Back From Vacation

I returned late Monday from a vacation with a girl that I have become very very close with over the last four months. We went to visit her hometown and I was able to meet her family and friends. The trip was so much fun and I don’t think I would have wanted to spend my remaining holiday vacation time at work for this year any other way.

It was so incredible to be able to spend so much time with this girl. We’ve grown so close and are so connected, open and honest with one another. Needless to say, this trip was a great test – we were hoping to discover how we would fare spending so much time together, hoping to figure out how sick of one another we would get. The only form of sickness I have is not being with her right now. We spent our entire days together running around to various places for visits and activities. By the end of the day we always had so much to talk about and winding down together was so peaceful and nice. I’ve never felt so excited and happy and I’ve never shared so much of myself with someone before.

The two of us were hoping that our flight back home would be cancelled so that we’d be forced to stay another night – neither of us keen to have our visit and time spent together end. One of our planes seemed to have trouble moving and we looked at each other with gaping smiles and high-fived. It was fun to entertain the thought of staying longer, but we did manage to get back home on schedule.

Overall, I feel very excited as mentioned and very happy and eager to see where things will go from here. I know that our meeting and many of the things that have happened between us are no coincidences. Apparently neither was this trip. As mentioned in my earlier post titled Expensive Mistake, I had given the individual who’s car I had bumped $1600. On my desk the day I returned from my trip was a cheque from said individual. The total amount that he gave back to me was pretty much the exact total value of my (discounted) plane ticket and the amount I spent on my trip together. I don’t believe in coincidences like these. This was a grace, no doubt! For whatever reason this trip was supposed to have happened and the fact that it brought this wonderful girl and I even closer than we already were is very cool. I’m going to see her today during my lunch break. Can’t wait.

Stepping Back On The Ice

My sprained ankle has kept me scratched from hockey for the past two and a half weeks. It’s even more annoying to be injured when you pay for ice time but can’t be on the ice. Today, in about an hour or so I am going to get on the ice for a scrimmage and to test out my ankle. I’m hoping to take it easy today and to try to figure out if I will be playing in our team’s next game this coming Thursday.

Here’s hoping for the best.

Feeling Unsettled and Awkward

I just had a discussion with a friend of mine who I had become very close with over the summer time. We hadn’t really spoken a whole lot in the last three months and things were in a bit of a strange spot. Our conversations had been less filled with excitement and with the types of jokes that our friendship seemed to be built with.

We had been good friends for a few months and spent time together hanging out and sharing our interests together. In a lot of situations like this – hanging out with a girl like this would have been a dating thing for me, but this was different. It was a cool friendship that really moved along patiently and it was supportive and healthy. There seemed to be almost no tension due to our gender differences which was something I wasn’t used to. It was very cool to hang out with this friend like I would hang out with a guy friend.

Towards the end of the summer we ended up having a conversation where she told me about feelings she had for me and that it seemed as though we were practically already in a relationship. I too admitted to having feelings for her, but also that I would not have admitted it on my own at that point in time, nor was I ready for something more than friends with her. I was a little bit scared and surprised by this because I felt almost bad for not feeling ready for something more – we had spent a lot of time together over the last while and talked a lot even through e-mails at work. I had been praying about where things were to go but felt no rush to figure it out or to decide, and as I continued to pray afterwards I realized that I should not feel bad for not feeling in a spot to take things further. I realized that the nature of our friendship and time spent together was not misleading except maybe in the frequency of our time spent together.

Ever since that time we had that big talk things have been different as she returned to her studies and I continued my work placement. We’ve both been extremely busy and haven’t made a point to hang out since. I think we’ve probably both thought of it but just have not gone through with it. I definitely tend to push away in these situations where my heart is worried. That is what I did. I did not really make a lot of extra effort to talk to my friend and I’ve realized now that this was not a good thing to do. The worst part is that I’ve been in a similar situation to this one before and for some reason find that I can just shut off – it is espeically easy to when I am busy and when I know that I am not being called to something beyond friendship with the other person. In thinking about it I have decided it is a mechanism to avoid conflict or to avoid facing up to hurting someone’s feelings and it is a way to slowly forget or to more easily get over a bit of feelings that were or are there. I have found this to not be such a calculated process, but it seems like those reasons make sense, so take those behaviours, add another party that is less open and less willing to express their concerns and you’ve got it.

