my birthday

i will work on getting the picture up soon. five years ago, in what was probably the best, last minute present ever given onmy birthday, schaffer and my housemates, tackled me, thumbcuffed me, threw me in the back of a van and took me to the quad. awaiting me there were a freshly made cake and a whole lot of good friends.

five years have now passed.

i found this picture again and was looking at it the other night pre-birthday with the thoughts of the times passed. of my days in 1103 when everyone i knew was so close. however, life has moved on. within that picture, many of those faces are now gone and i've lost touch with people one the edge of friendship. others however, i am quite certain will be lifetime friends.

i think this picture speaks to me for a couple of reasons. 1) i was meeting a lot of new people at this point. during the immediate post-anna apartment debacle, i stretched out. i was scared shitless really. i had never done it before and these people took me in. they counted me a friend and all showed up at midnight to wish me a happy birthday. 2) i have to do the same thing again, only now its slightly different. i am grateful for the friends we have made in our time in boston, but i guess i still feel like i have a way to go to have a network. a base. i have ashley, which undoubtedly makes all this much easier, but as she knows, though she is my best friend, i need more of them. and perhaps in time the network we have now will grow to fill that void. remembering back to a journal i started in the depths of the cave that was our bedroom, i know i felt the same now as i did then. but then five years goes by...

i had a wonderful birthday. the problem is simply i am becoming an adult. as jesse so eloquently put it, we no longer live a life that allows us to be on the quad at midnight, and though i long a bit for it now, having done it, i know i would be bored as hell to be doing it now. ashley took me to a fabulous dinner, and the only thing...the only thing that would have made it all better, is if i could have just met everyone afterwards, for a drink. i know why everyone goes home eventually i guess.

lame

Hi, my name is Nate and I never post to my blog. I'm so cool.

a new year

more or less, a year ago tomorrow was my last day in the US for six months. i was recounting the total number of places i have visited over the last year to someone I met at a new years party. i was also trying to convince them that travelling and bunac were the way to go. you have the rest of your life to work, but you don't get that much time to travel.

a year ago, many people told me that travelling was the smart move, and that it would only help me in searching for a job, life, etc. well, a year later and a move to a new city have put me now, 2 days away, from interviewing for the final time for a full-time job. i thought i would be employed four-months ago. but i was wrong. i suppose that overall, making a concentrated effort and finding work within four months is a pretty good situation to be in. i just don't know what i will do with myself next. i mean without having to worry about work or money - what am i going to do? ah to have such problems i know.

anyway, its just amazing now, to think of the last year and how much has changed. new home, lots new memories and new countries, and a chance to start a meaningful job. i am really am just grateful right now as i sit in my apartment, drinking a slightly chilled cup of coffee, and counting down the days until ashley comes back (you are probably the only other person to read this, but that's alright its true anyway). i am so lucky for her.

and more than anything, i can't wait to see what this year brings.

intro

I imagine the reunion will take place in bar we have never seen yet, we do not even live in this state yet. It will start out simple enough while we wait for everyone to show up. Yet somewhere between the plane touching down and before we go to get the rental car, we'll end up having to call a taxi. Friends are like this. It reminds me of nights going for dinner and stumbling home somewhere in the middle of the night. Of course we didn't mean to, it just happens. You get caught up talking and joking, and being. It will start casually enough with catching up on family, new girlfriends, jobs, the Cubs, and people we ran in to. Then it will probably drift more to memories and finally looking forward to the upcoming weekend.

That's roughly how I imagine it will happen when I get together with my friends next time.

I recently have thought of writing a story about them. Not something to be published mind you, or even something I would ever show anyone, but it would be my own private tribute. A tribute to a dozen or so friends that have been with me at times they shouldn't have and vice versa. I hope everyone has friends like these. I want to shine a spotlight on them so the world could see how unique we are, but in the I'll probably just keep it to myself.

The trouble is that 'friend' slightly misses the point, and let me tell you why. Imagine you put together a group of a dozen mid-twenties males who love to compete, drink, joke, laugh, and think and then spread them across the country and only let them use this same medium, the internet, to communicate. You would be right if you supposed most days there is no email, that it comes in bunches. That we strive to try and keep emails going - to stay connected. That sometimes the only thing that connects us is the joking and teasing we all remember from middle school.

and then.

and then something shows up that surprises you.

Maybe it won't be an airport bar, it could well be Wrigley Field or a beach in California. Yet I know without a doubt that these men will always be part of my life. On a routine, quiet day - one of us gets some bad news. Its posted not to receive pity but to inform because he knew we'd all ask. And in that same depricating manner, in the same mode that can be used to one-up each other, the tone changes. We now ally ourselves and decry the test and uplift the person.

And it struck me. Not because similar things haven't happened before, but this time the flurry of responses and support came so quickly and so openly that it could have been a support group. And as quick as it appeared, it was gone. Back to business by reminding him how lousy his fantasy football trades have always been. But now I know its there for us all, a net held out by two dozen arms stronger than our own, and when someone else's arms get tired we'll trade and then they can be carried for a while.

This seems to be the theme of the week, and I am grateful. I know what it feels like to be carried. I know what it feels like to help carry someone else. I just don't know if I ever really knew what it felt like to know it will be ok to leap.

babylon

the last time i sat and listened to david gray i had most of it on my computer at work -- way back when i had an office. i turned down a temp job this week. three weeks of making phone calls for 11/hour, but the trick was that i had to start on tuesday this week, and with my work schedule already up at the restaurant, i didnt want to just up and quit. though my employment 'counselor' suggested that in order to get ahead and move into the business field that's exactly what i needed to do.

so i stayed a waiter. for now at least. and though i usually mentally punch myself each time i ask people if they want fries with their burger, its a step up from my first job after getting a graduate degree, making toast at 6 am coated in vegemite.

but i dont mean to linger too far on job hunting since i have begun to accept that its going to take a while and that as much as i want life to run on my schedule, i better make peace with its schedule. in fact tonight talking to john kersh, who has now been working in urban planning for a full year, he reminised (sp?) on his time waiting tables. i fear that i may well at some point miss this lifestyle too. i sleep in, work is laid back, my job isnt that tough, and rarely, someone leaves a note on the bill saying that i helped cheer them up. just waiting tables.

the christmas song, by dave matthews, has always been a standard piece of music that i listen to while writing. i dont know what about it appeals to me exactly. its the story of jesus. perhaps the chorus, 'father up above, why in all this hatred do you fill me up with love?' at least thats the part i can really remember so i imagine it must be the part worth remembering. but it always inspires me a bit to write.

and looking back on this writing, this is what you can come to expect, a bit of rambling, a bit of reflection, no capital letters or apostrophes, and probably a few spelling mistakes.

first post

my laptop died. i knew it would happen eventually. i mean i carried it around for two months in a backpack throughout australia and new zealand. i dropped it a few times and i probably left it in really extreme temperatures more than a few times. but nonetheless, nothing can really prepare you for such a loss. i lost everything --- pictures, music, and most importantly my two year old journal. i have been writing a bit longer than that but those had been lost in other tragic computer losses. you'd think by now i'd be older and wiser about these sorts of things, but like i said, you never really are prepared for the day you turn on your computer and it asks you where the hard disk is located.

so anyway, my laptop died and i was left with the prospect of needing to write. obviously not all writings will appear here, but at the suggestion of my significant other and in the form of my brother, i thought, why not give it a try.