Today, I got my first—and last—piercing. It was a piece of cake.

It was pretty cool, and something that most people I know would never think I was capable of doing. The amount of pain I’d been imagining would come with getting pierced just didn’t materialize—just a little stick and about 1/2 second of pain. Then I sort of felt a tingling or itching for a couple hours and that was that. It was far worse getting my braces tightened when I went to the orthodontist as a kid! It should be “officially” healed in 8 weeks or so, but right now it’s a bit black and blue and just the tiniest bit swollen. I’m totally glad I did it, though.

I’m not going to write much more about it here, but may end up posting my story on tribalectic.com later—that’s where I did all my research and studying before getting it done. Some of the things there are downright terrifying (oh the things people will actually do to themselves…), but it’s a goldmine of information.

I’m just glad mom & dad aren’t on the internet and in the habit of reading this—they’d probably freak…

Some people—including me—work all their lives to “become” what they want to be. At the moment, I think I may have arrived.

I’ve almost never been happier.

That’s a pretty neat thing to be able to say, considering how many things there are in this world in general and particularly right now that are causing so much stress and consternation for societies everywhere.

I must admit, however, that on April 7th of this year I wasn’t so sure. I turned 40. It was the first time in my entire life that I’d ever been depressed or even subdued on a birthday. I’d finally begun feeling older: taking longer for my eyes to focus when I wake up in the morning, groaning a bit more getting out of bed, my hair now having more gray in it than my father.

But that (fortunately) lasted only a couple of days. When I took time to reflect, I really couldn’t complain too much.

I’ve got a wonderful career and the blessings of financial stability that go with it. The day before my birthday, I’d successfully completed a sprint triathlon—the first one in four years—and felt really strong. I have a nice car, a pleasant place to live, lots of interesting friends & hobbies and some attainable goals for my future. Maybe it takes my eyes longer to focus, but I can still read small signs at quite a distance (better than Eusebio can—and he’s younger than me, hee hee!). Due to my race training, I’ve lost 20 pounds of fat and built several inches of muscle in the past year, and frankly have never been in better physical condition (I was always a wimp in High School and never saw the importance of sports and physical conditioning).

So I guess I’m really happy. Sure, I wish I could be completely out of debt, own my own home and some of the other things I’m still missing, but I can’t complain. Put that together with being really and truly in love and I feel invincible.

I’m very, very blessed and hope that I can stay that way.

Finally—an easy way for me to let my voice be heard.

Welcome to my blog.

I almost didn’t want to do it, since blogs seem to be so damned trendy right now and I didn’t want to feel like a “unique person, just like everybody else”.

But I sure find this medium (and the wonderful program I’m using, iBlog for MacOS X by Lifli Software) so easy to use that maybe I’ll finally start saying something.

Anyway, don’t necessarily expect earth-shattering revelations about stuff, deep philosophical discussions or even timely and frequent entries. When I feel moved to write, I will. Maybe it’ll be interesting to people who read it. Maybe it’ll help someone out there in some way. Maybe it’ll give someone a good laugh or a good cry—I don’t know. It may only serve to make me feel good about having expressed my views, feelings or thoughts.

But it’s a good way for me to exercise my writing skills, get things off my chest and leave a diary-like record for posterity.

So—welcome!