text.

My first day at the new company was set for September 11th, but hurricane Irma hit which made what was supposed to be a relaxing week turn into a stressful 2 weeks. My start date was pushed to the 18th, and everything was good.

On the Sunday night before my first day, we were supposed to see the Bleachers concert in downtown Orlando. I really wanted to see the show, but not the day before my first day at a new company. I gave the tickets away on Facebook to some people I knew from improv class. They seemed to have a good time. They were dating at the time. A few years later they moved to Atlanta and got married.

You steal the air out of my lungs, you make me feel it I pray for everything we lost, buy back the secrets Your hand forever's all I want Don't take the money Don't take the money

[ofasleepvisits]

Nobody Wants to Read Me Write About Nobody Wants to Read Your Sh*t

After reading Nobody Wants to Read Your Sh*t by Stephen Pressfield, I can give myself credit for doing a decent job of storytelling in my verbal life--with my family, at work--but of course there’s always room for improvement.

But I don’t think I do storytelling well enough at all in my writing, so I should probably apply some of his principles. This book isn’t exactly a simple to use how-to guide though. It’s more of a series of short, loosely-related riffs on Pressfield’s opinions on writing and storytelling. So I’m typing up my notes and going to see what I can make of them.

Overall message of the book:

It isn’t that people are mean or cruel. They’re just busy. Nobody wants to read your shit.

Reminds me of a story Walter Williams tells about meeting one of his heroes. Williams tells his hero, his wife likes to assume most people will like her, this maximizes her potential friends but also maximizes the chances of getting hurt. While he prefers to assume most people dislike him, this minimizes his chances of getting hurt, but also minimizes his amount of friends. So who’s right? His hero responded with, did it ever occur to you that most people don’t give a damn?

How do you deal with the fact that nobody wants to read your shit? Do these 3 things:

Be clear and concise. Pare you writing down to its most digestible form. 

Be fun or sexy or mischievous or interesting or original. The whole, “be so good they can’t ignore” you advice.

Apply this to everything. And I really think Pressfield means everything.

Those 3 rules are pretty good. How do I apply them? With every paragraph, sentence or word, you must be constantly asking yourself if you are giving the reader enough. I don’t do this and it sounds exhausting and is probably why I am not yet a professional writer.

Every project needs a concept. What’s the concept of this blog? Man feels compelled to write so he puts himself on a twice per week posting schedule and writes about things he is interested in that aren’t important but in reality are quite important.

Here was a good line:

it ain’t stealing if you put a spin on it

And here it gets circular. This quote reminds me of things David Perell talks about with imposter syndrome. Where everyone is an imposter so no one is an imposter. Creators have the duty to stand on the shoulders of giants and build on what is already built. And I searched Twitter to find the clip but didn’t find what I was looking for but found Perell posted a transcribed excerpt from his interview with Seth Godin. And Seth Godin references Steve Pressfield as a pioneer here.

He lists 3 situations that produce bad ideas:

trying too hard

being too formulaic

panicking 

Interestingly enough reading the rest of the book, I think you need to do all 3 of these things to succeed as well.

If something is not working, don’t look for the solution, but rather look for the problem. OK, I’m listening.

The theme is what it’s about, you need the theme to understand the problem. Knowing what your story is about give you the key to every scene and chapter. What’s the theme of this blog? Is this different than the concept? 

Then there’s this:

We discover who we are by what we say and what we do. We uncover our nature through action.

What’s my nature? I’m afraid to put it into words I think.

There’s talk of soul, of Jung and the collective unconscious, of Joseph Cambpell and myths and legends. I should reread 12 Rules for Life. Or rewatch that Guy Ritchie Joe Rogan clip. Or maybe I should actually read Jung and Joseph Campbell.

Pressfield offers the hero’s journey as an important template...

home

call to action

reject call

meet mentor, accept call

enter special world

meet villain

confront villain, win treasure

try to exit special world and go home

pursued by villain, defeat villain

return home with treasure a changed man

...and cautions stories that veer too far from it will feel slightly off to the audience.

There needs to be an inciting incident in act one (climax needs to be embedded into it somehow). The villain owns act two. I guess act three is the climax?

Start at the end. Begin with the climax, then work backward to the beginning.

Raise the stakes, get your characters in jeopardy, stakes and jeopardy work in tandem.

Pressfield likes to use all caps:

EVERY CHARACTER MUST REPRESENT SOMETHING GREATER THAN HIMSELF

Hero can’t be passive in the climax. Hero can’t be saved. Hero must do the saving.

Stories work for corporate presentations too, organize it like its fiction. Write non-fiction like fiction with act one, act two, act three. I do this to an extent but could stand to do better.

Narrative device--who tells the story, how they tell it, who do they tell it to--get it right and everything falls into place. Need to be on theme. Concept, theme, narrative device. OK. 

To make the protagonist a star, make the theme and concept a star.

Fiction is truer than truth, write what you don’t know. I don’t know how this fits into the rest of the advice.

Some other tips:

when we think in blocks of time, we acquire patience

Yep, love it, makes sense.

Thinking in multiple drafts takes the pressure off

Agree. Already do that. So I do one thing right.

No one wants to watch you stroke your own ego. No one wants to listen to your cries for attention. Because it’s boring to us.

Make it beautiful. Make it fun and sexy and interesting and I’ll buy it. I’ll wear it. I’ll tell my friends about it. Your book, your poem, your movie can even be despairing, as long as it’s profoundly conceived and takes my understanding of life a little bit deeper.

