Patrick McDowell's Blog

My 2008 Year in Review

By Patrick McDowell|Personal

I plan to give a brief overview of my 2008 year, what happened, and what things mean something to me. I’m doing this partially for myself, and partially for those who care. I hope this will help digest what happened, and allow me to move ahead stronger in 2009.

Alright so January 2008… well at this point I have been living with my mother and Mike for about 4 months. I suppose the biggest thing to happen this month was me finally being motivated enough to get a job. So a job I got, working part-time as a dishwasher at a place called Village Pizza & Grill in Ashland, NH. I was still without a license at this point so it was about a 2 mile walk to work between four and five days a week. I should back up and say the reason I got this job in the first place was because I was trying to move back to NC to be with my girlfriend (at the time) Marian.

So I started as a dishwasher, walking many a cold NH winter night to work and back. The cold didn’t bother me so much though honestly… I was just excited to be working. I felt motivated again, especially after my first pay check. Plus that Christmas before my mother bought me an iPod nano (3G), so that made the trips a bit more tolerable.

It was at this place that I met probably the single greatest influence in my life that entire year. His name was Tony Tsetseris, and man I have never met a kid with so much energy. He was 23 years old, and owned the place I was working (which I should note was part of a bigger “chain” of restaurants all owned by this one Greek family). Right from the start we bonded, and during our time there together we became close friends.

I kept up the work ethics my father taught me, and the raises kept coming. Within a few months I was moved up to the kitchen, where I started doing the oven, answering phones, making subs and pizzas, and even a bit of cooking. It is fun and all, but it wasn’t for me. Luckily I realised that very early on, so I started seeking alternative means of financing. Thats when I started learning SEO (search Engine Optomisation), web development, and the likes.

So as the winter progressed, Marian continued coming for visits. I started feeling really bad after a while… I wasn’t making the money I needed to move, and I hated not being there with her. We started to drift apart, or at least I did. I don’t care who you are, two years of being long distance can take quite a toll on anyones relationship. Regardless though, we pushed on.

So summer started coming around. At some point or another, my mother came into the money that was left to her by her parents. And as she promised me, she gave me the money to hire a lawyer to get my license back. Two weeks later I was eligible, and on June 10th 2008 I was driving again. You have no idea how good that felt… a couple weeks later I purchased a car from a local dealer, a 1998 Chevy Cavalier. It’s a small four cylinder coupe, but it serves its purpose. It’s also the first thing I have ever financed in my life, and because of it I am starting to establish credit

Sometime around this point my mother opened up a bead shop on Main Street in Plymouth, NH. It’s pretty well established now and is officially titled Cool Beads! Studio. On June 22nd my 21st birthday rolled around, and I went out drinking with Tony for my first time. I don’t even remember how much we drank… but I do know that it was a three figure bar tab by the time we finished, and my Irish name seems to hold true to the stereotype.

In July my cat Shiva became pregnant… somewhat my fault for not spaying her, although it was on purpose. But nature has its own plans and she found her way out of the house. Some time latter she gave birth to four kittens. Luckily I only got stuck with one of them. My mother has one, and two others I was able to give away. I also bought my first gun, and started shooting it on a regular basis. A Hi-Point 9mm. And for the record, yes it’s a great little gun. I even went to the sheriffs office and was approved for a Concealed Carry License. For the next 3 months or so I carried it on me everywhere I went. After a while it started to become a burden though… and when I started working out I didn’t really “need” to carry it for self defense. Although that was never really my reasoning anyway. I mostly just carried it because I belive in us as Americans to be able to.

I should mention that around this time, Marian and I broke up. That took a huge emotional toll on me, and took a while to recover from. When you loose someone, everything around you becomes a memory. The pillow, the candle, the jacket, the tree… unfortunately to move on from it, your brain has to process the memory one last time. After I dealt with it, I met my current girlfriend Carolyn. Well I should say we met before that… but I didn’t ask her out until September.

Carolyn… she is a gift. She is gorgeous, she is smarter than I am (which takes a lot for me to say!), she has the same hobbies, interests, everything! She is even a gamer! She is damn near perfect. She even has the same objectional output on life. But we are also just different for us not to get on each others nerves. She tends to be on the passive side of things, which is my opposite… but I suppose thats good because we balance each other out. We started our anime buisness together, and she was a big help in making that successful.

Around this part of the year, Tony passed away. But I should back up. He bought an BMW M3 a couple months before this. An absolutely beautiful car, and amazingly powerful. He even installed a cold air intake, and more effecient exaust to squeeze out as much horsepower as he could. He loved that car with a passion. Unfortunately he was out racing one night on a very windy road in Tilton. Nobody knows how it happened, but he crashed head first into a tree. He, along with his friend Richard, died instantly. There was another car involved, but that kid survived, although his Lexus was totalled. He was following Tony, and aparently the crash happened on a curve. Now like I said nobody is sure, but I know Tony, and I know what he can handle. The police have said they think the crash happened at about 90 MPH, and the way the scene was laid out, I think the kid following may have bumped Tony’s car on a high speed turn, and thats what caused it. But of course… he isn’t talking. It’s just speculation anyway.

Tony was the most energetic person I have ever met. He had so much drive and stamina it was unbelivable. He worked hard, and enjoyed life to the fullest. He had so much knowlege and always was after more. He cared, and he helped so many people get back on there feet. He was strict, but merciful. To give you an example of his typical day… he would wake up early, go have breakfast with his family, come to work (at Village), take a break in the afternoon to help his father build a house, come back to work, go out to clubs and bars at night to socialize, than go home and work on his car. And he would do it again the next day, and HE NEVER WAS TIRED, as long as he was moving. His theory was that your mind has direct control over your body, and instead of listening what your body wants, you should keep your mind in control. His life was living proof that theory holds value. He will never be forgotten by me. Since his death, I have adopted that theory, and I have never been doing so much better.

After Tony’s funeral we opened shop back up. I started getting close to his sister Suzy, as well as one of the cooks there named Mike. Carolyn and I started hagning out with Mike and his fiancee Beth more and more, and since we have became pretty close. Mike is a painter, and a good one at that. I like his work anyway… you can see some of it here. Suzy and I for the longest time have had a very interesting relationship, but she will go down as being someone I will never forget. I am also close with another cook there named John. Mike, John, and I try to go out for beers every Satarday night. Most times someone else comes along too though.

That’s pretty much where I am at right now. (I didn’t really mention too much about internet marketing and SEO, which is a big part of my life, but I wanted to keep this on a more personal level.) I plan on moving back to North Carolina with Carolyn come Febuary. The biggest reason for the move is something I have learned this year, and that is the importance of family. I want to be in my brothers and sisters lives before they grow up, and I cant do that 800 miles away. Plus the climate change is not going to kill me! This state is just too damn cold… plus the people hear generally have that “I’m just here to survive” mentality, and that is discouraging to me. I need to live in an environment that is going to push me to be successful, in order to be it. Raleigh seems to be a good place to start, although I can’t wait to move to a tropical island

And that is where I am at as of January 1st 2009.