[Note: Scroll down to watch the video for "Boulevard of Broken Dreams" by Green Day on YouTube and to read the lyrics.]
Sigh. I've had better days. It was great meeting up with friends over the past couple of days, and i'll be connecting over the next three or four days with other friends - but today, my actual birthday, was pretty uncelebratory. I did receive birthday wishes from friends and some family but I didn't actually do anything today. Specifically, it was pretty boring.
In the interest of trying to stay positive, the most refreshing time today was an hour long conversation that I had this morning with a friend's friend of whom I had never met before today. So the funnest birthday event today was meeting a stranger (which hopefully we'll talk again and be friends - super cool guy!). I was only supposed to drop something off for my buddy but once I got there, me and the friend just started chatting. That was fun.
Anyway, tonight I ended up walking home (for an hour) because I felt disconnected with the people I had been with. They would have hung around each other whether I was there or not. It wasn't a birthday. I felt like Jesus on Christmas Day. So in the interest of staying real about how I'm feeling (despite the downer mood) - well, the song below pretty much says it all.
Scroll down to read the lyrics . . . .
"Boulevard of Broken Dreams" by Green Day
I walk a lonely road
The only one that I have ever known
Don't know where it goes
But it's home to me and I walk alone
I walk this empty street
On the Boulevard of Broken Dreams
Where the city sleeps
and I'm the only one and I walk alone
I walk alone
I walk alone
I walk alone
I walk a...
My shadow's the only one that walks beside me
My shallow heart's the only thing that's beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
'Til then I walk alone
Ah-ah, Ah-ah, Ah-ah, Aaah-ah,
Ah-ah, Ah-ah, Ah-ah
I'm walking down the line
That divides me somewhere in my mind
On the border line
Of the edge and where I walk alone
Read between the lines
What's fucked up and everything's alright
Check my vital signs
To know I'm still alive and I walk alone
I walk alone
I walk alone
I walk alone
I walk a...
My shadow's the only one that walks beside me
My shallow heart's the only thing that's beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
'Til then I walk alone
Ah-ah, Ah-ah, Ah-ah, Aaah-ah
Ah-ah, Ah-ah
I walk alone
I walk a...
I walk this empty street
On the Boulevard of Broken Dreams
Where the city sleeps
And I'm the only one and I walk a...
My shadow's the only one that walks beside me
My shallow heart's the only thing that's beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
'Til then I walk alone...
4 comments:
Happy Birthday and best belated wishes to you.
Keep smiling - life is great!
Happy birthday, bro.
I know how it feels, but not on my birthday. I felt that way in high school. Often I would get the ball rolling by calling one friend and asking what they were going to do on Saturday night. Movie? Pool? Rental? Hang out? I would sometimes initiate the calling, and then they would call one another... and forget to call me back. I'd find out what happened later, but none of them knew I'd been waiting all Saturday evening for the phone to ring.
You remember that I came from the east coast, I'm sure. When I go back to visit there (shoot, and now when I go back to California!) I felt disconnected, too. I had grown. They had grown. We'd all grown -- but not together. All we could do was re-hash old memories, and that's all we could "know each other" around.
I know you'll see the spiritual reality behind these things without me having to explain it. God has redeemed these things in my life by allowing me to participate in His heart -- His heart that waits by the phone for us to call, His heart that longs to know us beyond yesteryear's memories, and for us just to break down and say "I don't know You, but I want to know You now." He took the pain I'd had and showed me He'd feels the same, and somehow it redeemed my pain.
I remember your old email address, what you longed for. In the pain, rejoice (God, that's hard, but praise Him and watch what happens) that you may share in His heart.
Thanks NorthWoodsGuys!
and Thanks Ramone! I'm so glad that we've been able to re-establish contact. I miss you and the way that you always keep my focus on Christ. Thank you so much! I wish I were there in Japan to see you and Y. and the new baby. =)
Eric, thanks for being real. It is so easy to pretend and often I can get the sense that some people don't want to hear about the hard times.
Coming out, like getting born-again, doesn't fix us or make us any less human. The pain of our humanity with all its lonliness and longing do not get eradicated, nor should it. But it is hard some days and I appreciate you sharing that with us here.
Hope to be one of those friends who gets to see you over the next few days!
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