Tired!

Being excessively tired makes it really hard to control my emotions.  Today I think I’ve run the full gamut.  From extreme happiness to utter despair, anger and apathy, it’s all been done.  In short this sucks but at least I know what’s going on.  As stupid as it may be it’s taken a long time to get to this point where I’ve figure this out.

God, what a day!

My day today started at 330AM.  I had to be at a job in Kelowna at 5 which necessitated the early start.  Overall I’m still doing fine and the only reason I’m not in bed right now is because I know that if I do go to bed super early it’ll totally throw my sleep schedule for the rest of the week right out the window.  So tired…

Ding Dong, the fries are gone.

Ding, Dong!  He’s FINALLY Gone!  Hallelujah.  The Brother-in-law is back on a bus to Calgary.  May God be with him… and those on the bus.

So today I thought that I was supposed to be in Trail.  Turns out that I’m not there until next week, oops!  I was actually scheduled for Revelstoke this morning and as luck would have it I didn’t start ‘till 9 so everything worked out really well as I was planning on being on the road to Trail by 7 anyway.  Just really confusing to try and figure out why you’re not going where you thought you were supposed to be going.

Feeling rather strange today actually, come to think of it the strange feeling started last night.  Feel rather like I used to when I was on the verge of emotionally crashing, but nowhere near the same extent.  Now I know that I can choose not to “go there” and let my emotions flay me alive.  Now I just need to figure out why I feel… off, and deal with it.

I hear that Wifey is back in the country and I’m anxiously awaiting a phone call to confirm… wondering why I haven’t received that call yet?  :P

Well I’m taking The Baron to a sports bar for supper because they honestly have the most amazing burgers in the city and that’s what he has a craving for tonight.  I for one have decided that it’s time to stop eating mass amounts of crap while on the road.  This is the first year that I’ve been working on the road that I’ve really just let everything go in terms of what I’ve been eating.  I’ve even been eating fries *gasp!* this last while.  This is something new for me as I’ve always made sure that I avoid them while I’m on the road in order to avoid a growing gut.  So it’s “Can I get a salad with that” from now on.  I’ve got to slow the growth of this gut or my Dad will be completely unable and utterly excused for telling me that I’m going to look like him soon if I don’t watch it.  (

Random Thoughts

I spent tonight with Ruth.  Yesterday I was feeling really badly about her leaving and I basically allowed myself to mourn her ‘passing’ but I’m totally over it now.  It’s weird actually because prior to learning that it’s completely normal for a person to feel sadness ect, when a friend leaves I would have just suppressed the feelings and probably got more and more angry at her for leaving.  Finally that anger would have caused me to completely lose all contact with her and cease to desire to have her around at all.

Tomorrow I’m going to be getting ready for a 10 day trip to Trail where I’ll be working at Teck Cominco.  I’m hoping that I’ll have internet access at my hotel, because hey it’s not Alberta, but you just never know.

For all you Vancouver people out there get ready for a visit!  I’ll be working out when I’ll be coming down tomorrow as well.  I’m going to be taking the new truck down for some more work on it and then flying home after hopefully spending a few days down there.  Not looking forward to the expense though.  

I bought my baby new booties today.  Just over $500 but apparently they’re awesome tires and I supposedly got a smoking deal on them.  Just looking at them you’d think I’d be able to climb walls with them so they should be great on ice and snow.

Getting really frustrated with the planning for New Years.  We were originally wanting to get a cabin at a ski hill but decided that getting people to commit would be to hard and we didn’t want to get stuck with a huge bill.  Then The Baron said we could have the party here at the house but some different friends said they for sure had a cabin at Big White booked.  Turns out later that they don’t now and unfortunately it seems The Baron has changed his plans and maybe having a get together or something here after all so, so far my party is homeless.  I’m quite frustrated about it because the whole point of working on this early is so that New Years won’t SUCK!  Now it has the potential to suck.  MUST FIGURE SOMETHING OUT!  Any ideas let me know!

