Parallel Universe

What better time to start a blog entry then at 2am on a Saturday night stone cold sober. This was a strange week. A parallel universe to the week that preceded it. Then I was in some kind of fantasy reality on the beach in 85 degree endless warmth and sunshine. I was hiking lush, green, tropical mountains, and biking down six Eco-system climates from the frigid Arctic volcano mountaintops to the white sand beach 30 miles below. Now I'm holed up in my house alone and have lost all the momentum that week had afforded me. It didn't take but three days back to give it all away either. I felt pulled from the womb of paradise and left in a cold, wet, and dreary climate with air that hangs over me like a comforter pulled straight out of the washer.

I read an article today about another man released from prison in California after twenty plus years in jail. The evidence to retry him was not salvageable and the judge felt his first trial provided inadequate defense and ordered a retrial. Without valid evidence for a retrial he was set free. This doesn't mean he's innocent, it merely means the due process couldn't be afforded so they released him. I don't know enough about the facts to make a determination if it was a fair ruling or not, but there are countless prisoners in jail tried with faulty evidence and power hungry prosecutors looking for another notch in their belts. The justice system is flawed and evidence that was used to make many rulings is probably not accurate by today's stricter DNA standards. But what about our own lives? Do we hold ourselves guilty of crimes, do we carry regrets, and do we mourn in remorse over episodes in our lives years ago that we can no longer see so clearly? Is the evidence we've used to feel this way even salvageable as well? Or is it just faulty perception and here say that we have held against ourselves and do we suffer for no reason at all?

I love the quote, "A coward dies 1000 deaths a brave man only one." Am I living like a coward? Everyday in Maui I woke early and walked or ran. I used each day of vacation as if it were my last day on the planet. I maximized my days and now a week back and I've fallen into my old habits and routines, life is no longer a great gift but a daily chore. It's more than just going to work, because work feels like a reprieve from home. At least at work I am busy from myself.

I am going to be brave. I am done drinking. For a week in Maui I had no desire to drink and while I occasionally had one or two drinks it was my binging Tuesday that has led me back into a week of spiralling. That's it, I'm done. Life is more important to me than allowing something that has caused so much damage in my life to remain in it. It doesn't make sense to continue something that produces the same results over and over again that causes me this unhappiness. This is after all the definition of insanity. I've had 34 years of fun times and miserable times with alcohol a part of it. I'd like to see how the rest of my life looks like without it.

Can this replace the beaches of Maui? No. Will it wash away the rainy sky? Not at all. Will it make me feel better about myself? At least tonight.