I don’t have the most amazing life out there and certainly, it could be improved upon in many areas. I’m not the tallest, best looking, get to travel as much as I’d like, could stand to lose 5…35 pounds and I don’t actually know where I’m going with this line (other than to counseling) but for this past weekend I feel as though I absolutely crushed life. To me, that doesn’t mean you have the nicest things, the best Internet-curated-life or to even necessarily do all of the things you want to do (bet it’d be fun though) but it means to live your life, your way, mindful of all the amazing things in it already.

This weekend we had the First-and-Last-Annual Officially Dumb event in Euless and it came about because one night I got drunk and wanted to do an event in Euless so I asked GORUCK and it was like some serious coin for a custom Light and lol nope not gonna happen. So I asked my homeboy David if he’d like to help me run a free event with all monies going to charity and I could have my friends come over and we’d do the dumb things together.

Initially I wanted it to be a small group of 6-8 people who would eventually hate life and everything in it but apparently that’s not a good marketing strategy (thanks Catrine!) so I expanded it and made it a little bit easier. By “made” I mean “hey Dave please don’t kill us k thx” and I guess he didn’t so we did the thing that I’d come to regret trying to do.

I say “regret” trying to run an event because one… I’m lazy. That’s pretty much it. I mean, there’s little to no work involved save for setting a date, time and having David coordinate the PT so I’m not sure what I was bitching about but according to Linda that’s in my wheelhouse.

I asked some peeps and a few said they were interested so after getting some pro-tips from Jimmie I decided to start this at 04:00 on Saturday (heat reasons) and people were like ‘nah’ and I was like ‘yah’ and so it was. So Friday night we were drinking all of the beers and knock on the door Cristina shows up from out of nowhere (Miami actually) and the night just gets more fun. She brings these hideous shirts that people have ordered and they are just as ugly as when she showed us proofs online but hey, friends are here! Sam and Jill show up from Tulsa and I actually don’t remember most of the night because I was hydrating with beers for the shenanigans about to ensue.

So the event details aren’t important because they almost never are but there was sweating, cursing my name, PT, beer, vomiting, carrying things, team building and low crawls with your hand behind your back!

I was like hey we are going to low crawl with our hands behind our back across this volleyball court. Patrick said to demonstrate so I started and then all eleven people were like “nah we’re good bro” and then they started kicking dirt on me. Then they grabbed my leg, pinned my hands behind my back, opened my shirt and shorts and dumped sand on me.

…?

 

So we endexed and covered five miles over five hours and it was absolutely fun. I spent quite a bit of time trying to enjoy my time with my friends who took the time out of their busy lives to come to my corner of the world sand spend some time with us. To be in the moment, as it were. Even when the moment meant digging dirt out of my shorts because that’s where they put the most of it. It was put there with love and not to be mean, right?

I got stole this from cadre Marcus where he said “family is the family you’re born with. Friends are the family you choose.” Kinda hokey but I can say unequivocally that I have a great family.

Thanks again to Nick, Tonya, Tonya’s brother whose name eludes me even though I asked him 10x, Duennael Gelorme, Madeline, Evan, David, Samantha, Patrick, Houy, Christina, Chase, Jill, Cristina best Ina and Sam. Well, except maybe the giant bear of a dude on the left. Just kidding Sam, you’re cool people.

So I guess living my life, my way, mindful and appreciative of the amazing things in it means to spend quality time with my friends forming great memories (save for Friday night). We ate, we drank, we did dumb things like PT in the middle of the night and ran backwards and well, just had a good time.
Thank you, each and every one of you. Those who came out, those who donated and those who inspire others to crush life. Shine on mofos!!

Also my friends inspired random strangers at a grocery store to stop and tell them they lived the shirts. litrly the worst shirts.