This Is My Life

(this is my only life)

The phrase is, "No news is good news." That seems pretty valid, in the sense that this is one of the longest breaks in this blog, and coincides with the greatest time of my entire life. Indeed, I do this more as a courtesy, as I don't feel the need to write (in my blog) much. There is little I need to figure out. My life is very, very, very blessed.

Foremost is Casey. Pandora (my romantic muse) and Caissa (my writing muse) are off-the-charts giddy and excited. I could write a thousand paragraphs on what she means to me - but will simply state that I have found my match, my friend, my confidant, my lover, my teammate, my challenger, my supporter, and my love. For all those who still search and yearn for such a person, know that I passed up a chance to settle, had to wait two and a half years filled with many questioning thoughts and wonderings about whether I would ever find someone who made me truly happy. Then came the random Friday night when I went to a gathering where I told myself I didn't even want to meet anyone and was only going to see friends... and my life changed, instantly and irrevocably. It was all the cliches. Love at first sight. It will happen when you least expect it.
Maybe yours won't work the same way, but in my case, I had to simultaneously stop looking so hard and make sure I was out there for that to happen. And I thank God daily that it did. My prayers were answered.

Sports are fun. After a tough time over the last few weeks because my heart acted up again - necessitating a hospital visit in Maui on our only family vacation west of Kansas ever - I've been tentative. But after DW's bachelor party weekend, I've realized that this is my life. This is my only life. And I will not let this rule my life. I have to push through.

Dave is getting married. :) I am so excited for the wedding. Jess is a great girl. Dave seems excited and content, a good combo. Casey has already bought a dress. I think this might be one of the best dancing opportunities of my life so far.

My city is doing amazing.
The Steelers won the Super Bowl... and I was there, in person. I was at the 18 yard line, some 33 rows back, on the end zone that James Harrison scored into after he ran across my whole field of vision. I saw Ben scramble right in front of me four or five times and marveled that he even survived, much less made critical plays. I saw Santonio Holmes's catch in a perfect window and stunning snapshot in my mind. I agonized over every reviewed call without the benefit of instant replay. We celebrated like mad.
My Penguins won the Stanley Cup, and I was in person for the entire regular season and playoff run, including Games 3, 4, and 6 of the Stanley Cup Final at Mellon Arena. I attended Game 4 with Case; it was one of the seminal sporting moments of our lives (and our relationship). We were both at the parade (with DW) with another 374,997 people. It was all so surreal. It was a script that was written four years ago... and then came true. That is what never fails to astonish me. The Game 7 experience, watched with my family, was a tie with the Super Bowl in intensity. I held hands with Case tightly, paced back and forth, laid on the kitchen table and groaned in agony. I don't even remember what happened after the last-second save Fleury made. I can't believe we did it. Arguably the most amazing championship I've ever seen.
The city is beautiful. It will host the G-20 soon, and is as gorgeous as ever to watch from Mt. Washington or to see coming through the Fort Pitt Tunnel. I've visited other big cities, like Philly and New York, but only Pittsburgh makes me feel part of it. I feel so connected to it... and so does Case. We are happy here. We feel at home here. Yay, Pittsburgh.

I'm still employed at work - even though I am writing this right now - and have the opportunity to perhaps continue schooling, if my heart is in it.

I haven't done much writing lately, mostly because of Casey - in the best way - but still think about it and love it as much as ever when I do it. I am literally hours away from being done with the first ten chapters, and capable of handing 145 pages to anyone and say, "This is the beginning of my story." That is the length of the entire book I wrote in high school. That is exciting.

5725 Phillips, in Squirrel Hill, where I've lived for four years - as long as college - is ending. Dave has moved in with Jess. Nate is buying a house. I may not follow him to it, but will look back at that time - the 5725 Phillips Ave - as the height of my bachelorhood and transition into something else. Drinking on the steps, late night bears/baseball/boobs, random wandering around the apartment in boxers, eating when you could. Total madness. Totally wonderful.

To all those who wrote nicely about this blog - maybe most eloquently summed up by Ryan Corbi, a friend from afar who wrote a note that I think about much more often than he probably guesses - hoped for more updates.

I will try to keep them coming, so check back, if you wish; I sure as hell will not abandon this writing space. I've grown to like it, and will need it in the future, I am sure.

But this is my life.

And no news, for right now, means the best news of all.

I am happy.

A Letter From Caissa

(my muse)

Hello, Mathew.

You didn't know I would call you 'Mathew', did you? Of course not, because I'm the one who came up with the idea. But like all my ideas, you immediately liked it as soon as it arrived. Why? Because I'm the one who gave it to you. Yet it seems right, in the way that a good story idea fits solidly into your web.

I'm giving up a good game of chess in the meadow to write this to you. Seeing as how my name is based off the goddess of chess, you should be doubly grateful. Usually I'm much more ephemeral, striking hard and swift with power and beauty and then vanishing before you can guess its source, like a sneak attack of description, or if ninjas ambushed you with plot points. But, as awesome as my home in your soul's meadow is, where I can wear my hair long and wear shades of green with a dark base, sometimes I want to do something new. That is, after all, part of my job description.
Hence, this letter.

I was inspired by Martin's letter from his demons. Great stuff, particularly the changeover uses of 'we' and 'I' as different demons were discussed. Riotous. I wish I could do something the same, but unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), being your muse is a one-girl only proposition. Your idea for Seya battling the Dragon at the Gate? Me. Your idea to make that the end of the second book, to embark on a journey it may take the rest of your life to walk? Me. Your Dragontamers, your magic spells, your characters loves and betrayals: me, me, me. Of course, I'm also responsible for your desire to kill at least half your main characters and your apparent penchant for rape, and I'm fine with that. I take the credit and the blame, and am fine putting my skills up against any others that dare come to my meadow. Not that I expect anyone to. It's not as if Dan in your brain running the IT sector could conceive of something like shadowlight.

I guess I'm doing all right. A 6.37 on a scale of 1-10. It has, of course, been better than that. Part of me wants to remind you of the way we had it once. Remember the writing nights we used to have? The all-night sessions where you and I would build together, seamlessly moving back and forth and achieving higher and higher lofts of description and character and plot until I stripped naked, baring everything I had for you - nothing is hotter than a strong plot point that fills a gaping hole - and you poured red wine over my writhing body as we consummated yet another chapter, burning holes through the paper with words we wrote with fire?
...Whew. Sorry. Good memories.
I do understand the need to balance the work, the friends, the life, with me. A girl's got to eat, after all. So I don't mind as much when I'm not needed for some days, and I can rest on the grass or work out in the tree, maybe idly amusing myself with a game of chess or turn of phrase I will save for later. And when we do get together, I understand if it can't always be for a lot of time, that staying up all night is an invitation to disaster, and that sometimes you just don't think of it.

