Reflection 2009

     Allen I'm plugging your site.  Return the favor.

     One year ago I made a New Year's resolution to start a journal and write in it three or four times a week.  I've successfully fulfilled that promise to myself for an entire year now.  The Word document entitled "Journal" that sits inconspicuously on my desktop is now 122 pages long and 66,490 words.  For that I give myself a pat on the back.
     I started the project shortly after I graduated college as means of self-discovery I suppose.  I remember being a little depressed with the way things were going at the time.  Suffocating in a town I knew too well, going to the same old bars, working crappy jobs with no worthwhile prospects in sight (I was pulling double duty as a pizza delivery driver/ private investigator at the time).  I think the journal gave me a means of identifying my qualms with life, taking inventory, and in turn developing the necessary mental framework to tackle the looming monotony.  In a few months of documenting my thoughts it became apparent that what I needed to get out of life was not to be found in the lazy suburbs of south-eastern Pennsylvania.
     Towards spring of 2009 I heard about a friend of mine moving to Korea and all of the cool perks that goes with such a commitment.  Desperate for change and full of youthful vigor I pushed the paperwork through in under three weeks and, knowing nothing at all about Korea, I boarded a wide-body Boeing bound for adventure. 
     At the time, having graduated with a degree in English, it seemed that the natural evolution of my journal should be to bring it online in the form of a blog, not just so that family and friends might share in my varied experiences but also to develop some published credibility as a writer.  Sure, I still journal more personal reflections that I'm not keen on publishing but for the most part what energy I invest in my literary enterprises goes directly onto Deadly Quests.  It is an ongoing process of learning and though it is a relatively modest periodical I am proud of how far it has come from just a simple resolution only a year ago.
    So where does that leave me now?  Looking back at my entries from this time last year do I feel happier, more satisfied with life, content with the world around me?  I'm not sure.  So much drastic change has occured in only twelve months that I'm unprepared to reduce any of it to rhetoric or characterizable linguistics.  Too much meaning is lost between the sub-conscious and the pen that any attempt to compare two wholly different and paramount chapters of my life would be futile.  I definately feel more mature.  I feel a sense of personal satisfaction in my work that wasn't afforded from my years in various restaurants.  I feel fortunate for the things I've seen and honored that I have such diverse, intelligent, and attractive people in my life.  I think the most important thing I've learned however is to never settle for anything.  As soon as you start to feel comfortable in life it's time to pick up and move.  Explore new horizons and infiltrate more vibrant crowds.  I like Korea but I doubt I'll spend the rest of my life here.  I also love my home and I'm somewhat anxious to return but I doubt I'll spend more than a few months there.  Looking back it is hard to say whether or not my descision to come to Korea was right or wrong, but had I not come I wouldn't be in a position to ask that question in the first place. 

Cool Thing About Korea #42:  It's snowing right now and it's been snowing since last night.  There has to be about 12 inches on the ground already.  Ms. Huh says that this amount of snowfall is extremely uncommon and it may be the most she has seen in Suwon.  If we had this much snow back in Pennsylvania there is no question that school would be closed and yet here, despite the fact that there are no state snow trucks, snow shovels, or road-salt people manage to make it to work.  While at the bus stop I watched some people clear a driveway with sheets of plywood and brooms.  Korean dedication is comendable.