THURSDAY FEELS: Optimism in Brief

I count my blessings tonight.  It's been a rough few months, months that included a move across the country, the arrival of a beautiful baby girl, the loss of a job, the borrowing of money from family members, the receipt of gifts from family, friends, and strangers, and the list goes on.

I count my blessings, because, in spite of have to go to the food bank to get it, there is stuff to eat in my cupboards.  I count them because, inspite of the fact that the paint is all flaking off, it's rusted out under the doors, and it has trouble moving when you step on the gas too hard, we have a truck that gets us from A to B and even allows us to drive a short way out of town for hikes.  I count them because even though I'm not making as much money as I was making in Alaska, I have a job that I really enjoy, working for honest people, and making stuff that's incredibly beautiful.  I count them because I have a son who I get to talk to almost every day, even though he lives 15 hours away, a happy dog who doesn't realize he has only three legs, a beautiful girlfriend who told me not to stay up too late (it's 12:30 am now...), and a daughter who has already been "memed" twice at 2 months and 2 days (3 days now) old.

It's funny how true the cliche is that implies you one doesn't realize the value of the small things until you lose everything else.  We've had to sell so much stuff.  Our kitchen table has a metal folding chair and another chair I found by the dumpster a few weeks ago with no back.  We don't have a vacuum cleaner.  Some of this stuff is just ridiculous.  Still, we have free internet, which allows us to invest $8/month in Netflix, and that's a beautiful thing.

We found a church that has been wholly supportive of us.  We're going to dedicate our daughter there soon.  The Unitarian Universalists are wonderful people, and no matter what sort of spiritual cravings we have, we can satisfy those cravings there.  That, and they've really looked out for us there.  We found our mechanic through them.

Now we're ramping up to dig out of our hole and downsize even more.  No matter what happens, we'll be happy because, despite everything we lost, we have each other.  We can play rummy and watch documentaries about Nazis and re-runs of Star Trek: The Next Generation.  We can come up with 50 creative ways to cook rice.  Whatever we do, we laugh, we hug often, and we both don't waste a day forgetting how lucky we are.  When you get there, that's all you need.

WEDNESDAY SKILLS - What's New with Work!

We have been doing all sorts of cool stuff at work!  Here's an old sand-blasted sign that they made at Signs & Designs Unlimited (my new job that I lucked out and love.  It's been re-painted once already, and I was told to do it again. The first step was sanding off the white paint on the numbers to give the new paint a place to stick.  

After sanding it, I taped the edges and then "gound" in the background with a color called "Hamilton Green", a color created by the owner of my shop's dad, the man who started this business in Bozeman, Montana in the early 1970s.  (This makes us the oldest running sign shop in Bozeman... no big deal.)  After letting that dry, I hand-painted a coat of white letters and the Emerald Green border.  This was done in 1-Shot, which is one of the coolest paints I've ever worked with.  

Here's a different project, one of three sand-blasted signs for a local dentist.  This sign was stained, and then I used a color called "Chamois" to paint the letters.  I'm finding that attention to detail here is crucial in preventing touch-ups, an inevitable step, but the fewer I have to do, the better.

Here's another sand-blasted sign.  The paint is all down, and we're just waiting on vinyl lettering and graphics and the pin on the bottom that makes it official.

This is the same sign (albeit with a blurry picture), to show what the finished product looks like.  We should be installing this one next week.

Here is one of two concrete trucks we did graphics for today.  My boss and me and a couple of ladders took care of this job.  The graphics on the drum were printed on Oracal RapidAir film, and went on pretty well, all things considered.  We had a couple of hiccups, but my boss is very competent, and anything rough was smoothed out.  All in all, it's been fun!

TUESDAY UPDATE: What's New with the BattleWagon

Phew... so what have I been up to?  For starters, I have the newest BattleWagon, and her name is Road Kill.  She's a beautiful beast of a 1983 Suburban.  It's the perfect truck for what I have going on, living in Bozeman, Montana with my new family.

Our long term goal is to have enough property for a few farm animals, a garden, and a yurt, and maybe another property back in Alaska to visit or shoot for as a bug-out.  For now, we're in an apartment with a year-long lease that ends next Spring.  We also got caught extremely off guard moving here and losing work, so now we're digging out of quite the financial hole.

