Practically Perfect

The 20s are all about being happy where you are. Sometimes happiness can come as simply as choosing to be so. Sometimes things aren't as complicated as we make them. Sometimes people aren't the dastardly dark monsters we make them out to be. Sometimes we're not so complicated. In fact, many a times we make our lives a little bit harder than they have to be. Every once in a while you just let it all go. Be where you are when you're there. You're closer to practically perfect then you might think. 

There's something to be said about experiencing emotion. It's something that makes us wholeheartedly human. It's daily reminder of our humanity. It's our imperfection. It's our flaw. It's our vulnerability. Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad thing. It's truly important and it's what makes us so complicated. Sometimes you want to turn off your emotions, just flip a switch and not have to feel it all constantly. That would save you from the pain, turmoil and anguish that comes with some of the hardest things we deal with but then again that would deprive you from the zeal, warmth, and hope that some of life's best and brightest instances bring. Emotions are a double-edged sword, they fill us up with and help us express unbridled joy and then again bring us down to some of our darkest most distraught points. You cannot have one without the other. So we have choices daily, and some days it's easier than other, to choose to live in the moment. You can choose to embrace your emotions or to pretend they aren't brimming under the surface. You can let your emotions fill you up but never swallow you whole. Yes, you need them but it's not necessary to let them dictate your life. Sometimes you have to choose to be happy, content, and okay with who are you, where you are, and what you're doing. When the doubt, uncertainty, or general uneasiness comes creeping in where it's not needed or welcome, you choose to turn it away and refocus on the positivity of what you're engaged in and who with. What's the point of being mad, sad, or confused all the time? Clarity, gladness, and joviality can often just as easily  be called out. We complicated, knit-pick, and deconstruct everything and everyone around us. Maybe we should just let them be. Maybe it's not our jobs to be so critical. Maybe we're the things that obstruct and obscure what's right there. Things may just very well be practically perfect, if only we let them be. There's a certain peace in coming to terms with nothing ever being wholly perfect, but happiness in life can be more than enough.

If I tell you that I am wholly undeserving of the some of the people I get to know it would be an understatement. I use the word get because in recent months I've come to understand truly how much of a privilege it is to be connected to certain people. I applied the same to myself and found out how remarkably sought after and definitively priceless my friendship is. Because of that it has become reserved for only those who are able to cherish it, and me with the respect and dignity that I deserve (I am Joey, hear me roar). Anyway, what I'm saying that the past couple of days have been practically perfect. Not even in the picturesque Smart House (#DCOM whatup?) wannabe utopia kind of way, but a chaotic symphony of epic proportions. Friday morning started out with breakfast and a typical POC rant about the annoying covert racism of Vermont, Burlington, and my damn predominantly white campus. It was off to class mad late, as always, where our art history professor went in on all of us and called people out hardcore for being irredeemable messes quite incapable of getting it together. Hit the books to study for my exam and then went to go to work on said exam like a big ole boss. I was ecstatic to have knocked it out quickly and with such confidence that I made my way home to power clean. I'm talking headphones in, belting out songs, and going full Brandy in Roger Hammerstein's Cinderella scrubbing, sweeping, and mopping every last nook and cranny of the apartment.

I went to a poetry reading and a reflective session before meeting the inadvertent love of my college life aka my best friend Jeff. I don't think I have ever been so excited to see a friend like I was to see him. No rest for the chronically busy because it was straight to putting together final details for the brotherhood game night event I was hosting at my apartment that night. Grocery store, picking up pizzas, and soon they were flooding in. 18 brothers in all eating, talking, laughing, watching TV, and playing games. From Hedbandz to card games, Monopoly, and snapchat wars, it was amazing to see everyone come together to just be. People were present, off their phones, and really talking to each other. It made me so damn happy. I even spent the majority of the night away from my better half in Jeff. Our newest brother Dakota that night and those of us who lasted until late ended up just laying around being our ridiculous. What a gift it is to be afforded the opportunity to be silly in good company. Jeff and I watched vines for a solid half hour and just were there, doing what best friends do. It was practically perfect.

Practically perfect means getting as close as you can to perfect and then letting yourself take you all the way there. Your emotions don't have to get in the way if you don't want them to, but there is sometime to be said for letting them flow through you. Saturday morning Jeff and I did breakfast and then played cards and talked trash before gearing up to walk the campus. The rain came down hard and we hit up the mall for me to style my favorite buddy. It was like Clueless meeting How to Build a Better Boy. On to the food court and back home to enjoy Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Askaban in typical brolationship fashion. Even more TV was binge-watched before dinner. I took time to talk to my brother, Eugene about life and my future (#senioryear), and it kind of threw me off. Jeff and I had a pow-wow that was so damn real. Like how often do you get to tell someone every single thing about your life and to trust them with your shortcomings, fears, and dreams? When do you get to look at someone and see that you'll be friends for the rest of your lives? What the concept of no boundaries mean to you? The night came to a close and we laughed our asses off. It was practically perfect.

My blog post question for the day is ... when are things close to being perfect for you? I know when I get to be myself in almost every way possible - that is lively, authentic, and full of laughter, that I'm there.