Just so you all know I've found what I deem to possibly be the best blog on the web. Thourghly enjoyable Check it out!

The next Winter Blockbuster I CANNOT WAIT TO SEE! Narnia! Check it out.

Happy Harry Potter Day!

I just returned home from watching Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.  Just like the book it’s definitely the best movie so far.  Absolutely incredible computer animation and the editing is fantastic as well.  Even though, for obvious reasons, the story had a number of parts cut out of it, it flowed fantastically and you really didn’t miss a huge amount of things that they cut.  Two thumbs WAY up!

Ok, things with Ruth are good again. I'm uber sad that she is leaving and in a strange way I feel abandoned. Probably because I'm the only one here. There's just been way to much emotion going through my system this week. To much stuff for me to process and handle all at once. I hate the cyclical nature of life. You have a period of excellent time where everything goes right and your happy and such... and then the inevitable crash. I think the crashes are finally starting to shorten and seem to be much more infrequent but they're still there and hard to take. I'm going to bed.

Frustrated II

The Borsch was amazing.

I’m even more frustrated now.  The girl just called and asked me if I wanted to join her in Kelowna at the Just for Laughs festival as she’d come across some tickets.  I can’t because Ruth is here.  *grunt of frustration*

It's Borsch Night!

Just made two enormous pots of Borsch, as I invited my family over to The Baron’s place for supper.  Hope he doesn’t mind as I just called him and told him they were coming!  I kind of screwed up the recipe a bit but not enough that I think anyone will actually notice… at least I hope they won’t.  So tonight will be full of Borsch and The Baron’s self-proclaimed ‘World Famous Herb Bread’, which actually is really good.

Ruth is coming for dinner and she’s still acting strange.  I’m frustrated with her right now but just keep telling myself to enjoy her company while I still can.

Actually I seem to be frustrated in general right now.  Don’t know why but whatever.

OMG It's finally been confirmed!

Careful the Dance Floor's Slippery!

Wow, what a day already!  I woke up this morning at 515 (about 15 minutes earlier than I usually do) to download Confessions on a Dance Floor, the newest release from Madonna on iTunes, so I could listen to it in the truck this morning.  Well everything worked as it was supposed to and I happily burned to CD.  Then I got ready and went out to the car only to discover that it was snowing.

Long story short got up to the office and picked up my truck.  Driving through town was thinking ‘wow this is slippery’.  Got onto the highway and noticed people were driving way to fast for current road conditions.  Then as I was passing a Mustang, that obviously wasn’t ready for winter conditions, doing about 60kms/hr the driver lost control and HIT ME!  Yeah, go figure.  So I pulled over, to check damage and such, opened the door and promptly lost my footing because of the ice.  I ended up hanging off the door of the truck for a few seconds before I balanced.  The damage to my truck involved a scrape where about two inches of paint came off.  The Mustang however was not so fortunate as his bumper is going to have to be replaced.  So I decided it would be prudent to re-schedule this morning’s work and go home until people remember how to drive in snow.  It’s funny you’d think that it would be the big trucks that have problems driving in snow but it’s not.  It’s the jack-asses in passenger vehicles and pick-up trucks who think they’re great drivers who cause accidents.  Coming through town on the way back to the office this pickup truck in front of me was going so fast he was fish tailing all over the place when he stopped to turn I couldn’t resist and lowered my window and gave him the finger.  That’s when I noticed he was drinking coffee while he drove badly.  Unbelievable I know but true!

PS – Confessions on a dance floor is in my opinion one of Madonna’s best releases in years!

Breakthrough!

I’m writing this because I feel that it’s important for me to remember.

