Early 2012 featured an annual trip with some friends to Bass Lake, CA to visit some other friends of ours who live up there. It was a fun trip as always. We traveled into Yosemite National Park, went hiking, and had a good time.
Spring of 2012 also included a few concerts, namely Lady Antebellum, Gloriana, and Dierks Bentley. All were good. For Lady A and Gloriana, I was right up next to the stage (for Lady A I was actually IN the stage because of the cool stage setup they had where a small number of fans could buy tickets for an in-stage pit area called the "Inner Circle"), which is always fun.
Then at the end of April was Stagecoach. It was a hell of a good time. This was the third year in a row that I've gone to the festival, and it was was by far the best. The lineup was incredible, I ran into probably about 75 people I knew, I got to drink all day and dance all night after the concert. It was amazing.
Middle 2012 was a pretty good time as well. I traveled to Nashville for the second year in a row for CMA Music Fest in June. Like Stagecoach, this was also the best time I've ever had there. 2011 was amazing and certainly unforgettable as well, but this trip was arguably better, for completely different reasons. 2011 was my first-ever trip to Nashville and CMA Fest. So as a die-hard country music fan and enthusiast, this was an incredible experience, since Nashville is the mecca of country music, and CMA Fest is, as it is marketed and which I would find to be true, "the ultimate country music fan experience", and the biggest and best country music festival in the world. I visited everywhere I could and experienced several of the significant sites and venues in the city, and saw a whole lot of live music and met a bunch of country artists, including big stars such as Kenny Chesney and Jason Aldean.
But 2012 was, like I said, a completely different experience. The reason why this was the case is that, in addition to the fact that I had been there before and seen lots of things already, I got to experience this trip with a group of people. Both times that I've gone to Nashville, I've gone alone. But on this trip I happened to meet some people on my second or third night in town, and that changed everything. They invited me to hang out with them the rest of the night, and that ended up continuing for the remainder of the trip. Every day they invited and welcomed me to hang out with them. They introduced me to all their friends (some of whom live in Nashville; they themselves are mostly from New Jersey), and for the remainder of the trip I had a go-to group of people and a community to hang out with and be a part of. Instead of doing everything alone, I was with people. This was an incredible experience. Because although I'm used to and willing to do concerts and trips like this alone (because of my passion for the music), it's a lot more fun doing it with people. In fact, I enjoyed hanging out with them so much that I sold my ticket for the last three (out of four) nights of the main concerts at the festival, simply because I enjoyed hanging out with them more and and didn't want to miss out on any of it. These people were so kind to me, and introduced me to so many people, who were also so kind to me, and I can never repay them or thank them enough. My network of Nashville acquaintances and contacts has grown exponentially because of them, and I will never forget the amazing time I had with them. I have since kept in touch with them and have gotten to see them once since this trip, when I went and visited them in New Jersey in September. I plan on seeing them again soon, this next summer in Nashville if not sooner.
Summer 2012 also featured my first ever trip to the river. I went with some friends from my hometown area. It was just a weekend trip, but nevertheless was a lot of fun. We went on a group float down the river for a few hours, and hung out at night at the motel pool and the casino. It was a lot of fun, and I hope to go back to the river some more this next year, with them and anyone else that wants to invite me.
Then came the Fall of 2012. Three notable events from this time of the year were my birthday (28th), and celebrations for my 50th and 100th nights of dancing in a row. That's right, in a row. I managed to string together what ended up being 102 consecutive nights of dancing. Not every night was at an actual country bar or dance facility (I think those comprised 93 of the 102 nights), but every day or night for 102 days I managed to do at least a partial-song's worth of a line dance or two step. The celebrations for all three of these occasions (50th, 100th, and my birthday) were at some of my favorite country bars. I invited lots of people, many of whom showed up, and had a great time.
Now we're into the Winter, and the end, of 2012, and the beginning of 2013. My Thanksgiving and Christmas were good, both the usual tradition of gathering with family. New Year's was a fun time last night, as I spent it with a friend and a bunch of other friends, celebrating the one friend's birthday (which was yesterday) and New Years combined. As for today (New Years Day), I don't have much planned, just working and maybe going dancing or bowling tonight. However I may also stop by my brother's house this afternoon to watch some of the Orange Bowl college football game, which is part of an annual tradition (he has people over every New Years Day to watch the football games).
All told, 2012 has been a lot of fun, and free from any major problems. I got to pursue my primary passions in life of country music and dancing, going to several concerts and two music festivals, and dancing almost every night of the week. I've gotten better at dancing, made a few new dance partners, found a great new country bar in The Ranch in Anaheim (which opened in December 2011), and am still enjoying myself about as much as ever with all of it.