Still, living here is beautiful.  I had the experience of the country song on a back road in Montana in an old Chevy truck with a beautiful girl sitting in the middle of the bench seat, right next to me.  It was amazing.  And, since we're cheap, we go hiking and have fallen in love with Hyalite Canyon, one of the many, many canyons that have raging creeks and start at small, clear lakes high in the mountains.

As practice for bugging out, we're going to do some family camping trips this summer.  The funds simply aren't there for the ultimate goal of yurts and overlanding, but we'll get there.  We're lucky to have landed in a place that has tons to offer in relatively close proximity, and for that, we're thankful.

MONDAY THROW-BACK: December 17, 2007 - Monday - 4:55PM - Denver, Colorado

[Personal Journal]

"My body is sore from a ¾ day of snowboarding yesterday at Loveland.  [The Chin] has made a very dramatic improvement since I rode with him about a year ago at Eldora.  A few more times up, and we may  be able to try some trees together.

"[BattleWagon1] has an oil leak somewhere.  I may be grounded for Christmas because of it.  I'll email Dad and get his thoughts.  If only I could ride the old Columbia to Salida and not die...

"Work today seemed productive.  Since [Lindey] was training to run the new printer, I had few distractions and accomplished a bit.  We were supposed to get a truck this afternoon, but it never showed.  I hope that doesn't throw off the rest of my week.

"I've been thinking a bunch about [The Oldest] over the past few days.  It's a little unsettling having him here.  I wish we could scatter him at Lily Lake, but I don't think [His Mom] or I are ready to discuss it yet."

It's interesting looking at brief accounts of what I was doing over seven years ago.  Here, one of my best friends, a dude with a huge chin, a total asshole of a pervert with the biggest heart you'd ever find, went snowboarding at Loveland Ski Area.

My first van, the original BattleWagon had a leak, too.  I remember one time I drove it from 13th & Quebec to 13th & Grant in Denver and had to put three quarts of oil in it to get me there.  I was convinced it was going to cost me thousands of dollars, so I didn't drive it for weeks.  It turned out to be a $100 (with labor) O-ring.

Lindey Staar, one of my favorite co-workers of all time, was working on the FujiFilm Acuity flatbed printer that the company I worked for at the time had recently purchased.  Since it's December in this entry, I'm guessing the truck I was talking about was one we were going to do graphics on.

Posting these entries are also forcing me to talk about my kiddo, the oldest son of mine, who passed away from SIDS when he was less than 5 months old.  He died in 2006, about a year and a half before I wrote this.  I had just been given my "share" of his ashes, and was bitter with his mother for a long time and for various reasons, many of which remain unjustified.  I was also crushing on a place called Lily Lake, a small, high-altitude lake on the backside of the Blanca Peak Massif in southern Colorado.  The Chin and I had hiked there a few months prior, and it was a truly religious experience

The Big Sky Series: The Update

It's been a while since I've posted. Life takes some turns. I find myself in Belgrade, Montana, quietly waiting for a young lady to run to the bank and get a title squared away. Last night, my family sold our only car, Chandler, a 1996 Geo Prism, and this morning, I'm adopting her replacement, a 1983 Chevy Suburban named Road Kill. We've found that having a sedan is difficult when there is two adults, a toddler, a newborn, a dog, and any amount of groceries or stuff to haul. Sacrificing fuel economy to be able to put everything in one car and still have room to pick up other people could be a game changer.

Yes, I've said it. A newborn. For those who don't follow me on Facebook, our little Fidget was born March 19, joining our growing family in our new place to call home, Bozeman, Montana. We decided to move here from Ketchikan, not in response to disappointment with all of the grandeur that is Alaska, but to be closer to The Boy, my son and My Queen's step son, who lives with his mom in Denver. The community here has been beautiful, and we found ourselves hitting the ground here running with overwhelming support from friends and family, new and old. K and J, friends of friends, let us stay on their futon before we found a place. The Unitarian Universalist church here has been wonderfully supportive and intellectually challenging. Gas is a dollar cheaper per gallon. Our biggest hurdle to overcome as a family continues to be financial, as my income after child support for The Boy and rent continues to allow only a hundred dollars for food, fuel, and various other expenses.