But I'm writing you to remind you that what we can do is special. You love it, I know you do - I'm in charge of one of the best parts of you, matched only by Pandora's romance and (maybe) Thix's bubbling strangeness. And I've worked with both. Thix has sometimes given me some of my best ideas (even inadvertently), and Pandora and I have been good friends since the early days. We've connected on multiple levels. We helped create Seya-Talin and Sitiani-Cain. We even bake pies on Thursdays. Pandora and Thix both know you love creating. I certainly do - it is everything I am, everything that is me, the reason I exist. I know you like that. Let's create.

Sure, sometimes I feel bad that my talents don't go across other areas. There are so many mediums for me, and I seem to have only had talent in one. I helped give you that song you always hum to yourself every few weeks, and why you enjoy singing or whistling wordlessly, just to try out a new set of notes. I'm why you scribble in meetings at work, trying in vain to make an even discernible picture of a scene in TFOR. I'm sorry that I have no musical talent, nor drawing, nor acting or filming or anything else of the sort.

But I can write.

If that is all I possess, then I will write with every ounce of me, create events and people and worlds through your writing that leap into existence, letters flashing with their power. Not that it will be easy, or quick. But I promise you, if you give me the time, I will lay my life down on this grass of your soul to make your dream come true - that one day, you will write a fantasy series that will give someone the same joy and amazement at another world and events that you felt reading your first fantasy books. I can do it. I can create. I can help.
All it takes is desire... and time.

Bill in accounting makes offhand comments at group luncheons sometimes about the decreasing amount of hours he can divy out, and Sefro has only been happy lately because you've joined a third sport. It won't be easy, necessarily. Even Pandora is a little sad that you have no steady flame to stand by.

But they will be there still, and I'm not asking you to ignore them. Simply remember that I will provide you something the worth of which goes far beyond good work or good exercise.

I will help you do something that you will be proud of your entire life.

So...
Spend a little more time in my meadow? I have chocolate, remember. (Pandora told me to say that, but I could have guessed anyway.) I hope to see you there.

'Til then.

- Caissa

WW Quotes

(mass insanity)

- Gullifty’s with Claire and Pat: Do we stay or go? And, where does Pat sleep?

- Pegged Chautauqua arrival time: 12:30 AM. Actual Chautauqua arrival time: 4 AM

- Fly duty

- Moving the dresser for smoke detector duty

- A strangely cold night at Chautauqua

- Finding out the next morning that no less than 16 windows were open – thanks, Grandmother’s friends

- Waking up bright and early at noon on Saturday

- The Bemus Point Inn Cinnamon Roll claims another victim

- Debating taking the woman home from Bemus Point

- Mat: “I loved the hair, loved the breasts, love the back…”
Martin: “Loved the shoes…”
Mat: “Loved the – wait, the shoes?”

- Martin: “I’ve lost it man, I’ve lost it, I can’t do it anymore!”

- One check, please

- The walk through the woods, or, walking in the pitch dark and falling over

- Hundreds of bizarre mini-pumpkins in the trail

- The albino pumpkin: what the hell was that thing?

- Drying clothes over the fire

- Martin’s love of deer: Nione with deer, deer pajamas, deer hat, deer in path going to Webb’s

- Ah, Webb’s

- Matias getting tipsy on one glass of wine/apple juice

- The chicken noodle soup

- Accidentally ordering an extra massive bowl of the soup… apiece… and then finishing both plus two things of rolls and the huge meals

- Tasting each other’s wine at a romantic table dinner for two in front of a fire and Christmas Tree with amazing background music at Webb’s. Martin: “Strangely, one of the most romantic dinners I’ve ever been on”

- Twenty seconds at the bar with the woman: Great talk, great goal, great God

- The fire: Beautiful, hot, entrancing. Better than TV

- Martin: You have a spark.
Mat: Yes.
Martin: No, on your robe, there’s sparks, they’re still there, it's on fire, put them out.

- Going through the Writer’s Meetings notes. “Child: But that’s not where the pie goes!”

- Mat, acting out Sitiani slow-motion escape:
Mat(falling into couch, clutching shoulder): “Ow!”
Martin: “Geez, Mat! You’re falling apart over there.”
Mat: Man down, man down.

- Mat(reading aloud): Ch.8: Among the Leaves. …If you say ‘amongst’, I’ll blow your head off.
Martin: Ok.
Mat: … Is it amongst?
Martin: Yeah, it is.
Mat: Damn it!
Martin: You could say 'among' though. I’m pretty sure.
Mat: Fine.
Martin: Although it’s really amongst.
Mat: …Ch.8: The Leaves.

- Martin: I feel like I’m in an inner monologue with two people

- Face is top three

- Mat: “We’ll write again in 10 minutes.”
(Mat hangs robe in front of fire for thirty seconds, then puts it on. )
Mat: “…Oooh.” Asleep in five minutes

- A much better night’s sleep Sunday. Wonder why

- Bemus Point Inn II: The Revenge

- The owl

- Martin: This is the most productive I’ve been all trip.
Mat: It’s time to go.
Martin: Damn it.

- The ride home: We’ll discuss Manipulation for a few minutes as part of our many topics to cover

- Two hours later: “So if Manipulation was discovered, used, and then banned…”

- The End
Martin: I feel like I should kiss you goodbye.
Mat: With tongue or without tongue?
Martin: I think you know.
Mat: ...Writer's Weekend.


Until next year.

Writer's Weekend

(Caissa in paradise)

I recently returned from a Writer's Weekend. It was Martin and I, at Chautauqua, alone, for the weekend, and it was an absolutely wonderful trip. If it was slightly less productive than I had hoped, it was also much more enjoyable than I thought, and the trip can only be classified as a major success. Especially since no cars were damaged, the foundation did not get damaged by flooding, and no snowmobiles were lodged into tress (not that there was enough snow on the ground for that to occur anyway).
The actual events of the weekend were fun - I have a quote page from it that will not only remind me of the events, but is fun enough to post - but it definitely got me thinking. Martin and I talked about his movie, and how he still has not completed it, and as we sat around the fire, I realized that my core, my group of friends who were most responsible for me completing the Gate of Dragons, were all having similar problems. Margaret was still writing her pilot (did she ever finish it, I wondered?). Marla, as far as I knew, never followed up on her amazing writing from high school (or did she, and I just didn't know it, I wondered?).
Thinking of them, I wished they were up here, to enjoy the amazing ambience - Chautauqua is muse crack - and critique and suggest and praise and doubt and all the 100 things that any writer really needs. And I wished they were there not just to read my story, but so that I could read theirs, and be excited by their plots and characters and turns of writing, and be inspired by them in turn.
And by the way, Martin - so much potential, so little completed - is the definition of not finishing what is started. Until recently, that is. He did finish his CD... and he did finish his job search, and was able to get a job and hold onto it. That gives hope that he may finish his children's book or Nione or the movie.
And I? I've been writing this book for five years. I thought I was working hard on it, but I realize I haven't really been working hard until last year. Then I went a level above that and realized I haven't really been working hard until six months ago.

