Going for a quick walk around the building at work to stretch my legs. 10am. Started thinking about my grandparents. Council bluffs, Omaha, Fremont, minneola, pickstown, wessington springs. Spearfish, rapid city. Iowa, Nebraska, South Dakota. I spent so many years hungry for adventure. To know what was around the bend. I seldom stop to remember where I was. Where I came from. Nice to remember my grandparents. My brother and I were close to them growing up. We enjoyed going over to there house. Playing Yahtzee and skunk on school breaks when we were in college. Nice to have a different emotion and feeling about something else

Addendum 11:45am I knew my paternal grandfather more than my maternal. Actually I barely knew my maternal grandfather. They lived in Indiana and then he moved to Maryland before he died. I was 5. My mom doesn’t speak highly of him. Not that he was a bad guy. I don’t think she thought much of him as a father. But the way he approached his career is more like me. He would only stay four years or less in a calling. My mom was born in Michigan, moved to Illinois then Oklahoma, Missouri and Kentucky. By the time she finished college her parents moved to Indiana. Of course he was in ministry. I was in sales.

For the record I don’t miss sales at all. And frankly see the time as doing it as subjecting myself to abuse. I learned from my time in sales. Throw the pressure on them. Our referral volume has shrank. But I am not owning it. I sent a message to my boss and the area sales person the reasons we are slow and what we are doing. But I made it clear that the responsibility is on the sales manager and we expect his help. It only took a decade of setting myself up to be the fall guy to learn that.

6:21am nothing seems permanent or perfect. Not Utah, not California. The WIL, my daughter, my marriage. So much has changed so often the last six months. My wife and daughter moved out. I was taking a week off before starting a new job. I bought a car. My mom fell and went to the hospital. Then came to live with me. I lost that new job. I got another new job. I moved to another state. Arizona is good. I am in a good place. 2021. Arizona. This apartment. This job. I focus only on those constants.

For my own sanity and something to do, especially on weekends, I will pull themes from these posts and create more robust articles or entries. 300 words? 500? 1000?

10:12 at work. Yesterday afternoon felt like I a climbed a mountain. I reached an apex. With all the chaos of the first quarter of 2021 things have slowed down. I found a new job. A new place to live. I have completed the move. What do I focus on now? Having been in such a high pressure situation it is hard to get in a repetitive groove. Now life is showing up everyday. Putting in time. Nine weeks from this coming Thursday is the end of school for my daughter. That is the only real milestone on the horizon. Not much will change whether I stay here one week, one month, one year, one decade.

The experience of the past three months reminds me of working industrial construction at the cement plant in Croydon, Utah. My best friend recruited me to be a local hand the day before the job started. I geared up and worked intensely for four weeks and completed the job. 7am to 7pm seven days a week. This has been a 12 week intensive.

I like to turn my music up with my headphones and be a rock star in the mirror. Imagine the adoration of a enthusiastic crowd.

Going to work is that in real life. Getting dressed is preparing for the stage. Showing up is stepping up to the mic and performing. It is showtime.

I am strong. I am the leader. I am the center of attention. Smart. Charismatic. Make money

I get anxious. I want time to speed up. Get to the next good part. I have no patience. I slow down. Stay in the moment.

6:38am the morning sun is beautiful. My apartment looks nice. It has a good energy. This morning I woke up feeling multiple things. I am sad Dana Point is over. I am glad it is over. I feel like a failure. I feel like I have a new beginning. I needed fresh perspective. I worry how being in Arizona will affect my daughter. Either because she stays in California or moves to Arizona. Change was necessary. Inevitable. I don’t know what this change will entail.

It is weird to be nostalgic and conflicted. I was literally being ruined mentally and financially in that place. But despite the necessity. Despite the reasons why. I still left my home

Despite all the bad things there was still beauty there. There was goodness. Memories. I will never completely reconcile with the leaving. Beautiful things were lost I will never have again. I felt the same way leaving utah.

I feel a lot of energy about the WIL tonight. Like I am claiming a life outside of Utah. For all the years in California I was in exile from her world. Now that the California energy is released there is an abundance to be claimed. Arizona energy. Boss energy. Writing energy. I am no longer in Utah exile. I can claims new energy and embrace it.

The problem with the WIL is I don’t know what she is thinking. What she wants, what she needs. Objectively that is an absurd statement. She hasn’t reached out to me in over a year. She needs me to leave her alone. But one thing I always believed is we are simpatico. What I feel, she feels. Does she spend every single second missing me like I miss her? does every song make her think of me. When she hears our song does she cry like I do? In the end I wanted the world to know about us. I didn’t want to hide my love for her any more. I got my wish. I thought that meant we would be together. Not apart.

I am overcome with a sense of peace and closure. I had to leave utah nine years ago to prove something, accomplish something. Orange County was a great place to go. I always wanted to live in Southern California. But I always felt like the experience was out of control. I feel paroled. I did what I needed to do as a young man about to turn 40. Now I want to rebuild my life in Arizona as an adult that just turned 49.

3:41pm back in Arizona. The move is complete. All my stuff is out. The last part is getting my furniture and boxes from the movers. I am not a materialistic person but I feel secure surrounded by my stuff. I needed to move out of that house years ago. It was travel and long days away from home in the beginning. Then for the last four years it was going into debt to pay for a lifestyle I could not afford. The events of this year jarred me free. I rescued my sanity and my belongings. We are in a safe place.

The Arizona boss energy is the biggest asset I have. If you want to change how you feel you have to change how you feel. That sounds pedantic. But it is important. I found a new energy. yet I keep wanting to slip back into old energies that didn’t work. I wanted to change. I succeeded. It is like wanting to be a millionaire. Someone shows you how. But you don’t want to do it because you want it done your way. I found exactly what I am looking for in the Arizona energy but I keep wanting to find it with California energy. That energy was frustrating. This energy is new. It feels unfamiliar. I slip into the familiarity of frustration. I can consciously pull myself back to Arizona boss energy but it takes discipline and effort. Soon it will be natural.

This morning I ordered with my phone. I walked to pick up my drink at 6:45am. When I got there another guy was walking toward the entrance. The door was locked. Even though the app let us order it did not mention the lobby didn’t open until 7am. The other guy got in his car and went through drive through. I didn’t want to walk back to get my car. So I stood outside on a curb and waited for the drive thru person to help someone. I explained the situation. Another employee brought my drink out while the other guy sat in his car a couple places back. I felt that was a small vignette of boss energy. I am confident, assured and solution focused. Going back five blocks to get my car didn’t make sense. Waiting 15 minutes for my coffee to get cold didn’t make sense. I saw a solution and fixed the issue. I was proud of myself