I lost some time once...

Today is my birthday.

Somehow, I've managed to make it through 43 years on this planet. Forty-three. That's not a terribly large number, looking at it from this side of it, but that felt absolutely ancient when I was 16, or 25, or even 30. I mean, it was on this day, THIRTEEN years ago that Charles and Melissa threw a birthday party for me, invited my closest friends, and helped me say goodbye to my 20s. It was on this day, 12 years ago, when Scott -- who was then my roommate -- and a couple of people in my WoW guild, were the only people to recognize my birthday. It was on this day, 33 years ago, that my bunny rabbit's music box quit playing. It was on this day, 21 years ago (I think), that I didn't hear from ANYONE on my birthday except my brother, who I picked up and ran around with (this was corrected that weekend, but at the time, it was overwhelming). Heck, it was on this date, 22 years ago, that I sat on the hill behind the house in Munford that Kevin shared with his parents, reveling in my first legal drink (it was champagne).

I actually worked today. I didn't stay the whole day, but actually got up and went in to work. I realized, halfway through my day, that I will never work on my birthday again, if there is any way I can help it. I work on computers, and Windows 10 displays the time and date real big on the login screens. I don't recall exactly what the time was, but sometime shortly after my break, I realized that seeing "January 7" felt weird. I won't say that *I* felt disconnected, but it didn't feel like my birthday, and I didn't like it one bit. I've always said birthdays ARE special and, at the very least, *I* should recognize my birthday, even if no one else does.

I should have broken habits today, when I left work. I meant to pick up at least a pint of Wild Turkey, because there ain't nothing better for coughs than a shot or two of Wild Turkey 101. I meant to go see Aquaman, but I think I talked myself out of it, because of the coughing. I should have gone to Bed, Bath, and Beyond, and indulged my ludicrous love of kitchen utensils, cookware, bedding, and towels. I should have picked somewhere random, and driven there. The thing is, none of that really appealed to me today.

Instead, I came home. The place was empty, and I opened my new Death T-Shirt that came in the mail (the image is my Facebook wall photo: "You get what anyone gets... you get a lifetime."). Then, I sat down at my computer, for I had a plan. This wasn't in lieu of better plans. This wasn't a result of being unhappy and depressed. My plan today may have made me more than a little anxious and nervous, but it was borne out of something good.

My plan was simple: I was going to buy some brushes and paint, and get back into painting miniatures. I used to do it pretty regularly, back in the 3e/d20 heyday. However, as time went by, I acquired more responsibility and had less time to do the things I loved (I love how Kroger always pushed the concept of "work/life balance," yet never cared to see it happen). Painting minis became a thing of the past, even though I thoroughly loved it. I like to think that it was primarily because I had to set aside time to do it. Later, it was because the paints had dried up.

I picked up some brushes, a decent selection of paints (being an adult does come in handy from time to time). I even grabbed a few minis, so I could try my hand with some brand new poses. Naturally, I tried to assemble the group who played Eberron.I think I may have done it. We will see, pending my ability to come back to this hobby.

This wasn't the only thing I decided that I was going to do this year. I adore Philip Wesley's "Dark Night of the Soul," a collection of solo piano tracks that soothe and cradle my spirit, even if I'm nowhere near sleepy. Years back, I tried my hand at violin. I love that instrument, too, but I also knew that I wasn't interested in spending more money on getting it tuned. So, it has sat in my closet for these past six years. But I digress...

I used to take piano lessons from first grade through late fourth, I think. I learned how to read music (maybe not well enough that I could sight read as I played). I was even All-City once. Then I discovered baseball, and lost interest, since practicing on a piano in the house couldn't compare to playing baseball with the neighborhood kids.

I never forgot about my time playing piano, and I was always prone to let my fingers stray across a keyboard, if time and place allowed it.

So, sometime this year, I'm going to pick up an electronic piano, and see if I can teach myself what I've forgotten. I am doing this for myself, because I want to foster my creativity, to say nothing about how much doing so will do for my soul. I don't write like I used to. I don't read like I used to. I don't have friends with unlimited time to play RPGs once a week. However, if I start painting minis and learning piano again, I suspect that I will find a small sense of satisfaction from creating something again. I feel the pull to create something, ANYTHING myself, and I see no reason to hold myself back.

A friend commented that 5s are her number, citing a myriad of reasons. Well, I've always loved the number 7, and in numerology, 43 becomes 7. Is this a sign/portent for the year to come? Let's hope so.

This shouldn't take long, but I wanted to write it real quick.

After last night's melancholy post about space, I ran into an old LJ community that my friends and I formed so we could share posts that our gaming group considered relevant. I wound up reading several of the posts, and reminiscing about those old games.

They were plagued with the usual problems, from clashing personalities to bad schedules, but I still look back on them fondly. Every Sunday, like clockwork, I knew that I'd get off work at 1pm and head over to nyminal's place, where I'd sit and game with him, flumpdoria, kheadrin, lordreaibn, makeshift_guru, mfsfreak, and -- as always -- strieson. Obviously, the group makeup changed over time, too. Kheadrin decided to finish school (though I half suspect that he got tired of the rest of us always fighting during the game). Flumpdoria moved to Canada. Nyminal got married and moved to Southaven. Makeshift_Guru kind of fell off the planet.* MFSFreak got a job that required him to work. :) LordReaibn got busy with work and church. Strieson is the only one that I could call, and would show at a moment's notice to play.

Since the demise of the regular Sunday game back in May 2007, I've tried to get the game started back up, with limited success that ranged from "almost but not quite" to "spectacular failure". The closest I got was last year, when the game I was running got put on indefinite hold because I found myself promoted at work. We'd played semi-regularly for a few months. Something was in the air, though, because we destroyed Nyminal's carefully crafted Shadowrun game. My promotion on the tail of that ended the whole shebang.

I've since started running a game on Fridays for a group of people that includes strieson, air_n_darkness, and who folks I'm going to call J and M. It's not a bad game. Having new people helps create a fresh experience. I'm having fun, even. However, part of me misses actually gaming with Nyminal. He and his friend, R, helped make the games on Sunday -- especially at the end -- fun.

To that end, I contacted Nyminal about possibly doing a game on Saturday afternoons, possibly once a month (since I have to work most Saturdays). He was all for it, and I admit that I'm kind of excited about it. This will be the first time, effectively, that I've played a fantasy RPG since 2007, with the exception of some 4e games that LordReaibn ran (he's a great DM, but I do not like the system; I played in maybe 6-8 sessions total). Of course, Strieson was quick to point out that I played in our Friday game when he started it, but I pointed out that was maybe 3 weeks total. :)

So, I'm going to be playing Pathfinder, most likely in a homebrew setting. I'm going to push for the default deities, because that makes life INFINITELY easier. I'm going to consider classes, prestige classes, feats, skills, background, and personality. I'm even going to mention the 800 lb gorilla in the room: how much do we mine from the old 3.x D&D material? Should we keep it Pathfinder only? What about point buy for character builds? I guess I'm going to put together a list of questions for us to discuss when we convene for the first session. Maybe I could create a "group" on Facebook for just that one game, so we can hash out the details ahead of time, and start playing on day one?

Anyway, it's late and I'm working early, so I'm going to bed. Sleep well, all, and don't be afraid to follow your dreams, even the small ones. You never know how it's going to go...

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* - He still lives in Memphis. Maybe the time is coming, sooner rather than later, to see how he is doing, and get him reacquainted with everyone.