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end of the year Last night a coworker made a comment that I've changed since I started working at my job and I don't disagree. According to him I was so quiet when I first started working there, but not any more. For me this isn't anything new. It is simply who I am and I doubt that it will change with time. Very seldom would people say that I burst onto the scene. It isn't me. More often than not I won't say a thing when I am in a room full of strangers. I just go about my business watching and listening to what is happening around me. Some people say that this makes me seem more aloof than others, but I don't mind. Other people see it as me being shy, which is fine as well. In some ways this mixed subdued image of me gives me an edge over other people and I confess that I appreciate that part of it. I am never certain how much of how other people perceive me is within my control. To a small extent people consciously foster a self image and this does and doesn't always mesh with reality. When someone is being fake most people can tell. ... I have said this before, but I will say it again. Work is the smallest fraction of who I am as a person. There are thirty years of life experience packed into my being and obviously very little of that comes to the surface at work. They pay me to be there and I provide a service. Damn. That makes me sound like a prostitute. Okay. I got a little lost in thought there. What I wanted to say is that very few people can see the whole me so to speak. More often than not they get a partial version. Some people get to hear me talk about books. Other people get to hear my views on television and movies. Still others hear me talk about music. I change gears when I talk with different people and to me this is only natural. As for finding someone that could tolerate the full blown version of me, I doubt that that person exists. Neither Tracy or Brenda could fully understand me and they both told me so more than once when we were together. Perhaps in some ways I was a mystery to them and that was part of my allure. I don't know. They never told me. ... So often people are surprised that I have a temper. Hearing me swear also makes people take a step back. To me this is only part of being human. I never professed to be a saint or buddha. I do have strong emotions, but that doesn't mean that I expose them to everyone. My family knows that I have a temper, which surfaced during my early twenties and was used to great effect against my father. My sister has told me that her and my mom dreaded my visits home from college. More than once supper became a shouting match between my father and I, while the rest of the family tried to eat and waited for it all to blow over. Naturally all of that is in the past now and my dad and I get along rather well today. It was just me venting and forming some thoughts of my own a little late in life. ... There are days when humanity truly mystifies me and I have to wonder how we as a species have survived as long as we have. Sometimes people seem to act on some of the strangest if not the basest of motivations. So often I try to distance myself from all of that nonsense. Suddenly I become Norrin Radd riding above it all. The surfing alien. The stranger in a strange land. The fool from a Shakespeare play. This doesn't mean that I don't lust. This doesn't mean that I don't feel or want. Fear and desire rule me just as much as anyone else on this orb that we call home. ... I'm not sure where all of this quasi-preaching or pontificating is coming from all of a sudden, but I feel like rambling and I don't have anything to say about the great election. ... My thirty-first birthday is less than a month away and I have no idea what if anything that might mean to me. At the moment I don't have any plans. About all that I do know is that I won't be at work because in addition to my normal weekend of the third and fourth, I have the fifth through the seventh of December off. Part of me would love to just fly somewhere, but other things like school and money are holding me back. Speaking of school, the timetable for next semester came out this week so I need to start planning. Now that I know when the semester ends, I also have a better idea of when I can leave for Australia next year.
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