Tags

, , , , ,

Many readers might be wondering what the heck I mean by this title, and perhaps even more, think they know what this is about but they are wrong. Dead wrong.

But before I delve too far down the road of explanation, I should at least, set down a backdrop of what came before. If you have no understanding of the past, how can anyone expect to know the future or even the present?

Before I began my pursuit of my dreams in ernest, I was a father of two boys. Sure, I wrote and I created music but the time I could spend to devote to either of them, was severely limited by fatherhood and all that entails. I believed that once my time with my sons was done, there would always be time to really sink into those creations. In fact, I believed that I would have, more than earned the right to pursue them. After all, to be honest, raising kids was not a dream or desire of mine. It was what my wife desired and thus my love for her convinced me, that I should help her to fulfill her dreams. So I was the good Dad and husband for 22 yrs.

I never did it expecting that it would ever help me in accomplishing my goals. I did not do it expecting to be rewarded or for it to benefit me, in any way, shape, or form. I did it simply because I loved my wife. The only thing I desired was that once I had finished with my fatherly responsibles, that I have the time to pursue those creations.

As I did the fatherhood thing, I used my spare time writing and creating music. But there was never really enough time to do much of anything serious, until my boys became teenagers and wanted nothing to do with me. I found more and more time to really get into creating. But then things began to change.

My oldest son joined the military and left. Then a few years later my youngest son moved to another state to live with his current fiancé. Then the cat we had for 10 yrs. became ill enough, that he had to be put down. It was during these things happening that we became so much in debt, that my wife had to find a second job. I had health issues and no vehicle to use anyway. I began to notice a pattern that was forming though.

It was clear to me that slowly, everything I loved and cared for, was being taken away from me. I could not see or understand why. I therefore, reacted like I suppose anyone would, under the circumstances. I saw everything leaving and did not desire to be alone most of the time. My time as a father had left me friendless, and now my loved ones were leaving, one way or another. So when the family cat, Puddytat had to be put down, I ran out that very day and rescued a kitten, whom I named Jinxy. It was my hope that this little kitten would save me from loneliness, and with that situation being averted, I could continue following the path of creativity, I had craved all my life.

Several months later I saw a puppy at Petco and thought I would get the puppy for my wife. After all, she was working two jobs and deserved some extra happiness, when she came home from those jobs. Besides, she never once complained about me not working and her having to work two jobs. How was I supposed to know that getting the puppy, who we named Jax, was going to totally and irrevocably change our lives?

Before I explain how the puppy led to so much change a few things should be noted. I was not a dog person, at least not as an adult. Several traumatic events during my childhood made sure of that. We were still renting a house, hence the reason for the large debt. You have to get into debt in order to acquire good credit. I know these two small tidbits seem irrelevant to what I am typing about, but you’ll see how they matter more later.

Upon the property owner discovering we had a puppy, he insisted that we either keep the puppy outside all the time or get rid of him. This led to deciding to move. What was the point of getting all this good credit, if we could not use it to save us and the puppy from eviction? By chance, a credit card I applied for came through at that time with a $2500.00 limit and I saw that as fate saying “Here is your down payment on your own home”.

Therefore, after looking into mobile homes and discovering you could buy one but the land restrictions in our county made it impossible to put it anywhere, we had to look into other options. The one and only option we could afford was to buy an RV. Although this was not our preferred choice, it would serve to get us out of that rental property, and allow us to keep the puppy I had gotten for my wife.

Thus we practically gave away 90% of everything we owned and moved out. I had just managed to finish Shadow Shifters before we moved. It was no easy task between, training a puppy, selling our things, and making arrangements for purchasing an RV and moving it somewhere. Everything was eating my time and leaving little room for those things I needed to do.

But then shortly after moving into our new RV we began discover how badly suited a puppy was, for an RV environment. Neighbors complained about barking, we were forced into getting a shock collar or to move within a month of moving in. This pattern continued as we moved from RV park to RV park hoping to find a place that would be conducive to a puppy being trained. In each place we had the same or similar circumstances and we were forced to move.

It would take a complete idiot, tonot to figure out that this would continue until either the puppy got trained or we ran out of places to move and then he would have to go. This began creating a lot of stress on me in particular. I was not getting things done and I was becoming paranoid of even taking the dog outside. I wanted to work on creating but everything, especially the puppy and RV park managers were doing nearly everything possible, to make it impossible for me to create.

The puppy, the moving, the stress of the entire situation was taking its toll and when we moved to this last place and discovered the these RV park owners flat out lied to get us to move in, it just became the final straw in the whole moving chain of events. There was no other place to move and there was no good choice for us. We had to give the puppy up, so that he might have a better chance with another owner. It was the best thing we could do for him.

Having to do this; give up this poor little baby, sent me into depression. I asked, why me? Why us? What did me, my wife, or that little puppy do, to deserve this? Did it really matter? I was depressed and lonely because we moved so far away from my wife’s jobs to try and keep the puppy. Now I was living out in the middle of nowhere with no friends, in a RV park with owners I loath for lying to us, and I just could not wrap my head around what any of us did, to deserve this.

I know everyone has their own tale of woe and misery. I am not trying to take that away from them or belittle it, when I say what I say next. I did everything I could possibly do to deserve it. Right about now, I am guessing most readers will think “Yep, he has lost it obviously”. But the truth is I lost nothing. I gained exactly what I always desired. I just was not looking at it from the right perspective, because I was not paying attention to what the universe was trying to tell me.

You see, I always wanted the time to pursue my writing and music. The universe had been for years slowly removing the obstacles to doing just that. It removed the kids, the cat, and the puppy, to give me the time, to actually do the things I wished to do. I was simply too damn wrapped up in my own mind and thoughts, to see what was given to me. The universe gave me the freedom to do whatever I desire to, and is not about to let me or anything else get in the way of the gift it has given me.

Once I began to clearly see what had been taking place right under my nose, the depression, the pain, the loneliness began to slip away. In stopping my mind, my own thoughts, and taking the time too see what the universe had been trying to tell me all along, I realized one very important fact in all this, that I was not seeing. The universe would have never bothered giving me this solitude unless it knew it was important. It would not have given me what I desired, unless I had earned it and it would matter. Just knowing what you are wanting to do and accomplish, is important and WILL matter, is enough to bring anyone out of depression and loneliness. My solitude is required. My solitude is a necessity of what I do.

I hope you have read this far and my story has helped you. I hope you have learned that you must step outside of your mind, your thoughts, and your life sometimes, in order to gain an outsiders perspective, and truly see what the universe is trying to tell you. Thank you for reading and have a glorious day!

J.B.