www.chrisdarbro.com - Chris Darbro

“…I played the game by all the rules, But now my world’s a deeper blue, I’m sadder, but I’m
wiser too”

Oh boy, it’s been a up and down month, lot of fun things, lot of not
so fun things. But you all know me, what doesnt kill me makes me
stronger, things can get me down, but they never break my spirit or
pride. My job hunt came to an end temporarily, though I wont say where
it is i’m working, suffice to say I *shouldnt* be there too long. Went
to San Diego for ToorCon 7, that was a blast. I’d never *officially*
been to san diego before, so it was exciting. I met up with some great
friends, got to see some great classes/presentations, went to some
fun VIP parties and things, It was outrageous. I came back with more
money than I had when I left, and more possessions as well, so that’s
always a bonus. haha. It really was a great time, and I’m definately
gonna try to go back again next year. I even got to see someone I went
to high school with that I hadnt seen since we graduated. I was going
to this party at this restaurant/club near the gaslamp district in
san diego, and shortly after I walk in the door I hear someone yell
“Chris!”, and I look over and it’s one of the waitresses. I was really
confused, partly because I didnt recognize this person at first, and
also it was the first time I heard someone call me chris down there,
since everyone always calls me by one of my nicknames. I walk up to her
and am looking at her and she says ‘chris? did you go to tooele?’ Now
my interest is really peaked, because not only had she asked that, but
she even pronounced ‘tooele’ correctly. All of a sudden it hit me like
a ton of bricks and I sat there for a second in awe. It was Jacy Bell,
a girl I graduated with. What kind of crazy luck we bump into each
other in san diego, and she just happens to be working at the club I’m
at, at the time I’m there. Crazy huh? So we talked a little, and she
was looking even more beautiful than she did back in highschool. It was
one of the many things that night that made my night.

Anyway, the flight back home was alright, I started work the day after
I got back, then saturday after that went to the X96 Big Ass Show.
I had to go, part of it was it was tradition, and part of it was there
were some really awesome bands this year. I met up with some friends
there and we had a great time. All the bands were awesome, there was
hawthorne heights, 30 seconds to mars, the used, our lady peace, story
of the year,rise against, the bravery, all american rejects, and quite
a few others that I cant even bring myself to remember right now. It
was a great show. I even won some concert tickets while I was there to
go see franz ferdinand at the grand reopening of salt air. I went to
that the other night with nate and amanda, it was a great show as well.

