2025…Behave

The last 6 months of 2024 felt like a whole year in itself. From the infamous Colorado vacation on, time seemed to simultaneously expand and compress. It was one grating, extended hot/humid week after another until the next thing I knew we were looking down the barrel of end of year holidays. 2024 was this amorphous cloud gesticulating between sharing light and denying it. And when it did share it was like being 6 inches from a heat lamp and you just prayed to Jebus that it would go away and give you a break.

Looking back it’s honestly hard for me to find bright spots, but there were some. Our oldest moved to the state capital with a friend to live on their own for the first time. They said goodbye to their job at the library and at the marina which they’ve had since the summer of 2020. It was a bit of a risk, as they didn’t have a job lined up just yet, but they’d saved enough money that they could cover rent and food and a month or two. Fortunately it didn’t take long to find one, and it was running the ticket office at a pretty popular concert venue called The Hi-Fi. The plan was still to get a job at a library as that’s what they want as a career, and in the fall that job arrived as well. They are planning to get their Masters in Library Sciences, too.

Two very important connections were made as well for them. They met and are now living with their girlfriend, someone they met last spring. And in a razor sharp example of “What a small world!” tomfoolery, their girlfriend was someone they went to elementary school with…like nearly 20 years ago! Tor is an amazing human being and is currently in school in Indy to get her Elementary Art Education degree so she can teach art in elementary school. My wife and I love her and love that she’s a part of our family now.

The other connection is our kiddo’s cat, Gaea. She’s a cute Siamese that even despite the fact that I’m allergic to cats I love seeing her and playing with her. Our kiddo got Gaea from Tor, who found Gaea at the shelter. She’s a wonderful kitten, and they make a nice trio of a family now.

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Our middle kid, the 21-year old, has worked through a lot of life garbage in the last two years. From shitty jobs to getting through beauty school and going through a tremendous dumpster fire of a relationship. She lost one dog in the aftermath of a breakup and found her forever dog in a lovely and ferociously loyal Staffordshire named Celeste. She spent weeks upon weeks getting next to no sleep, opening at Starbucks at 4:30 am and then going to night school from 5 to 9pm. 5 days a week. Struggling to make rent and stay healthy, all the while trying to take care of a shelter dog that had been penned up for nine months at the Animal Welfare League. Of course her mom and I stepped in and helped out A LOT, but we saw the potential in our kid and don’t regret a thing.

She graduated in July, walked into a job immediately at one of those chain haircut places(Costcutters.) While not fulfilling in a creative, artistic way it was somewhere she could go everyday and at least get some experience. Plus, it was a steady paycheck which in my mind was the more important aspect of it. She toughed it out there for over 3 months before accepting a position as an apprentice at a new and up and coming salon in town. She’s now working under a sort of Jedi of hair style. She’s finding out how little she actually learned in school, but her boss knows that and is teaching her the correct way : HIS way! She couldn’t be happier and neither can we.

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My wife got a huge promotion at her job this year. As a non-profit they struggled this year with losing some of their staff and hiring staff that just wasn’t right for their organization. Their fundraisers were a little lackluster this year, too. But as the year wound down things began to pick up for The Watershed Foundation, and they have hired a longtime consultant and friend to jump in. They also have fundraisers already lined up for the new year, so 2025 could turn out to be an amazing year.

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My son and his girlfriend are working pretty consistently and are saving money for their eventual move to Indianapolis next fall. His girlfriend is enrolled in Vincennes University’s ASL program. She’s starting out doing online only for the remainder of this year, then will start the 2025-2026 school year on campus in Indianapolis. Very excited for them, and I’m sure I’ll be really sad when they move.

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As for me, I guess there were some bright spots in 2024. Read a bunch of books. Got through several Stephen King novels, ones I’d never read growing up. Christine, Dolores Claiborne, Needful Things, and The Dark Tower : The Wolves of Calla. I also re-read The Shining as I hadn’t read it in over 25 years. I also read Mouth, a horror novel from a writer that lives here in Indiana. Also read Kim Gordon’s excellent A Girl In A Band : A Memoir. Started Nicholas Pileggi’s Wiseguy yesterday. Nearly half way thru it. I also started Geddy Lee’s My Effin’ Life this weekend. Great so far.

This was also a pretty great music year for me. So many amazing albums dropped, and a nice variety as well. From metal to jazz to ambient to indie, my ears and brain were overjoyed. And to top off 2024 I picked up a Japanese pressing of Overkill’s !!!!Fuck You!!!! EP from ’87. The 13-14 year-old me was thrilled to say the least. I still remember picking up the cassette at Butterfly Records on a Saturday morning and feeling as if I’d found some ‘Holy Grail’ of teenage metal-dom.

