The Night We Met

Though you may not know what i mean when I refer t the Night We Met.  you may think I mean the afternoon we first saw each other, or the night we first met face to face.  I mean a night completely different from those.

It was a night just like any other.  I'd gone to work, come home.  I had been reading the novel series Twilight, but decided I needed to go to the gym before I snuggled in for a night of reading.  I got on the elliptical, setting it for an hour.  I was the only one in the gym.  It was quiet as the soft thrum of the elliptical began to create a rhythm.  The soft rhythm began to take me into a daydream-like state.

- - - I was running through the forest. It was a beautiful forest, full of dense trees and little underbrush.  I could feel the rush of wind in my hair.  I was moving much faster than I ever had before.  It felt thrilling and I was in a state of bliss, moving like the wind.  It was then that I first heard the voice.  The voice of Edward Cullen (if you're not familiar with Twilight, I'd recommend checking out the Wikipedia entry on it).  His voice was like the song of an angel on the wind.

"Stop running so slow, you'll never get here in time at that pace." He said to me in his soft but mocking tone. I immediately began to move faster and faster. The trees whizzing past me as I moved as fast as I could towards the sound of his voice.

I kept running and running.  Not sure if I was going the right way through the dense forest. It was then that I sensed I wasn't alone.  Glancing to my left and right, I realized I wasn't.  The Pack had been running on either side of me, guiding me where I needed to go.  Though I couldn't hear their thoughts, their eyes spoke volumes as they urged me to keep moving, to keep moving faster.

Soon I was nearing the top of a hill and there on the horizon, standing upon the top of another 

hill was the whole Family. The family of Vampires I'd been reading about for the last week.  

Though even in that fleeting glance I noticed something odd about the group. The numbers 

were off. My eyes strained to find the reason for the confusion. Even 

from this distance, I could see their skin and hair shining like alabaster from the Full Moon. There were 9 of them 

standing there. I saw Carlisle and Esme, Rosalie and Emmett, Alice and Jasper all standing together. Then just in 

front of them stood Edward and Bell, but there was another man standing beside Edward.

As I continued running, the pack at my sides, my confusion was silenced by Edward's silken voice on the wind again.

"I know you saw him. Don't be confused. We chose him for you. He's waiting, but you'd better hurry, it's almost

Dawn" Just then i saw the first specs of light on the horizon as the sky turned from a moon-washed gray to hues of

pink and purple.

I willed my legs faster and faster. I was practically sprinting now, I could feel the strain in my body, but I didn't care.

I still had so much farther to go and so little time to make it. I doubted my ability to run fast enough, but the gently

prodding of the Pack's eyes and of Edward's voice kept me going.

Before I'd realized it I had sprinted down the full length of the one hill and had broken through the treeline on the

other hill. They stood there, all of them staring lovingly at me. Coaxing me forward with their eyes. The sky streaking

with a million different colors but I couldn't take my eyes off the man standing beside Edward. As I came closer and

closer i could see more and more of him. His liquid topaz eyes (the mark of being a Cullen), his deep brown hair, his

hard jawline and perfectly white teeth. He was smiling the most intoxicating smile I'd ever seen. I could see the glitter

of diamonds as the dawn's rays touched his skin. he was perfect in every way.

Edward looked at me. This time I could see him and the rest of his family in all their splendor, but even the

perfection of them all was surpassed by the magnificence of this mystery man's perfection. This Mystery man meant for

me. though i couldn't bear to break my glance with this most perfect being, I heard Edward speak to me.

"He was chosen for you. Are you ready to be with him?", He asked in a somber, but musical voice.

"Of course I am." I said, not taking my eyes off of him for fear he might disappear.

"Forever?"

"Forever."

With that the beautiful man placed his soft hand on my neck and tilted my head to the side. His hands felt softer 

than the softest satin I'd ever felt.

"This may hurt," he whispered in my ear. His voice was wind-chimes and his breath was like butterscotch. 

"But don't worry, It will be ok...I love you." He said with a last shift of his face into that perfectly, deviously, beautiful

smile as he moved in to my neck to make the change and place the venom in my veins that would make us a couple

forever. - - -

I woke up then. Startled out of my daydream. Back to my elliptical, in the bright gym; still devoid of other human

life. I looked down to realize that the buzzer had gone off and it was displaying my results. I'd spent 42 minutes moving

at 8 almost 8 miles an hour. I thought back and though my mind was still in a haze I had remembered I'd never been

able to get myself past 4 miles an hour before, and never for any considerable length of time.

My legs were killing me, but I didn't care. My mind was ablaze with what this all meant. I had no idea who he was,

as I was sure I'd never seen him before, but his face with that beautifully crooked grin was what I saw every time I closed

my eyes. Even when I blinked I saw that face staring back at me, and the desire to keep my eyes closed and never open

them again for fear of the it disappearing was maddening.

