freedom, and other day-off musings

recently, i've been re-watching Friends and reliving what it was like to wonder about the future and be good-scared about the possibilities that can happen; knowing that even though i may not like my life circumstances, everything will turn out for the best. of course, i end up feeling a little bit restless, feeling like i should be doing more with my life, and also feeling like I ought to be living more, like putting more quality into my life. i don't know if that means that I ought to travel more or pursue other careers or go back to school or even just read more. I just know that the way my life is heading right now, i will not remain content for too long. I am approaching that time of year (fall) when I feel the most restless for change and in which season i have experienced the most change in my life.
despite all this, though, i can say that I am currently content. i don't have a hard life. my paychecks pay for my bills. my job is not that hard. and i have the ability to travel and do "luxury" things though more conservatively than i've done in the past.
today, mark and i tried out a new to our area steak restaurant, and had the luxury to eat in the middle of the day because it was our day off. my company didn't have to take out health benefits from this paycheck, so I had the ability to treat us a little bit with this paycheck. we also went out to Culver's and had some dessert after a day of errands, and are about to watch a movie at home. these are not the activities of people in extreme need; we are thankful that we have these days to be able to take off from work, relax and reflect on how wonderful our life is. even though we're living in a half finished house and we may not have the most complete furnishings ever, we are still fortunate and lucky with what we do have. Besides, it's hard to feel downtrodden laughing with each other so often.
Which is why i'm so glad to be living in the time of blogs and facebooks and iphones. i used to have a fear of losing my memories and would need to compulsively write out every moment and thought of my life into a journal, else i would forget something important that I would want to remember in the future. turns out, taking pictures of food or people or signs can impart more meaning than pages in a journal. and the act of compressing my thoughts into little status updates is a fun way for me to share random moments that are seemingly unimportant, but serve to engage long lost loved ones into an aspect of my life that they otherwise couldn't have been a part of.
i'm thankful for my freedoms. for my job. for my iphone. and for my computer. God bless America.