And I'm not done either.

I guess that's why I'm thinking on the subject of my story; its current progress, it's ability to move forward, its final picture. I think it might be good to record the progress, just to see how it goes. This is an amazingly rough viewpoint, and only includes work that is significant enough to warrant its inclusion in this list.
Ch.1: 27 pages, 15,739 words
Ch.2: 13 pages, 7,489 words
Ch.3: 9 pages, 5,112 words
Ch.4: 11 pages, 6,567 words
Ch.5: 14 pages, 8,124 words
Ch.6: 16 pages, 9,125 words
Ch.14(in progress): 9 pages, 4,476 words
Ch.26(in progress): 8 pages, 4,487 words
Ch.27(in progress): 7 pages, 3,237 words
Ch.37: 13 pages, 6,669 words
TFOR All Notes: 51 pages, 23,457 words
TFOR All Sections: 39 pages, 18,828 words

Total
217 pages
113,110 words

Wow. ...Wow! I have never actually taken the time before to count up what I had accomplished. Even though this is a very rough estimate, I am still proud to see that I have actually made it a lot farther than I had originally envisioned. During WW, I told Martin I might have as many as 150 pages. The Gate of Dragons, which I wrote in high school, was 154.
Now, not all those 217 pages are good pages. TFOR All Sections is (by definition) all over the place. TFOR All Notes doesn't always translate to already written material. Some of the chapters (like 14,26, and 27) are incomplete. Others (like 2) are a disgrace. Damn you viewpoint issues.
But what gives me hope is the story, plot, and characters; how much I enjoy the characters I'm writing about, how much I enjoy them interacting, striving, failing, and succeeding. Ch.3 is decent, and the new Ch.4 was well-received by Martin over the weekend, who proclaimed it his favorite dialogue of the book. Ch.6 I've always enjoyed, and 14 has real power. The good points remain.
How long until I finish? How long until I have something, really something, that I can hand 120 or 140 or 160 pages to someone and say, "Here is the first ten chapters of my book, The Flames of Resistance"? ...I don't know. I know that the writing is coming more quickly; the days between my notations in All Notes, shorter and shorter. I now run more and more into scenes I've already written, and they match into what I'm doing, like speed powerups in a racing videogame. There is real potential here. What timeframe does that equate to? I don't know... but I know it is up to me.
I'm simultaneously overwhelmed and excited by it. I guess that's both my story and my life.

Not giving up on the dream yet.

The Blood

(flows)

Life - on the whole - is going well.
Maybe that's why I haven't written. Pigeon in the Sun's greatest fault is her inability to write anything when things are well. This is different than being unable to write something happy; it's just that if the overall situation is good, you can expect shockingly longer wait times for posts, shorter posts when they are written, and generally a lack of the kind of molten power that suffuses some of her work. Hey, they can't all be bombshells. But the trend persists.
Maybe that's what's happening here.

It's odd - I feel strangely... disconnected. This is how I felt when my grandpa died. This is also how I felt - often - when my Aunt Linda died. Strangely disconnected, like everything that I lived and watched and saw was a play, a dress rehearsal for the real thing. This didn't matter. It wasn't real. I don't know what that says about me. A coping mechanism, I believe. That makes sense; but then, what am I coping with now?

When confused about my own internal motivations, I have always been able to count on my dreams to lead the way. They lead me down paths that wind and trail, through sea road overloooks and red-gold forests so thick with unwanted memories that they pile around you like the snows of a decade past. But they all eventually lead me to my heart.
I wrote down one of my dreams in detail here once. The result was so terrifying I've never done it again. For someone who occasionally prides himself on the strength of his creativity and innovation, it is terrifying to see what it can do in a realm where it is the sole master, and is not bound by the realms of my conscious or subject to its overarcing authority. My dreams are much more real, for that reason; the unvarnished truth, whether I like it or not.

I dream of people.

I dream of everyone, eventually; why I have a constant track of dreams that involve others that I know in my life, I do not know. Perhaps the storyteller in my muse perfers vivid characters to tell its story, like an artist would prefer the best paints for her canvas.
For an optimistic person, my dreams are amazingly equal in tone. 50% of my dreams are what one would call 'good'. Things generally happen to the benefit of the characters involved; tough times are usually overcome or an acceptable part of a better situation. Of those 50%, 5% of those dreams are fantastic dreams, ones that I actually hurt when I realize that it is not real. These can be easy, and often reaffirm the realities I could pull out of my conscious mind, with a little effort. A dream of resting in front of the fire at Chautauqua, with different friends all cozied up on the couches, equates to how special I feel moments (and history, ambience, and happiness) are to a friendship. A dream of dying and rising to Heaven, to see the land and know that more lay ahead, equates to my fervent (faith? hope?) of an afterlife.
The other 50% are not so good. And the 5% of this group are the epic ones, the terrible ones I will always remember.
The death of my brother, and how empty the family dinner table felt, and the terrible realization that I would never wrestle with him again or throw the frisbee or watch him grow to be his own man, woke me up in a dead sweat that left me sad that I sleep alone. Some time ago, waking up from choosing to let Margaret die had me over my own toilet, head swimming, trying (failing) to get the images out of my head: her sad face, the sight of her injured body, her lack of cries. I'll never know whether 4:43 was five minutes after I was in that bathroom or five hours. Time had left a long time ago.
That dream (and its compatriot two days later, a joyous one of saving her from an onrushing bus) did some good, letting me know that there was an imbalance in myself I had to correct, something that I had to do myself. That is good. But at the time... they were very hard. Very real.
Why do I bring this up now? I don't know. Maybe because at times like that, I've never felt more connected to reality.
It's good to remember those times now.

Life is very good now. I have some money, and a great family. I work at a good job and cheer on my favorite teams. I think often of an artist in Alexandria, a firelass in New York, and a long-found friend in California. My role models are nursing in Chicago, too busy to give me the time of day in New York, and working until 11:30 in Pittsburgh and none of them know what I think of them. I know a girl who likes me that I don't care for, I like a girl who doesn't care for me, and one girl has been shooting me smiles and I have no idea what each other are reading.
That is life.
Since my heart, I've often thought of how important it was to really, truly enjoy. To cast off the reservations of society and others; to stop, even unconsciously, thinking about what others think about you; to look up into the rain and laugh and not care. Just enjoy. Just experience life.
A watched pot never boils. A life enjoyed flows slowly through the hourglass. And blood flows more slowly through the veins.
Everyone's in a headlong rush to get ahead. Silly. No matter what, all roads lead to death.

I don't mind not winning that race.

A Touch

(of poetry)

It's rare that I write poetry, though it's not totally unheard of; I'd say on average I write it once a year. But this came to me in the middle of a GChat conversation with Bethany, as I was thinking about the strange qualities and circumstances surrounding love. It's short and I make no claims to its quality, but it seems well-received by the few who have heard it.

