During my visit to Valencia a couple of months ago, I had a coffee with my sister and a few friends, and received a bit of a bollocking from Christina, who wisely invited me to focus more on feeling rather than thinking, particularly as it related to my friendships and relationships.
I put this into practice almost immediately, with some rather alarming results. On Boxing Day at a family dinner, Daniel and I started playing with a small football in the living room. I was giving him "headers," and everything was going along just fine until a loose ball bounced backwards off of D's head onto the dining table, ultimately knocking a full glass of champagne into my mother's lap. End result - broken glass on the floor, wet mom, and two sheepish boys sitting in time out for bit with the instructions, "you guys need to think a little more about what you're doing! No ball playing in the house!"
A couple of mornings later, Daniel and I were watching cartoons. I decided to grab us a few actimels, so there we were hanging out, and I sort of said something like, "Actimels are really important for life." I was actually just enjoying a quiet morning watching some terribly violent Japanese cartoon on tv (turns out that one of us wasn't supposed to be watching that; at the time i didn't know) and thought it perfectly fitting to become the self-designated spokesman for strawberry Actimel. Daniel sort of took my statement literally, and told me later in the week, "but you SAID, they're really important for life!"
My nephew was in the stage where he's listening a lot more closely, and sometimes taking things a little to literally. Fortunately, during my little commercial moment on the couch, I did not say, "Actimel, it's like Jaegermeister for kids." I doubt that my nephew's mother would appreciate him repeating that.
For New Year's Eve celebrations, I hung out with a couple of friends. While we were preparing dinner in the kitchen, we discussed our Vorsatz for 2009. I basically conveyed that I would be doing less thinking and a lot more feeling during the year.
Within days, I had yet another incident that prompted me to wonder if I was perhaps taking things a little too literally myself. After freshly refilling my zippo one morning, I commuted to work. Upon my arrival, I plonked my backpack down in the Kantine, grabbed a cup of coffee, then went outside for a cigarette or two before starting the workday.
We have a little Raucherzone outside the factory building, and each morning about 9am there are 10 or so employees enjoying their break. Said individuals were treated to an impromptu "holyshit that fucking hurts!" show as I lit my cigarette with an overfilled zippo. Benzin fuel leaked onto my hand and then suddenly burst into flames. One might have thought I was at a stunt man audition or something. I casually tried to wave my hand to extinguish the flames (that has worked in the past, and yes this wasn't the first time i've done this) and succeeded in spreading the flames. The 4 second rule passed, hair was burning off my hand, and I almost panicked, but finally sorted things out, much to my great embarrassment. Once again, cursed with the "feel more, think less," concept.
I'm fortunate that I can laugh at these moments, since the year has been pretty challenging thus far. Like always, work tends to be the primary reason for this. As a result, my personal life and my personal health have probably suffered more than I would like. At the risk of jinxing myself for the umpteenth time, as I've said this more than once over the past couple of years, the past two months had more low points than high. Frequently in the past six weeks I have wondered just how much longer I would be in Germany, and what additional options could I create for myself. The emotional impact has been pretty chaotic, borderline insane. That typically doesn't do many good things for one's relationships, but I'm lucky that most folks here have expressed their concern and have been supportive. I'm very grateful for that.
The other day, I glanced at Facebook, and noticed a posting by Spence, who had written up his top 25 albumns of the moment, along with a bit of commentary. "Listening to the album Tommy at AC with Bryan." Reading that absolutely made my day. Funny, just when I needed yet another reminder about feeling the music. Interesting, too, that the album itself had a primary theme of someone who had to "feel more."
Later that same day, I completed a little compilation of music for a friend's upcoming birthday. As I was finalizing the track order, I spent more time feeling my way through it. The effect was fantastic, and as I listened to the playlist over and over, realized that I've fine tuned Chris' directive from December, and am truly feeling now more than ever. And it's cool.
A friend of mine noticed this a couple of nights ago, and in his sutble way, simply said, "welcome back."
Thanks. It's nice to be back.
keep the faith
bryan
