Friday Thoughts

My friend John is fond of saying that I need to realize that I'm not a blogger. But I seem to have this stubborn thought that I can do everything. Which leaves me as a jack-of-all-trades instead of being really good at one or two things. It also leaves me with a very full schedule. The only thing I've conceded I'll never be good at is golf, but that doesn't mean I don't hit the links on occasion. I'm rambling toward an explanation of why this post is labeled Friday Thoughts instead of something more specific: I'm following John's advice to try for one post a week and Friday seems like as good a day as any. You never know the posts might have the impending weekend optimism.

In my mind I’ve been fluctuating on writing a couple of different posts, since I want to discuss my new life (which is almost literally true) since starting a new relationship in December, but given the timeliness of my weekend activities I’ll go there and come back to how life can change so suddenly.

My friends would never consider me a social butterfly. I tend to have a lot of trouble with groups, particularly when I’m with acquaintances versus close friends. Despite this discomfort I somehow end up organizing group outings. This has happened for whitewater rafting trips, ski trips and the most recent occurrence is the organization of a team for a skydiving competition that happens tomorrow.

Side note: I recently learned why I have some of the social trouble that I have, which I may end up going into greater detail in later post. But I will say that knowing is much better than being confused and frustrated.

How does a social misfit end up as an organizer? Did I start doing in a proactive way to overcome what I originally diagnosed as shyness? Is my desire to participate higher than my fear of organizing? Is it because my quiet nature leaves me out of the planned activities of other people? The potential answers seem to provide conundrums. I’m quiet so I have to be very social to compensate? That doesn’t make any sense.

As background, a skydiving competition typically consists of a four person team and a videographer who captures the jump for the judges to review on the ground. I’ve had to call and email about a dozen people to try and find a fourth person to complete the team. I have a year’s worth of competition skydiving under my belt, so the competition itself isn’t a concern to me. Now that the team is completed I feel liberated and I’m very much looking forward to an activity that I was dreading just a few hours ago.

I’ll let you know on Monday how the competition turns out. I don’t know what division we will compete in, but we’ll crank out some good jumps and come away with some entertaining video.

Final note, I’d really like to thank the few people who have arranged activities and let me tag-a-along without all the organizer responsibilities. The list is small enough that I can actually list them here, how sad is that.

Thank you John for organizing a bowling team last summer, I only wish I lived in Irvine so that I could participate more often. Although in 2007/8 I will probably get that wish, so we can try for another league.

Reuben, you handled softball organization duties faithfully year after year, and I thank you. Although I suspect you only included me because I was willing to stand on the pitchers mound and try to dodge the bullets that came back at me. :-)