a world removed

There is one reason above all that I hate the Marine Corps. It is that sacrifice. Of course, I signed the contract, knowing what I would get myself into, and so I really have no right to complain. But even so, can anyone know what we have to sacrifice? For the most part, I have had to put my life on hold to deploy for two years. While the first year was not so bad (seriously, what else was I going to do?) this year has proven to be a struggle so far. Part of it is because before my first deployment, I was like a little kid, knew to the Marine Corps, and just doing what I was told, when I was told. But now, I am no longer that Boot who is lost, and does not know anything. And as such, my life has advanced this past year further than it had in previous years.

My biggest problem, of course, is with WoW. I think that I should have forced myself not to play this past year. Knowing that I was going to deploy again, my thought process all of last year was that I should play as much as I can to get my fill before I leave. I am beginning to think that this was a very bad idea. While I did get to experience a lot in this past year playing, I am missing out on so much over these past few months alone. New patches bring new contect, which only increases the appeal of the game. There are new quests, new skills, new dungeouns, and it is easier to enter the higher level content. While making things easier is kind of opening the door for all players to experience the content, it is still taking away that thrill of beating the game at its toughest. But anyways, basically, I am missing out a whole year of playing WoW. A game that I have put in nearly every free hour that I had last year, and that I miss dearly. How I wish that I could be back in the States right now and spending my free time playing. But no, I am stuck out here in this god forsaken country doing stupid work everyday and wasting my time. I honestly believe that what I am doing right now amounts to nothing, and I am just riding the money car right now at the expense of my personal wants.

The thought for today: I am no true hero. If given the chance, I would never have signed and joined the Marine Corps. I believe that I would have discovered WoW anyways, and I could be playing WoW back in the States right now and enjoying true freedom. Fuck anything that I am "earning" out here. I just want out of this Hell.

I have found that spark within again. I went to Amazon to order a graphic novel, and I glanced at some of the recommendations that Amazon had for me. One of the titles caught my eye, and I happened to glance at it. That was a good choice for me. I bought a movie from Amazon a few years ago called Remember Me, My Love. It is an Italian movie, and it turned out to be what I expected, and I liked it a lot. Well, Amazon decided to offer me some more Italian movies. Long story short, I bought a few new movies, and I am looking forward to receiving them. I wanted to buy a lot more, as my cultural kick just hit full swing, but I refrained from doing so. I will content myself with the new movies for a little bit, and then go from there.

I really like reading about other people's lives. I have this serious fly on the wall complex, compelling me to search through people's lives, striving to understand what it is to think like them, and to experience life like they do. Back on those long Band trips, I would sit in the back of the bus and day dream about switching bodies with someone. Of course it always worked out perfectly in that day dream, but it proved only to be the beginning for me. My biggest obsession now is by far Postsecret. I have contented myself for the longest time to just read the weekly postcards, but I am finding more and more similar sites popping up on the internet, and I am hooked on these sites. One of my greatest finds has been a Postsecret web forum. I could spend hours upon hours of reading different posts from people. A lot of the stuff, I cannot associate with, but then a majority of it shows little snippets of my life, if not what my life could have been. For me, it fills in that gap that I have, to constantly experience new things, and to truly live. For now, I can fill that gap. But I have to be careful. This need runs deep, and if I allow it go to far, to delve too deep into my being, it could be dangerous.

The thought for today: I hate being a fucking a pogue and playing fucking pogue games. I only have less than two years left now.

For the longest time, I have wanted to make a certain post. But, I do not know how to say the things that I want to say without sounding like a pompous and arrogant prick. I have been talking in my mind and tring to make this post sound better, but so far, I have am still in the rough draft stage. I will work on it and in the next month will make the definitive post, and hope to not be too pretentious.

