yepyepwoah
Bluelighter
- Joined
- Oct 28, 2004
- Messages
- 2,671
Hey yepyep, good to hear from you. You know, I have a friend who was in a really low place a few years back. He just saved some money, bought a vehicle, and traveled around living in his truck skydiving, climbing and base jumping... after a while he ended up doing like 500 skydives, he was making money doing skydiving photography. I mean, not much money, but he was surviving and he was happy about what he was doing. Eventually he came back feeling like a new man, and started a business doing deck work (staining, washing, fixing, etc)... he just created fliers and started direct mailing and getting business, he didn't have any training except just a general past of doing stuff with his dad and whatnot. These days he's pulling in $10k some months and is about to buy his first land and is building a house on it. He's super happy, has a great girlfriend and they're having a baby. A few years back he was living with me in order to not be homeless and was in such a different place. Doing something you love or at least like makes a big difference. The rest of it sort of fell into place over time.
I'm super stressed right now... trying to refinance my mortgage, which is great, I'll be getting a better rate, borrowing an extra $25k, slightly lower monthly payment than I have now, and I'm using that extra money to do some house repairs, most notably to replace my roof. But I have to get an appraisal and have it come in at a certain value or higher. I know I've had some leaks for years, but I thought I fixed them. However, when clearing out a closet that has shit packed in it, I discovered a bunch of black mold and a soggy ceiling. I need to figure out some way to hide that or else I fear my house's value will be too low. Not to mention, shit like that is really bad and expensive to fix. The damage is substantially more extensive than I thought. It's been raining almost every day this month and today it's been pouring and storming all day. I am fucking sick of the rain, rain makes me anxious because of this shit, I hate it. Why the assholes I bought this house from had to do a shitty job installing a skylight is beyond me. If any of you guys ever own a house that has a roof leak, please consider doing something about it right away. I mean I was dead broke and massively in debt when it started, from opiate addiction. But still. I could have done something. Now it's gonna be way harder. I have the appraisal scheduled for Thursday but I'm trying to get it moved to 2 weeks from now... I'm gonna go visit my family and see my dad on Friday and be gone for 9 days. It's likely the last time I will ever see him while he can still talk at all because he can barely speak now... might be the last time I see him before he's laying there and gets unplugged. Which is probably a big part of why I feel so stressed. Fuck I'm rambling. Time to go to the studio and finish my tracking for 3 new songs... always good for cheering up some.
On the plus side I got back from my first Burn this weekend, it was 300 people, so quite small, and I had a fucking awesome time. When I have more time I'll tell some stories from it.
Yah, you have referenced that friend before, an older BL poster methinks. This is more detail than I have seen you go into in the past though. Which is cool.
I'm pretty much right there. About a year and a half ago I went skydiving for the first time. Did two tandems and maybe 7-9 solo training jumps. I just didn't have the money to do it all at once, and spacing student jumps a few weeks apart didn't really work for me. I would get nervous again and fuck shit up. Freefall manuevers are way harder than they look. You try and spin in a circle by dropping a leg and all of a sudden you are tumbling with the instructor straightening you out. Then once you throw the hackey and your canopy deploys the real fun begins. Now you are truly alone and have to figure out where the Drop Zone is and how to get back. Also throw in some manuevers you are supposed to accomplish.
Fuck though, it is the most addicting shit I've ever done. I was gonna move to Coloroda when my parole was up in December just for the fuck of it. I wrecked my car right before and ended up having to live with my mom.
My focus is saving for another car. Clocking some dollars (lots of refinerys/plants for shutdown work) for a few months. Then getting my A licence in skydiving (25 jumps, so you can jump on your own. I think I had completed solo jump 5 or 6 out of 18. I might just do the whole program again. Place by me offers A licence package for $2400, which isn't bad considering a single student jump is $150.)
They also offer about $9k for a year of unlimited jumps. It is a pretty top notch facility, and lots of teams train there, people travel from all over for their training programs. Throw in a rig for maybe $4k used? a good tent to sleep in, money to eat. maybe $20k? Even work 3 days a week or some shit as a delivery driver for some cash. I think you have to have 200 jumps to video tandems and shit. That is a good way to make money for sure. I just think if I had a year to do nothing but skydive. I could learn so much. Gain coach/instructor ratings. Basically reinvent myself as a person. Get rid of a lot of the negative baggage I have and just live.
My homeboy is training to be a pilot too. He's just like "yo, we can go into buisness together, travel the world". Haha, don't have to tell me twice.
Just got to get past this hurdle of working a shitty job again, getting a car, finding a $$$$ job . All doable. I just need to keep what i want as a reward in site. Even if I don't end up wanting to do skydiving as a career, what a way to spend a year right? I need to go watch some of my student videos again and just imagine myself in freefall. Such peace.
Sucks about your dad. I've been seeing his slooooww decline through your post for a while. If it was my dad, I'd be like "Are you sick of this shit yet?" and if he said yes just ask a medical person around for a little extra morphine. one night I've read it's not so un common an accurance. Then again, I'm not in that position.