I was wondering if I had any reason left in writing this blog, because I couldn't find anything to complain about, which my regular readers know is something that I do well. The first and foremost reason that I have come upon these giant fields of Xanadu, the blissful plains of Cloud 9 is that I found a great girl who understands me, knows how to calm my rage, and takes away all of my frustration and anxiety about the world around me. I love her, and she knows it. We have been dating for eight months, and every day our relationship grows stronger. With her in my life, I have become more humble as a person, and have come to appreciate life so much more. She has had an amazingly positive impact on me. Helen, if you are reading this, I love you.
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My girlfriend and I at the WTA.[/caption]My sabbatical was incredibly needed. In that time, I recovered long-lost friendships and picked up a few old hobbies that I had dropped after joining the army. Photography being one of the more personal hobbies that I had dropped along the way. I feel so much better as a person after picking it back up.
During my sabbatical I transformed as an individual. I used to use the tools I was amazingly gifted with as methods to impose my stresses, anxieties, guilt, and rage upon others. I was sort of a passive-agressive in that sense. I never used my photography for anything decent, and my blog was simply a tool to say "fuck the world."
But I have awoken.
Perhaps I needed to come to terms with the demons living within me in order to make sure that they never came out again. Perhaps I have been metaphorically exorcised by the kindness of others.
SHOUTOUT: One source of great inspiration has been a friend of mine from high school that I am ashamed to have not known better. Her name is Lennox Bishop, and her blog Love Like Crazy, is something that I follow closely, and I hope she never stops coming up with such amazing posts. She is truly an amazing person. Head on over to her facebook page Lennox Bishop Photography to check out her AMAZING photographs.
For those of you who are expecting me to carry myself into a rant or tirade concerning the state of our nation or the events surrounding my being furloughed, you might get what you want in my next post. Or, you might not. It's interesting to know that when I publish this, hundreds of people are going to start reading it and say to themselves "What the fuck? This isn't why I subscribed to islesfreelance! I want more dark humor. I want more tirades fueled by pure rage. I want more satire and cynicism. I want to know that I'm not alone in my feeling that the world is full of idiots!"
Again, the future is unclear to me. This means that as I progress through my life and work through paradigm shifts, my style of writing is going to change with my attitude toward life itself. More appropriately, my posts in the future will have much more research behind them, and the statements that I make will be much more inclined toward specificity. The art of literary argument I have come to realize is quite akin to a game of chess, where each player should always have the attacking piece backed-up by two other pieces, so too then should the claim be backed up by evidence.
I doubt that any of my readers are aware of my original reasons for starting this blog. Hint: it doesn't involve teenage discontent or any sort of antic disposition whatsoever. I never aspired to be a demagogue or to even gain the faithful audience that I have managed to keep for so long (thank you). The primary reason for my blog was to keep my family informed of my life and how I felt about the world around me. Eventually, the blog morphed into a giant journal of my hatred and a way to relieve the pressure in my head.
Never once have I mentioned on my blog my lovely mother, my father, or my sisters, and how much love I have for each of them. I was so focused on my rage that I could never focus on why I was really writing. In the simplest of terms; I was immature.
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My amazing father Jim. He'll freak if he sees his image online, so don't tell him about it, kay?[/caption][caption id="attachment_547" align="aligncenter" width="300"]
My beautiful and loving mother, Debbie.[/caption]And oh how much I wish I could tell them I am thankful for all that they have given me. My father gave me a sense of direction, and my mother instilled in me a love for all things - especially books. Both of my parents gave me the gift of poetry. And my big sis Jenn taught me how to tie my shoes! And Erin, she passed to me my rebellious streak. So, to my family, thank you. I love you guys, and I realize that I haven't really showed it the past few years. I want to work on that.
The title of my blog, islesfreelance, is something that I coined many years ago because of my personal relationship with two concepts; that I was born and raised on Whidbey Island, and that I am a freelance journalist. I have gotten numerous emails and IRL comments inquiring as to that point, and whether there was some mysterious Gaelic dialect that had been hidden away for centuries which could translate my title into English. Sorry, there is no great mystery behind the name.
As the name of my blog suggests, I will always have somewhat of an affinity for Whidbey Island, but this summer I had to endure one of the least enthralling stretches of time in my life while the whole time feeling trapped and imprisoned by my island's sandy shores. I have escaped once again, off to new horizons, and I have vowed not to return to Whidbey for a very long time. At least, not for any length of time longer than a few days. Island fever was extremely debilitating.
To my friends in life, I would like to say thank you. All of you, you know who you are. Matt, Chase, Kevo, Max, Jordan, and all the bros. Thanks for helping me to define my masculinity.
This sabbatical was greatly needed. Welcome to a new style of me, but still me.
P.S. This post was written while listening to; We Can't Stop, by Miley Cyrus, and On Top of the World, by Imagine Dragons.
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