I told myself it was just a dream as I packed myself up and slowly, carefully willed my gelatin legs to make the walk

home. I climbed the stairs to my apartment as carefully as I could, came inside, dropped off my gear, and took a shower

to calm myself. My heart was racing, but not from the exertion. From the face that stared back at me from behind my

eyelids.

I laid down on my bed and opened my mail as I did every night. I noticed that someone had sent me a friend

request. I checked the profile cursorily and realized the guy was a real person and clicked accept. Perhaps he'd contact

me some time soon and we would chat. Maybe I'd make a friend. My thoughts were muddled as all i could think about

was THAT MAN. THAT MAN MEANT FOR ME. His soft, silken voice saying. "I love you."

Our story jumps forward a few tantalizing weeks. I'd recounted the story to a few close friends. they all looked at me

funny and patted my head (figuratively) and said it was just a daydream. I knew it wasn't just a daydream. I'd had the

same dream every night following the incident, never wavering, no detail out of place. Always ending with those three

powerful words.

I was sitting alone at home after going for my weekly walk in the park when I got hit up on Yahoo. It was a guy

I'd spoken to a couple of times on and off, the one that friended me THAT night. His face looked oddly familiar, but I

thought nothing of it. We'd talked for a little while and he asked me to come on webcam. I was a little tentative at first,

but figured, what would be the harm. I did not expect what happened next in a million years.

As the window appeared on my screen my heart stopped. I couldn't breathe and all I could do was stare. I couldn't

move; I couldn't think. All I saw was THAT FACE. It didn't look the same. This face was human. No amber eyes, no

diamond-like skin, but too many features were the same. His cheeks, the set of his jaw, his beautiful hair. And THE

SMILE. I couldn't take my eyes off his beautiful crooked smile that I had been so in love with. I knew it was You.

It took me whole minutes to compose myself enough to turn on my camera. It was like a dream, like you'd walked

right out of the dream, made yourself real and was sitting in front of me, plain as day. I couldn't believe it. I couldn't

believe the angel from my dream existed in the real world.

I couldn't believe you existed. It wasn't until I saw you with my own eyes. felt your satin-like hand against mine that

I knew you were real. And I'll never forget the feeling I had that night we met. That night on the hill just before dawn.

That night when you made me yours forever...

Day 5 - 1/5/2009

Today was a major victory.  I am proud to say that I am now able to wear contact lenses.  While it took a little longer than the allotted 1 hour time limit and after quite a few unsuccessful attempts along with some major discomfort, I was able to achieve my goal of not only getting contacts in my eyes but also doing it on the first appointment.  

So there Madame Doctor who said I'd never get contacts in my eyes.  HaHA.  Soon I'll have my amber eyes and step one will be complete.  Who knows, I might even dye my hair the same day to complete the look at the get go.  Overall, mind over matter was the victor here. I'm pretty proud of myself. Now that one of the major obstacles is passed, I can now focus solely on the next big issue, my weight.  This isn't a quick process, but if this episode with the contacts have proven anything to myself it's that if I want something bad enough, I'll keep working at it until I achieve my goals.

Day 3 - 1/3/2009

"Patience is a virtue, but persistence to the point of success is a blessing" - Peter's Law

Today I went to the Optometrist with my sight set on getting contacts.  I've always needed glasses but it is really hard to find ones that look good on my face.  Well, I decided that even though when I was a kid I tried getting contacts and couldn't get them in, that I would try again.  The main reason: I want to change the color of my eyes.  

Now you might be thinking, why ever would you want to do that? Well the answer is actually pretty simple.  When you look in the mirror every morning, what do you see? You see two (insert your color) eyes staring back at you.  When I look in the mirror, I see my left eye staring back at me blue and my right eye staring back at me green.  It's not something the casual observer would notice, but it really, truly bothers me that my eyes are different colors.

The doctor, who didn't seem overly thrilled that I was even alive let alone giving her money to check my eyes, told me that I have a pretty bad astigmatism and that because of this the contacts wouldn't come in the color I wanted.  She then told me that I am an "eye-phobic" because I have a hard time having things close to my eye and that contacts would probably be out of the question anyway.

I was heartbroken.  I'd been talking myself up about changing my eye color for weeks now and because of an involuntary hang-up I have I wouldn't be able to get what I so desired.  Unfortunately for the doctor, I had a lightning strike of an idea that seemed just crazy enough for it to work.

Though the insurance wouldn't pay for it, I could get non-prescription contacts in the color I want and just wear the glasses as normal.  She actually told me that that would be silly, but I told her I wasn't going to let anything stand in the way of my progress.  

