Realization

Let’s start at the beginning. Until the age of 14, I thought I was straight. But after getting my first girlfriend, I knew something was different about me. I didn’t know what it was, but I just knew that I didn’t like dating girls. It took me 4 years to accept that I regularly developed feelings for men . And once I accepted it, it took me another year to get up the courage to tell just one person.

The first person I told was someone who I now consider my best friend, Taelyn, who I had met 3 weeks prior in Introduction to Marketing. It was a quiet evening in her dorm. She and I were sitting around with, watching funny YouTube videos and snacking on fatty foods.  So we got the conversation on the popular talking point of me never mention women in my life. We discussed it, and she jokingly asked if I was gay. For a a few moments, I joined in the laughter not knowing how to answer and I finally said “you know what, I’m gay, nothing more, nothing less." At that moment I felt a big chunk of weight come off of my shoulder, for I wouldn't have to put on a facade anymore and eventually end up blocking friendships from going far due to me not wanting anyone to know as I had done all through high school.

See, I had barely known Taelyn which is why it was easier to tell her and others I met that during the year I spent in Chicago. I knew I was starting with fresh slate with these people and being honest would be the best way to go. The hard part would be telling my family and others from back home. 

When I decided to leave Chicago and come back out to San Francisco I knew I would have to tell, I just didn't know how. After being back I started to enclosed many emotions which eventually turned into stress, because I was not able to express myself the way I wanted. Whenever I was asked how I am feeling, I would always respond with a positive adjective, but deep down I wanted to die.

For the past few months I had become so stressed that I started alienating myself from the world. I would go to school, work and then go home and lock myself in my room. Then, about a week ago I started realizing how pathetic I was making myself look so after spending about an hour or so debating with myself I finally mustered up the courage to walk into my mother's room and tell her. You would have thought I died, she spent that day laying around the house mourning before she could finally speak to me. She was so sad, but she said it wasn't about me, it was the life she had planned for me in her head, dealing with a gay son isn't exactly something she imagined, but I'm happy to say she and a lot of my family members accepted me.

 

What I hate about working at Dominos...

Sure everyone hates their manger, even the managers hate each other, but its the managers at Dominos that I hate the most. In my eyes the managers at Dominos used to be like me, a ordinary crew member, but maybe they didn’t go to college, maybe they did but left because they started earning, or maybe they are just dumb and think working for Dominos is awesome. So gradually through the wasted years working at Dominos they got promoted done a few managerial courses (learning how to use Microsoft Word and wearing slightly more formal clothes) and eventually became an assistant manager, who looks down upon us mere crew members, and are possible just that little bit jealous that we are still in college or are about to go and aren’t going to work in Dominos for 30 years. 

I would just like to add, I don’t hate the people, I just hate what they do…actually I do hate one.

This is insane.

The bombs went off at a time where the average people were crossing the line.  Apparently, the 4 hour mark is usually the finishing time for the average marathon runner so whoever did this was trying to make a statement - making sure there were families and children there waiting to meet up with whoever was finishing the race.

I feel so bad for all of those people who were injured. An 8 year-old dead, 2 others dead, several injured, several people lost their limbs - their arms or legs, mostly legs. Its all so sad.

Random Thought

Sometimes, I’m petrified of feeling great because there’s nothing like having the rug pulled off from under you and falling thousands of feet down a jagged, rough, dark pit and hitting a cold bottom hard- especially if that happens repeatedly in a short time. Yes, they say the best thing about being at the bottom is that there’s nowhere else to go but up, but once you get up….the direction down is a lingering option. 

Album Review: Justin Timberlake - The 20/20 Experience

As someone 100% sure that he would not provide anything better than his last album, FutureSex/LoveSounds, I sat with it for multiple listens before giving a knee jerk reaction and had an open mind.

The 20/20 Experience is a result of artistic restlessness and being unsure of how to move forward. When you can't move forward and paint the next progressive musical picture, the easiest thing to do is pull from the past. Reworking old R&B/Soul records and adding a 2013 mainstream finish is the meat & potatoes of the album. Unfortunately, what worked for and what was so cool about the first single  "Suit & Tie" just doesn't work for 10 more tracks of the same structure and format.

I had a conversation with a friend (a big Justin fan) this morning, and she described the album as "time consuming". I think a better description is self indulgent and empty. The production on The 20/20 Experience is a lot better than some of the actual songs and melodies. The slick production gives off the appearance of something extremely grand, but behind Timberlake's glitz & glam, it's really just average. The song lengths are afterthoughts I'm sure. I'd be willing to bet the original form of the tracks, and album in general, was thin & lean. To make up for that, they added transitions to every song & overproduced it through fun (and at times retread) production quirks. I think it was actually a very insecure thing to do, and to some degree it's a little desperate in trying to make every song eventful. There's a lot of polish here, but the polish is see through. When all else fails, beatbox and add in a couple 808's for 2 more minutes I guess.

With all that being said, I think it's a decent effort. The songs that standout are "Don't Hold The Wall' and "Strawberry Bubblegum".

“Everything in our life, every person in our life…every relationship…everything is there for a reason and when you really pay attention, there’s certain little clues we get; it’s so crystal clear what the next step is. It’s like a puzzle; everything is in it right place and as we grow, we take the next step, the dots get connected and eventually we become what we’re supposed to be.” - Beyoncé Knowles

Something that I am realizing more and more each and everyday.