Bryan’s Ramblings

It’s been so long since I last did, I feel almost compelled to write something here, and since I at least feel like I have a lot to say, I guess I’ll give it a go. Since I was somewhat unsure of my topic, I thought the easy way to go was with “My New Year’s Resolutions this year are…” or at least “What I learned in 2006 was…” However, I will do neither of those because I have resolved this year to have no specific resolutions and in truth I think I learned very little in 2006 that I didn’t already know in 2005.

So, instead, I’m going to write about opinions. I’m not necessarily talking about my own opinions right now – just opinions in general. Where do they come from and what good are they? I guess opinions probably stem from all kinds of places. Parents are a pretty good starting point for opinions. When you’re little, you have very few opinions of your own and they are mostly reflected by what your parents believe, I think. I imagine this follows you around for much of your life, but at some point (college?) you start to form your own opinions too. Where these come from I’m not sure. Probably friends and maybe even teachers influence these opinions, but a lot of it is probably based on your personality too, which your parents are at least indirectly responsible for as well.

I’ve always considered myself to be a very opinionated person, and I generally have no trouble sharing what opinions I do have. Unfortunately, I don’t know where most of my own opinions stem from…they just form automatically it seems. Sometimes I have good arguments to back them up, sometimes I don’t. I’ve certainly written about quite a few of my opinions here in this space, but it’s pretty safe to do so here because no one can really challenge them. They can leave comments, but I have to approve those, so it’s not really a dialogue so much. I definitely prefer it this way. I’ve also found that as I get older, my opinions grow weaker and weaker and I have fewer and fewer of them in general. Of course as you age I imagine your opinions change drastically anyway, and the things you care about inevitably are not the same as they once were.

I used to think I’d be a good lawyer. Since I have always had strong opinions, I always seemed to be a good arguer. Plus, I have a knack for not listening to other’s opinions, flatly disagreeing with them, or denying they have any merit at all. Except, I don’t think I’d be a very good lawyer any more. For the most part now, I’m apathetic, and a lot of times if I argue it’s almost for the sake of argument, or because I’m defending an opinion I’ve just always had and never really thought about changing as I grew, so to speak. I’ll even often pose a question that I don’t have an answer to and then choose the opposite side of what the group chose as a sort of devil’s advocate thing, but I’m just not even very good at that any more. I get frazzled and my facts or arguments just suck. I don’t know when I stopped being good at this. In some ways I think I’ve gotten dumber; or maybe the world has gotten smarter; or maybe I haven’t kept up; or maybe I just don’t care as much any more. I really don’t know, but it’s awfully frustrating and I’m considering just never sharing my opinions at all and just agreeing with everyone all the time. That’s not appealing to me either though, because I hate people that are like that generally.

On top of all of this, I feel like I don’t really know people who share my opinions with me as much as I used to. Sure, my parents, my sister, my girlfriend, my closest friends, these kinds of people generally agree with most things I think, but it sometimes feels like I have no allies any more. In my youth, everyone close to me just always seemed to have the same thoughts as I did. I don’t know if I just only recently found people who challenge me or if I am just hanging around the wrong people. I think it’s probably the former, but being challenged and seeming clueless shouldn’t feel the same, I don’t think, but maybe they do. It seems like my whole spectrum of opinions are constantly being challenged, from musical theater taste to political beliefs. I sometimes feel like I have no where to turn where people will just support me regardless. That’s a pretty shitty feeling.

In truth, I’m probably over-dramatizing much of this for the sake of self-therapy, self-reflection, and to make this a bit more entertaining, not only to read, but to write. However, I definitely do feel more alone in my world of opinions than I ever have before in my life, and I guess I’m looking at the fresh start of a year to try to figure out how to either fix that or deal with it. I’ve said that I think 2007 is going to be a fabulous year. I don’t know why, but I just feel like it’s really going to be my year. I have nothing to back that up of course. It’s just my opinion.

Two things always happen at the beginning of November. One of these things is my birthday. I turned 25 today. This freaked me out and almost became a blog entry itself, but I had a couple of weeks to get over it before it even happened. So, it turns out I’m feeling pretty good about being a 25 year-old (old being the operative word) after all. That means I’m going to write about the other thing that happens in November – Election Day.

Yes, it’s election time. As consistently as my age increments every year, my knowledge of the current events of our world, nation, state, county and city seems to continually decrement. Of course this is rather backwards. With age and experience, knowledge and wisdom should come along as well. However, the further removed I am from my high school political systems course, the less I seem to follow politics and the news in general (sorry Mr. Coffman!). Every day I read technology, entertainment, and sports news with a smattering of business/financial news here and there to satisfy my corporate culture conditioning. I skip right over the “World” and “U.S.” sections. I channel surf right through CNN and MSNBC to watch ESPN or HBO and I listen to music or sports talk on the radio in the car. Evidentally, I can’t even muster the brainpower to regularly watch the Daily Show or read Doonesbury. However, for roughly 364 days a year, this doesn’t bother me at all. I’m content in my own shallowness. I’m perfectly happy to read about the new iPod models, hear who’s been traded to the Yankees, or see which Hollywood couple has broken up now.