Transitioning and looking ahead into 2013, my life will probably continue to be much the same as it was in 2012, as far as my plans are concerned (obviously you never know what could happen that is unforeseen or out of your control). But there are a few things I might like to change. Let me address this by giving a little recap of where things are in certain area of my life, and where I would like to see those things go in 2013.
Professionally, I'm in decent shape. I co-own one of my family's businesses, and that's going well. Looking forward, it would be good for me to move forward in my career, either with this business, or with songwriting, or both, or something else. But it's time that I start being a little more proactive with this, rather than being complacent and not trying very hard to progress or move forward, which I've been guilty of in the recent past.
Socially, I'm arguably a bit out of balance. My social life literally consists entirely of dancing and the friends who I have from there. I'm somewhat okay with this, as dancing is one of my biggest passions and I'm still enjoying it about as much as ever. But at the same time, I realize that I am probably neglecting my close, longtime friends from home a little bit, and should spend more time with them. They may be married and have their own lives and different interests and such, but still, I ought to make more of an effort to spend time with them than I have been recently. I should also probably look into broadening my hobbies and activities, or at least my social circles. Dancing is great for meeting people, and there's lots of really cool people there, many of whom share my interests in country music and dancing; but while all of that is great, it might not hurt for me to look elsewhere also, such as a bowling league, softball league, or church, especially considering that the places I go dancing are not close to me, and hence, neither are the places where most of my dancing friends live, which is a natural obstacle for friendships. Despite this obstacle, however, I would also probably be best to try to develop some of my dancing relationships, and become closer friends with some of them and hang out with them outside of the country scene. Part of the reason for my lack of closeness with them is that I tend to be a wanderer or mingler at the country bars, hanging out with several people or groups of people throughout the night, rather than sticking to one group. While I enjoy this, it doesn't help with developing friendships and close-knit community, so I might want to consider changing that behavior as well.
Speaking of church, my spiritual life is in a perhaps interesting place right now. It's not very active, which would appear to be a bad thing, yet I don't really have a problem with it. For those of you who don't know, I've been a Christian for most of my life, with my church attendance, and my effort toward my personal relationship with God (and, I feel consequently, my closeness with Him) fluctuating up and down throughout my life. Lately both my church attendance and my effort toward my relationship with God have been minimal-to-non-existent. I've basically been content living my life the way I want to live it and doing what I want to do, and have not really consulted God about any of it. While my life has had many negative and unhappy moments, and while I may be far from being as content and fulfilled and happy as I maybe could be, I still do not feel a great need or desire to change what I'm doing. My life is largely a happy one, and though it is predicated or dependent on things that maybe it shouldn't be (namely, looking forward to events in the near future like a fun night of dancing or a concert, or a maybe a love interest if I have one at a given point in time), I am not yet to a point where I feel I want to turn to God and look to Him for my happiness, contentment, fulfillment, and peace in my life. But this may be about to change somewhat. I'm considering checking out church again on Sunday nights (for the aforementioned social reasons if nothing else), so we'll see where that goes.
Personally, my life is in decent or okay shape. I still have close friends, albeit with perhaps a slight barrier present, in that literally just about all of them are married. I have tons of acquaintances through dancing. This feels great, because I know somebody wherever I go and people are always saying hi to me and such, which makes me feel popular and wanted, which is nice. However as I said earlier, not many of those relationships are developed very far past the acquaintance level, which is by my own doing and lack of willingness to commit to a single group of friends. This leaves me occasionally feeling lonely or bored, even while I'm at the country bars. A bigger source of loneliness, however, comes from my love life. I'm currently in a spot where my love life holds a primary focus in my mind, in that I tend to allow it to have heavy influence on much of my emotions and my happiness. I know this should not be the case, and that I need to put my main focus and find my happiness from other sources and let love take care of itself and happen in it's own time. I'm just a little tired of waiting, as I have yet to have my first girlfriend or even my first official date. I'd love for 2013 to bring me success in my love life, but I know I just need to be patient and confident, and the success will come sooner or later.
As far as resolutions go for the New Year, I actually made a list with as many as 10 resolutions. I was planning on sharing them by way of a blog post, but after a friend advised me that it would be very unlikely that I would keep all of them, I'm going to choose to officially state only one: to improve my punctuality. If you know me, you know I stink at punctuality and timeliness. I'm last minute or late to literally almost everything. So over the next year, I'm going to try to improve with that. I'm not saying I'll get rid of it completely. But if I improve, I'll consider that a victory.
Well, there's my recap of 2012 along with an outlook into 2013. Hope y'all have had a good year; here's to what will hopefully be another and perhaps even better one!
