Passionately Apathetic

I've always been fairly lackluster in the 'passion' department. I'm not talking about the kind of passion shared between two gay cowboys or that of a prostitute who falls in love with the desirable Richard Gere. I'm talking about passion in the way of my interests. That is to say, I've never enjoyed something so much that I can devote my full attention to it. It all started in High School I think, maybe a bit before. Nothing I've done has ever excited me past the point of treating it as a hobby.
My father (and probably yours as well) is a jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none in the handyman type way. He's just as comfortable with plumbing and automotive repair as he is with electricity and carpentry. He is the same man who built a 3000 sq ft addition on our house, rebuilt a '67 Camaro, and turned our yard into a mini vacation resort.
I feel like I have similar characteristics in the way of Art. I can draw, sort of. I can play the bass, sort of. I can sculpt, write and direct mildly entertaining home movies.
But am I -good- at any of these things?  Can I call myself an artist? Can I call myself a musician? A sculptor or writer? No, I don't think I could.
My problem, as it would seem, is that I'm simply not passionate enough about any one thing enough to develop my skills further than my sliding by with my God-given gift of creativity.
I regret it in the same way I regret not forcing myself to exercise every day. I get discouraged if I don't get immediate results. It's frustrating for me. I want it and I want it now. When I look back at all the years and ask myself- If I had just made sure to run 10 minutes a day, and do 10 push-ups before and after bed, where would I be now?  I'd be in much better shape, more comfortable in my skin and I wouldn't sigh every time I had to walk up two flights of stairs.
It's the same dilemma I faced when I had to study and do homework in school as well. In High School, I was infamous for never studying. I would pay attention in class, absorb all of the information I could, and leave it at that. Studying did nothing for me. Perhaps I never learned the proper way to study? Who knows. It always felt that when I sat down with my text book, flash cards and notes that I would get nowhere, and I'd just start doodling or snacking. When the test rolled around, I wouldn't remember anything from my study session further than what I already knew going into it. I wasn't in Honors classes in High School, but I also wasn't in standard classes. I was in the middle of the road, the Advanced classes. I didn't study.. Ever. I barely ever did my homework. I was a B student. It leaves me wondering, again: Where would I be today if I had just applied myself?
That leaves me where I'm at today. It was easy to not care about school when I lived at home and worked some lame 25 hour a week job. It was easy to keep telling myself that eventually the pieces will fall into place. It was easy these last 15 years telling myself that I'll lose weight next year- telling myself that, sure, I'm overweight, but I don't have low self esteem and I don't FEEL unhealthy.
Now I work my tail off 40 hours a week at a thankless, low-paying job and have recently found out that my cholesterol is higher than an obese 45 year old man. Scary stuff. It's becoming much harder for me to rationalize my don't-give-a-fuck attitude, especially when I have a family to support and love.
I've joined Weight Watchers for Men. Perhaps I'll blog about it in the future, but trust me, it's the perfect dieting plan for Dan Burnett. It's been a month and I've lost 14 pounds. I haven't worked out as much as I should have, but I promised myself that I would not become discouraged and give up. I'm taking it one day at a time and not judging my performance. I need to stick with this because I'm officially unhealthy. Christ, I have to take a pill every day for my cholesterol. That is not cool.
 I can't do much about my job situation other than work hard and keep my head up and hope that eventually something will come along that will accept me as the man for the job. I have strong work ethic and strong relationship skills with my co-workers. It is more than enough to keep me from driving off a cliff on my way to work. So until that day comes, I have no problem keeping a smile on while at work, cracking jokes about management and pushing forward.
I'd like to use my family and my house to excuse the fact that I don't have time for college. However, when it all boils down, it always comes back to the fact that I simply don't fucking want to go back to school. Ever. I'm literally one class away from my long-awaited Associates Degree. I may someday take that class and get the degree. But that will be the extent of my life at college. My educational aspirations have reached an end and I'm inclined to blame my complete lack of passion on the American education system. I hate being forced to care about shit I don't fucking care about. I react with the teenage angst I was brought up to thrive on.
So that leaves me where? (Honestly, I fell into a rant and can't remember what I was talking about)  Oh- RIGHT. The arts.
Now that I'm older, I'm slowly starting to care more about my hobbies. It's time to take them out of the cupboard and dust them off.
Music will always be just a hobby for me. Even when I was playing bass in The Royale Brothers, I never had the same drive as the other members- or that of most of the community in New London that I've become friends with. When people tell me "Oh, you were a great bassist" "You should join another band" and "Stick with it... I can give you lessons." I kindly thank them for the compliment and explain that if I had to write a list and prioritize my hobbies into most attention to least attention, playing my bass would always fall at the bottom. I had a blast tearing up some Rock-n-Roll shows in New London and surrounding areas for a few years, and trust me, if we had gone anywhere from there, I would have gladly joined and toured. But that didn't happen. Playing music was fun while it lasted, and sadly, that's all it will ever be.
To make a long story short, and skip over drawing and sculpting, what I am trying to get at, is that I think I'm going to continue actually applying myself to writing.
I've always liked writing. I had a lot of fun writing fiction in school and it was always something that I never felt 'forced' to do. However, once I graduated High School, I just stopped. Other than message boards and myspace and facebook status updates, my writing hobby simply died.

This last year, I started to get back into it. I can really credit Cheney (at hellocheney.blogspot.com ) and a coworker for encouraging me to get back into it. I started writing a fiction novel, just a few chapters with no actual plot, just to see how I would do after my long hiatus from the keyboard. As it turns out, I was pleasantly surprised with myself. Grammar and Spelling aside, I felt that not only did I still write well enough to entertain myself, but I had somehow gotten a little better.
Now, when I say better, you have to understand that I mean for ME. I'm not bragging or anything, and my writing falls far short of being critically acclaimed.
Since that fateful day when I started writing those chapters, I've continued to write whatever comes to mind. I've written a bit more fiction, have read and discussed some of Cheney's fiction, as well as the work of my coworker, and have dedicated a bit of my time to Thescopemagazine.com.
I'm far from where I want to be and sometimes it's frustrating. But I'm going to stick with it. The more I write, the better I'll be.  Hopefully this blog will help me along my path as well.

I had a clear direction when I started this post and I fear I ventured far off and then ran out of time. If anyone ever gives me shit about my spelling and grammar on my personal blog, you can drink a bucket of dicks. I don't care, so don't tell me.

Six out.