The Rabbit Hole - 6th Edition

Welcome back to The Rabbit Hole. Been a while.

Life Update: Seems like it’s been ages since we’ve caught up. To bring everyone up to speed, I was in Put-In-Bay last Tue-Wed for a work conference, which is why I wasn’t able to write an edition last week. It was a nice quick trip. I've always been a “stay in the hotel all vacation” type of guy, but here I was forced to be out and about which I enjoyed. I all of a sudden realized exploring new areas is a lot of fun. There was a phrase that had been bouncing around my head during my time there “loading new chunks.” Minecraft ball knowers know what that means. It’s the perfect phrase to apply to traveling to new areas. I now just want to load as many new chunks as I can throughout life. Simultaneously, I thought of a fire IG caption for the next time I explore a new area and want to share it.

A few pics from my stint there…

The travel of last week would only be just beginning as I took Friday off to drive up to Minocqua Wisconsin with my parents to visit my boo thang for the weekend! The drive-up was mostly a nightmare due to Walid’s erratic behavior (yelling at me because of my music choices, speeding tendencies, and anything else he could muster up). This was of course between him lighting up darts in the car and cracking his window a mere half-centimeter as a courtesy. Yep, the old man’s quite dreadful to be around these days but that couldn’t dampen my excitement to see Guntz once again this summer (thankfully this time for much longer than last month).

We had a blast up there, I’ll spare the details, and instead insert a few of my fave pics from the trip:

Now I’m aware this began as a friend group newsletter, but it’s about to get a bit simpy so if you’re not into that sort of thing feel free to scroll to the next section. This past weekend has just made me a bit reflective and this is my newsletter to share my life and it just so happens that Guntaaz is a very large part of my life. And I feel like we aren’t always vulnerable enough with each other regarding our relationships. Of course, you want to have privacy when it’s necessary but we need to start celebrating the positives in our lives more.

I’ve been underselling how great this weekend was. It was one of the best weekends of my life by far. Being so far from the person I care about most has been the biggest challenge I’ve ever faced. There’s a lot of sadness that comes with it and questions like “why us?”, but navigating it over these past couple of months has been a process that we’ve worked on together. There have been plenty of downs, but when you get ups like we did this past weekend, those storms are a lot easier to forget about and move on from. We talked a lot about how a blessing of long distance is how much more we now appreciate our time together. It reminds me of a Noah Kahan song called “If We Were Vampires.” That talks about the beauty of finality, and how the inevitability of death allows us to cherish the time we spend together. The song is a lot more dramatic than our circumstances, but I relate to it a lot in that way.

For the longest time, I thought I’d die alone (quite melodramatic I’m aware). For what it’s worth that was mostly in my teenage years when we had no concept of time and very little life experience. But seeing all of my peers get girlfriends and live the life I wanted so badly did quite the number on me in HS. Before G, I was terrified of women, and you guys can vouch for me, couldn’t dream of talking to them on a flirtatious level. Safe to say I wasn’t actively seeking out a girlfriend when I met her (especially not at work). But I felt a spark immediately but brushed it off quickly due to past experiences of not doing anything about my feelings—Until one day, I decided to shoot my shot and ask her on a date. The rest is self-explanatory, but one thing I wanted to touch on was this: getting into my first relationship has been the best thing to happen to me BUT it hasn’t been at all what I expected. Growing up, I was of the mindset that finding a S/O immediately erased all of your problems and made you instantly happier and your life 100x better from day one. That just isn’t reality. It’s a constant fire you have to feed to keep lit. It’s a kingdom that needs its castles renovated regularly to keep them from crashing down. I thought finding someone was the hard part. It turns out that was the simple one. You can only imagine how making that revelation put my 16-year-old self’s brain in a blender. A relationship can’t and won’t last without constant attention. Not just from one side. It needs to be from both. This may all sound like super basic stuff, but I’m a self-proclaimed late bloomer, and finding all of this out over the past 9 months has been world-opening for me.

All of this to say: Has falling in love been exactly what I expected? No, but I’m so grateful to have been through it. And I’m sure there’s a lot more that will surprise me as I navigate this thing. I welcome all the learning experiences that are to come. And having someone to do that alongside means the absolute world to me.

