Don't read this if you're looking for nonsense. This is an honest look into my reality. I guess that's all I can say.

I guess I have to preface this with some warnings. It’s not a happy blog full of randomness. It’s insight into my life. I need a sounding board. I have tried to bend, but I think I’m just broken. This has nothing to do with my job. I cannot use names because people other than me are involved. Some I don’t even know all that well. But the ideas behind what I do know have struck a cord with me. Some others involved are those that I love very dearly and am trying to hold onto for dear life. Others I would be OK with never hearing mention of their name again. I will tread lightly, but get the point across. I am taking bits and pieces of a blog I wrote before but never posted. I will likely cuss. More like I promise I will. In fact the title of the blog I saved and didn’t post is “_________ F**king Sucks.” It’s the truth. _________ does effing suck.

Please don’t judge me for this or think that I am a weak person. Maybe writing all this out will help me somehow.

I guess I have to use analogies on this. And yes. I used this in the blog from before. My life has been a complete 180 from where I was two years ago. I thought that the idea of me being happy died with Ethan. I know it sounds extreme, but when it comes to matters of the heart, sometimes that’s the way it is. I can tell you with complete honesty that I was suicidal for a while after he passed away. Nothing sounded better to me than showing my love for him by trying to get to him again. I can also tell you with complete honesty that two things kept me from going overboard. First, that whole debate about hurting yourself leading to hell. And secondly my sister, Samantha. No matter how much I had given up on myself and didn’t care to wake up from one day to the next, I had to. For her. I had to be there for her if she needed me. So that was my driving force for quite a while.  And I guess I learned to go through the motions no matter what I was feeling inside. The two-year anniversary of his death is on July 13. It is so painful to recognize that he has been gone for almost as long as he was here. And it’s so funny the way the heart works. I fell head over heels, absolutely, madly in love with Ethan when I saw his sonogram. The innocence and the potential for this little boy were overwhelming. He was 2 years old and I had already called the task of picking him up from school at least a couple times a week. I went to his Baby-K graduation and saw the pride in his face as he stood there in his little cap and gown. He had cookie on his face and he was just completely carefree and happy. I envied that in him. He had the chance to me whatever he wanted of his life and it brought me genuine joy to be there and watch him grow. Love comes so quickly when someone deserves it. But grief stays with you. And time healing is a load of crap. It doesn’t.

Just like that the person who had given me life again was gone. The day before I had gone to my mom and dads house for Tuesday dinner. We had to run an errand to get something for dinner and I stopped with Ethan at the 7-11 off of Northwest Highway and Lemmon. He wanted juice. I searched hard for one of those juice containers with a Spiderman top. He called him “Man Man.” I was “Yannen.” It was music to my ears to hear him speak. That cowboy sign thing there at Walnut Hill and I-35 was “Wee-Wee” to him. He thought it was Woody from Toy Story. To me that kid was two and a half feet of perfection. As we walked out of the 7-11 with a regular jug of juice in hand, he wouldn’t leave without making sure that the cashier hear him say and saw him wave Bye. That was just how he was. Perfection personified. And he deserved all the love he was given plus some. He showed me the meaning of true, unconditional love. And we lost that. And yes. The last place I was with him was a place that a lot of people around here have been. Maybe you can picture his smiling face, waving and saying bye next time you’re there.

For those of you who don’t know, Ethan and his abuelo Rolando drowned in their backyard pool on July 13, 2011. 3 days before my 30^th birthday. It’s strange how your worst nightmare becomes your reality in the blink of an eye. My sister called me and told me what happened. I jumped out of bed and was shaking like a leaf. I threw on a shirt with a cactus on it with the words “Hug Me” below. I can’t ever wear that shirt again. But I also can’t get rid of it. That was the shirt that last touched Ethan when I went in the emergency room and saw him there. Lifeless. My baby was gone. My sister, Orlando, and his mother heartbroken. It’s the worst, most helpless feeling in the world to go from blissful love…looking forward to what’s to come…and losing it. Just like that.  

Getting older brings a lot of harsh realities to the forefront. You learn that with love comes the guarantee of loss at some point. But life is supposed to be a journey. You live it and take the good with the bad and hope to come out better in the end. You establish a life that you can look back on and smile when you know your time is coming to an end. It’s supposed to be our mission as intelligent creatures to find the good in everything and focus on it. I’ve not done a very good job of that thus far in life and I think that my ways have caught up to me.

