Thanksgiving - 2014

For the first time in, no joke, 10 years, I will be celebrating Thanksgiving with my biological family.  I specify the biological part, because I've spent pretty much every Thanksgiving with family - just not always blood related.  For that, I am supremely thankful to have found people who would take me in and treat me like family to celebrate a wonderful day and have on many, many occasions.

I love Thanksgiving.  A lot.  Most people probably don't know this about me.  Mostly because I don't openly profess my love for Thanksgiving as it usually gets construed as a love for turkey, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie and gluttony.  While I do enjoy all those things, what I love about Thanksgiving is it has no religious undertones and no ceremonial acts associated with it.  As an atheist, this makes me super, super happy.  The entire country (EVERYONE) gets to celebrate something as simple as saying thank you for the good things that have come your way in life.  Despite what people think, atheists are grateful and we acknowledge when good things happen in life due to hard work or coincidence (sometimes referred to as luck) and that showing appreciation for those things is healthy, good, and goes a long way to fostering happiness.  It is not religious.  It's not me thanking someone else or some weird energy for the things in life that make me happy, it's simply as expression of gratitude and humility that life has some great aspects and I have great people in my life.

For those reasons, I'm happy to be sharing this year with my original family.  It is great to be able to share in their world for a bit and hear about the wonderful events happening with them.  As far as the gluttony piece goes - I'm usually pretty good about keeping the food consumption in check.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!

So that was 2014...

Wow... a full year without a blog post.  I started the year with the "not to have an opinion" post of which I'm still not really over the confusion.  I'm not sure why I stopped blogging, oh wait, yes I do...  I felt boring, I felt uninteresting, I felt like no one read them so what was the point.  I also felt this tremendous overexposure to some extent.  Anyone who stumbles upon this site has a pretty good insight into my thoughts and person.  I think I was a bit tired of being exposed, even though my site views suggested the only people reading this were my family, my very, very close friends, and me - in various stages of nostalgia.  As I reread the posts, I also find a negative vein which I don't like, but is probably a result of when I feel the need to write and share is mostly when I'm needing to work through something emotionally.

This is why I think I'm tempted to start blogging again.  It stems from a cathartic feeling I get when I put proverbial "pen to paper."  I recall my high school days of letter writing as a therapeutic way to work through some of my relationship challenges.  Those letter provided me a way to tell someone exactly how I felt without ever actually telling them.  As I let the emotions flow to the page, I had the cathartic release of sharing without the associated backlash of their response to my typically unjustified emotional state.  I think it was a really healthy way to work through a lot of growing up.   Thus, I feel I might be wanting to work through some things again.  Why not put them on a public stage for others to read and digest and say "hey, I feel that" or "get over yourself, it's not that bad" or "I don't get it" or "I get it" or any combination of any of those sentiments, or nothing.  Nothing is always an alternative as well.  Say nothing.

As I stretch my fingers and think about getting back into blogging - here is an update since January 2014.

• Launched Breyers Gelato in February - big freaking innovation launch for my job
• Offered a position in Clearwater, FL as the manufacturing manager
• Cruised with my brother and now sister-in-law to get them married! 
• Accepted the position in Clearwater, FL
• Sold my house in Cape Girardeau, MO
• Moved to Clearwater/St Petersburg
• Bailey flew in a plan!!!
• Took a three day yoga class and was able to visit with Sidd again (amazing!!)
• Mini-vacationed in Key West, FL
• Celebrated 4th of July on a boat in Clearwater Harbor with fireworks and lighting and rain and great friends and my daddyman!
• Announced the closure of the Clearwater factory
• Offered the position of plant manager in Sunnyvale, CA
• Accepted the position in Sunnyvale, CA
• Celebrated my mom's 60th birthday
• Broke my lease in Clearwater and move to Sunnyvale, CA
• Bailey flew in a plan - again!
• Realized I have no local friends
• Re-realized I have AMAZING friends everywhere who will Skype, FaceTime, and text anytime
• Attempted to become a functional plant manager (still working on this)
• Registered my car and myself in California - hello CA drivers license
• Tried (trying) to date again - ongoing adventure....

That's a lot for a year.  Three states, two full relocations, three jobs, two plane rides for Bailey Girl, jumping back into the dating scene... who said life was dull?

Let's see where the rest of this year goes... it's only December, who knows??