I hope this doesn’t come off as bragging or rubbing my relationship in the faces of the singles who will receive this letter. Because I think a lot of what I talked about above can apply to maintaining our relationship with ourselves as well. Taking the necessary steps regularly to ensure we are on the trajectory we want to be on. These years that we’ve both been through in college and are about to go through post-grad are some of the most informative years of our lives. Thinking about where we’d like to see ourselves as individuals in the coming years. The perpetual questions from family members of “What are you doing after college?” aren’t slowing down. The anxiety of the future is in full effect. The same future we once envisioned as teenagers is about to begin taking shape over the next couple of years which is equally terrifying and exciting. I want us to remember that we’re all going through the same things at the same time. I’ve struggled so much with comparison my entire life. I think I’m finally getting over that fear, but it still looms inside me. As hard as it is to shake we all have to realize no one’s path to their goals looks the same as yours. No one else’s success will match or reflect your own. Be happy for your friends when they win, but don’t get discouraged if you aren’t matching their strides. I know better than anyone how easy it is to get caught up in the rat race of superficial success. Taking this month off from social media is a massive reason I’ve found a bit of inner peace, but by no means has it subsided completely. Tomorrow will mark 1 month clean from it but I’ll probably download Instagram and still see people posting lives I wish I was living. Or things I wish I had. We all just need to constantly remind ourselves that we’re doing great, and we’ll all end up exactly where we need to be. Maybe it’s taking longer than you expected. Maybe it will sneak up on you. It took me 20 years to fall in love. Maybe it will take 20 more to find my place in life. Regardless, I know I’ll find it. And so will you. You’re doing amazing. You aren’t alone. You are loved. Life is crazy right now, you’re not meant to understand it. All you need to do is keep living it. One day at a time.

If any of you feel like you need someone to talk to about stuff like this or anything else, don’t hesitate to reach out.

I’m not sure what qualifies me to be giving this kind of advice. Looking back it’s probably more so therapy for myself. But I just wanted to share a bit of what I’ve been feeling lately. This brief interaction from the other week has stuck with me to this day for some reason. It was at Bill’s when Elanor was talking to Cam about his recent breakup. She repeated “We’re still so young” multiple times throughout the conversation and it struck me in a weird, unexpected way. It’s so simple but it’s so true. We’re still SO fucking young. It feels like we’ve been doing this for ages but we’ll realistically live 3 more of these “lifetimes.” What I mean is in 21 years, we’ll be 42. 21 years after that, we’ll be 63. 21 years after that, we’ll be 84, and you could live past even that who knows? It’s important to remember life isn’t guaranteed, but It’s equally as important to remember how much more we have to see, and experience. I’ll throw a niche movie reference at you to close. Last year’s Asteroid City was one of the most profoundly impactful movies I’ve ever seen. This scene is the one that never fails to bring me to tears. I feel it most accurately depicts my feelings in this article.

I still don’t understand the play.

It doesn’t matter, just keep telling the story.

The scene certainly makes more sense within the context of the film so this is my plead to all of you to go watch this movie preferably more than once. It isn’t for everyone but it’s deep up my alley.

I don't feel like doing my other segments after all that rambling. I can only hope at least one of you will take something from that. I didn’t sit down tonight planning on writing about this stuff but clearly, it’s been on my mind. I’m in my reflection and gratitude phase I suppose. but I do still owe you guys a spotlight so let’s get into that!

Rabbit Spotlight: Jmart

Q: What is your favorite color?
A: Orange

Q: What is your favorite food?
A: Steak, cooked medium

Q: What is your favorite Rabbit bit? (past or present)
A: When Chris showed up to the movies in his who let the dogs outfit

Q: What is your fondest memory involving the Rabbits?
A: Dealing with Pete the pizza guy with Cam being high

Q: What is your favorite trip you’ve been on with the Rabbits?
A: Farwell, may be controversial but I love a chill trip

Q: What are your hopes for the Rabbits in the future?
A: That we all continue to stay close friends even after college

Q: Is there anything else you’d like to add about our awesome friend group?
A: Tryouts for WRU’s football team start next week, reach out to coach Cam for additional details

Thank you Jmart for the insightful responses. If anyone read this whole thing, let me know and I’ll adjust my rabbit rankings accordingly. JK!