I’ll be the first to admit that when I was younger, I was a jerk. My circumstances were far from ideal. I was hostile towards certain specific people and took it out on others who didn’t deserve that. I know my feelings were justified, but it wasn’t fair of me to treat anyone else poorly just because I was miserable. But I did. And no matter how much I want to go back and make good, life isn’t full of do overs. All I can do is have honest conversations with God. Admit that I’ve learned from my mistakes. And try not to repeat them. It’s said that misery loves company. That is absolutely, without question 100% TRUE. It’s up to us not to let the poison of such people get into our veins. I hurt people. I was hateful. I lived a lie. I can’t go back and change those things. I can just make a promise to myself not to repeat them.

I promise there’s a point to all of this.

Fast forward from me feeling no sense of hope or motivation and suicidal in 2011 to the end of last year. I found happiness in my life again. I opened my heart to the idea of pure, honest, unconditional love again. Because life really is about the journey…not the end result, right? I won’t get into the circumstances of my happiness, but it’s great. I can say with certainty that I have felt unconditional love twice in my life. With Ethan and at that point in time. And I saw that the path to my forever was going to be a happy path filled with memories that would make other people vomit out of envy. I still have that feeling in my heart. I have a love that I know is meant to be and I’m very fortunate to be in such a place. That is not lost on me for a single second.

It sucks pretty bad when you can’t just live in your little bubble of love and joy and lock the bad out. When for the first time ever in your life your fantasies are real. You have the love for another person that most people dream of having. I’ve had that love. I have that love. I’m bragging. That is my life. The love that I want and deserve.

I have tried so hard to become a better person as I’ve grown. To take a step back, look at the situation at hand and the people involved, and do what I need to do in a utilitarian effort. In the past few months I have learned to sometimes give utilitarianism the finger and live life for me. When you’re little they say to treat others the way you want to be treated. I tell you now that is a bunch of BS. At least in my opinion it is. Again, this is not a vague commentary on my job. So please don’t assume that’s what I’m talking about. I’ve learned that there is little to no reward in loyalty. I see that givers are going to give and takers are going to take. There’s not a whole lot of bleeding over in the roles. And it really is true that you have to look out for yourself because, truth be told, that’s exactly what other people do. Look out for themselves. Holding no value in your well being, happiness, or circumstances. This world is a sickeningly selfish place and it’s up to us to weed through people’s intentions and pray that we see through them.

 This is the point that I pick and choose ideas from the _________  Effing Sucks blog. So get ready. I’m about to wrap all of this nonsensical talk into a pretty little bow that makes sense. At least that’s what I’m going to try to do.

It’s most kids dreams to go to Disney World, right? To load up in the family car. Sing stupid songs on the way. Play dumb, meaningless games just to fill the time. But the anticipation of the arrival to your final destination is overpowering. It’s like you get within 2 miles of the big Mickey Mouse arch sign. You can see the Tower of Terror. It’s RIGHT THERE. But then you run the car over a spike strip, get four flat tires, and get stalled out.

And it’s not like the police just ended a chase and hadn’t gotten a chance to remove the spikes yet. It was a spike strip thrown out in front of you by someone who saw the blissful joy on your faces as they drove along side you (probably in a Toyota mini van). They can’t stand the fact that you’re so visibly happy while they live a miserable, toxic existence. So they take action to bring you down to their level of misery because why? Misery loves company.

You’re stuck. There’s not a damn thing you can do at this point because who carries around 4 spare tires? So you stand around and wait…feeling the misery that the piece of shit person beside you intended you to feel. And they drive off with a smile on their face knowing what they did. Not caring about the impact of their actions. Because at the end of the day that person is miserable and toxic because THEY DON’T CARE ABOUT ANYONE OTHER THAN THEMSELF. They might try and convince you that they do. They can charm their way into your life. Suck you in. Bite you and inflict their poisonous venom into your world. Sucking the life out of you with every intention of inflicting misery into your body until you’re near death. Then walking away with a grin on their face because they didn’t quite kill you…they just brought you down far enough to share in their misery. Then you’re stuck trying to find the energy to recover and pick up the pieces and they move onto the next victim.

It sucks to have to deal with these people. When all you want to do is be at the happiest place on earth and for no good reason other than their own shitty sense of personal satisfaction they stop you dead in your path. They might try and justify their actions and say that you were driving too fast and they were trying to safely slow you down. But that’s not it at all. The fact is that they can’t stand to see that you have what they could have had. We all have the potential to find happiness. And sometimes we have it and for whatever reason walk away from it. And it’s insane to me to think that the people who abandon those they claim to care about expect to come back at their leisure and pick up where they left off. And you’re guilted into and expected to just bend over and take what they have chosen to give. What they should have given when the opportunity was there. Staring them in the face. But walking away was easier.