For were it the strict realm
of the gods and goddesses,
to favor us with our loves,
and flaunt us with our losses;
would all feelings be decided
without emotions to muster,
and thus predetermined,
lose all their luster.

The Elements

(of power)

Wow. I totally didn't mean to type that for my (), but it just came out of my fingers. Hahahaha. Wow!
Just another example of how sometimes, when the muse speaks, you are merely the conduit of greatness.

I love the feel of wind in my hair. Love it. It is one of the times I feel connected to nature. It feels like I can feel the breath of Mother Nature upon me, and get a sense of whether she is content or annoyed or sad.
I love marveling at the strength of the wind, at its abrupt rise in power and changes in direction. I love watching people scurry in the street, trying to find cover, knocked out of their almost permanent sense that man has tamed nature and that weather is a mere annoyance as papers and debris are blown everywhere.
I love how I feel in it. It is one of the times that I feel the most alive.
This probably goes hand-in-hand with my love of thunderstorms. A few days ago I was home alone when a BOOM shook me out of watching TV. I went to the window in time to see the first sheet of rain in a torrential thunderstorm wash over the world. I grabbed my laptop and a chair, dragged both down the steps, and sat out on the front porch, the rain pelting my feet as I typed in the warm summer rain amidst a lightning storm that would put any human fireworks display to shame. Beautiful.

The power of current and movement in a river, so strong that it's all you can do to stand and not be swept downriver, same as any leaf or twig... the swaying of a world of trees out my window when I drive through the Blue Mountains on the turnpike... the beauty of a blanket of pristine snow, icicles dangling off tree limbs like cold wind chimes.

The Elements of power and beauty, indeed.

The Passion

(the commitment)

I have no doubts that I want to write a fantasy story.

I finished Chapter 5 of TFOR - finished finished, including page-level editing work. Nothing was rushed, nothing was forced just to put a last period to a piece of paper; it was complete and worked. It's easy to tell when writing is going well; you look up at your desk and suddenly realize three hours have gone by, and it felt like twenty minutes. That happened with the last pages of Chapter 5.
Now, in olden days, I would print out the story and give the Mar's - Margaret, Martin, and Marla - a separate copy each. Those were great days. I could get three people's different viewpoints on the chapter or section I had given them, and each person offered a different expertise - Margaret's innate sense of character, Martin's view on plot, mood, and excitement, and Marla's technical and sentence structure skills. Unfortunately, now I only have Martin nearby (I'll have to send it out to Margaret), so we headed out to Eat N' Park and we read over Chapter 5.

He didn't like it.

That's not actually true, of course. Martin was pumped to read the chapter, and afterwards still liked the movement of what was happening, liked some of the things in the plot and character. But the manner in which I went about describing one of my main characters, Ru, didn't ring right, and he didn't enjoy it as much as he usually enjoyed my chapters, and told me so.
When that happens, it's not easy for anyone. It's hard to tell someone that you don't like something they've written; it's even harder to hear it. But truthful reading requires it, at least if you really want to get better and write something so good that an editor or house has to publish it. That's a true statement, of course, but it doesn't always make it easy to do.
I remember one time Martin and I were working over a portion of my story - I think Chapter 2 - and he made at least two pages of verb choice and intra-sentence corrections when I just wanted to hear his opinions on the overall feel of the plot and characterization, as if those were missing there was no point in going down to the individual word level. It was quite a heated meeting for a bit until he and I realized that we were on totally different thought processes of analysis. Afterwards we agreed that we would not take offense to each other's comments, that we would meet many times (we hoped) in the future and that we had to be able to give criticism (lightly) and take criticism (liberally). Writing is a personal art, after all, and it can be difficult to receive critiques on something you have mentally sweated and strained towards, something that reflects your creativity, your hard work, and your passion. In writing in particular, critiques of your work often feel as critiques of yourself as a person.
This is why I am happy with the way this meeting worked out. Martin listed his critiques of the chapter, chiefly revolving around the Ru-Valavar connection (as the story is currently written, they're both extremely similar characters), and I concentrated on taking things constructively. And while some comments were hard to hear, I succeeded in taking value out of the comments, and started asking proactive questions. We ended up talking until 2 AM, and I ended up taking three pages of notes and ideas coming from the scene, which ultimately should improve the final product. Perhaps not as great as a comeback from the days of "Why don't they just break the Holocron? 'Whoops! Ok, story's over.' " ...But not bad nonetheless.
Writing goes on.

Today is Barbara's birthday. The thought makes me smile. Happy Birthday, Barb. I miss hearing from her.

So much to talk about - owning a car, riding a bike to work, re-doing my room. The last one is actually the most important, the most meaningful. Another post.

"Without the water, the wisdom of past
slips through your fingers, forgotten so fast."

Indra's Theory of Existence

(a.k.a. Mat's Web)

Another enlightening and engrossing writing conference with Martin. If you've ever played a really good series of games of pickup basketball, or played a tough match in volleyball, or any of its equivalents in one hundred different sports, you know the rewarding feeling of physical exertion. A good workout cleanses the body, makes it work, and ultimately makes it stronger. The mind needs just as much exertion. It needs a workout too, particularly in today's day and age, where TV thinks for you. No imagination is required with TV, no thought or analysis in most shows; the brain has about as much activity to do as when it is asleep, or in a coma.
But a good writing conference - or philosophical conversation, or private mediation, or any other excellent exercise for the mind - is as rewarding as its physical equivalent. It really is great to get to expand your mind for a few hours and imagine, create, weigh, analyze, discuss, collaborate, interrogate, reject, and create again. I find myself looking forward to them, and wish I had more completed writing to bring to them on a regular basis - a wish that may well come to pass if Caissa can keep up the pressure she's built up over the last couple of months.
The quote from above is from the conference, in which Martin explained that a Buddhist/Eastern idea of reality - via Indra - consisted of a number of glass nodes on points where lines of reality crossed. Martin argued that this was exactly like my idea of the story web, my idea of how a story is created/held together/succeeds. Good to know that I was actually coming up with a theory of reality. That's especially cool when you think about it, as fantasy writing really is all about creating a reality - one the reader can visit and leave his or her own behind, if only the reality is real, believable, and engrossing.
That's some good mental exercise.

Friday night I am leaving for my Hershey-AC trip with Dave, Tom, Jeff, and Nate, and I am wildly pumped for it. It's our summer trip and we are going to rock. I also will have quite a bit on the line at AC, and need to determine a set limit before arriving - rule #1 of gambling being setting a limit and not deviating from said limit no matter what - but I imagine that it will be a ton of fun. This is going to be an absolute blast!

I have volleyball tonight and dodgeball on Monday, which I will be coming back specifically for. Good thing we have an 8:30 PM game.

I'll definitely write another blog entry before I go. Can't slow down the momentum now that I'm freed of the dreaded project of doom.