So we had our discussion today and it went on and seemed fine, but ended in a way that made me feel upset and unsettled. I feel as though my friend is hurt and upset with me. I feel bad about myself and the way I have treated my friend even though it is not intentionally. I even partially feel bad for not caring for the person in a more than friendship kind of way, and I know that that is a true feeling and I cannot control that. Therefore I should not beat myself up over that.

From this experience I have a new goal and I feel that where I am now I have gained the tools to achieve it. My goal is to be more real and to not worry so much about hurting someone that I avoid being real altogether because this can be worse than just fessing up as soon as you know. In addition I want to be able to better recognize that people won’t always voice their concerns and that sometimes they need to be prompted to do so. I wish I had checked up on my friend.

Expensive Mistake

My expensive mistake

I’ve always had a pretty positive outlook on living life and on our ability to recover from making mistakes. Often times when we make mistakes, we can rectify the situation. In other cases we cannot. This week I learned about a pretty expensive kind of mistake to make.

I must have been having one of those mornings, I woke up feeling a bit run down and crappy, my ankle which I had sprained not long before was swollen and in pain. Needless to say, I was not really in the mood for going to work. As I was arriving and pulling into the parking lot I went to park in a space and as I did the front of my car managed to rub slightly against another parked car. I managed to recover quickly enough so as to minimize the contact but I could not believe what had just happened.

I had never been at fault for a driving incident. My heart sank and I needed to find out who the owner of this car was. Immediately questions starting popping up in my head.

“Will they be pissed off?”

“Do they work in the same office as me?”

“Is it really bad?”

“Will I have to pay for this?”

“How much will it cost?”

There were still others, though I doubt that if the above questions did not get the point across, neither would they. So I found out the owner of the car did not work in the same office – thank goodness. He also was very understanding about the situation – thank goodness. We went together to get an estimate on the damage and when I saw the figure I was quite surprised – not so thank goodness.

I have spent the last few days wishing I could take back that brief moment – that brief error in judgment, I wished I could just say I’m sorry, I really didn’t mean for that to happen and that it would resolve the issue. Reality is a slap in the face at times.

Despite having to fork over a lot of money for this mistake there are a few things I can take from this situation. One is that happiness is not money. I am relieved that my car sustained no damage, that the person I dealt with was understanding and cooperative and that I’m okay. The reason I was upset was the fact that I had inconvenienced someone and that I’d be “wasting” a load of money on something I’d rather not be spending my earned cash on. To reduce the inconvenience I’ve offered the individual extra transportation if necessary during the time that his car will be in the shop.

So I’ve done what I can to reduce the inconvenience caused for the other person. All that’s really left is the fact that I’ve blown money. It’s depressing to know that I’ve worked the last little while so that I’d be able to cover my own butt for a mistake. What has happened, has happened. There’s nothing else to it. The good news for me is that money does not equal happiness. As such, I am trying not to view this loss of some of my savings as a loss of happiness. For the next little while I’ll be extra paranoid when parking near anyone, knowing that the tiniest mark can be an expensive mistake.

Welcome

Hi there!

If you are reading this, that means that you’ve stumbled here by some reason. It is unlikely that it was a mistake, then again who am I to make that call?

Welcome to my online escape, I’m glad you are here. I’m just getting started but I hope to be able to share some of my experiences in this world with you. I am optimistic that others will be able to relate to these experiences and hope that you can take something from reading them, even if it is just a form of mild entertainment to get you through a boring period of time. There is an about page if you want to know a little more about who’s page you are reading.

I welcome all comments and messages. Thanks for stopping by.