It’s so strange how jacked up a persons though process can be. And what’s even worse is the fact of their insistence to bring you down to their level. It is exhausting. And unfair on every possible level. And before you know it the place where you know you’re supposed to be is the exact opposite of where you stand. It’s like you count down the hours until you get to the gates of Disney World…anticipating the happiness and thrill of being there. Wanting to take it in. Take hundreds of pictures. Make memories that you can live on until your time is up. Dreaming of being able to kiss your kids goodnight knowing that they’re probably not going to sleep because they’re just too excited for what’s to come. Waking up next to them and seeing the joy in their eyes because their dreams are about to become reality. And you get down to the final hour when it’s time for those dreams to become reality and BAM. Some asshole person with a miserable existence throws a wrench in your plans. For no reason other than selfish ones. They blatantly have no respect for the work that you put into making that trip to Disney World happen. The  years of saving up to finally be able to afford it. The journey of getting from Seattle to Orlando in a beat up SUV with no A/C. But your dream is within reach. All you want is to experience the joy that comes with such a trip with your family. No harm was done on your part. You didn’t steal the money to fund the trip. You stopped every 3 hours and refilled the oil tank because some stupid leak kept dripping it dry. You have done what you needed to do to experience the happiness that you without question deserve. And then selfish person ruins that.

Now what? You saved up all your money for Disney World. You can’t afford 4 new tires. And you have to buy 4 because you’re not going to get from Orlando back to Seattle at 50MPH on a donut tire. You are at the mercy of a horrible person with NO GOOD INTENTIONS. They just want to ruin your plans. And they succeeded.

You can try to talk the tires out of going flat, but what good do your words do? You can try and pump air back into them and crawl to the finish line, but they won’t take the air. They are full of the infliction of that sorry ass persons spike strip. And at that moment all of your hard work, money saved, and going without the luxuries that you’ve wanted to make your journey happen is wasted. Poof. It’s gone. And maybe there would be some sense of worthiness in your pain if it really did bring them happiness. But it didn’t. And you’re not gonna see even a shit eating grin on their face when they drive away anyway. So you’re just screwed.

It’s my hope that the people in this world who are like this take a second and realize that life is not a game. And that their spike strip took away valuable time that could have been filled with bliss and made it hot, wasted misery instead.

Your actions don’t stop at you. That punch you just threw at someone else has consequences. You just damaged someone else physically and emotionally. And what if that person has kids at home waiting for daddy to come tuck them into bed? Daddy can’t do that when he’s at the hospital getting bandaged up from your raging outburst. You probably feel a lot better after getting your anger out, but your actions surpass you. Far and wide.  And I sincerely hope that maybe people in this world will take a second to realize the path of destruction they are creating. Because at the end of it all we just want to be happy. And if you really love the people in your life, you will allow them the opportunity to seek that happiness. Even if it’s outside of you.

We all start every kind of relationship with a clean slate and the potential to make it whatever we choose. And nobody is perfect. We are all going to screw up and hurt the people we love the most. But it’s what you do after that hurt that matters. If the right thing to do is see that you’ve done more damage than good, walk away. Feel the shame in your heart that you deserve to feel. But have some sense of dignity in knowing that your misery can stop at you. You don’t have to bring those you say you love down with you. What happens to the people who love them? It’s a never-ending cycle that’s not fair to anyone. And no. Life isn’t fair. But any self-respecting human with an actual heart that is capable of feeling love should be able to cut their losses. Give into the fact that you screwed up. Accept that walking away in the first place was your choice. You can’t open and close the doors into other people’s lives as you see fitting. Unless you have no conscience or good intention. If that’s the case, there’s a special place in hell for you. And your fist full of shittiness. Take your fist and stick it up your ass where it belongs. Keep it away from the people who have the opportunity to feel genuine love. You are a coward. So go crawl back into your hole where you belong and give other people the chance to feel the happiness you gave up on.

My state of mind is obviously not very clear. I have to sit back and just pray to God that the people in situations that relate to this see what they’re doing. Because my words can do nothing to change their path. And it sucks.

So I guess this has been long and confusing enough. I don’t think I did a very good job of saying what I wanted to say. But I guess that I can end on this note. If I have wronged you in the past, I apologize. I am a different person now than I was before, so I hope to never repeat my mistakes. And I’m about to take my meds and lay down. And who knows if it’s in God’s plan for me to wake up tomorrow. For all I know this could be the last trace of my existence. So I feel like it’s my duty to say I love you to those that I do love. I’m sorry to those I owe an apology to. I acknowledge my moments of weakness and hope to learn from them. And I had planned on going to bed tonight with a sense of blissful exhaustion, but that’s not the case. Where I should be is not where I stand. Now what? I guess we will have to wait and see what God’s plan for me is. Thanks for reading and following my stuff. Your loyalty is not lost on me. Its been appreciated greatly. Goodnight.