Quality Control a.k.a. I’m Bored as $#!*

Everything surrounding me is gray:
The outdated wall to wall carpeting
And the glum shut blinds to keep out the day,
The cubicles partitions dividing.
I spend everyday searching for mistakes,
When all is right I begin to worry
If the report, after the time it takes,
Is flawless, then I was “in a hurry.”
No report can be seen without complaint.
They all have in them some imperfection
Like a few black drops dripped into white paint.
The photos don’t match the home description!
Turns out what I am best at, sad to say,
Is QC’ing a high value survey.

Amusement Park

...And when you're really down and out
And you feel like there's no way out
Let go of your tears.
-Angel's Wings, Social Distortion

Dylan only wants to die sometimes.

There are times when he is happy, but he is able to draw so much happiness out of this life that he is bound to find the dark places too.

Dylan has discovered that this world we all live in is a world of opposites. Meaning, the happier he is able to make himself, the higher he is able to go, the bigger drop he has waiting or him.

I dare say that everyone understands the roller coasters of life. We know that passion works both ways, but what we don't understand, and what Dylan gets, is that passion should not be turned off. We know that when highs come to an end they can be dangerous, and when we reach that peak we shut down our passion and we fight gravity. We try to slow down and stay as high as possible.

Dylan doesn't.

What we forget is the lower you go, the more energy you have behind you to help you go higher than before. And so he doesn't fight his descent; he free falls. He descends so spectacularly that any recovery seems out of the question. He speeds toward that darkness, and when he gets there he loses himself as he continues toward the hard rock below.

His thoughts turn to despair, and still he doesn't attempt to pull up. He lets himself feel overwhelmed. What Dylan has learned is that the faster he reaches rock bottom, the sooner he can begin his long ascension, so he puts just as much passion into his sadness as he does his happiness.

At times he feels that death is an option. He says to himself, "Do I want to die?" When he continues to discover that the answer is, " No, I don't," he puts all his energy, all his passion, into being alive, and life is better than it ever was before because he knows he is exactly where he wants to be.

For Dylan, wanting to die sometimes is just part of life, and life should be embraced, not ignored. Feeling failure, fear, and despair just means he is trying.

After all, a level roller coaster would be boring as hell.

On Turning Twenty-Seven Years One Month and Fourteen Days Old (I'm Back!)

The last time I blogged was in October and before that, August. Honestly, I shouldn't be blogging right now, either. I had planned in my head a triumphant return to the blog, but it turns out all I want to do is make the background white...

As you would expect, a lot has happened since my last post: an engagement, the holidays, like eight birthdays including my own and Chelsea's, the end of a semester, a wedding, the beginning of a new semester, moving etc.

First things first: Engagement/Marriage/Wedding

An interesting phenomena occurred when we were engaged. It seems about 93% of the people we told about the engagement (excluding friends and family) had nothing positive to say about marriage. Usually they just mentioned that they felt sorry for us, or talked about giving up our freedom and joy. I was told to run on several occasions. Many times these conversations happened in front of the spouse of the marriage basher (oh yes, forgot to mention that a lot of these people were married). Yes, they were joking, but a lot of times it was hard to tell, and hearing a husband tell us, in front of his wife, that he wishes he wasn't married, and we shouldn't make the same mistake he did, usually turned into words that we shouldn't have been present for.

We should have given them the finger for making us feel so awkward, but what can I say, we're nice people. I would like to give that overdue finger right now, however. Odds are if you are reading this you either fall into the friends and family category, or the 7%, but if not, just take it, you know you deserve it.

I would also like to thank the two stand-out acquaintances that were positive. An older gentleman from Chelsea's work responded "I love my wife." That guy kicks ass. A guy from my work who congratulated me when we passed in the stairwell said, "Marriage is a good thing. I dig it." To you two, I say thank you. Your change of pace made our days.

The lesson: When an acquaintance announces getting married try not to let your first words, or any subsequent words, be about how he or she is making a huge mistake. If the urge is too much, say congrats (or, if you can muster it, a congrats!) and walk away.

Because we wanted a ceremony focused on family we had my brother perform our ceremony. He doesn't have a marriage license, but, since having the state recognize the fact that Chelsea and I wanted to be together was secondary, that didn't matter to us. In order to fulfill said secondary objective, though, we needed to get married in the fancy state clerk's office the morning of our wedding day.

I know most people wouldn't consider getting married in the clerk's office as being a fulfillment of the best of two worlds, but for us it really was, and we did not expect it to be. We got to have the super private ceremony that we had originally planned for and then realized was not realistic, and a more public get together afterwards; we got to give traditional wedding vows, and say the "I do" which we weren't planning on and was pretty cool; we were legally married by a woman, which made my wife so very happy.

We had a great experience inside that office, and it just proves that, as my brother would tell us later on that night, All You Need Is Love. There was so much of it in that little room.

The wedding was amazing. It went off almost without a hitch; we got about as close to 100% success as can be expected, I think. It was a great day. I don't think I have or ever will feel that loved in one particular moment in time again. There were so many of our loved ones in one spot, and they were there just for Chelsea and I.

Our families worked so hard getting the place prepared before the wedding. So THANKFUL for all them. We later saw in our unedited video footage our families taking care of things the people from Noah's (reception center where the wedding took place) said they would take of, like setting up the tables, taking care of messes etc. The employees mysteriously disappeared after the ceremony. The playlist that I spent like 12 hours on, then deleted and re-did, and was so excited to listen to on my wedding day, couldn't be played because the system got screwed up and we couldn't find anyone to help fix it, and for that same reason Scene-It couldn't be played.

In the time I haven't been blogging I think I have done more growing up than I have in the past five years. My life is very different now, and so much better than what it used to be.

Speaking of growing up, I am twenty-seven years old now. Tony Kornheiser made a joke on PTI the other day, and Wilbon said that 18-24 year olds around the country are laughing hysterically. It is still weird to not be a part of that demo anymore. I didn't get the joke either. It was stranger than it should have been probably.

All right, I better get going, but stay tuned because I have a lot more I was planning to put in this post. I will do my best to get it up here ASAP.