Last night I had a pretty major breakthrough that actually helped me understand everything that happened this weekend.  While talking to my counsellor on the phone I was telling him all the things that I had written down here the other night.  When I finished going through the three major events of the weekend he shared his thoughts.  What he pointed out was that each of the three events had something to do with personal value.  Explaining that a little further:

Brother-in-law – This situation actually had nothing to do with the Brother-in-law.  The reason I got so violently upset about this whole situation was not the person but rather the subject.  The poor guy accidentally touched on a subject that was causing / is causing me a lot of pain.  Upon exploring the issue further I why it was that church / Christians have caused me so much pain for so long, hindering my ability to forgive and move on.  I have always felt taken advantage of by the church because when I have been involved I have always worked extremely hard at whichever task has been given to me but I have always been doing these tasks for the wrong reasons.  Thinking that maybe if I do things for people they will notice my contribution and I would become a valued member of the congregation.  Because you can never buy your way into any social group with any sincerity this tactic obviously didn’t work.

Truck – Because I didn’t get the new truck I interpreted that as “You don’t matter to me (my Dad) or the company.  You don’t do a good enough job to deserve the new truck”  Again I didn’t feel valued.  Of course my interpretation was totally wrong and was in fact not intended to be a slight.  In fact in my Father’s usual dense ways he didn’t even realize this was an issue.

Ruth – By not informing me of her plans or thoughts before she made arrangement to leave I interpreted this as ‘I don’t value your friendship’.  This I hope is not the case and I suspect that it isn’t but that’s what got me going.

I have to say Counsellor really earned his pay this week.  Having his unbiased view of why these events threw me into such a tailspin was a saving grace.  Of course now that I fully understand the issue myself it makes so much sense as it affects me in so many ways.  Not having a personal sense of being ‘valuable’ as a person has really affected everything in my life.  Talk about contributing factor to low self-esteem and lack of confidence.  

To the Ones I Love,

This is an incredibly hard e-mail to write as quite honestly the message / situation is just awkward. As you know just over a year ago I came to you and told you that I was gay. During that time in my life I was going through a lot of mental and emotional unrest. Nothing made sense and I felt I didn’t fit anywhere. While in Vancouver I tried to live a lifestyle I thought that I was supposed to be a part of. Try as I did to convince myself that I was living the life I wanted to it just didn’t work. I couldn’t seem to quell the disquiet in my spirit or silence the nagging voice in my head that was telling me that this too wasn’t me.

Now after many months of personal reflection, soul searching and much emotional pain I have come to a conclusion. I am not gay (sometimes the simplest way of saying things is also the easiest). I have been working with a counsellor for many months now and by utilizing the tools he has given me I have been able to restructure many of my thought patterns and build better emotional boundaries.

In my situation the same sex attractions were symptoms of character deficiencies. Having identified and worked on a lot of these issues has caused the same sex attractions to subside. I can confidently say that I have moved closer to a sense of my own masculinity that I have never before been in touch with.

Finally I want to thank you and beg your continued indulgence. Thank you for bearing with me during this incredibly difficult time in my life and thank you for being a part of the catalyst for change. I know this may be hard for some of you to understand and that’s where I want to ask your indulgence. As I have learned so much about myself throughout this phase of life I would be happy to talk to you one on one if you have any questions.

Don’t worry, the KS you know now won’t be turning into something else. I’m tired of playing games and hiding behind masks, the sarcastic disinterested arrogant, pious religious fundamentalist, drunken partier, or whatever else I hid behind. As I grow to know myself I also sincerely hope to grow to know you in a deeper and better way.

This new chapter in my life is full of surprises and quite honestly a measure of fear but I don’t think anything that comes along is going to be any harder than this chapter that has finally closed.

I look forward to talk with you.

Peace… at last.

