More random thoughts...

What a tangled web I tend to weave, especially in my own mind. But there are milliseconds of clarity, even with all that is happening in my life. Small realizations such as that which I had this morning are more valuable to me than to anyone else, obviously, but it is so hard to place an actual value on them.

Today will be just about one week of total sobriety for me. I am not sure if that is a good thing or not. Maybe, maybe not. I am many things... a creature of habit, type A, obsessive compulsive... the whole lot. Sadly, during this time while I have given up the drink, and I know it has only been a week, I have been wanting to eat like a horse. I have avoided those inclinations, by and large, but they still exist. It was not until this morning that I realized just how and why this is happening.

Food has always been an addiction for me. For as long as I can remember, it was the drug that eased my pain and sheltered and comforted me from the horror of reality. Granted, I was the only one who prevented me from doing anything about it - Lord knows, I am the only one who has the key to that car. But as time wore on, and in my futile attempts to right the wrongs of my life, I continued to exchange one one drug for another. Food, alcohol, back to food, sometimes exercise, whatever.

Just how dependent am I on these drugs? Obviously, very. Am I an alcoholic like my father was? I don't know, maybe. He probably drank a bit more consistently than I ever did. One thing I have never been is consistent. Insert rim hot here.

The other revelation from this morning was not really so much of a revelation as it was a recollection. I truly believe my dad talks to me from time to time. No, they are not the orchestrated conversations with those long gone, as we see in movies or on television. He occasionally just shows up, unannounced - that is just like him - and sticks his two cents in - that too is just like him. The recurring theme of what he tells me is, essentially, to be better than he was. Honestly, I am not completely sure what that means. I never really knew him well enough to be able to say what that entailed. But his reputation precedes him - sorry dad, I am trying to stick up for you.

I really wonder if it is him talking to me, although my heart tells m it is. I guess it is possible that I am using his memory to convey something that I want for myself, and this is another way to get that message from my subconscious to my conscious mind. I cannot be sure. I like the former thought better than the latter. I would like to think he is looking down on me, and wants good things for me. It is reasonable, I think, to believe that he knew life was going to be hard for me without him. I don't know, maybe he did not care. But I did. I do.

It is thoughts like these that really make my mind even more busy than it already is. It is difficult if not impossible to compartmentalize right now. I guess it always has been thanks to that little coping mechanism called repression.

But, enough with the doom and gloom. I am working on myself. Granted, I am a work in progress. I probably always will be. But it is little things like this that put a smile on my inner face. I know I have a long road to hoe to get myself back in order, whatever that means. I am ready, willing and, I pray, able to get on my way.

Although I know he will never read this, I have to say it... I want to thank John Bingham for writing... at all. Everything I have read from him thus far has spoken to me in ways that go so far beyond the act of running itself. It really tore right into my very being with regard to my emotions of the past, present, and future. I would like to think I am a better person for having read a single line of his work. I am not the only one he has helped with his writings, this I know, but I am the only one I know who has benefited quite as much as I have.

Keep waddling I will, John. I will.