When you have to go on a long drive by yourself, there isn’t much to do. You can either listen to music or listen to your thoughts. Sometimes when there isn’t much else to do, you end up thinking. You end up thinking thoughts you shouldn’t and you end up thinking thoughts you don’t want.

The window faces my back at work but I still like glancing over my shoulder to catch a glimpse of the sunset through the trees. Across the street, there’s a building that shows the reflection of the sky. I can’t help but take a glance as I pass by. Last week as I was leaving for work, I could see that the sunset was awesome through the trees. I was tempted to drive toward the sunset just so I could watch it. But I didn’t. There’s a spot on the 15 around the miramar base where there are no trees or mountains in the way. Right around 5:00 when the sun sets, you get this amazing view of the sky. You can see all the colorful swirls in the sky. It’s awesome. I miss living by the beach. I miss being able to go watch the sunset and taking photos. I miss going there just to think. And mostly, I miss the view because I think its beautiful. Something about the sky, the clouds, and the sunset just captures me.

La Jolla Shores – Summer 2004

Happy New Year. There’s nothing like spending new years sitting in front of a TV with a flannel blanket in a freezing house by yourself. As the clock struck 12, the only feeling I had was sadness. It makes me sad to see people kiss on new years. Maybe someday I can spend new years with someone special. I am spending this New Year’s Eve hanging out by myself at the new place. Ever wonder why the New Year is such a big deal? People go crazy celebrating it – going to Vegas, NYC watching the ball drop, parties, etc. Is it to celebrate and wish for a happy new year or is it to celebrate the end of one year. I don’t think people live their lives by the year. You celebrate “new years” once and that’s it. How often do people somewhere in the middle of the year, reflect back to what they hoped for that year. Sure people make resolutions, few people keep them. I was looking over at the entry I wrote last year about 2005. It was quite reflective. I wonder which of those things have changed or stayed the same this past year. I like last year’s entry and I don’t think this year’s can compete. Here are my thoughts on this past year in no particular order.

2006

Family
Family’s good. I go home every so often to visit. My brother is going to be graduating from high school this year and turning 18. I remember when I was graduating and turning 18, thinking I was so big and grown up. But the way I look at it now, 18 is so young and not grown up. He’ll be going to college next year. Crazy.

Friends
I would like to think that the more years a person has lived, the more friends they would have. But in reality, it seems to be very much the opposite. As you get older, your group of friends gets smaller and smaller. I need to make more friends. I have a very small group of people that I hang out with. And at times like this, when everyone is out of town, and has somewhere to be, I end up alone with no other groups of friends to hang out with. I’m not good at making new friends since I don’t talk to anyone. I guess the goal should be to make one friend a year. And that goal was accomplished this year. I’m really grateful for my friends, they play a bigger role in my life than they will probably know.

Work
I finally got a new job. It’s different, but a good kind of different. I’m doing more different types of marketing, than just SEO and paid search, although lately, I’ve been working on email marketing a lot. That’s not what I was hired for, but it’s alright. Sometimes it’s stressful but its nice to know when a lot of sales are coming in. Slowly work has been seeping into my daily life. At work I write a lot of marketing copy and now wherever I go, marketing copy stands out to me and I read it and analyze it. It’s actually kind of annoying, but at least it gives me ideas. I get to give input on the website on usability. I really like looking at user interfaces and how to make them better for the customers. I think its kind of cool that I’m in the (web) marketing department of a company, a good-sized company. I like that my work actually plays a role in how the company does. I think this job is taking me one step closer to my actual career goals. Although I’m not sure what that is exactly. But when I decided to pursue communications as my major and have a psychology background as a minor, I thought that advertising would be the most interesting thing. The goal is to figure out how to make people buy a product. And that’s exactly what I’m doing now. So I guess it’s a step in the right direction. I also feel like I should know how to web design. Since I work in a very related field. And also it just seems like I should know how to do that because that’s me. But I’m a long way from that. But I will learn.

Spirituality
I miss going to church. I haven’t gone since who knows when. Over a year ago. Once in awhile I spend a lot of time researching churches in the area. But it just stops at that. I’m too afraid to go anywhere by myself. It’s the SAD kicking in (but more of that later). Sometimes when I think back to college, I really wish I had joined AACF or something like that. I still believe that things happen for reasons. My relationship with God hasn’t been as strong as it was before, but that’s what I’m working on. I also feel uncomfortable talking religion with other people because I can never answer all the questions they have. What does that say about me? Not very good things, I know.

Love
Or lack of. Dating looks like fun but I’m too scared to try. Sometimes hanging around non-single friends makes me depressed. It’s just hard to be around people when they all have that special someone there. And then there’s me, just sitting by myself. It makes me sad. I can’t decide if knowing is better than not knowing. I like listening to break up songs. I like listening to love songs, but it only makes me sad when I hear them. I’m still looking for that guy. Who knows if I’ll ever find him. Seems kind of hopeless.

Life
Life is all over the place as always. The only consistency is inconsistency right?

I’ve moved twice this year. Moving is a pain.

I think, am pretty sure I have social anxiety disorder (SAD), even though I haven’t technically been diagnosed with it. I feel like I’m doing a lot better dealing with it although it is a struggle almost every day. However, most people don’t know how much it affects me. I’m slowly working on it, very slowly, but its still very challenging. I don’t want to go into too many details here.