Still, My Queen and I feel optimistic that we're going to come out on top, knowing before we left Alaska that this was going to be the most difficult year of our lives. We're confident that, in a few years, we'll be able to tell stories about how hard life was and how we got through it together, laughing about the times we had only a few boxes of store brand macaroni and cheese to last us until payday, three days away.

Life is fickle, but it is also beautiful and to be cherished. We're going to be okay. We have help, donations of furniture, money, clothes and baby gear, all thrown our way, and while we'd love to pay it all back, we're accepting that, when we can, we'll only be able to pay it forward, and we'll do that. Life may be fickle, but it's so damn good to hear The Boy laughing when I get home from work that it's all worth it. Don't let the bastards grind you down.

Kindness and Hardship, my take on 2013

Life. Life is one crazy shit storm. Life hits you hard in the face, and then watches you bleed, and in the next moment, it patches you up and wraps you in a mother's embrace.

Last year was a hard year. 2013 did not skimp on the hardship. There was plenty of anguish and strife. My son left just before Christmas in 2012 with his mom in Denver. Until just before this Christmas, I hadn't seen him since.

2013 saw me selling virtually everything I owned to stay afloat. I had a 1976 Jeep pickup, lifted, with 35s. Gone. My TV, X-Box, Netflix, furniture, Honda... all gone to make it by. I moved on to a sailboat for four months, and now I have an apartment and can't afford that either.

It seems horrible, I know, and at times, it feels horrible, too.

However, now I am simple, and I love it. I have next to nothing that is collectable or impractical, but when I've reflected on 2013, I realized that I have EVERYTHING that really matters.

2013 saw the union of my girlfriend and me. It saw the incredible trust and companionship of this relationship, and in all of the most meaningful ways.

2013 was the year that my son did get to come have a Christmas with me in my house with my new family, his sister baking in her little oven until the end of March.

2013 was the year I met some of the most inspirational people, from the kids in Ohio who belong to my lady, friends and family that have protected and entertained her for years, all of whom took me in instantly as one of their own.

2013 was the year Pope Francis came, and while I'm not Catholic, I dig the shit out of that guy. You do good work, I do good work. We'll meet there.

2013 was the year that I went halibut fishing, and it was the year I got to camp on the beach with a beautiful woman and a three-legged dog.

For all of my gripes and bickering about how hard my life is, I have to continually remind myself that I have a loving family, I have a roof, food and water, clothes, a job, and a few dollars to my name. That's good enough.

I hope that 2014 is a relief, but I'll expect it to be worse, and that's okay. I can do worse. But I'll have people in the worse with me, and that's okay. I'm a lucky guy. I'm a very simply a lucky man. I hope I never forget that.

Here's to this year.

CHRONICLES: Cold and Beautiful

It's around 20 degrees here in Ketchikan this morning.  It's chilly.  In Colorado, it's in the negatives and double-negatives.  We're having a heat wave here.

View from the top, several months ago.  I live in the red building on the far left.

I haven't updated this blog in a very long time, and I apologize for that. My aunt was so kind as to point that out when we spoke on the phone last weekend.  Well, I suppose it's time for an update.

The dream of the boat is breathing its last breath.  It turned out to be a very impractical way to live, especially with the news that the girl and I are expecting a little girl at the end of March/beginning of April.  So no boat.  But a baby girl will be here, and in the long term, that is going to be SO MUCH MORE fun!  The little boy will have a little sister to take on adventures with us.

We have the coolest shower in this apartment!  Random picture, but i'm excited about it!

Speaking of the little boy, he'll be up for Christmas.  We're going to take the ferry up, and I'm really excited to see how he does on the big blue boat!  If we're lucky (or unlucky, depending on how things go), we'll be taking the train to the ferry terminal from the airport.  The little boy will have been on a plane, a train, and a boat in one day!  How many three-year-old kids do you know that are that lucky?

The Three-Legged Wonder Dog

Here at home, the new home, the new pad, the three-legged dog is sleeping quietly on the couch, the cat is on her towel on the highest shelf in the bathroom, and the girl is sleeping quietly, keeping a cozy baby warm in her guts.  ;-)

Today, I hope to get back down to the boat and pick up a few odds and ends, pack, unpack, move stuff around, and get all cozy here in the apartment.  We've been here since the middle of September.  Yes, far too skimpy on the blog lately.

At any rate, speaking of being proactive, I'm going to get on with this.  Thanks for reading!  Feel free to throw a topic my way.