KS

I am just SO upset

I am just SO upset!  I haven’t felt this wound up for months now.  Tonight the previously mentioned Brother-in-law started asking me all these religious questions and basically told me that I was living my spiritual life all wrong.  Apparently he’d had a near death experience and since then God’s told him how he should live.  So my understanding of what God has told him is that he’s supposed to boss people around and tell them that they need to get involved with the church and to share their faith at every opportunity.  When I asked him if he’d taken the opportunity to share his faith today he tried to change the subject.  When I persisted he told me that God hadn’t pointed out an opportunity today, to which I replied that maybe waiting on God wasn’t the right thing to do maybe he was supposed to create opportunities!  Well he just changed the subject again and started talking about how God was using him to direct people towards Ministry opportunities where they would be used.  To which I really wanted to say “isn’t it wonderful that like many other Canadian public school teachers God has appointed you to be a delegater and task setter as opposed to someone who actually has to get their hands dirty in the undesirable tasks of witnessing and ministering to people!  If only I was so blessed.”  That’s what I really wanted to say.  Instead I held my tongue and swore at him in my mind.  Later The Baron commended me for my restraint but I don’t know how much more restraint I can show with this guy.  Even though staying with The Baron is temporary this is still my home at the moment and having this Ass come into my home and attacking me makes me incredibly angry.

The next thing that pissed me off is that after being promised the new truck for work for months now I have been told that someone else is going to have it till the end of this month!  I AM SO FUCKING ANGRY ABOUT THIS IT’S NOT EVEN RATIONAL!  I don’t know why but having the new truck means a lot to me.  It could be the fact that for the first two months of this job I was driving around in the oldest truck in the fleet and making due.  It could also be the fact that after all the shitty years of doing this job and NEVER getting the new truck I feel that it’s due to me this time.  Finally it could just be the fact that I was led on to believe that I would be getting it and there’s no FUCKING reason that they would give it to the employee they did give it to as she’s leaving the company at the end of the month anyway (I’m not mad at her in the slightest because she even called me today and asked why she still had the truck when she knew that I was supposed to be getting it and was looking forward to it)!  I’m SO angry about this I want to quit right now.  Unfortunately I have responsibilities that don’t allow that.  ARGH!  SO FRUSTERATED!

Ruth

Fuck!  I’m really feeling a great deal of frustration right now.  When I got home the other day from my trip I called Ruth, who is pretty much my only and best friend in Vernon, to find out that she’d disconnected her phone!  I was totally confused by this as we’d been text messaging the whole time that I was gone and she never once mentioned anything; coupled with the fact that up until the last I communicated with her she was supposed to start training to start working for my Dad’s company.  So I called her Aunt and asked her what was going on and her Aunt told me that Ruth was pretty anxious to go and had already changed her phone number to an Abbotsford number.  So apparently she’s moving to Abbotsford!  Anyway long story short she just called me and told me that while she was on her recent trip to California (where she used to live and work) that God spoke to her and told her that she was supposed to move on and apparently he told her to move to Abbotsford.

I am so angry and hurt that I just answered her questions with yes or no and listened.  I just can’t believe that she would make such an important decision and not tell me about it.  I mean we spent most of the summer together and hung out just about every night.

Knowing her I know not to take this personally as she’s done this type of thing before and I’ve lost contact with her and she always turns up eventually… this time though it feels like betrayal.  

Super Saturday

The Baron’s Sister and Brother-in-law are in town visiting.  While very nice people the Brother-in-law is slightly, shall we say, eccentric?  He’s a retired math teacher and keeps offering to help me brush up on my mathematical abilities!  No thanks.

Today has been a very expensive day.  I had the oil changed on the car and then decided that I should get some new windshield wipers too.  Turns out that windshield wipers are the same price as an oil change!  I couldn’t believe that and that’s even getting the super duper deal that my family gets on all vehicular maintenance and parts from our Ford dealer because Dad’s company does so much business with them.

I ordered The Baron’s Christmas present today!  I’m very excited about it because he’s going to absolutely LOVE it!  What I really can’t believe is how PACKED the malls are already.  For the past few weekends they’ve been absolutely insane.  In Calgary at Chinook it was actually difficult walking around in some of the stores because they were so busy.  I’m sorry people but Christmas just isn’t that big of a deal.  After last year of working for the majority of the holiday I’ve realized it’s much more important to spend time with friends and family than it is to spend a shit load of cash on people.  

I think I'm overtired. I even took sleeping pills and I'm still wide awake. So the logical thing to do is to write.

So I'm glad to be home. It's just so much easier to relax when your at home.

