Grounded

It's been a while since I've posted and if anything I've discovered that not expressing my thoughts often enough leads to some really unhealthy results so writing out what I'm thinking about in such an anonymous and detached way is a lot more beneficial than even I realized! Today's post is really a culmination of a bunch of recent events that individually would already be overwhelming, but together have made for a pretty rough couple of weeks.  Do you ever have those moments where you find yourself grounded to reality whether you like it or not?  Like all you want to do is suspend realism for just a little while and lose yourself in the imaginary because it's soo much better than your present, but you can't because deep down you know that eventually you'll have to deal with the consequences.  If you understand what I'm talking about then congratulations you're human and have the unfortunate luck of dealing with the constant battle between the logical and the emotional that everyone faces.  I've done a fairly decent job so far this summer of balancing the abstract imaginary world of my desires and my future and my idealism with the concrete world of the present and reality.  However, my perfect balance was ripped apart and now I'm grounded in a reality that, as much as I would love to leave it behind, is too important to forsake.  One of those things is my grandfather passing away at 2 am this morning.  While my relationship with him was not a strong one it still pains me to know that someone who shares my last name and part of my past is no longer with us, more importantly, I hurt for people I know who are more affected than I am.  Yet, what hits me the most is the harsh reality that time is not a part of that imaginary abstract ideal, but rather a concrete and tangible entity.  Time has a beginning and an end for all of us which is horribly morbid and that epiphany almost caused me to run straight into a mailbox this morning, but the truth is that the only thing that can truly outlast time is the past not the future.  Our legacy. Our friendships. Our work. Our influence. Those things that we have done live on.  I think it really boils down to the fact that we live in our future, but we die in our past.  This really grounded me to reality and the reality that I shouldn't wait to say things to people who need to hear them or do things I need to do; I have to make them a part of my past as soon as possible before I no longer have the opportunity.  Then I found out that my dog, the only living being that truly appreciates my rapier wit and sparkling personality (insert sarcastic tone here), has to have surgery which makes the part of me that wants to do everything in my power to help in any way I can feel hopelessly lost because, as much as I wish I could, I do not have the skills to perform surgery and make her better.  Then, another thing that happened was that after almost two months of blissful denial on my end I had a breakdown at a campsite in the Middle of Nowhere, Pennsylvania surrounded by motorcyclists and insects intent on making my life an itching hell (On a positive note the actual camping aspect was super rewarding and made me feel incredibly accomplished even if there were showers nearby...).  I'm not sure what exactly triggered it, now that I think about it though it was probably the country music because seriously that would drive anyone to the edge, but I couldn't run away from reality anymore.  I was informed that I'm a difficult person to get to know, which surprised me because I pride myself on being pretty open and to the point with people rather than ambiguous or closed off, but it made me see that relying on people is necessary if you expect them to rely on you.  So while breaking down like that made jumping into the susquehanna river, toxic substances and all, look particularly inviting it was probably necessary.  It just means that I can't go back to the imaginary world I had stored so much of that part of me anymore, I have to stay grounded in reality a little longer and work to find a new balance with new information to incorporate.  And maybe every once in a while not force myself to be okay with things for everyone else's sake and just accept that sometimes in that battle of wills I mentioned above even the emotional side can surprise attack behind enemy lines in an effort to scatter logic's forces and succeed.  When you're at war with yourself reality is hard to avoid and with nowhere to turn taking a breath and regrouping is your only option so that's what this post is about.  Regrouping and remembering that reality is not something to run from just because it brings us extreme sadness sometimes, it's something to cherish because on the other end of that spectrum is extreme happiness.  Serge Daney a french cinema critic wrote once, "In an age of synthetic images and synthetic emotions, the chances of an accidental encounter with reality are remote indeed".  These encounters are painful, but they're purposeful too and they can be beneficial to us all if we choose to see them as reminders that reality has such wealth to offer us if we choose to come down from the clouds.  Sorry if this wasn't as light-hearted or random as my other posts I just couldn't find it in me to be very humorous today, but tomorrow can always be another story and another run.
Have a RUN-believable day!