Thursday, August 25, 2011

I was just pacing my apartment

A minute ago, rather furiously too I might add. I didn't even realize I had been pacing for a full minute or so, as I was brainstorming equally furiously.

I re-read some old journal entries and one page chronicled how bored I was in that particular point in my life. This was in the fall of 2010, when I was a sophomore at Oral Roberts University, studying graphic design. My actual words went something along the lines of: "I feel like I have nothing to be excited about in my life."

Of course I had some cool things going on, mainly my upcoming mission to Brazil (which was amazing of course), but I can only live one week at a time after all. I'm no stranger to being bored, of course, I always tell people I'm easily bored. Not to mention, Tulsa is an immensely, well, boring town. This was before I had decided that I was going to transfer to AiC and pursue what I really wanted to.

I look back and chuckle, because I feel that statements and thoughts like that over a period of time was almost like I was daring God to actually do something about it. And here I am, good job Buck.

Anyways, to get to the point of this post before I lose you, the reason I am awake at 4:50am when I have a 7:30am class is because I am excited. I longboard and recently my friend coerced me into learning to power-slide. I've wanted to learn how to for quite a while now of course, in my pursuit of pushing the sport, but to be honest I was mildly terrified of the prospect. Power-sliding is such an intense adaptation of the sport, it's almost as if you're defying the very construction and purpose of the longboard while doing it. And it's dangerous. I assumed I would get to it sometime next year-ish.

But what really has plagued me with insomnia yet again, is an idea I have whizzing around in my head for a pair of sliding gloves. It's a common piece of equipment for advanced riders who enjoy sliding. The construction is basically a work glove, with a polymer (usually) 'puck' velcroed onto the palm, and sometimes on the fingers. They allow the rider to get nice and intimate with the pavement and yet keep it all business. Anyways, gloves professionally manufactured cost anywhere from $35 to $80, and I'm a poor college student. I used a pair of work gloves I've had laying around in my closet for our sliding session the other night. They ripped on the third slide.

I've heard of people DIYing their own pair of gloves using anything from chunks of granite to slabs of cutting board. Being the industrial design major (not to mention a man) I of course set out to research how to make my own pair. My mistake was doing that tonight.

Instructables.com is quite the addicting website if you let it pull you in. So of course I spent the next hour and half (this was at midnight) looking at longboard related Instructables. What I found inflamed my brainstorming center so intensely that now I'm not just planning on making the gloves, but I eventually want to make my own longboard deck, press and all (the press gives it a concave profile). Anyways, I'm actually considering pursuing this glove project to the degree of making it my capstone project. I may recant that later.

To return to my beginning thesis, I would like to again expound upon something I'm really quite good at making. Mistakes. When I wrote that journal entry I had no idea what I was sacrificing in exchange for more 'excitement'. I've learned this past year (gosh, I can't believe it's been that long) that having true friends around you is worth it's weight in gold. My friends are like family to me.

I've been told by a couple people from ORU, when I was leaving, that just because I'm moving doesn't mean I will have a change in support structure. Well, yes, but I'm afraid it doesn't quite work that way. A phone call doesn't quite equate to a hearty sit-down.

Bottom line. Keep your friends close, and don't ask God for something you can't handle. He might just do it.

-Buck the Undead Dragon