Except, well, Election Day is always there to make me feel ashamed of myself. Every year I get the practice ballot and it sits on my desk until that dreaded day and I never take the time to read it and I go to the polls clueless as can be, usually regretting my decisions during the following days.

It’s important to look at some of my history regarding this topic. I wasn’t kidding about my APS (American Political Systems) class in High School. Mr. Coffman “changed my life” during that class. It was truly an eye-opener. I was reading the L.A. Times (not just the sports section), watching CNN (Inside Politics), and listening to KNX. I was an active member of our political system. I was a true constituent. I was knowledgeable and I had all the tools I needed. I couldn’t wait until I could finally vote.

The first election I got to vote in was the 2000 presidential election. You may remember this one. It was only the third time in the history of our country and the first time in over 100 years that the majority of voters actually voted for the loser. That’s right, the winner actually got less votes than the other guy, and our wonderful electoral college system helped to put George W. Bush into office. With the exception of perhaps 10 months later (September 11, 2001), I’m confident that I have never watched CNN for as many hours straight as I did on the election night of 2000. I just wanted to know who our president was, and it was clear that no one really knew. In fact it wasn’t until days later when I had given up on our political system and our media all together that I finally found out that my vote didn’t really matter all that much after all.

Okay, okay. I know. My vote matters. Right?

I must admit that this experience did not leave a good taste in my mouth. My first election was rather unsatisfying. It felt to me like either Florida or our Supreme Court decided who our president was and the rest of the votes didn’t really count. At any rate, it definitely made me wonder how much my single vote in the state of California really mattered in the grand scheme of things. No way I could swing things myself. I realize this is faulty logic (because if everyone thought this, no one would vote), but after 2000, I just couldn’t stomach things. I felt like if you were able to become president, you wouldn’t be a good one. It seemed like a flawed system to me.

Following this pathetic excuse for an election, I still did follow the news quite a bit. I was still in college, and while in school, current events are a part of learning, so it wasn’t hard to keep in touch with what was going on in the world. However, I think it was around this time that I developed my patented signature political cynicism that all my friends and family seem to know so well and despise so much. I’ve always been something of a cynic at heart, but I don’t think I’m quite as bad as everyone tries to make me out to be. When it comes to my opinion of our government, however, I guess they have a point.

In 2004 I began advertising my intent to stay away from the polls and completely avoid voting. That’s right, I planned to not vote. I was convinced that my vote didn’t matter and there was no reason to participate. In reality, I caved under the pressure of my parents and close friends and chose to go to the polling place yet again, as uninformed as ever and with a jaded sense of our system of government. I voted for my candidate of choice and took wild guesses at how I thought I felt about our state’s propositions and such. I went home feeling sick to my stomach that I had participated in this game at all.

Here I am at election time again, finding myself at yet another crossroads – unprepared to vote but feeling the burden of my citizenship/patriotism. It seems that every year it becomes more and more a question of which candidate is the lesser of two evils or which option screws us over less than the alternative. It doesn’t seem to be about who is actually the right person for the job or what proposition might actually better our community as a whole. I’m beginning to feel less and less of an allegiance to my registered “party” and more of a devotion to “undeclared” seeing as virtually no “party” seems to agree with all the things I believe in.

I realize that this has gotten to be something of an editorial, albeit a rather personal one, and perhaps my longest blog entry to date. The purpose of it was completely selfish as I force myself to think about things in a slightly different light here on my 25th birthday. I feel like it’s my second Bar Mitzvah – like this is the day I’m really supposed to start acting like a man. Real men vote. Men are informed and educated and they feel strongly about politics. I’m still finding it hard to do so, but I’m hoping that I can leave my polling place tomorrow on a mission – a mission to not make the same mistake again and to show up with my practice ballot filled out confidently in the year 2008…probably voting for a Libertarian or something.

This entry picks up where my last one left off. This is real continuity folks. It’s a new concept for me. I wrote, “I’m trying to stay positive (and clearly failing miserably).” Well, guess what? So far, I’ve been successful.

I have a lot of reasons to be upset, worried, stressed, and generally negative. Usually, this time of year, I don’t even need any reasons to be that way…I just am based on years past and my general feelings towards the “wintertime”. Except, for whatever reason, last week, I finally woke up on the right side of the bed – and I do mean the correct side. Things that should be stressing me out aren’t really. Things that used to annoy me just make me chuckle to myself. Things that I normally worry about have me feeling carefree. I really don’t know how long this can last, but I sure hope it doesn’t go away. I could really get used to it.