Luckily, the office manager (or whatever she was who took my information and did all the logistical work) was much better at customer service than the doctor.  Though she was confused at first, (since I'm sure they don't get many requests like this) she quickly explained my options and told me that as long as I could prove I could get them in my eyes I could get the non-prescription cosmetic lenses I so desperately wanted.

She even gave me some special solution (what they use for hard contacts) because it's viscus enough to simulate the feel of a contact touching my eye.  I also went onto the web to find ways that have helped people like myself get contacts in.  I think I may have found a sure-fire way (practiced it and it seemed to work well) of getting the contacts in.

My appointment is Noon on Monday and though I'm kinda scared I won't get it, which would cause a major setback in my plans, I'm determined to make this change and do whatever it takes to get there.

Luckily, I still have all day tomorrow to practice with the solution.  With any luck I'll stick it to the doctor and get them in within the timeframe easily.  That'll be an added bonus.  If not, i get unlimited tries.  So however long it takes, that's how long it takes.

Persistence is key.  Thank goodness I'm like a pitbull when I really want something...

Day 1 - 1/1/2009

This seems like as good a time as any to start living the life I choose.  It's the start of a brand new year.  We have a new president who will, hopefully, start to fix this country.  It sounds like the perfect time to fix me as well.

I've decided to put this on the web, not because I want sympathy, help, or even support.  I'm doing this for me because while this is on the web, there is the possibility of other people reading it, and that holds me accountable.  There, now that that's out of the way, let us begin in earnest.

It is January 1st 2009 and I am at a pretty low point in my life.  I can't say it's the lowest point.  I have a lot of things to be thankful for, but there are still way too many parts of my life I want changed.  I weigh more now than I ever have.  And this is now the 9th year (before I turned 18 doesn't count) that I not only didn't have someone to kiss on New Years, but haven't dated anyone at all.  I'm going to be 27 in June and with the universe as my witness, I demand this year will be the turning point in my life.

I've got a lot of changes planned.  I've been working for the last month at losing weight.  It's going well enough, but after a major lapse at Christmas and New Years, I've decided that today is the new Day 1.  This means that I now have 22 weeks until my Birthday and my first goal date.  The goal is to get down to 200lbs by June 4th.  This means 45.8lbs will be shed in 22 weeks.  Once I reach that goal, a new goal will be set to reach 150lbs by Dec 31st, giving me 30 weeks to shed the remaining 50lbs.

Along with my weight loss, comes a myriad of other changes.  I chopped off my long hair before the end of last year, so that was one major change down.  Soon, my goals to transform my body will begin by changing both my hair and eye colors.  I've begun changing my wardrobe, having thrown out almost all of my older, less attractive clothes (keeping a few notable exceptions as exercise wear).  

My body isn't the only thing getting an overhaul.  My personality is also getting altered.  Though there are aspects of who I am that I enjoy, there are many I do not.  I will be systematically taking steps to remove the self-indulgent, pining about how my life was before my accident, stop living in the past, and become less dark in my personality.  Though the darkness was a friend to me growing up, it isn't who I want to be anymore.  

Now, you might be asking yourself, what is prompting this, Pete?  Or as my friend so aptly asked me last night, "What, Pete? Don't you like yourself?"

Of course I lied saying that I did, but that I just wanted to change, and that seemed enough for her but it wasn't the truth.  The truth is, I don't like myself.  I never had.  Up to this point, what people saw was a carefully crafted facade.  Even after coming to Texas, and having the chance to "Start Over" I'd been so used to the fake me, that many of the same old lines, same acts began to take shape again.  And before I knew it, I was back deep within the walls of my gilded shell that I used to protect the real me from the world.  

I came off as warm and welcoming, though a bit dark and rough around the edges.  Always laughing and quick to use self-depreciating humor to make people think I was comfortable in my own skin, each jibe I took at myself was like a knife planted squarely into my own back.  The tough, silly, angry, gay NYer.  That's how people at work see me.  Yet none of those epithets really fit.  Ok, the last one does, but the rest don't.  

I'm tired of not living my life as Me and I'm tired of not living on my own terms.  Well I'm going to be changing that.  I'm going to be changing all of that.  It starts here and it starts now.    

Day 1 - I ate poorly today, but I was able to go an entire hour on the treadmill, level 15 incline at 2.4 mph so overall I'm not disappointed.  Tomorrow will be a better day.

Starting Measurements

1/1/2009                Current  Goal     Difference to Goal

Weight                    255.8lbs 200lbs 55.8lbs

Upperbody            50"         46"      4"

Chest                45"        42"      3"

Upper Arms          16.25"     15"        1.25"

Forearms          12.25"     11"        1.25"

Upper Stomach 41"         36"       5"

Navel Line        48"         36"      12"

Waist                43.5"       34"      9.5"

Hips                  50"         38"      12"

Thighs              30"         26"      4"

Calves              19"          17"       2"

BMI                  43.9        34.3    9.6