Happiness is defined differently to each person. For some it's their kids, others find it in work and so on and so forth. As it stands right now, I am on a bit of a happiness roll. My happiness doesn't lie in having a romantic relationship. And for the first time in a long time, it also doesn't lie in my work, which I am still very proud of and it's still something I like to do, but I'm not the workaholic I used to be. I've come to realize in the last few days that my happiness isn't about kids or a girlfriend or this complete and content feeling inside. I'm learning to accept that this is who I am right now. And I'm not a bad guy. Certainly not as bad as I was a few years ago, I hated who I was then. But I've worked on it and it's taken several small steps to get to the me I am now and even more steps to accept me. That's a bit of a breakthrough for me, I guess.
I never used to dwell on the bad things in my life before the accident. I was the king of the optimists my entire life; always seeing the bright side. But then there was sooo much negativity thrown into my life over the next few years that it was hard to keep a positive spin on it. For a while I faked it to everyone else and tried to be who I was before it all went to hell, but everyone knew I wasn't the same. Sometimes I get these things in my head that are just so...I don't know..dark and I can't shake them. Call them demons, I guess. I know someday I'll face them down completely (at least, I hope I will) and I'll be to the other side of this incredibly big hill. My accident changed a lot of things and forced a lot of things. One of the biggest things it forced on to me and my closest friends is adulthood.
It's not like we were irresponsible or still acting like teenagers or anything. But we were all in our late teens or early twenties when this all went down and suddenly everything changed. Everyone grew up on that night because we had no other choice. But we all did it together, like everything else. The group of us isn't that big but as long as we've been this little family we've gone through every good or bad thing together. Everybody knows everything about everyone. And that makes me happy. It makes me happy to know that I have these people; some I've known since childhood, some high school and a few I met just as I was into my 20's; who know everything about me and who genuinely love me for me. I can spend hours (or days) with any one of them and never get bored. We just have these incredible, sometimes sitcom-like, experiences that I don't think I would truly enjoy with anybody else. We're all different, some of us very different, but when you throw us all together it just seems to work. They make me happy. So where some people have significant others or jobs, I have this family that I wouldn't trade for anything in the world and that I know will be with me for the rest of my life. In April, we'll all go through this "change by committe" thing again, when I have my first child. I'm the first one to have kids and it's only been by everyone's complete support that I've gotten through these month of the pregnancy.
This is enough for me right now but I couldn't be happier or more excited to welcome one more into the fold. I love them and I thank God every single day that we were all brought together because I wouldn't be here now without them. And even though there's the occasional pairing off gone bad or a work-related spat that leads to a small phase of not speaking (the great fight of '06, anyone? lol), we always end up back together again. Kinda like humpty dumpty. lol It's the only thing in my life where all the pieces fit. And that's worth being happy about.