My tolerance for drunken people is slowly disappearing. I find drunken people more and more obnoxious and annoying whenever I’m around them. That may be due to the fact that I am always the only sober one, but nevertheless, I am always the sober one and will probably always be, so I think that way.

The mind is a very powerful thing and it can mess you up pretty good. You think of something a certain way but feel completely different about it.

I also eat out way too much and drink too much soda. I should really cut back. Its probably slowly destroying my health.

I’m too fearful, too fearful of life, of people, of everything. I need to be braver, stronger, and more positive.

I wish I could dance because it looks like fun. I wish I was physically capable of dancing (knowing how) and mentally strong enough to let myself go.

I am always so aware and concerned about how people are feeling that sometimes it really messes me up. I feel other people’s feelings. I hate conflict and underlying tension whether its between me and someone else or between other people. People ask me why I should care about other people. I don’t know. I just do. I care. I care if my friends are sad, angry, hurt, etc. I just want everyone to be happy. I’m a mediator. I hate it when people aren’t happy. It messes me up.

I want to say I’m 50% done with dental work. The results were not as expected. I was disappointed at that. It looks better than before. But there are still pros and cons about it.

I was in a wedding. I’ve never been in a wedding before and the only other wedding I have ever been was when I was a kid. Weddings are a lot of work. I was nervous walking down the aisle as a bridesmaid. Everyone laughs at me when I tell them I was nervous at the rehearsal. Truth is I was and the uneasiness was increased enormously during the actual wedding. I guess it hadn’t hit me that I would actually have to walk in front of all these people with the attention on me. My legs were shaking so bad. I forced on a smile that probably looked more like a grimace. I was thinking to myself as I began to walk, how on earth will I ever be able to get married when I’m such a wreck as a bridesmaid. Nevertheless, it was a very nice wedding and it was kind of cool getting my hair done and make up done since I’ve never done that before.

I ran a 5K. That was a huge accomplishment since I hate running and I actually paid to do that. 3.1 miles doesn’t seem like that much. But when you hate and suck at running, it feels pretty far. It was kind of lame to have to run by myself too. I came in last in our group of runners. Oh well. Running sucks.

I’m going to get a new computer. I’ve been saying that for the past year and half. I think this one is around 10 years old. That’s one old computer. It has a lot of problems. I’m also running windows 98! Crazy huh? I’m waiting for the new windows vista. They are selling vista capable machines now, but I kind of want to wait for one with it already installed. At the same time, I’m afraid they’ll have problems right when it comes out, so now I don’t know if I want one right away. So that probably means waiting for another while.

I’m sure many other things have gone on, but I can’t think of them right now. Maybe I’ll write new entries if I think of them.

And for comparison, last year’s entry.

2005

Another year is coming to an end. It can be said again and again and it will still hold true: time flies by quickly. We go through each day and just go through the motions. Have you ever stopped to just think about it? Have you ever thought about how each and every encounter, occasion, thought, moment, feeling, and situation effected you then and affects you now? Think about where you are now, where you are in mind, in spirit, and physically. Every learning experience good or bad has molded you and shaped you and brought you to today. Everything that happens, happens for a reason. Your personality, your beliefs, your ideas, they have built up throughout the years and put you here and now.

I usually don’t think of the year going by as from January to December. I always thought about the year going by according to the school year. School starts in September and a whole year has passed when summer is over and school is in session again. Sometimes I think about the year in terms of birthdays. It’s hard for me to think about the year of 2005 starting in January and ending now in December. But I want to think about this year like that. I want to relive the memories so that I can document what I experienced and what I learned this year.

This year has been a learning experience filled with realizations and confirmations.

My reflections of this past year (in no particular order):

-Sometimes you are put in a situation to see how you can deal with it.
-Business has a lot of politics.
-Things happen on the other side of the world that a lot of people are oblivious to.
-I’ll be sad if it makes you happy.
-God makes all things better.
-Drama is apparent in most (but I really want to say ‘all’) people that are in relationships.
-I have to be patient with the things going on in my life.
-I realized that I can convince myself to the point of blurring the lines between reality and dreams.
-Even though I have a lot to deal with, other people have their own problems too.
-I am blessed because I have a great family and great friends.
-Sometimes it does get lonely.
-It is very different to not be in school.
-Getting a good job is not easy.
-People are put in your life for reasons. You just have to figure out what those reasons are.
-You can’t change people but people can change.
-There are more good guys out there than I imagine there to be.
-Sometimes you have to do things even though you don’t want to.
-Sometimes it is better to keep things to yourself.
-Sometimes you have questions but will never find the answers.
-Reading books can actually make time pass enjoyably.
-People come into your lives but its up to you to keep them there when they leave.
-It is hard for me to make friends because I don’t talk to anyone
-Things can always be worse
-Sometimes you have to learn to let go even though you want to hold on so bad.
-Friends like me just the way I am.
-Sometimes people get jealous.
-It is easy to get blindsided.
-Little things to me can mean a lot to someone else.
-Talking to each and every person is a completely different experience.
-There are good days and there are bad.
-Sometimes I need to take care of myself first.
-If something is bothering me it is better to talk about it.
-I don’t express myself enough.
-You can’t change yourself for someone else because it robs you of who you really are.

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I hope you have a Happy New Year.

An amazing story for the new year.