Introduction

Thoughts from Life was originally a series I wrote when I was working in an office with little to do. I’ve never been one to sit around and do nothing, so I worked on creative writing projects. It was 1997 and I believe I brought the writings in on a 3.5 inch floppy disk. If you don’t know what that is, Google it. You will find a fascinating computer history opened up to you that is truly uninteresting to anyone who didn’t live through those years. It was difficult working on existing projects because I could only work on them sporadically, so I wrote whatever was on my mind. I was 27 and had gotten married only a few months before I wrote them. The end of that job was the end of that series. They were nine papers in total.

I continued writing my thoughts about life and referred to them as the Thoughts papers. At no point did I ever write them on actual paper, but I’ve always called them that. They were part musings, diary entries, and always overly honest (for me, that means weird honesty). I had written diary entries before that, but they were always more about my thoughts than my life. I never had much of a life, but I had thoughts about everything.

I should point out I don’t have normal thoughts. I don’t say this to brag. I say it mainly as a warning. As I was writing my thoughts, I saw the future reader as a participant in them. I tried my best to smooth out the writing so the reader wouldn’t pull out their hair in frustration. My raw thoughts can be difficult to read even for me. I’ve had anxiety issues my whole life. When I was about 40, I had a breakdown and finally started getting help. I’m happier now, but I haven’t lost my unique perspective on life.

Other people choose to ignore realities I’ve never been able to ignore. I point out things others either don’t think about or don’t want to admit they think about. I question everything. People who don’t question things tend not to enjoy talking to me. I’m still writing my thoughts, which all start with the date I wrote them. Some entries include “future notes” to clarify confusing or troublesome statements from my younger and stupider self. I was not sacred to the original text. What I’m writing about is much more important than what I originally wrote.

I think this wordy introduction gives you an idea how verbose I can be. The more time I had, the more thoughts I wrote about. I have an app on my phone that reads documents to me. I have listened to all the Thoughts papers and was entertained by them all. There were things I completely forgot about that cracked me up as if I was hearing someone else’s insane rantings. I hope you enjoy my insane rantings as much as I did creating them over the years. Good luck!