Ok, here's what's really on my mind. I made friends with a girl while we were all still in school. The girl and I get along famously and have often gone out together to the clubs dancing and such. Over this summer I really started to have some pretty strong feelings for her but of course kept them secret as she had a boyfriend who was a good friend of mine too. The last time that we went out together was in Penticton and the drive home was just the two of us and it was really nice and we talked and sang the whole way home. During that conversation she idely mentioned a few times that her boyfriend was really bothering her a lot. She didn't elaborate on it anymore than that and I didn't bother to dig because I figured it was really none of my business. Well upon arriving home tonight I gave her a call and after chatting a bit she told me that she and the boyfriend weren't together anymore! Wow. This whole time I was in Alberta I was fantisizing about the possibility of this happening and... now it has. So now there's a few things I've got to figure out / do.

First of all I need to communicate my non-gay status to her (which by the way is not surprising anyone I tell... I know I don't get it when I told people I was they wern't surprised, now I tell then I'm not and they're not surprised... whatever). Then I need to let her know of my considerable interest in her. Then I need to pray that it all comes together. I'm actually not really all that worried about that part of it now because hey there's no point in getting all ahead of myself. I'm looking forward to this Christmas season even more now because I'm hoping to stake out some kind of "territory" with her before some other guy moves in... but at the same time I don't want to be pushy. Fact is the two of us are going to co-host a New Years Party (somewhere, we're looking into the chance of getting a cabin at a ski hill but The Baron has already offered the house, which has been the site of some fantastic parties already this year) so there's a perfect opportunity.

The girl is amazing and is actually someone I'm willing and planning to go to great lengths to get. Ok. I'm done now.

That's what I'm thinking about tonight.

Last Night

Well tomorrow I head back over the mountains to home.  I’m so very happy to be going there.  I’ve had a good time in Alberta but it’s starting to wear thin.  I’ve invited myself over for dinner at my Calgary cousins, I’ve visited a lot of friends and relatives along the way but it’s got to end.  No more travelling thank you.  

I bought two new CD’s yesterday.  The new Kayne West, my first rap CD!  I have to say it’s an excellent CD and gets two thumbs up from me.  Hell it’s so good I almost feel black while listening to it…  The other CD is the new Rolling Stones – A Bigger Bang.  I’ve never been a fan of these old guys before but I find the music on this album fairly enjoyable.  I think that I’ll burn a copy for me to keep and give the original to my Dad as his car refuses to play burned CD’s.

Well I just had an excellent Turkey dinner at my cousins home and I’m having a glass of Little Penguin Shiraz which is making me sleepy.  So we’ll see you at home.

Three Hills

This is an excerpt from an e-mail I wrote to Matthew cause he can’t see the blog from his present location in China!

Hey ya'

Get this I'm sitting in the Wireless Steakhouse in Three Hills right now!  Go figure.  As if that isn't the strangest idea I've ever seen.  The two don't go together at all and honestly I don't give the place much of a chance but hey it 'served' my purpose for this morning.  It's -13 here right now but in true Prairie fashion it doesn't feel like it.  So I'm doing my requisite visiting through Three Hills.  I stayed with my Great Aunt last night and now I'm meeting some cousins for breakfast and then I'm off to visit with an old Missionary lady I knew when I was at Prairie.  It's weird being back here.  Even though I wasn't happy here I did have an awful lot of good times.  Ok, enough nostalgia.

I'm heading home on Thursday and I have to say I'm happy about it.  It is weird though because this trip has been really good.  I can't say I mind being on the road anymore.  Now that I've exercised my demons life is so much different.  Everyone is telling me how much I've changed and even I feel it.  The Baron tells me I just seem more comfortable in my own skin, my Parents tell me I'm not as caustic and mean, and others just can't seem to figure it out.  I have to say that I feel like I've lost something in a way as my humour sarcastic and mean as it used to be isn't there anymore in the same way.  It's actually hard to think of things to say to cut people down.  Maybe I'm just in a slump... although if I'm not I'm good with that.