I resolve NOT to be a Toss Pot for 2012

It's almost the New Year of 2012. If you had stood in front of me 5 years ago and told me that I would be where I am now I would have said you were nutters. It's amazing how my life has changed and blossomed. The blending of the new and the old things in my life has been an amazing process. I'll say it again and again I truly am blessed.  A few highlights of the year 2011:
     I joined twitter.(@ladystrange73) adding one more social network to my cadre. I am finding it a challenge to express myself in 140 characters. I think it will help me learn the skill of being more honed in how I express myself.  It also doesn't hurt that with a few clicks I can support my friend Kelly by helping to promote her wonderful book "the Readheaded Stepchild" .
In one of my more surreal moments I actually have been chatting with the drummer of one of my very most favorite band Def Leppard.  It's amazing how technology brings us all closer together.
Mind you he's not a "friend" in the sense of the word but the exchange of ideas on vegetarianism, drumming , charity, etc. has been amazing. His charity Raven Drum Foundation does a lot of work with our veterans.
     I became a host mom to an exchange student. He is a great guy and I have really enjoyed getting to know him. I have new friends in Italy and I cannot wait to visit them. I have learned much about Italian culture ..now if I could just learn to speak fluent Italian. He tries to teach me but my inability to roll my "r" is quiet inhibiting.
It has been quiet fun being a contributor to international diplomacy. Having a teenager in the house has helped me remember what it was like to be starting out on the journey to adulthood.  It's wonderful to have laughter in my home.
     I had my 20ish high school class reunion and I reconnected with my roots. I got one of those rare second chance moments to "right some wrongs" with some people who had been casualties in some bad decisions I made after high school. That's the thing about great friends. No matter what they forgive and welcome you back in after they get through reminding you how dumb and stupid you were being at the time. Many tears of joy were shed that night (by me )and I felt the world shift and things were starting to really feel like they were getting back on the track where they should be.
     I got to see Def Leppard from the second row of the Sprint Center. I never had been closer than the nosebleeds at any Leppard concert before and to get to be close enough to almost touch them was heaven. I got to meet Phil Collen's lovely wife Helen,  an album cover signed by the guys, Guitar pick from Rick Savage (who liked my Sheffield Wednesday scarf) and I met Vivian Campbell and took a pic with him after the show (thanks to my new Concert buddy Marni).
  Back to the future. I already have my theme song "Undefeated " by Def Leppard  for 2012 (actually I adopted it in 2011 when Mirrorball came out) as I think it's quite appropriate. No matter what I'm always ready to get back up and go right back into the fray.
     Realizing that no matter what as long as I have my health , my faith and the ability to work the rest of it will fall into place as it should be. I will continue to grow and change and hopefully get a few more second chances to undo some mistakes of the past.
   So that being said I asked Rick Allen (@rickallenlive) last night on twitter if I could "borrow" his New Years resolution. He said "please do :)" so here it is. Summing it all up in one sentence. For 2012 "I resolve to try to not be a Toss Pot."

DJ Hero (not the game)

I was listening to one of our radio stations here in town last night Power 96.5  and one of my friends was on there about 16 hours ago and I was musing today on how much I admire him. He is currently on the BET show Master of the Mix  .  Danny or D.J.P (as he as known as in his profession) has always been focused on his goals and this has lead him to achieve his dreams. It's a great lesson in what pure determination and focus can do for you.
I first remember meeting him in Junior high he lived across the railroad tracks from me, this tall, bit hyper, skinny, dark headed white kid who was always getting in trouble on the school bus. Our bus driver was a cowboy boot wearing , pearl button plaid western shirt wearing woman named Marge. Marge had a voice rather like Mrs. Crabtree off of South Park. She said a lot of the same things too. Her favorite one was "DANNY SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP!" or something along those lines. Danny had (and still does) the ability to perfectly mimic her voice. Which would set all of us into uncontrollable laughter and her into uncontrollable rage.  I like to think of that as one of his first public performances.
Danny always has talked about being a professional DJ from the time I first met him. He has always been very good at marrying rhythmic bits and improvising on the go. He demonstrated this ability in a high school during a talent show (there is a great clip of this on his you tube channel) where he won the thing by performing a kick ass drum solo.
He and I were in band together on the percussion drum line. He was a snare drum player and snares (in our band) lead the cadences.  I was on the bass drum holding down the low end.   He was very creative in coming up with the cadences that we would play in between songs during marching band season. You could always count on him to improvise above the bass line and make it interesting. As we would walk the parade route everyone would always start moving and dancing as we passed by.
The first time I ever got to see him really DJ was at our senior Project Graduation. I sat up by him at his DJ booth all night long while he beat-boxed, scratched and mixed songs so that we could all dance. He of course demonstrated his mad breakin' skills. It's one of my best memories ever me an him talking, laughing and him displaying his talent for picking out just that right moment for transitioning over to the next tune. I remember asking him what he was going to do after graduation. He looked me straight in the eye and said " I'm going to be a DJ. I'm going to travel with guys who are on tour and be their DJ." He never wavered , he never doubted it.
After high school I went to college, got married and lost touch with Danny as he had traveled on to pursue his dreams. I next ran into him after I started working at DFS passing out public assistance. I was in my normal lunch spot, a tiny food place called the Rickshaw, when he spotted me and called out to me. I gave him a huge hug and he told me about his work space in a nearby downtown building. "I have thousands of records now" he said. "I've been traveling ."  I think he also mentioned the Rock Steady Crew .  I was in awe.  I said we should go out and have a beer. "You can have a beer" he laughed "I'll have a coke. I don't drink."   He invited me to come over to his work space sometime and being as I had an extremely jealous hubby I accepted the invite but never took him up on it. I kick myself a bit for that choice made out of fear now a days.
I followed him as he played around Springfield at the clubs and admired how he always stuck to his goals. I never went to see him play many times as my spouse was not into rap or that style of music at all. We would briefly reconnect in passing, fleetingly keeping in touch.
We really got back to it at our last class reunion( #20). Good god are we really that old? Anyway, we started off at Club Vegas on South Campbell he was spinnin' for us and of course he and the guys got out there and were break dancing. He still was full of energy. He was still a great dancer.
 He gave me a huge hug and now that I didn't have a jealous spouse I could accept it with comfort. We exchanged numbers and he let me and a couple other girls hang out with him up in the DJ booth.
 The next night we had our "fancy dinner" and about 10 or so of us from the old neighborhood caught another friends set out at Cody's south. If you haven't seen the ABC band with the Bedell's you are missing out .
 The whole gang went to breakfast where I sat with Danny and his assistant and caught up on things. He told me about the last 10 or so years of his life that I had missed out on . How he had migrated to Tulsa OK, Vegas and now was back in Springfield helping out his family, who ironically, still lived across the tracks from my grandma's house.
Then he linked me a the message about being on Master of the Mix . He's living his dream. I watch him on TV and I see that guy who looked me in the eye at Project Graduation our last night in high school and said "I'm going to be a DJ."  and I smile and think " You made it homie, you really did ".