beer and pretzels

Dewenter and I met up at Rock Bottom Brewery after work. He had a hamburger and I had some ballpark pretzels (well, a ballpark pretzel; I just can't seem to eat as much as I used to, and I ended up giving half my meal away to Mandy and Ams, who dove into it like crack fiends). The milk stout was good, and I got a decent buzz off it. "Are you a lightweight?" Amos said. I told him, "Now that I've stopped drinking regularly, I guess so. I used to be able down eight, nine shots of bourbon without a second thought. Now one heavy beer puts me over the edge." Not that I'm complaining. The route to a good buzz is quicker than it used to be, and how's that a bad thing? After dinner we walked around Fountain Square for a bit, and the sun set, and we went back to the house to play some Mario-Kart, hang out with the girls, and then before he left we sat out on the front porch smoking cigarettes and talking about life and all its trimmings.

He's going through a lot of the same things I am, albeit slightly re:worked and a bit more intense at points. It's easy to feel alone in your pain, easy to forget that there are others suffering just as much as just as silently. We're able to be an encouragement and support for one another, and not just in our various trials and troubles. We're in similar places spiritually, definitely on the up-swing but recovering from a long time of spiritual neglect and abuse, and we're able to point the way forward through the mist when the other person's just too tired of squinting. Friends like this are rare, and though at times I feel unfortunate, I know that God has blessed me with a great family, great friends, an amazing job... Basically, I have nothing to complain about. I see God's providence again and again; I may be a fool, a wayward dummy, but God's there, and he's carrying me when I'm too weak to stand, and he hasn't abandoned me. "Everything's Gonna Be All Right." I believe that; not necessarily in the sense that Bob Marley believed it (he wrote that song, right?) but I believe it all the same--even if that belief lies dormant, ready to be awakened, ready to blossom like spring flowers. It's there, albeit quiet, and I cling to that: the promise that everything, one day, will be all right.