The Pony Express

(your mail in three months, guaranteed)

There is something infinitely redeeming about a letter.
Every day I send upwards of twenty work e-mails, sometimes more. Sometimes many more. I send a lot of friends e-mails as well. Just type, click, and it's there. Instantaneous. And when I type as quickly as I do - almost as fast as I think - it's not hard for me to get all my thoughts down that I want immediately, fresh and hot off the synapses, still sparking with nanobits of literal mental electricity. And when e-mail became the preferred method of communication, both in the work and the social worlds, it was because of its immediacy, it's ease of creation and delivery, a process that required no pickup or dropoff times, no physical materials, and no horses. (Or the couriers on them.)
So getting a letter is a strange and rare event. Getting two in one day is unheard of. But upon opening my little mailbox in the lobby of my apartment complex last night, I found two letters from Margaret, sitting all nice and pretty.
One was dated June 20th; the other, June 26th. I got them both July 6th, a testament to Margaret being at an electricity-poor camp in Maine and the reliability of my apartment complex always adding 4-7 days onto the normal mailing process. I sometimes wonder if the building supervisors wait outside for the mailman, cheerfully saying "We'll sort them into each apartment box for you!" and the mailman leaving thinking, "That's really nice of them to do that", while the women carry the mail back to their offices and see how long they can hold it before their residents pitch a fit.
But I digress - I got two letters, both long and handwritten. That seems to go without saying but after the thousands of e-mails I've sent and received over the last year, there is something pure and simple about a handwritten letter. For one, it takes time. My handwriting is infinitely slower than my typing. It shows you that the person put a lot of time and effort into it, because it's not that easy to create a long letter, particularly compared to the ease of e-mail. For another, you get all the personality of the characters, the slant of the lines, the flowing strokes of curves and hard dashes. It brings to mind the scene in Hero of the battle at the calligraphy school, and how writing and swordplay are almost exactly the same thing. But the personality is the key - and it's something I never noticed before, or at least not this explicitly.
The cool thing was that Margaret was having a similar experience in Maine. Away from all the 'basics' of city/suburban life - like electricity - you get down to what the real 'basics' are - trees, fire, lakes, stars. It was really impressive to read about and the topic just seemed to fit the handwritten letter perfectly.
And the last cool thing about handwritten letters is that, unlike e-mail, one good letter deserves another.
A timely quote: "The harder you press on paper, the more intense of a personality you have."
Excellent...

Going to meet with Martin for a writer's conference tonight, and I'm excited about it. Caissa practically needs a new dress. W0w. I'm pretty sure she wrote that before my brain had actually comprehended it.

I set up the family fantasy football league today, and it looks like it's going to be awesome! So many good things ahead...

Life is getting better...

Freeeeeeeedom

(every man blogs... not every man really writes)

Oh, you know your muse is on when she comes up with a title and opening without so much as a hint of a thought.

My project is over.
OVER!
The long work hours, the early starts, the undetermined late finishes, the weekend work, the upgrades, the logging in from home, the general mental weight of how much had to be done - what can be summed up as 'June' - is done.
Officially, anyway. Unofficially, the system is still a bit slow and has some kinks. But it's still working, damn it, and that means that the dreaded sense of urgency - the now now NOW NEED IT DONE NOW - is finally dissapating. I have room to mentally breathe, which I wouldn't have understood until I actually got out of it. How can I tell that things are better? Well, for example, Caissa is running around like a virgin that just discovered the fun times being with the opposite sex can create. I've been writing TFOR like a fiend, and she's wanted to blog all weekend, though that would have been tough in internet-poor Chautauqua. But now that I'm back, work seems like it was before. Work hard, but you could take some time to rest, or take a breath, or get a drink... and after everyone's gone, it's not so hard to remember it in a blog entry.

Saw fireworks last night, which was nice, and am going to basketball tonight. Dodgeball Mondays, basketball Tuesdays, and volleyball Thursdays means I am at least staying in shape better than I would before. Julie's playing dodgeball and volleyball too, and I'm stunned at the way she's taking it - i.e., very well. She's open to learning and trying to have fun. Example 14,879,206 of how confusing the female gender is.

Seeing the family over the weekend, we now have our 10-team fantasy football family league lining up. I am absolutely pumped for it. Combine that with my friends' league and my work league, and I will be in fantasy heaven come September... as I expect to be in a heated race for the championship in fantasy baseball at the same time.

Trying to stay in touch with all my friends. I'm hoping to see Martin for a writing conference tomorrow night, hoping to get Stoph to come down to Pittsburgh on a weekend, and I haven't heard anything from Margaret but will send her something around July. She's probably collecting all kinds of bedtime stories... if you know what I mean.

A new month and some free(r) time. I am looking forward to it!

So Many Paths

(but which way will you go)

In the midst of total work madness, I find myself coming to a crossroads in life.
Isn't that the way it always works? It's not during a relaxing, uncomplicated time that you could devote 100%, or even the majority, of your time, effort, and thought to so that you came to a calm, rational decision about the matter. Instead, you have to work around a crazy schedule with multiple responsibilities, mulling over the problem in stolen moments when you probably should be doing something else.
Julie will be visiting this summer and it will most likely define the next few years of my life - in particular whether I'm headed to a long-term relationship with a very distinct goal or I am single again for the first time in over five and a half years. The sheer enormity of it is so big that it is difficult to grasp mentally. I need to think what is best not only for myself, but her. If I didn't have such faith that what is best for me is best for her and vice versa, I would probably be terrified that what was best for her would be worst for me, and vice versa.
Ah well. At least I can see the issue coming. Sometimes you run into huge crossroads in life blind, casually choosing your path, maybe (if you're lucky) with some hint that your choice will have massive complications - though you have no idea what they could be - and only far down the road realize your choice has changed your path forever, and there's no way to turn around and go back. That's the funny thing about time. It's a one-way street. And you look back at the crossroad fading in the distance, wondering what could have been if you had taken the road less traveled.
In life, we don't regret what we did. We regret what we didn't.
That kind of revelation is extremely unpleasant.

My volleyball team got knocked out in the semifinals in heartbreaking fashion, being only three points away from the championship match at one point before losing. A good season, though there is a personality or two that is wearing on the squad heavily. That kind of issue is non-existent (thankfully) on the dodgeball team, who start their season this coming Monday with immense anticipation. Coupled with Tuesday co-ed basketball - in which I have both volleyball and dodgeball members, including my sister Emmie - I will be playing dodgeball on Mondays, basketball on Tuesdays, volleyball on Thursdays, and even refereeing dodgeball on Wednesdays if there are enough signups. It is going to be simply wonderful.

I had a nice little meeting with Martin the other night, which really woke up Caissa and made me miss writing. I simply must continue hammering away on getting the first draft done. I'm getting bogged down on the details, in trying to make things the best they can be before moving onto something else, and I realize now that I would be better served trying to get down my first draft of everything and going back to correct it. I have a rare-in-instance but strong-when-it-comes perfectionist streak - we're talking someone who completed every level of Doom I and II with 100% kills, items, and secrets, not to mention complete beatings of other games like Burnout 3 and Soul Calibur II - and maybe that's what's going on here. Either way, I plan on upping the production of new material, not just working on what's already there. Martin inadvertantly (though not completely) gave me a wonderful idea, so I have even more incentive to write, most likely at the expense of my work.
Big surprise there.