I saw a ton of concerts this year, which is a first in many years. We started the year on Valentine’s Day with Mr. Big at the Honeywell Center in Wabash, IN and ended it the day before Halloween at the Murat Theater with the BEAT tour(my wife did see Taylor Swift two days later at the Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis as well.)

Lessons learned? Don’t buy tickets to a concert halfway across the country and plan a vacation around it. Doesn’t work, at least not in 2024 it didn’t. Also, when there’s a concert during the week make damn sure you can get the next day off. I can’t do 4 hours of sleep and then go to work anymore. And, and….if a concert is 4 hours away then stay the damn night. Driving home in the middle of the night is not something 50-year olds should do anymore.

I really delved into art in 2024. I made several paintings and worked on a lot of music in the studio. I’m in the process of making a new music project as I type this. Very excited as it’s bringing together both my love for synths and electronics, as well as live drums, bass, and guitar. This one might turn out pretty special. I’m also drawing more. Did two drawings yesterday with acrylic pens and colored pencils.

Saw a ton of great movies as well, both in the theater and streaming. Longlegs, Cuckoo, Deadpool Vs Wolverine, Nosferatu, plus some classics like The Friends of Eddie Coyle, The Maltese Falcon, Out of the Blue, and a bunch of movies on The Criterion Channel. I watched a lot more of my Blu Rays, in-particular hitting my Criterion Collection pretty hard. Since November I’ve revisited a few Martin Scorsese classics, like Mean Streets, Goodfellas, Casino, The Departed and The Irishman. The latter might be my favorite Scorsese gangster flick. I’ve watched it nearly every year since it dropped in November of 2019.

The not-so-good?

A lot of it is still pretty fresh in my head and heart, but having to put our dog Otto to sleep was biggest one. I knew it was coming, even over the summer I could see how much he’d slowed down and how hard the heat was affecting him. But I still deep down was hoping he’d pull through for another year of shenanigans. Unfortunately the week of Thanksgiving and that following weekend made it perfectly clear that my buddy was struggling and I couldn’t let him struggle anymore. I can talk about him without tearing up now, so I suppose I’ve made some progress. But that’s a hole that will not be filled any time soon.

Not even a week after Otto crossed that Rainbow Bridge our 21-year old was in a car wreck driving home on icy roads after work with her dog. She wasn’t hurt(neither was her pooch Celeste), but her car of 5 years was totaled. We spent a week and a half shuffling cars, then my wife’s brother came thru for us. He works at major dealership in Indianapolis and is the online sales guru. He found us a 2010 Honda Civic, super clean with less than 150,000 miles. So the Saturday before Christmas we headed down early and bought it with the insurance money.

That did have a happy ending, but it was stressful getting there.

That Colorado trip was a waste of money and grey hairs.

We’ve also dropped more money on plumbing and toilets than we have in the last 10 years. Dropped a bunch of money in my car as well.

I did find out my job is safe for the foreseeable future, but that is what you call a double-edged sword. I’m thankful for continued employment, insurance, and an ample amount of vacation time, but what our employer did to us for the last 5 years is not something I can just forgive and forget after they admit that they screwed up and are keeping us open. Still pissed. Probably will be for a long time.

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I guess 2024 really isn’t much different than any other year. Good, bad, angry, sad, indifferent…that’s life I guess. I’m glad I’m still here and that those I love are as well. I’m planning to make some changes in 2025. Slim down, get healthier, no more beer, and making exercise a habit as opposed to a burden. I’m 51 and am still young and healthy enough that I can do something about my life. Exercise has been a big part of my life for over 20 years now, but this year with all of its ups and downs put my daily walks on shaky ground. That’s done as of now.

My wife and I both are taking that exercise journey together. Not saying I’ll drop meat completely, but we are adding lots of vegetarian options to our home menu. I would love to eventually have one of our bedrooms as a an exercise room with a treadmill. That’s down the road a bit, so our YMCA membership will have to do for now. Plus when the weather allows my outdoor walks will be top priority.

2025. I want this to be a year filled with engagement; with the body, the mind, arts, creativity, self-improvement, self-awareness. Even though I’m older I want to continue to make me a better individual, and that’s through knowing who I am and locking in to creativity and one on one relationships. And disengaging from the chatter outside of my bubble. I can’t fix what’s happening on the world stage, nor can I fix the stupid I’m surrounded by. So I’m just going to concentrate on fixing me, and then go from there.

So 2025, behave. Please?