What A Way To Wake Up

I wake up just in time to see a pillow on route to my face. Lofted from a across the room from an already wide awake Sebastien.

God damnit, just give me 5 more minutes. I've slowly become less of a morning person, and this sort of thing has become rather difficult for me. He quickly reminds me that he set his alarm for 7:30, I look at the clock next to my bed, and somehow feel grateful that it's a little after 8.

I promised him the night before we would jump in the local reservoir even though winter has yet to surrender to spring and the water would be nothing short of a painful experience.

Why? I have no idea.

However, being who I am, I didn't hesitate to agree to such an arbitrary activity.

We made our way upstairs for breakfast once I was able to drag myself out from under my comforter. Separating myself from the comforts and simplicity of my bed to join Sebastien in his unsolicited excitement.

This was suppose to be a sort of cleansing experience. Or that is what he kept telling me and what I told myself to avoid thinking I was absolutely insane. If it involved any sort of shot to improve some of the ever present problems in my life I was all about it. Unfortunately being warm was not on my list of problems, however Sebastien preached all sorts of benefits this experience would deliver.

But in all seriousness it sort of opened my eyes.

Alright, let's count to 10 and jump. Standing at the waters edge, Sebastien had to prepare himself for the final jump for reality finally struck him and he know knew what he was up against.

1..2..3..4..5..6..

I got tired of waiting and shoved him in. For two reasons...
1.) There is no point whatsoever to count all the way to ten
2.) I knew if he jumped I would see how miserable he was and not jump myself, so by pushing him I had to jump in or become the biggest asshole slash worst friend on Earth so by pushing him in it sort of contractually binded me, and I dove right in behind him.

I sprawl out of the river beating Sebastien back to the shore, and as I look around I ask myself, who really does this? It just goes to show that all of us die, but not everyone lives. I realize that is a quote from somewhere, but I lack the desire to cite that source, since I know I lack the audience that would lead me to any sort of law suit.

I have become somewhat perplexed with life lately. For I am in a completely different spot then I saw myself but a year ago. I had such high hopes for certain aspects of my life that never panned out, and other things in life that worked out better than I expected. However, it makes me seriously reflect from time to time and even caused me to completely break down nearly a week ago.

So, I have been somewhat drifting through life, and when I received an unexpected phone call from Sebastien asking me to do something that might snap me out of my "life phunk" I sort of instantly jumped on the chance to do something out of my daily routine.

Jumping into a cold river not only rid my body of a few impurities, but it also showed me that we go through life too fast, we lose people we love before we can truly appreciate them for how wonderful they are, we always getting stuck in routines, give up hope too easily, refuse to accept what is right, and try to make our mark in this world when it costs too much of who we really are.

I know it sounds stupid, how can jumping into a river enlighten me in such a way. I literally was in freezing cold water for a few seconds and now I have this new view on life?

No, don't be dumb.

This took years to figure out, and life just happened to deliver the message today. In a sort of gentle yet cliche fashion.

As I was walking back up the cliff I had just jumped off but a few moments ago, I crossed paths with a tree. A tree that had fallen quite some time ago, but my mind sort of flashed back merely a year where the tree holds a bit of personal significance. It made me look at how much my life has changed, and reflect on the friends I had lost.

I do not need to get into the details of what happened, but some of my best friends from a year ago, well, I could not tell you where they are today, and it made me sad to think our lives may never intersect again.

However, right now, reflecting on all of this I realize I stand here today with the sum of all that has been. My thoughts began to drift out of the moment.

I turn around and all I see are roads that are broken, full of misguided hope, lost friendship, good times intertwined with bad times. However, it has led me to the wonderful people in my life today, and those are the people that matter the most.

Because no matter how those roads behind me appear, they look past that and see me, trying to live, learn, and become a better person with each passing moment. I soak up the lessons life is so gracious to teach me, and grow with the people around me.

...The people I love, and so the story goes.

Thank you for being apart of who I am, and who I stride to be...