New computer coming today or tomorrow. Excitement!

I Am Blogimus Maximus

(and I will write my entry, in this life or the next)

Dodgeball was absolutely infuriating last night. We played a team that didn't rush for the balls, didn't try and throw, didn't try to entice action. They would get one of us out, then go to the back line and wait. The new, bigger court makes it nigh-impossible to get anyone out if they're on the back line, so they would merely wait for us to throw. If it was an easy throw, they caught it. Anything tough, they moved out of the way. Then, they either rolled or dropped the balls back on our side. With the very large court, catching always had a large advantage over throwing, so it would have behooved our team to not throw at all and merely wait for them to throw. But you know, our team didn't come to play an hour of roll-the-ball-back-and-forth.
I am personally steaming and have already filed a complaint with the head of the league.

On a better note, I am still healthy, and eating tons of food at meals, despite my rather large tonsils. This bodes well for tonight, as I am off to Olive Garden with Martin for a writing conference night. There is no better food to discuss a story over than Olive Garden breadsticks, spaghetti and meatballs, and unlimited Pepsi. I'm drooling just thinking about it...

I beat Grand Theft Auto III: San Andreas the other night. Chalk one up for the Gold Master of Burnout 3 and the ten-time completition of every single player Final Fantasy ever made. Soul Calibur III will eventually be coming out. I'm thinking that's next on my list. What better way to defend my Soul Calibur II skills?

Random thought day today. I'll have a more cohesive entry tomorrow.

Assuming the voices in my head let me.

Avanon Reached For The Skillet

(he was really pounding the bacon)

Priceless quote from tonight. And we all know the phrase "he was really pounding the bacon" has all sorts of good uses around the home.

I got to talk to Barbara tonight, which was wonderful. There may not be a nicer person alive than Barbara. She sent me 15 IM's the other day thanking me for our shared experiences at Villanova, which is amazing since I learned a lot more from her than vice versa. Getting to talk to her again was great. She had spent quite a while in Nicaragua as a nurse. That's just the type of person she is, bless her soul.

Then, tonight, Martin and I shunned our usual Eat N' Park writing conference for an Olive Garden writing conference. The results were fantastic - great food, great breadsticks, great service and a great story. We went from scratch to 15 page short story (Martin's assignment) and it freaking rocks. One of the characters, Avanon, has somewhere along the line developed a habit for always eating bacon - hence the above - which was cracking me up the whole night. But really, the pure pleasure of brainstorming, creating, bouncing ideas off of one each other, it was a great night. And seeing as how the first 15 page story that received this treatment got rave reviews (One reviewer stated that she "couldn't put it down and had to see how it ended", one of many great comments) and Martin was skipping for joy. I clearly remember the first time I let someone read a story of mine, how insanely nervous I was, how I sweated for an entire day and night. Bless Margaret, Martin, and Marla for giving me the confidence I so desperately needed in those early days to read my work, come back to me and say, "Yup, you're a writer." At that point, it's not about polished skills, good pacing or good characterization; simply, can you write an interesting story. I still remember that validation because, as mild as it was, those comments became the cornerstone of my writing self-esteem. So it was amusing and rewarding to see such great comments on Martin's paper.

I'm going to try to get the first good night of sleep I've had in a while. Tomorrow is the last day of work for me this week - Good Friday off! - so I want to be able to leave if I can't resist the temptation of a long weekend anymore.

It's BACON!

Erin Go Bragh

(a row in the town)

That was a blog break! I feel guilty about not blogging in so long, but in looking back on it I realize that I had very good reasons. The upgrade/Julie took the whole of the weekend. As for Thursday...
What a day!

It started off by agreeing to be in Margaret's 30-second film for her class. Actually, Thursday was unofficially 'Margaret Day'. We were filming as early as possible, so I dressed in my finest dark pants and best shirt (which got me a lot of compliments during the day) and I was into work early at 7 AM. I met Margaret for lunch, worked my hours in the afternoon and left work at 4 and we were off to filming!
The location of choice was Dave's (a mutual friend/acquaintance) apartment complex in Oakland. This is an old building, pushing 100, and the rooms had sinking floors and an extremely questionable heating system that had two settings - 'full blast' and 'none'. But that was nothing on the basement. There was only one hallway, a claustrophobic lengthy hallway with offshoots to either side. The ceiling was low, with rusted pipes and loose wires everywhere along its length, and when the ceiling was visible it showed off its decaying asbestos. But most freaky of all was the lighting, which was dim, sickly, and came at wildly irregular intervals. Needless to say, this was an awesome location for a thirty second film on fear.
I've never acted before, so it was good that this was a non-speaking movie in which I was not the main character. Mark Spitznagel, who is just a wonderfully fantastic guy to spend time with, played the role of the person doing their laundry (in the scary laundry room at the end of the hallway) when they notice something doesn't feel right. Now, depending on which version of the backstory Margaret's going to go with, I was either a collection agent or a ghost. Hahaha. But my role was the same regardless - I stayed in a closet that was impossible to see, seeing as how it was both in dark shadow and was off to the left. As Mark walked down the hallway, Margaret followed with the camera behind and over his left shoulder. I had to time stepping out with Margaret going (very quickly) past the back of Mark's head to his right shoulder. Done right, it looked like I had appeared out of nowhere. Mark would freeze, and after a moment, I would step out of the shadows towards him.
We ran 5 or 6 takes and let me tell you, it looked so much better than I thought. The freaky lighting and Margaret's camera work were dead on, but Mark stole the show by acting in ways that were not caught by the camera. But even never having acted before, Mark's performance was so convincing that right away it stopped occurring to me that he was acting as a scared guy and he simply was a scared guy. That, in turn, made me be a scary collection agent, not just a guy acting as one. Tough to describe, but really amazing. And it came out so well! I gotta see the final results. It went a ton better than I thought. Being around actual quality production people like Mark, Margaret, and Martin on the set was an actual thrill. Pretty damn cool.

After that, we went to Filmmakers (a nearby studio) and I was filmed again, this time in an interview format for Hunt For The Holocron (Martin's amazing movie). This was much more comfortable for me, despite the fact that now the camera was always on me. Basically, I had to simply discuss the writing process and what I did for the movie, and halfway through my muse had totally taken over and my speech and debate skills were keeping up. I think there were some great little segments there, which was nice and hopefully the rest of the team thinks so too.

Filmed twice in one day.... I've obviously made it big!

