February 10th, 2002. Friday
 

    In truth, I'm only writing today because today is the third anniversary of Daily Aggravations and Regrets.  And being such, here is the link to the very first entry.  Now I'm getting all nostalgic, thinking about three years ago.  Living in DC, making more money than I am now, paying half the rent, stable and fulfilling relationship, car, and only 22 years old.  It seems like when I graduated college I automatically turned 25.  I can't remember not being 25 except in the abstract.  I'm feeling old.  So where am I now?  Well, on the upside, I somehow managed to get a Master's degree.  I'm living in a city that's a lot more fun than I was three years ago.  I have a lot more friends, I'm in slightly better shape, my hair is looking better, and I'm dressing in a more consistent fashion.  But I'm also working two jobs, neither of which I am particularly fond of, paying an obscene amount of rent, and undergone some pretty interesting psychological changes.  Anyway, I guess I'd just expected to have done a lot more with my life right now. Well, I don't know that I'd expected it, but I'd at least hoped.  And maybe that's the problem.  Just hoping, like somehow the magic wand would be waved and I'd have done all done all these satisfying things.  I'm trying to think if I was really hoping for big things three years ago.  I don't know that I was.  But maybe I didn't feel as much like time was running out.  Sometimes it seems absurd to be thinking like that at the age of 25.  But sometimes it seems like I should have been thinking like that a long time ago.
    In truth, I'm not entirely dissatisfied with where things are right now.  I feel pretty comfortable with how things are.  Maybe it's just a resigned complacency.  Sometimes the fiery young upstart in me thinks that. Other times I just think there's nothing I could really be doing right now in this sluggish economy. Anyway, this is pointless to think about.  All I know is, three years ago, I wouldn've have even bother to write any of this.
    So I'm sitting here in what was once my room, in my parent's house.  I lived here as a permanent resident from 1976 till around 1998.  Or 1994.  Recently, my mother decided she needed a room of her own and converted my room into her own little rumpus room.  This had always been my room. I've shared it with every bother during various room arrangments over two decades, but I was the only permanent denizen of the room.  And now theres' not even a bed in it.  All my shit's moved out, the curtains have been changed, and looking up right now, there appear to be small bugs on the ceiling.  Ugh.  How am I supposed to sleep here now? What hasn't changed is the thin blue semi-shag rug that's been here for at least 26 years. I think it was put here by the original owners of the house.  Also, the dents in the closest cause by various punchings are still highly visible.  I used to be a very angry young man.  You can almost chart my growth by the height of the dents in the closet.
    Anyway, this is really fucking fascinating.  But I am tired.

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