"This is gonna be so awesome..." and it was.

I've been a part of some fairly incredible experiences since I've left Pennsylvania, and I've encountered a lot of interesting folks along the way. There was the guy in Wyoming who played guitar in his storefront, a guy in Idaho who yelled at me for riding my bike too fast, and of course everyone I've met out here. Right now, one sticks out in particular.

Last week, a bunch of us went to see some friends participate in a jazz jam at a semi-upscale pizza joint. That experience itself was fairly awesome (all you can eat spaghetti for 8 bucks? Hell yea!). During dinner, though, our friend Tom said he found out (from a hobo on the street, totally reliable) that there was karaoke happening at a bar right around the corner. It took very little convincing to get us there. As we were leaving, he said "Oh man, this is gonna be so awesome..."

It made me think. I'd spent a lot of time with this fella in recent days, and that phrase seemed to come up a lot in his speech. Before we went into a dingy bar at the beach. While making breakfast through a pounding headache/hangover. While splitting firewood in a driving downpour. Just before we left him in the middle of a city at his request with no way to get back to the farm.

Not that I minded. In fact, I really enjoyed his enthusiasm, so much so that I told him about it. He actually thought I was making fun of him after a while (I guess I tend to repeat myself). This isn't a direct quote, but after I said how much I liked his attitude for the 5th or 6th time, he said "Hell yea man. I've enjoyed everything I've ever done. I've shoveled horse shit and it was awesome."

Having experienced working with horseshit recently, it's not that bad. I don't understand this negative dogma surrounding horseshit. But that's another rant for another blog post. Seriously, though...I'm going to try this: before everything I do, saying "This is gonna be so awesome." Even if it might suck hard, how bad could it possibly be? And to his credit, everything I did with him after he said that phrase was, in fact, pretty awesome.

What an awesome dude. It's a shame he left today...