We went out to celebrate at Molly Brannagan's, the new Irish bar that opened in the long-abandoned Towne Fair center near Sesame Inn. The party included (among others) Margaret, Martin, Jessie, Nate, Bethany, and myself. The night was very interesting:

Wait: C-. We were in a line 30 deep for twenty minutes, and had to wait another 15 for a table. But what made it worse was that we had to wait for over an hour for Martin, Nate, and Bethany to get in. By the time they did get in and tried to order food, the kitchen had closed.
Decor: A. Every stone, brick, the entire bar, and everything on the premesis had been imported from Ireland and built on site by Irish craftsman. The bar itself was amazingly well done. There were different sections to sit in all around, with Irish sayings over the doorways, and a fire with comfy leather chairs for sitting and talking with friends. All in all I was extremely impressed.
Service: B+. The servers were jovial and many, and they all wore copious amounts of Irish shamrocks, blinking green necklaces, and ridiculously large Guinness hats, which admittedly I really wanted. Also, one cute waitress had these long green jewel system going down her long hair in the back. That distracted me for a great deal of time. Yikes. (sweat) But I digress. Our waitress was nice and friendly, but came infrequently. That had something to do with the fire-code-breaking amount of people in there, who were six deep the entire length of the bar. Insane.
Music: D-. The DJ was one of the worst I have heard in recent memory. I think (I hope) he was trying to pander to the 'Irish' and 'young' demographics, but he ended up alienating both. Alternating crooning Irish ballads with songs like "Jump, Jump" and "R-E-S-P-E-C-T" is not going to do it on St. Patrick's Day. The DJ actually played "Baby Got Back." The only reason he doesn't get a straight F in that category was because I ended up going nuts to Baby Got Back. Either way, totally fun.
Food and Drink: A-. Great pub burger and fries, and Guinness as fresh as it gets. The only (notable) minus was that Margaret and I ordered Irish car bombs, and they came in plastic cups! I have been back since to report that this is not their usual way of doing things - they were severely swamped during St. Pat's - but it is downright impossible to drop a plastic cup with Jameson's/Bailey's into another plastic cup of Guinness. I eventually ended up having to pour the two together and mix them, which was unsmooth but at least stayed down. That was an issue later because my body likes to either imbibe alcohol or eat... not both. Although it was touchy for a bit, it ended up being fine.

What a night!

Just remembering this reminds me of why I hadn't blogged in so long...
Back on schedule and ready to blog. Ohhh yeah.

This Is Your Blog

(this is your blog on fish)

Fridays in Lent are always the roughest. No meat. No chocolate. I am reduced, basically, to eating fish. I end up at Max And Erma's every Friday, ordering fish and chips (by which they mean fish and fries, where did the chips come from?) and longing for every succulent burger or plate of gooey, hot chocolate chip cookies going by.
Oh man.
And now I'm drooling all over my keyboard.

Writing is going very well. I feel focused, in control. Chapter 1 is a couple steps away from gleaming. And while I don't want to have every chapter meticulously pored over before I go to the next - I should have a rough draft before I do such hardcore editing - but it's nice that it is going to start right. Additionally, I had a burst of inspiration from my muse and figured out how to introduce two characters at the same time. Chapter 3 practically writes itself. :)

This weekend I have very little planned, and actually feel kind of down about it. Ah, well. Perhaps its better to have a quiet weekend. I just don't feel that way right now. Same with dinner tonight. In my Lenten state, I'm going to make noodles. It's one of my few options.
Besides fish.

It's Everywhere

(it's in my raccoon wounds)

My brother and sisters love this quote. Family Guy = incredible show.

I had a great writing conference with Martin tonight. We traded stories and it was an absoulte blast. Chapter 1 really got some excellent comments. The key to a good reader isn't someone who says, "This needs this here, this needs that here" - they simply tell you, "I liked this." "This confused me." "I don't understand this." "I was excited here." That really shows what the reader is feeling, and Martin has gotten immensely good at this. I returned the favor, discussing his short story that he has due for class (in a much more corrective fashion, but his is by far still in the conceptualization stage). It's really turning out well.
What a fun night!

The support for dodgeball has been nigh overwhelming. The dodgeball league for the PSL (Pittsburgh Sports League) opened at noon. By 12:14 PM, it was sold out. Unbelievable. Thank goodness I got my team in there! And better yet, Stogie, a girl on my volleyball team, has paired with me and we are first on the waiting list for Thursday night co-ed basketball. So if we got on a team, I would be playing dodgeball Tuesdays, volleyball Wednesdays, and basketball Thursdays! I would have a blast AND be in shape. My medication has my tonsillitis down, my weight has stabilized (at 191) and I finally feel healthy.
Health really is something that people take for granted. By far, enjoy it while you can. Getting old is a bitch!
...He said at his ripe old age of 22. ;)

I have to go to bed now, lest I oversleep and miss work. And that would be, you know, bad.

Women Were Nice Before Men Were Like, 'Garrrr'

('I am the penis')

This quote from Martin (which sent me into tears) is just one of the many great things that happened over this weekend blog break.

I ate dinner with Martin at Eat N' Park Friday night and had one of the great conversations of my life. It was about the nature of faith, the existence of God, and the roles of religion. And I can honestly say, for 20 minutes, I was okay. Okay with life, with dying, with reality. Really, truly, okay.
It's something everyone should feel once in their life.

I also got to eat dinner with Martin and Luke at once late on Saturday, which turned into a Burnout 3 tournament in my apartment that ended at 5 AM. What total insanity. It was an absolute blast, however, and it was great getting the chance to see Luke again. We related to so many things - to Final Fantasy, to video games, to classes, and to Family Guy. Woo! What a blast.

Then on Sunday, I ate lunch with my cousin Claire and her boyfriend Josh, which was an incredible amount of fun again. As I've said many times, I have the greatest family in the world, nuclear and extended. Claire is one of those insanely cool people that really is just short of being too cool for their own good. She sings in a band, has a degree in teaching and music and isn't going to work in either, loves the Terminator trilogy to death and is as energetic and naturally happy as I am (granted, we're half the same blood). She answered her cell phone in the restaurant and I harrassed her about it mercilessly, which was also a blast. And to top it all off, it was the Olive Garden. Breadsticks. Mmmmmmmm.
And to continue the family vibe, Mike came over and we hung out for a few hours. I think it's a real blast to get to see him because he's growing up to be a really good guy. It even looks like his grades - he has nothing lower than a B - are coming up, which is great as he has all the ability in the world but tends to slack off a bit academically because of it. (Like I don't know what that is like.) If he keeps working hard in school, he's going to be well on his way to putting it all together. And we had a blast, playing FF9, going for a walk around the complex and stopping at McDonalds on the way back. It was a ton of fun. We're also close to beating FF9 - we're in Memoria - so he's excited to see the ending. So am I. It's a great game.

I continue to try and write to get chapters out to friends. I now owe Martin Ch.1 and Margaret Ch.2. A call from Julie, who's at a teacher conference for two days, really cut into my available time, something I was less than happy about. Ah well. I am encouraged to write profusely, something I'll be doing when I finally get out of work tonight.

