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Where did it go?So I got an email from my old boss Marty from the car business the other day – what’s up? Recently got another email from one of my highschool girlfriends I hadn’t heard from in about 12 years getting back in touch – what’s up? It all kind of hit me – what is up? Where is everyone I used to know? What are they doing now? Where are they? Married? Single? Still alive? Happy? I went and looked at the alumni page for my high school – Poway High. Funny, I only recognize a couple of names. I’m only in touch with one or two of the people I knew then. Where has it all gone? Those days of piling into the old 83 Buick Regal with friends and heading down to downtown San Diego, Coronado, anywhere we could go? Pink Floyd on the radio, careless, sometimes reckless days and nights… Now, 12 years later, what do I have to show for it? A paid off car, some credit card debt, an apartment full of stuff (too much stuff!), a job that pays the bills with just a bit left over, and a few friends.What happened to all the dreams? Flying? That one’s still on hold. Fast car? I miss my IROC desparately. Travel? Good question. I look back and it’s all seemed to flash/slip/slide/ by like mile markers in the Nevada desert or waves at Tourmaline Beach. I find myself looking back and I can barely remember. Like a dream from last week, it all seems so unreal, like it never happened. But I know it did. Now I find myself looking at 40 and I have less time to go until then (provided I reach it) than I have to look back on since high school. I’m not asking for pity, just trying to understand is all. Hitting an early midlife crisis I guess. The next logical question is where do I go from here? Aside from Cindy, I don’t have much to tie me down to Vegas aside from my job. I could move, but where? Aside from just moving, what do I hope to learn and accomplish? Where do I want to travel? All good questions which will require further tought. Trying to turn this into a positive (as Adrienne tought me with the song “Accenutate the Positive”), I’m going to look at this as a clean slate, more or less. Opportunities. Open spaces. America. Earth. People. All out there for me. I’ve already started with me – see my blog on trying to become half the man I am. So I think I’ll do a bit of work on my room, the apartment, and maybe go out to the Strip tonight for some sightseeing. Yeah, I haven’t seen the fountains in front of the Bellagio in quite a while – always very good – and free! Maybe wander into Margaritaville… Thinking about all this reminds me of (shock and amazement!) one of my alltime favorite Buffett songs (this blog is titled “Parrothead Jeff” for a reason) from “Off to See the Lizard.” “Changing Channels” has a very quiet, contemplative feel to it. It speaks of the past, present, and future in much the way I think of them. It was the last song of the last encore – the last song of the show at the first Buffett concert I went to, but I knew and loved it for quite a while before then. Back on September 23, 2003, Cindy came out to San Diego for the show and that’s when we really hit it off. I was going to Microskills to get my computer certifications and I knew I wouldn’t work at Captain’s Cove forever. It was already looking like I would be moving to Vegas and away from everything I comfortably knew. A more appropriate song for the occasion I cannot imagine. Read the lyrics, maybe look up the song and give it a listen. I think it’s appropriate now. Come to think of it, check out the entire album – “Off to See the Lizard.” Great stuff. Another song by Buffett that’s appropriate for this post is “Last Mango in Paris.” It’ll give you a pretty good idea of what I’d like to be able to say about my life when I’m near the end. Last, but certainly not least, is “La Vie Dansante” which translates to “The Dancing Life.” Pretty good idea of how I try to think about the world.
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Not just any old 83 Buick Regal…it was the “Land Barge”. Don’t forget the time you launched it onto a rock! Also, we didn’t just listen to Floyd. There was Scorps, Van Halen, Sammy Hagar, and Alice Cooper… There was the time you got locked in the Toyota Supra (at the convention center), the trip to La Plage Noir, Six Flags. Then there’s always Foreigner two years in a row, Van Halen (Balance), and Scopions/Alice Cooper. Not to mention all the air shows at Mirimar we went to. Maybe you just need to come to Chattanooga and we can stir up trouble here in Tennessee! (Oh, and don’t let the steering wheel get in the way…)
Yeah dude, definately feeling the itch to talk to some ppl I haven’t talked to in a while. It sounds like you had some damn good times in the Buick, I had a K car station wagon myself.