I have been doing a lot of searching on the internet lately, looking at different tech forums and jobs, and seeing how IT profssionals live their lives and the problems that are encountered. Of course, I cannot know all the ins and outs, but I found that I can gain some insight into my future career. Daily, I am learning new things that I will be able be able to use in the future years, and slowly, I am folding back those naive covers from my eyes and starting to things clearly. I look forward to the future years, more so than I have in a long time. While I know that to get where I want to go, I will have an uphill battle, I genuinely look forward to the struggle. The hardest part, is knowing where I want to be, seeing where I will be in two years, and knowing the many different paths that can diverge and take me from where I see myself being.  It is weird for me to think that in two years, I will be out in the wild roughing out. I be will spending hour after agonizing hour hiking through wilderness and "uncharted" land. Honestly, I am questioning whether I will hike the Trail or not. I mean looking at it, it seems a bit undisciplined for me to put my life on hold for a year to spend that time hiking. I should be out there securing my future by getting a job and making some money, not living a simple boyhood fantasy. But, if I do not do this, hike in this great "Wilderness", I am forever damning myself to a lifetime of torment. I will probably never get another chance at this Hike, and if I do not take this opportunity, I will regret it forever. If I do not do this, I know that I will be depressed, and enter a black hole, from which I will not return.

The thought for today: I always like to be cryptic, opting for subtle hints here and there, always being a coward and not just saying things. Why should things change now? But I do not have anything to say.

One of my pet peeves has always been pens. I am kind of picky concerning the pens that I use, always opting to use roller pens, and the more expensive kind rather than just the normal bulk BIC pens. This obsession has finally caught up with me, and I have decided to actually buy a better pen. After a little searching around, I have settled on a Cross brand pen and pencil set: The Classic. This is kind of a big step for me, and as I start to have a more professional approach to the way that I act and other areas of my life, this is just one small step that I think that I need to take. I have always been the kind of person not to partake in the normal stupidity of other people my age, but for the past several years, I have let this slip and have gotten this supidity out of my system. As I look forward to the upcoming years, and start to think more of the future, I recognize this need to go beyond this phase, and start to act like a grown adult. Add to this list a new, more professional e-mail, and no longer will it be said of me: "It is like having two kids around"

I cannot help but sense a certain untruthfullness to a recent situation that has happened. While I am not calling anyone a liar flat out, I do think that certain facts were mis-represented in order to cause a little bit of havoc. I have no doubt that a door was unlocked, however, I believe that it was opened, the room found to be empty, and then the games were started. I have learned a lot over the last few years, and one of the most important things that I have found is to not take things at face value. There is always more to every story, and while you trust certain people, that does not mean that they cannot fall victim to their own personal prejudices and seek revenge, in the true Marine Corps fashion, of course. In the end, it comes down to what I hate most about the Marine Corps. That feeling that it was done to me in the past, and as such, I will do it to those below me; it is that never ending case of "abuse" and "hazing".

The thought for today: I often dwell on that what if. I no longer do so out of pain and a desire for my personal pleasure, but more for curiosity. Perhaps the ultimate voyeurism is for me to look at my life if I had made different choices. I am curious as to how it would all turn out, and what else would have happened. The biggest question that I have to ask myself, and that I have dwelled on for some time now, is could I have stopped her death had I been there? Also, how much did my lack of love and total disregard for her contribute to her overall sadness? And perhaps the worst feeling of all comes wiith the question: Could I have been someone that she turned to that could have stopped her from ending her life? I do not think that I will ever know the answer to these questions.

It is hard to imagine, no scratch that. Time is relative. Some days it seems to fly by fast, while on others, it seems to drag by slowly. It is the oddest thing how time is measured; how the minutes can turn into hours, or how the hours turn into seconds. There are times, when standing post that I think that the two hours would never end. But so many times, the good things in life always pass right on by and are now nothing more than a distant memory. But I digress. I bring this topic up, because this week, it is three years since I "graduated" Boot Camp. Nothing compares to Marine Corps Boot Camp. Honestly, there were days that I just wanted to give up. A lof of Marines will tell you that to then ut was nothing, and that they eased through Boot Camp. But not me. I will be the first to admit that I wanted out. If I had known that I could have gotten out, I would have. But, I was not given that chance, and as a result, I stuck it out, and finished the three months. And I am glad that I did. I learned a lot about myself in 2005. I truly did not push myself as hard as I could have in the time that I was there. Oh, I still suffered. I dont believe that there was a night that passed that I was not dead tired, and that I did not wake up in the middle of the night with a charlie horse in my leg. But, I know that I could have done more. I used to fault mysefl for that, but looking back on it now, I don't so much. I pushed myself and got what I needed out of my time there.

