i would consider this blog to be a sort of monument or milestone in my journey since i see it as a sign of progressing health and maturity. i'm sure that my decision to blog has been met with the same fears and insecurities of most that make the plunge into "blogdom". it may turn out that this arena may just be a way to vent or express my anger or thoughts in a way i can get away with it relatively unscathed and therefor prove to be somewhat therepeutic. i do hope though, that someone somewhere may enjoy it or be able to relate and hopefully give some welcomed feedback. whatever, who really knows. the idea to start just came upon me one day when there were things on my mind that just had to come out so this first one may seem like a bit much. the imagery of a magic show comes to mind. my life (thoughts, feelings, internal going-ons) have been proceeding underneath this shroud that i have been somewhat afraid to let people in on for various reasons and i am now abruptly removing the shroud and this is just whats been going on. except that there is no fancy magic trick or surprise, just me trying to live. so here it is. abracadabra!

the longer that i am patient in embracing my suffering, in sitting and starring into the face of my fear, i can learn its name. it is frightening and i am afraid but the clearity that i recieve is addicting and it gives me space. space to live, think, make mistakes, grow up. everything inside me wants to run to what has helped me survive this far, but that is dying and the fire in my bones is giving me new life.

ive learned today, or should i say accepted more completely than i ever have in the past, that i am depressed. chronically depressed. and i see everything through this clouded lense. now i believe that there are many reasons for my depression, some of which i am probably still not aware but i am journeying through in a positive way.

what ive noticed as ive embraced this suffering/depression by sitting in it, questioning it, becoming angry, crying out, crying, questioning god, being hopelessly confused, is that all of these bundled up suppressed feelings from now and the past climaxed and took the shape as a need to grieve. i need to grieve. i feel like ive gone from being passively depressed, and for a long time unknowingly so, to the awareness that i need to proactively grieve.

i think this insight came to me because of my willingness, regardless of how small that it was, to submit and acknowledge my reality. my willingness and desire to see the truth, starting with myself. i am being taught how to be honest, how to suffer, how to follow, how to lead, how to grow up, how to love, and how to live. and i do believe that this is the work of god shown thru his son, his spirit, and his children who have been given authority in my life.

there are many things that i have to grieve. and a part of grieving, as i am taught, is anger. so bear with me. i have lost most of my childhood. my brother and i were raised by a single mother until the ages of 6 and 8. i had not met my biological father until i was 11 who turned out to be an alcoholic and drug addict until just about four years ago. i did have a stable father figure til i was about 12 or 13 but that was taken away. my mom decided to take me and my brother sean away from everything we held dear and knew over night as we watched it get smaller and smaller in the rear view mirror as we drove half way accross the countrty to small town texas. my mom, who was the only stability and consistency sean and i had til this point, abandoned us at 12 and 13. she wanted to drink and party more than she wanted to be a mother i guess. she also became a drug addict as a result of surgey onset by insomnia and the idiot of a doctor who prescribed her methadone (this is a drug that is used to get heroine addicts off of heroine, basically lower grade heroine) for her pain. i watched her slip further and further into insanity and watched my mother turn into a stranger. the list goes on as it does for us all but these are some of my biggies. i was alone, in the darkest most desolate desperate sense of the word. no one came to my rescue. no family, no church, and seemingly not even god. i lost everything at 12 years old and have spent the last 12 gasping for air, tending my wounds as best i knew, and limping around in the dark. i "got saved" or "born again" when i was 7. hmmmmmm. makes you think huh?

now, my story does not merit any pitty nor disregard. there are more atrocious things happening to more and more innocent people right now as you read this. this is our reality. i do however have to own my story because it is real, it is me. i think the drill sargeant in full metal jacket was close, if i may. "this is my story, there are many like it, but this one is mine". this story, good and bad, is me. if i deny my story i deny myself. if i deny myself i cannot know myself, i am lost. i think thats what ive been running from.

however, i cannot say these things without also saying that the last year of my life has been the hardest and thee most significant year of my life so far. i believe that this is due to where i live. the church in montrose, harbor community, bomar house. with my family, jim, betty, andrew, and lujack. i am truely being transformed, re-parented, mentored, fathered, mothered, brothered, sistered, deconstructed, reconstructed, pissed off, failing, succeeding, learning, challenged, maturing, experiencing, feeling, and living. i do think thst community is necessary, and i have found mine. i have come to develope many relationships that i hold dear in my short journey. those who watch over me and those that are growing with me. the church in tomball, wellspring community: ken and becky, hot rod, karen, kevan d and charis, and my beautiful girlfriend juli, and the others whom i still have blossoming relationships with. all the others in the harbor community. hawthorne house, and alpha house whose journeys are all somewhat similar to my own and who are all helping raise me in their own way as we share life togather. and my fraternity brothers, yes, my fraternity brothers. and before you stop reading we are not your typical fraternity and i know that most typical fraternities say that but...whatever, think what you want. you can ask my girlfriend the most ant-fraternal chic on the planet (shes coming to the dark side slowly though arent ya). these guys are special to me and some have been there for me through the worst. they were my family when i had no where else to go. nathan, josh, mike, damon, jj, thank you. "i got nowhere else to go!" i just noticed that.(officer and a gentlemen, you guys get it).

anyway.... i hope you enjoyed the show.