Still, in general, a great weekend. My medication is really helping, the weather is better, and I'm healthy and active again for the first time in too long. Dodgeball doubleheader tomorrow. Life is good! At least for today... and since today is all you can control, I'll take it!
And I'll take tomorrow when it comes. :)

Living On My Own

(sometimes I feel like no one gives me no warning)

Listening to The Platinum Collection of Queen, which includes their Greatest Hits I, II, and III, and it is freaking awesome. Just great stuff.

I found out an Irish bar is opening at the old Towne Fair building in uptown Mt. Lebanon! I'm extremely pumped by this development. I'm going to have to go there with Margaret and Martin (who is not technically Irish but I may force him to come along anyway). Also it will be good to check out to see if the guys would like it when they come down.
It's even close to the Sesame Inn. :)

Writing conference with Martin tonight, where I'll try to help him with his two stories he needs to write for his class. I like challenges like this - it keeps my muse sharp and creative. Also, there is something rewarding about working towards a goal with other people that have similar passions to yourself. That's how sports teams that go through a tough and long season bond well, sometimes creating long-lasting connections, from the NFL to my sister's high school volleyball team, who I know just had her third or so dinner with all the members of their volleyball team months after their season was over.

For someone who doesn't think much about politics, it recently hit me that we've been at 'war' for two years, including bloody occupation mode. This makes me sad for the men and women who don't know when - or if - they're getting home.
(small prayer)

Take The Dice Away From The Baby, Mama

(before he craps all over the floor)

A huge win for my volleyball team last night! We lost the first game in a heartbreaker and were down big in the second. The whole season could have turned around on what happened next, which was the team coming together in a big way (it's what volleyball is all about) and coming back to win games 2 and 3 in a knockdown, drag-out brawl. It ups our record to 6-9 and puts us back in the playoff hunt. I love it!

I'm going to try and complete chapters 1-3 of The Flames of Resistance by the end of this weekend. The key night will be Friday, as I will have nothing to do but write, write, write. Martin will be expecting those chapters, so I hope to have them all done by that time. I need to have some actual rough drafts together, and then we'll go from there.

I talked to Stoph the other day and mentioned my bonus off-hand. He hadn't heard - I never remember who I tell what (or what I tell who, for that matter) - and wanted to know the details. I told him, a bit reluctantly, and he congratulated me, also a bit reluctantly.
Christoph was my roomate in senior year of college, and our only major source of strife (in the sense of a recurring problem that was never resolved) revolved around my choice of work. I was a computer programmer, he was a computer engineer, fairly similar fields, and Christoph could not believe that my plan for my life was to work for a company without 1) ever looking at any other options and 2) without even knowing what pay or benefits I would get. I, on the other hand, had had two years of internships with the company, loved the people and the culture and the work, and knew the company to be very employee-centric. Moreover, I didn't generally care about the exact dollars; I loved the fact that it was in Pittsburgh, I loved the company, and that was good enough for me. This pissed off Christoph to no end.
"You should be looking around!" I distinctly remember him saying to me one night (and this conversation came up many nights). "You should be able to start at at LEAST $50,000, at minimum!"
"You've lost it," I said, or something like it, "this isn't the late 90's tech boom anymore. They're not pulling sophmores out of college and starting them at 80k. Those days are over!"
Naturally he didn't take well to that at all, and told me I was an idiot for throwing away thousands of dollars, perhaps tens of thousands, because I wouldn't even go out and look. I told him to enjoy his money, because he could make 70,000 a year and be miserable and I would take my 30,000 and love my job.
Gradually we both let it go, each one still holding firm. We never did see eye-to-eye. It was our only uncompromised argument of the entire year.

I carried a lot of bitterness from that, convinced that if he was starting out with the expectation of starting at a minimum of 50k in what was then still just coming down from the height of the lack of jobs crises, then he would be waiting a long time. I mean, I was angry. Most people have - or shortly will have - experienced the nervousness that is inherent with every senior's second-semester life: worrying about the future. Some people worry about not knowing what to do. Trust me, making a decision isn't all that much easier. Christoph put a lot of doubt into my mind, and it made me angry, because it was such a huge career choice that I made. But I was so sure that I would be happier than he would be even if I was being paid $20,000 a year that I was still angry whenever I thought about it. So when I found out what the salary was that I was being offered by my company to work full-time, I was stunned. I would have worked for half as much. And Christoph couldn't find a job that started at $50,000 a year. There weren't any. This wasn't the late 90's anymore. He ended up getting a job doing something that really wasn't along his line, definitely didn't pay a lot, and had nowhere near the company culture that mine did (and few do, the reason I picked this company). He would complain about it sometimes, as he has a hard-working streak that is admirable by itself but ill-suited to a company that basically wants to slack around and just do enough to get by. And since the end of senior year in May, when he's had two jobs and I've been working hard programming in mine, I think we both realized over the past eight months that I was right.
I am a person who tries not to gloat. But I couldn't help feeling very triumphant, which of course then made me feel bad about it. But I was so angry that he had put so much doubt in what was originally a pretty rock-hard decision that it tried to come out angry. I think Stoph realized that he was wrong too. So I definitely wasn't planning on bringing up the raise or the bonus with him. And when I did by accident, it was awkward. I didn't feel happy about it at all. Stoph is a worker that most people would kill to have on their team. Slightly headstrong, if you can point him in the right direction he will work his tail off for you. We were a great team senior year because he got me fired up and I got him mellowed out. It mixed very very well. But the one issue was our different career decisions, and now I feel awkward discussing it at all.

In fact, my raise/bonus didn't go over well with almost everyone who is in the corporate world. Christoph, of course, but Julie's reaction was painfully monotone, more painful because I know what she was holding back. Nate is working 75 hours a week without pay and Dave is in a field that he has zero training in whatsoever and works in the kind of company where the winners of the backstabbing and infighting get the promotions. There wasn't much to relate to at all.
Actually, the one person who had the best reaction of all was Margaret, who really congratulated me and was coming up with ideas on how to use the bonus. Go figure. Really, the irony of this world is stunning.

A recommendation to all thinking about what job to take. Take the one that makes you the happiest. Don't take the money. Money is nice. But you'll find that you begin to dislike coming to work so much, that you'd pay all that extra money you're getting just to get a job that you would like doing. I don't love every day of work here. But I am challenged, enthused, surrounded by good people and in a good environment. And those are things that most people can't get, no matter HOW much money they have.

Tonight I'll be going to my grandmother's to help redo her DVD/VCR/TV/Webmail/Toaster Oven combo. This thing has about 40 bazillion wires, and if they're not all connected just right only two of them will work at a time, or only three will work at all, or the TV can only get channel 17 if the Toaster is set to a power level of 5, or some other form of madness. So they call me.

Who you gonna call? Bacon Bits!
(doo doo, doo doo, doo doo, doo doo, doo doo do do doo)