That Moment.

It's time to say goodbye to this year. Its failures and victories. Laughs and silent sufferings. Its stories both told and untold. Its time to start looking forward to starting again, right this time (of course). So, I will finish this year off almost as I began it.

2011 ended just like every other year. A chill in my bones, a years worth of creations behind me, and the equally preposterous notions of aging miserably and hoping fortunate resting heavily on my bones. I've been sitting around in my house for a few days. Looking back over the year. Wondering what I could have done differently. What progress I may have made. What errors I failed to prevent.

I began this year working a job I both loved and hated. I fought a security guard over the honor of my wife and a bag of peanuts. I was detained. I fought a fever that brought such nightmares that recurring insomnia echoed throughout the remainder of the year. I recognized myself as not only a victim of this lost generation, but also the cause. I was suspended from my job for something I did not do, and when they realized it and took me back, I quit. Eventually I took a new job that I despised. Sometimes, you just can't work a job. I quit. I feared the worst, I broke down a little. I quit. Quit writing. Quit music. Quit a newly found appreciation for all things optimistic. The cold came and I began to dig myself out, but what damage was done, was done.

However, that is not to say that 2011, in all of its challenges, its trials, its impediment, was all bad. No.

I began the year as a great fan of the band Ghoul Poon. Then, I was asked to join them. I don't think anyone really understands what that was like for me. It was wonderful. It led to playing a number of shows, and once again becoming an active member of not only the local (and incredible) music scene, but also of a group of like minded creative individuals who slowly became friends, despite my natural anti-social state.

I wrote in 2011. A fucking lot. For me, creating is the single greatest thing a person can do in their time, next to, only, loving those around them. I am on a constant mission to amass a nearly unending creative legacy. Music. Paintings. Words. I can't say for certain that anyone would ever want to hear, see, or read what I make, but I refuse to die until I feel as though my soul could be pieced back together with the works I leave behind. So, I wrote a fucking lot this year. Beside maintaining this blog, I began three novels. Finished one, and thought another was fairly good. I wrote essays, rants, stories, and short little scenes. Some people I respect said some nice things about what I wrote, and that meant the world.

I took July off, mostly. I spent it on the beach with my wife. We drank wine, enjoyed the sky and the water. Read to each other under trees in the fading light of perfect days, and caught poison ivy. We swam near hidden ledges. For the first time, I tried mimosas and guacamole, and loved both. We lost weight, and looked quite good, if I am allowed to say so. We laid on blankets in the heat, browned, and smiled. July was the greatest month of my entire life, and worth every trouble both preceding it and yet to come.

Lastly, and most importantly, I found peace. If only for a moment (though still, I occasionally feel the resonance). I don't know how, or why, or what switch was flipped, but there it was. The weight of years gone, arguments had, battles lost, none of it mattered. The greatest victory of this year, and all of those before it, glimmered in front of me as I sat on a large hidden rock on the water, watching the light bounce off of the waves and running my fingers through my wife's hair as she laid with her head in my lap. Despite any bad that came this year, this is what I'll remember of 2011. That moment, when somehow, everything was okay.