When I was in the tenth grade, I started working at a fast food restaurant. When normal teenagers were out partying and doing other things on a Friday or Saturday night, I was stuck working. Let me rephrase that. I truly enjoyed working, and so I volunteered to work on the weekends. I would usually go into work right after school on Friday, and then around 3 on Saturday. I would work all night, and close the store, usually finishing around 1030, sometimes 11. By the time that I got home, my parents would already be asleep, and so I would pass my time by watching television. We did not have cable then, and so I would amuse myself by watching the news. Usually, I would stay awake after the news, amusing myself by watching SNL. But then I started to find the Sci-Fi shows that  ABC abd FOX aired around 1 and 2 in the morning. It was during this time that I started watching Stargate:SG1. And that is how I would spend by late Saturday evenings, Enjoying episodes of Stargate. I was never able to watch the shows in order, but a few years ago, I bought the DVD's, and have been putting off watching them until the series ended. I really, really do not like waiting for new episodes. Anyways, I have spent my free time these past two months watching the whole series of Stargate. It got boring around Season 7, and for the most part, 8 was a drag as well. But then Season 9 hit, and the series got exciting again. I was just forcing myself to watch the series, wondering what would come next, and how much longer I could put up with it. In the end, I am glad that I stuck with the show, and I thought that the ending was fitting for the show.

The thought for the day: I am unsure what to watch next. I am trying to watch House, however, I am not getting into the whole medical drama thing. I am not sure what to watch now, but I am thinking.

Life has a very odd way of working for me. I have stated in the past my luck with finding books, music, and movies. Lately, that luck has not really kicked in all that much. Partly because I have been out of the loop, and partly because a lot of my "discoveries" happened while I was shopping around for new stiff, whereas I have not done much shopping these past 5-6 months. But on a whim, I have found sonething that has eluded for me all of the past year.

Upon returning from Iraq last year, I spent a lot of weekends with Ray at his house. I had not elapsed into full WoW mode yet, and as such, he and I would go out to the local malls, watch some movies, and pretty much just enjoy having free time again. On one of our mall excursions, he and I went to the Virgin Music store and did a little shopping. I remember my first impressions of that store, and how overwhelmed I felt in that place. Until then, the largest music store that I have been in was Disc Jockey back in Lexington. Well, needless to say, Virgin blows Disc Jockey away. While shopping in there, I did find a lot of new music, but that was not my find. Ray and I spent at least an hour in there, and when we were ready to check out, we stood in line for about another 10 minutes. While waiting in line, there was a song that come on over the in store player. I remember how catchy that tune was, and that i really wanted to know who sange the song. I did something very un-Richard like then, and asked the counter salesman who sang it. Of course, he had no clue, and I was stuck with trying to figure that out on my own once we got back to his house. The only thing that I could remember was that the song has chocolate in it, and that it was really rhythmic and catchy. Unfortunately, I was unable to find the song on any searches that I did, and have spent this past year always on the look out for any song that reminds me of it.

Well, I have finally found that song. The song is Chocolate and Roses by Ana Sorrenao van der Laan. I saw the title in my weekly new releases bulliten from ITunes, and i just had this sense that it was it. And so, I downloaded it, and sure enough, it is every bit what I remember it being. I have waited a year for this song, and it is fitting that almost a year later, the song finds me again. Life truly is a circle sometimes.

The thought for today: I wonder how many things from the past will come full circle as the years progress.