Don’t get me wrong. My pessimistic/pragmatistic personality is still in play. I’m not all of the sudden wonderfully jolly with no sarcastic tendencies. There is indeed a decent amount of that around. However, it’s with a much more playful and quite a bit less of a cynical nature than it seems to have been before. At least, that’s my impression. This is new territory for me.

I think despite my apparent “negative” attitude and more cynical view of the world, I always sort of talked the carefree talk. Sure, I had moments where you could see right through me, but I mostly tried to maintain that cool confident air. Now, I feel like I’m actually walking the carefree walk, too. I’m really starting to practice what I preach. I’m listening to my valedictorian speech. I’m trying to act 25, not just be 25.

Maybe it’s my coming age increase that triggered this event. Maybe it’s my upcoming job shift. It could be the influence of my loved ones or the pressure I’ve always put on myself finally tipping me over. It’s probably a combination of all these things coming together at just the right time. Whatever it is, I’m in a really good place right now and that’s rare for me during the fourth quarter of any year.

The last couple of months always seem to bring a rediscovery of something – friends, family, feelings, faults (I wasn’t even going for the alliteration there). This year, I’ve rediscovered all those things, just like normal, but the twist for 2006 is that I’m enjoying it. I’m through dwelling on the past but I’m also done running from it. “This winter will be different. This year is good.” I’m not kidding.

Cold weather still sucks though.

What is it about this time of year that I hate so much? Every year, right around October and through January I become even more cynical than my usual self and turn into a whining, complaining, annoying ass hole. For me, there is so much tension and stress around this time of year, and while some of it is of course self-inflicted, it seems like the whole world (or at least this great country of ours) tries to cram a ton of big events into three short months: Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas/Chanukah/Kwanzaa, New Year’s, my birthday. That’s not even mentioning all the businesses that have to get projects done and goals met by the end of the year. Throw in that the weather starts to suck and people start to go crazy…all of this contributing to my loss of a happy-go-lucky demeanor for a few months.

Most of the really bad events that have happened to me during the short course of my life to date seem to happen right around this time of year – towards the end. Sicknesses and deaths, breakups and meltdowns, they all seem to occur during the Fall and Winter months. While it’s true that I’m focusing on the negatives and there are plenty of positives that have happened during this time as well, it always seems like they get trumped by some major downer that happens right at the cusp of a new year. I’m afraid to guess what it could be this year. I’m sure I’m over-reacting though.

Worst of all, this is the time of year when I get to be the most self-reflective and over-analytic. I truly get close to psychotic just before my birthday happens. I’m turning 25 in three weeks. Why does 24 seem young and 25 seem old? Aren’t I supposed to have more shit figured out by now? Anyway, I’m just trying to get through the next few months and coast into 2007 without too much damage done. I guess keeping myself busy is the way to do it, but it sure seems to be adding more stress to an already stressful time of year.

I’m trying to stay positive (and clearly failing miserably). I’m trying to think “Hey, this winter will be different. This year is good,” but really, who am I kidding? Cold weather sucks.

I hardly ever do this. However, maybe I’m growing a little. No, it doesn’t mean I’m going to go out and rent Titanic, but it does mean that I will probably continue watching Today on NBC in the mornings, at least semi-regularly like I’ve always done. Okay, so part of it is that it’s finally in HD, but unfortunately, the other part is that I liked Meredith Vieira on it…and damn it I wish I didn’t, because then I wouldn’t have to admit it. I mean she’s no Katie Couric, but it is her first day, and, I hate to say it, but she’s likable. I never could stand the The View. It made me insane watching those women yap about stuff. I also thought the daytime version of Millionaire that she hosted was second-class. However, removed from those rotten shows, she’s not so bad.

Let’s give the producers at NBC a little credit here. They knew this was a good opportunity to start filming in HD, and they also knew there would be nay sayers like me who would tune in during her debut anyway. For this they had the segment where they talk about her past and pull you in and get you to respect her and like her and all that. Not too stupid of them. Maybe that’s why they are producers for the Today show.

What does this all mean? It means that I might watch the news more with Katie Couric on at night and Today in the morning. Truth be told, I hate watching the news. It’s not because I don’t care what’s going on in the world around me, it’s just because I usually prefer a filtering system like the Internet or someone I know, so that I only get news on a need-to-know basis. I also generally care more about what movies are coming out and what new gadgets are coming out than what goes on in the Middle East or in Washington. I realize this is shallow and close-minded of me, but I’m a spoiled Southern California kid. What do you expect?

So if you had your doubts about Meredith, take it from me: she’s not so bad. This is all making me realize that the new season of television is here and maybe I shouldn’t just assume that all the new shows suck. They can’t all be as good as Arrested Development, though. I guess I’ll have to record more than I planned and see what sticks with me. Oh well.

Goodbye Summer! … Hello Fall!