Outside of that, life’s been alright lately I suppose, I’ve learned to
not say that it sucks, even when it sometimes does, because I know
there’s always someone that has it worse than me, and I’m quite thankful
for everything and everyone I have in my life. I’ve learned to try to
not let the little things bother me so much. like an old friend who
get’s pissed at me because she pushed me away, and is now upset that
finding her or saying hi to her or whatever the hell else isnt a
priority in any way for me anymore. but I wont get into that. I’ve been
doing lots of reading lately, and lot’s of thinking as well, which I
can never get enough of. hehe. I realized something interesting the
other day at work while thinking about my life and my past. Throughout
my life, when it comes to people I’ve dated, or been romantically
involved with in some way, even with some just really good friendships,
a lot of them have been with people that I tried to ’save’ in some way
or another. I’ve had this habit for years that if I see someone that
I know has something great to them, but is making a lot of mistakes, or
doing things that’ll ruin their life, etc, I feel compelled to jump in
and devote myself to saving these people from themselves, I can’t help
it. but I realized I cant always help everyone, as much as I’d like to.
I saw someone the other day I dated once, and now she’s a couple years
or whatever out of highschool, and she was now married and had a baby,
and I hate to say it like this, but it looked like she was living a
trailer-trash tooele kind of life. back when her and I were together,
I knew she had some tough times growing up, and she had told me how
she’d be raised and how she’d been treated or let herself be treated by
other guys. It was terrible. I wanted to show her how to let that go,
to not become victim to it, and show her how much she was capable of,
and she didnt need to let herself slip into a bad position. And now
it’s years later and she’s in that position, locked into a life now
that she cant do anything about, prevented from having something
greater and better out of life, and more happiness than that. It kinda
hurt to see. I can think of one main person off the top of my head
that I dated that wasnt a ‘charity case’ in any way, and her and I
had something great for a long time, and I think part of that aspect
of me rubbed off on her. Despite a lot of the bad positions she’s put
herself in that she does or doesnt realize, I do notice that with the
guys she is with, she tries to save them from themselves, whether it
be they have drug problems or whatever. In fact, she succeeded quite
well at that once upon a time, but I never told her. I’ve never much
mentioned this to anyone till now, but it’s a mistake of my past, and
I’ve moved on, grown wiser, stronger and left it behind… A few years
ago I had some problems of my own. Some of them included drugs. I’m
ashamed of it. Ive been clean for over 2 years now, and I know I’ll
never do them again. I hadnt seen her for a while, (this was long before
we started to date mind you, she was just by best friend at the time),
and I was moving back to utah. I knew I’d see her again. And she was
amazing, inspiring, and I cared very deeply as a friend for her. And one
day it hit me. What would she think if she saw me like this? what would
she think of me? I couldnt bear it. I cared about the friendship I had
with her too damn much. And that was powerful enough to say right then
and there, “i quit, im done. this doesnt benefit me in anyway, and
doesnt just hurt me, but will hurt the ones I love and care about.” and
I stopped, just like that. no excuses, no ‘well, I’ll take it down step
by step’, etc. I was stronger than that, and I knew it, and wasnt going
to let anything stand in my way. I told myself that was it. I didnt want
her to ever see me like that, and I didnt want to ever be some guy
hurting or breaking her heart inside by making excuses about it, and
having her have to see or deal with that. I dont think I ever told her
about it. I was scared to. god was I scared. come back and ‘hey, guess
what? I had some problems, turned to a life of drugs and things, had a
problem, and now it’s ok, Im clean now because of you and how much I
care!, wanna go grab lunch?” haha. yeah. I could see that scaring the
shit out of her. I kept it in, it always being a constant reminder of
how strong my character is since then, all the way to today. Maybe that
was one of the little experiences that turned me into who I am today.
Ive always had a big heart, Ive always put helping others above my own
self most of the time, but that was something else that just added to
that. But now I realize I can’t always help everyone. There are times
where it’s in my interest to just let those people go and move on,
as much as I dont want to sometimes. I guess there’s just no helping
people who wont take the time to help themselves. Including the ones
that dont know they need it, if only because they might be too far
gone to bother to really listen and absorb what you’re trying to help
them with. It’s definately been pointed out to me that I need to
actually start being a little selfish and do more for me, and I kinda
agree. I can definately say I am happy at who I truly am, and everyday
shapes the philantropist I truly hope I can be of tomorrow.

Anyway, enough of my self thoughts and babble. The first episode of
this season of smallville just got done downloading, so I think im
gonna go watch that for a while. Hope everyone is doing well.

BY THE WAY…. There’s a bunch of new pics up in the gallery, just click
on gallery, and you should be able to navigate to all the new september
pics I posted up. Neato eh?

So, here’s the deal. Ive got some tickets for the Franz Ferdinand
concert @ SaltAir wednesday night (09/28), and im lookin for a date to
go with. So if anyone’s interested in checking them out, drop me a line
before wednesday afternoon and let me know!

I’ve known about this for a while now, but I got my official email
about it today, which reads as follows:

“Congratulations you are the winner of the 08/29 - 12:20 Xbox 360
sweepstakes brought to you by Mountain Dew. You will receive your Xbox
360 before it’s available in-stores and will need to provide a signature
when it’s delivered. The Xbox 360 is being released later this year in
2005, once the delivery date is confirmed we will post it in your
account history so please check back periodically.

In the meantime, during the next few weeks be on the look out for a
Party in the Box package from Mountain Dew and Xbox, which includes
Hats, T-Shirts, coupons, invitations and more.

Congratulations and Thank you for participating in the Every 10
minutes sweepstakes!”

Pretty cool I thinks.