[ofasleepvisits]

Autumn fallin' from trees The snow is up to our knees Oh, I let you borrow my keys To sleep in my room

Our house in Newport, the painted red brick, the couple steps up to the front walk through the tiny front yard, four or five more steps up to the large front porch, the big white door that would the wind would blow open kept unlocked, the squeaky wood floors, the living room with the the pale orange/yellow/green sofa/loveseat/chair setup, real adult furniture I remember being proud of purchasing.

The table your mom had bought years before, it followed us through several apartments, now in our dining room. It’s funny, I don’t picture it with mail and paperwork and other junk all over it--though I know that was it’s typical state--but rather I picture it clean with placemats.

There was your toy tool bench in there, your toy work goggles and tool belt. I am picturing you with that green dinosaur T-shirt, but I guess I’ve skipped to toddler years somehow.

Before that, the highchair, I remember figuring that out and finally getting some peace. I would put it in the kitchen and give you some puff snacks, and I would stand and eat my dinner, that grey tile floor, was it tile?

Before that, the purple Bumbo seat, on the kitchen counter, on that dining room table, that was dangerous wasn’t it? I don’t think ours had a strap and buckle.

I remember humming the “Sanford & Son” theme song, you liked that. Did you hum back? I don’t remember. But I would sit you at the high chair in the dining room, at the table, and I would hum that song or maybe sing something.

I loved singing to you, dinner time or bath time especially. I remember singing “I Can’t Fight This Feeling” by REO Speedwagon to you in the bath, I remember hitting the “duh duhhhh” hard between the verse and the chorus.

But “Autumn Fallin’” was probably my favorite song to sing to you at bath time.

You threw away my shoe I brought you to central park zoo Then I drew your eyes very blue And I stuck them on the fridge

I remember that baby tub we would position inside our large jacuzzi tub, I picture myself bending over on my knees, it doesn’t look comfortable as I picture it now in my mind, but I don’t remember being uncomfortable.

That black and white tile bathroom, that three-quarters wall between the tub and the toilet, that shower with the seat, no door or shower curtain.

That song was so easy to sing. It still is.

I remember hearing another song by Jaymay on the coffeehouse satellite radio channel and buying the whole album on iTunes. That was early iTunes download days, for me at least, no streaming, so I’d buy albums and listen to them over and over. Your mom would listen to what I listened to. She liked those songs too.

That neighborhood, walking with the stroller, running with the dog, taking the bus to work, that time in our lives. We brought you home from the hospital to that house and would move less than three years later. But it seemed like a lot longer.

And I believe it was you Who I wanted to be walking next to And I believe we were friends And I believe we will be again

[ofasleepvisits]

Of Vice and Ben

Is this what the end feels like?

That was the question I was asking myself late last December. The Steelers were a few weeks removed from their unexpected 11-0 start and aspirations of an undefeated season. They lost a couple games they shouldn’t have, and Ben Roethlisberger was starting look his age.

But their incredible start allowed them to stumble into a January home playoff game in spite of their regular season finish, and they were matched up against the one team I figured they were capable of beating.

If they could knock their division rival Browns out of the playoffs for the third time since 1995, then advance to lose to whatever better team they would face in round two, the season would be satisfying enough for me.

But then the Steelers--and especially Big Ben--went on to play about the worst game they were capable of playing and actually lost to those Browns. Again I was left with that lingering question, is this what the end feels like?

The end of what exactly?

I am not Ben Roethlisberger or affiliated with the Steelers organization in any official capacity. I am just a fan who’s watched Ben lead the Steelers for the better part of two decades, and it’s been fun to watch.

I was born between the Steelers’ third and fourth Super Bowl victories, and therefore, not able to witness the glory years of the ‘70s. My earliest memories of Steelers fandom was their ‘80s mediocrity. The adult males in my life at the time (uncles, family friends) would repeat jokes they probably heard on AM sports radio like, “did you hear Mark Malone is starting a bakery, only open on Sundays, specializing in turnovers?” I used to wonder to myself if these older Steeler fans in my life even liked football because all they did was complain about it.

I, on the other hand, not having experienced the Terry Bradshaw era, felt genuine excitement and optimism entering seasons in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s with Bubby Brister as the starting quarerback, and again in the mid ‘90s with Neil O’Donnell, and again in the late ‘90s/early ‘00s with Kordell Stewart, and again in 2003 with Tommy Maddox. Although there was some fun to be had during many of those seasons, they all ended in disappointment.

Then came Ben Roethlisberger.

He wasn’t as good as Peyton Manning or Tom Brady or Drew Bees. And he wouldn’t be as good as Aaron Rodgers or Russell Wilson or Patrick Mahomes. And some of his off-the-field behavior was questionable. But he was fun to watch, leading the Steelers to three Super Bowl appearances, winning two of them.

Those championship seasons were obviously fun, but they were only two among many. Every other season--though they had some interesting and fun moments created by interesting and fun players--ended with disappointment and me wondering what could have been different if one or two plays went another way.

Maybe the end that this is--or should be--is the end of being disappointed by what sports could have been. And this could be the beginning of enjoying sports for what they are. Not wanting or asking more out of sports than I should be getting out of it, which is something delightful to play and follow and connect with others about, especially family, especially my kids.

So I have decided this is what the beginning will feel like.