Life's Little Challenges

Sometimes, life is a challenge.

My fiancé and I want to be together. However, through the happenstance of how we met, it turned out that we are from different sides of the continent and in different countries. So our ability to be together is stymied by rules and regulations we must overcome first. It is taking longer than we would like, and it is frustrating, but all we can do is continue to press our nose to the grindstone and move forward. We are, at least, reviewing the immigration paperwork and making some tough decisions on when and how we can get me to her. And, of course, this challenge leads to other challenges—moving, marriage, distance from my current friends and family, job. All of which I look forward to meeting and overcoming in the future.

I really enjoy Dungeons & Dragons and other roleplaying. I have a great group of friends with whom I play. We even have a wealth of people who like to GM, which is often unusual for groups. However, I really want to play in a super-hero related game. While my friends are open to playing in a game, it generally means that I have to GM it, as I am the impetus for this sort of genre. Which, while fun, defeats the purpose—I want to have the fun of creating the character, not knowing the plot, and defeating the bad guys. If I am the GM, no matter how much fun I may have in the game, I really cannot have the specific fun for which I am looking. The only solution to this one that I see is to find a group who enjoys this genre and join them. But that leads to other challenges; fitting in with a new group, time, location.

Bike riding is something I have always enjoyed. However, I enjoy it the most when I can ride with someone, to a location or for a purpose, and share the experience. Right now, I do not have anyone with whom I can share that joy. I have asked around in my apartment complex with those I have seen biking, but they are mostly of the racing variety; I’m just looking for a buddy to take a 3-5 mile ride with around the local environs. I am not sure why this one has been on my mind so much lately, except that I have felt the need to get some exercise in and I like biking for both the distance and speed as well as the low-impact nature of it. I am not seeing a ready solution to this one right now, except maybe to go back to biking alone. Now that I have a cell phone, solitary biking does not have quite the same worries as it once did.

PC gaming is a fun activity that I like to lose myself in on occasion. However, PC gaming is at its most fun when you can team up with people you know and from whom you can expect a certain level of play and comradeship. For a while, I managed to get two of my buddies to join me in some online gaming and I had a real blast. Just prior and shortly after their involvement, I did my best to join and play with a group within the game. But, in each case, the friends and the groups had other things come into play and they disbanded, stopped playing, or drifted to other groups. There is a new online game coming within just a few days/weeks (NWN2) which I know one buddy of mine is buying; so I may have an opportunity to get some more gaming with friends in soon. But he’s a busy guy, with a wife and a child as well as a job with a lot of OT, so I am not optimistic that he can play as often as I can. But any time will be better than none.

There are other challenges; health, family, pet, apartment, and job related. Not sure even why I mention the four I do, except maybe that those are four that are on my head a lot these days. The first and last are two that have a fair chance of being overcome in some fashion or another. The middle two are more of a challenge, and I look for ways around them. As to the many other challenges; I guess I will get to them when I get to them.