New Year, Old Me... Sorta

Wow. Can we all agree that 2018 was a whirlwind? Sorry, Eureka, I didn't see this bad pun until I started proofreading this. Oof... Well, for nerds, Spider-Man faded away in Avengers: Infinity War and came back in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (kinda, not really, no). However, Spider-Man co-creators Stan Lee and Steve Ditko both faded away (and haven't come back, sadly). Avicii, Stephen Hawking, Stephen Hillenburg, Burt Reynolds, and Richard "Old Man" Harrison also passed away. Man, what the heck happened? I mean, we had the Winter Olympics in South Korea this past year. Do you remember that? 'Cause I sure don't.

That being said, with every new year comes people who make New Year's resolutions. I've never really been one for them because of their cheesiness and the lack of integrity that is associated with them. (Ever made a resolution to not get seconds on dessert at church potlucks? In my experience, it never works.) However, I have found myself just shy of having made a New Year's resolution. I planned to start working on this at the beginning of the year but it isn't technically a New Year's resolution. Okay? Okay.

Being intentional is something of a life theme of mine. I want to be intentional with people in how I interact with them. I feel like I've come a long way from the homeschooler who only came out of his room to get books and movies from the library, just to return back to his room. I can say with confidence that I have friends who care about me and I them.

Nonetheless, there is always room for improvement. I specifically want to focus on friendships again because I feel like I hold back in this area. Having friends like the ones I do is, at times, scary. I'm simply not used to it. I didn't grow up having friends like this, so it scares me that I do now. There are specific people who come to mind who I know I could have a better relationship with them had I been more intentional. I was too afraid of wasting their time, annoying them, and losing them, among other things. I have come to find that this is not the case, at least now with everyone, especially the people God has laid on my heart. Now that He has given me a second chance, it's time to make up for lost time.

I also don't consider this to be a "new me," but rather the "real me." This is who God created me to be, and I have hid that for almost my whole life. But now it's time to be who He created me to be. It's scary. Believe me, I know. But it is so worth it. At least, so I'm told.

All that aside, you may be wondering, "Why is a nerd like Jase even writing a blog like this?" Don't you worry. So am I. Now that I read this, I see that I myself should be worried. Oof...

Honestly, I felt led by God to do this blog. It's kind of a, "Start it and instructions will follow" sorta thing. I think it's also called faith. Sure, it started out as a college lab requirement at the beginning of last semester and ended up being a place where I complained about it. But, now that that's all over, who's to say it has to stay there?

I always thought that my story was uninteresting to the point that I believed that God couldn't use it to help people. Over the past year or so, I have seen that this is not the case. God uses ordinary people to do, for lack of a better word, extraordinary things.

Tangent: How does one become extraordinary? I mean, the term 'ordinary' seems to have a general sense of neutrality. So, how does one be "extra neutral?"

But, for real, I have had experiences in which I have been able to relate to people in ways that I would have never been able to had I not experienced the things that I have and still do today. Sure, a lot of those experiences can be considered "bad," but that doesn't mean good can't come out of it. God has a knack for this sorta thing. Right, Joseph?

Not only do I want it to be just about the seemingly mundane everyday things I experience or a reflection of my past experiences, but I also want it to have fun stuff as well. I have had a few people who have reached out to me having noticed that I stopped posting movie reviews. I quite honestly thought that people were either annoyed or disinterested in them. So, I stopped. However, it has been brought to my attention that this is not the case. So, I will write movie reviews once again and post them here, (hopefully) making it easier to find them. I am debating with myself on going back and reviewing the movies I saw in theaters but didn't write a review for. We'll see who wins.

If I do end up writing reviews for past movies, I will, without a doubt, do Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. I freakin' love that movie. It's currently up in the air for my all-time top 5 movies. By the way, I translated the script and posted it on Genius. You can read the script chapter-by-chapter here. Yes, I know. I am a nerd. What else is new?

Well, that's pretty much all I have right now. I plan on posting here every two weeks-ish. I am currently taking a C.S. Lewis interterm class, which is keeping me busy. I am also training/working for Sterling College, not as the Assistant Convergent Technology Specialist, but the Assistant to the Convergent Technology Specialist. There is a difference. I am glad to be back at college and getting back in touch with my friends here. I guess we'll see what God has in store for me together. Hopefully, it's not too boring for y'all to read. We'll see.