I died again.

Hey everybody who no longer checks this blog, sorry I died on you.

Between working 3 jobs and being a miserable student, this space turned into yet again another aborted writing attempt. It won’t happen again I swear.

In the meantime, I’ll update you on where I’m at:

I’m not one to believe in anything, least of all fate, but the past few weeks have probably been the most trying time of my life. To start about 2 weeks ago, my car was broken into for the second time, with someone smashing my window for my inspection sticker. That same week a freak combination of bank and payroll errors at two jobs dropped me from semi-broke to completely broke. Then, five days after my window was fixed, I moved my car from the lot I usually park in, where it was broken into, to a “secure” lot next to my building. Less than three days after I paid for my spot, five cars were broken into, their stuff was loaded into my car, and my 1990 Buick LeSabre was the world’s shittiest getaway car.

The police found my car the next day, but here’s where I started to get the feeling that fate was fucking with me: the car was found in front of a house that burned down, killing two young boys. If you’re in Buffalo, you’ve probably heard of it. Freaky, right? Well, it gets better. Because of where it was found, my car was impounded about five minutes before I could rescue it, a problem compounded by the fact it had no inspection sticker from the previous theft.

Then I found out an incredibly good person I knew in college died in a freak car accident. His name was Stefano Moran-Guiati, a really great guy who had already dodged death from a bike accident in Italy two years ago. While we had lost touch since school, I always remembered him as a sincere, funny and excellent person, a good friend to my friends and an inspiration from recovering from the earlier accident that left him in a coma for a month. He was 23.

To top this off, my mother underwent tests all week for what started to appear as a liver or gall bladder problem, that led to the discovery of a growth on her lung. Fortunately, after several CAT scans and MRIs the doctors believe the growth is merely scar tissue, though they will be monitoring it over the next six months.

Needless to say, I’ve been a wreck over the past few weeks, and I truly believed that I turned into an astrological black hole, with anything I touch or care about turning to crap (random example: Driving home to Rochester last weekend, I called my sister to meet up with her while I was in town. Immediately after hanging up with me, she had a 60-mile-an-hour blowout, thankfully she’s safe).

But I think I’m finally emerging from this rut, though I can’t say unchanged, which is not a bad thing. I learned three things from this ordeal:

1) Don’t ever take for granted the fleeting nature of life. No matter what you have overcome, where you are in life, it can all come to a crashing halt in the blink of an eye. One caveat: This doesn’t mean despair – to use a cliche, only the good die young, and if you don’t live your life to its potential, you’re going to miserably live forever.

2) Never take for granted the people who love you. In my case, I was so wrapped up in myself the magnitude of what my mom was experiencing escaped me. I know that made me a prick, but I will never lose sight of who is important to me again.

3) Never own a car. Ever. They are bad for your health, wallet and environment and they only break and get stolen. Take the bus.

So sorry about the terribly personal nature of this post, I swear it won’t happen again. Until I forget to update for a while again, which I would not bet against.

Though keep checking back, if only for me to string you along and break your heart.