Before I go any further with my blog postings, I need to offer up fair warning that the stories I tell are simply the stories I remember.  That caveat should protect me from the need to redress my many omissions and errors.  The people, places, moments, circumstances, outcomes, and just about all of the recollections of my past have a way of fitting the narrative – if not always fitting the facts.  So it goes.

Another year has rushed to conclusion, and although they get shorter as I grow older, I haven’t had a year with so much going on since 1997.  The big difference between 1997 and 2014, however, is that 2014 was all good.  But I won’t bother kicking 1997 around [because without it and all the chaos it caused, I definitely wouldn’t have the friends, businesses, or opportunities that I enjoy today].

But I don’t want to dwell on all the good fortune that 2014 brought us, I just want to take this opportunity to aggravate all the people that have given me a hard time over the years.  Let’s start with the biggest jerk I’ve ever had to deal with …

Aw, come on, you didn’t really think I would go there, did you?  We all have our list of betes noires [and I know I’m on my fair share of them], but they’re best forgotten – because nothing annoys them more than being irrelevant.  Maybe when I’m 100, we’ll see what I remember.  Until then, I’ll just let an incredible 2014 bother them [on the outside chance that they even notice or care].

Enjoying your life is the only revenge that actually feels good [so I don’t bother serving up anything else].

I was always looking forward to Fr. Sturm’s 100th birthday because he promised to ‘tell all’ [or at least all I wanted to know about his women over the years and Jesuit mysticism].  Right now, he’s probably shaking his head, troubled by how he is ever going to get me into heaven.  I wonder if getting me in is going to be as hard as it was for Fr. Nagle to get me into BC?  But never sell the Jesuits short.  I’m still counting on John, just in case there really is a heaven.

While I was up north for Christmas, I ran into a few people that I told the most well-intentioned but absurd stories to.  Realizing that I jumbled the names and events of most of my tales, I feel the need to tell everyone I talked to while I was home to forget everything I told them.  I’d be better off telling stories like my brother-in-law Bob.  He’d just make up the most ridiculous shit and then sell it with a straight face.  When he was building his REIT and getting ready to take it public, he’d tell people he was retiring to a pig farm he bought in Alden.  And then there were his Hollywood starlet stories … I miss Bob.  I miss the people that made me laugh the most – and Bob definitely made me laugh.

I had a chance to go down memory lane at Giancarlo’s with a couple of alumnae of Nottingham High School.  Nottingham was an all-girls high school, and it was in a class by itself.  My date for both my junior and senior year proms was the lovely ballerina, Nancy Galeota, but I don’t think I’ve talked to her since her senior prom.  I was a freshman in college, and although I came home for her big night [she was class president], I wouldn’t go to the after-prom party.  I’m pretty sure she did ok at the party without me but then again, my recollections betray me.  Anyway, I got to telling stories about hanging out at Cole’s back in the day, and I’m certain that it was a mangled remembrance at best.  Forgive me.  But it did jog my memory enough to recall that I was briefly and hopelessly in love with Molly O’Connell, the most beautiful girl that ever walked the halls of Nottingham, maybe.

For the past few days, Amanda and I have been spending time with some new friends from Buffalo.  Once again, I am sitting here thinking of the narrative I offered up over a couple of really enjoyable dinners, and I am hoping I was both accurate and kind.  At least when I write something, I have the opportunity to look it over [several times], but when I’m rolling along about the past, it’s just a stream of consciousness that Wittgenstein might be proud of, but with little merit beyond its possible thought-provoking value.  And while I can live with my inaccuracies, my real disappointment comes with being inadvertently spiteful or bitter in any of my remembrances.  I just don’t see the past that way [but there is this one asshole who wrote a book …].

As for 2014, what I remember most is that I worked really hard, Skyped for hours a day, got really fat, and was of value to my partners in a variety of endeavors [especially the FedCloud Ecosystem].  So, accordingly, my next post about 2015 will include not working as much, getting fit, and building on the value and opportunities we created in 2014.

…  and if you really want to see my list, you’ll need the password.