After a year and a half of silence, I talked to my former girlfriend Meredith today. In 25 minutes we talked about college, family, new dates, and new adventures. She really is a special girl. I’ve always known that, and that I’ve loved her through prayer, even when I couldn’t talk to her. I hung up the phone and smiled, happy to reacquaint with a friend. Things aren’t perfect. If they were, then we’d still be together, but God has a plan, and I’m just living it out each day.

Tonight I watched another episode of “The Gauntlet.” I was happy to have Candyce over to support me through it. The plot was pretty fair. I got snapped at and didn’t make everyone a fan, but that’s what happens when you stand for something. They have 24 people to cover in 22 minutes, so it’s always a little victory just to get some camera time. There’s nothing worse than not being on a show that you are on. My favorite scene was me dancing wildly at a bar, right in front of a glowing sign that said, “Good.” I remember that night well. I dragged the camera guy over to shoot me having a good time while being good. All good.

Going on the show was intense and exhilarating. I miss that. When I was on the show, all I wanted to do was be at the beach with Candyce. Is the grass always greener on the other side?

Everyone left once the show was done. It took me two hours to plow through the mountain of mail on my desk. I opened envelopes and wrote checks and organized my life, if just for an evening. I confess that I am excited and bored as a newly-minted adult. I like my four-bedroom house, but it’s so boring to pay a mortgage. It’s fun to polish a pimped-out car, but painful writing the check for the insurance. A top-notch college education is rewarding, and they keep on taking my reward with every check I write to my student loans. I don’t know.

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Mother Teresa said you can do no great things, only small things with great love. I’m under the covers now, the fan spins and my laptop hums as I thunk away on the keys. It’s late and I can’t make sense of tonight, but I do know I’ve written this small journal with love. This weekend I’ll be in New York City. Next weekend I’ll be somewhere else. Until then, it’s just good to be here.

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Here’s a summary of tonight’s episode that I took from another section on the site:

Mission 4: Ice Scream
Everyone on the cast was trying to find out what Challenges we had next. We’d walk around Telluride and talk to locals. We followed the local newspapers. On this morning, the local paper ran an article about a new ice cream shop opening up, and I had a sick feeling it’d be an ice cream eating contest.

Strapped and Slopped

  • With the horde of us standing in front of the ice cream shop in downtown, we drew quite a crowd. People tried to get on camera, and the production assistants shooed people away.
  • When we walked down the stairs and saw the two boats of ice cream, and was excited and anxious. I don’t particularily like icecream, but I could do it. It sucked because we had two less people.
  • Both teams made their strategy, but in the end I knew it would become every man for himself. Every woman for herself.
  • Eating the ice cream was sick. I told myself I would not throw up.
  • I just kept plowing through the mound of frozen snot.
  • I took almost ten minutes to finish off the mess. Road Rules beat us by fifteen seconds.

Politics Shmoliticks:

  • The ride back to the house was pretty entertaining. This is a game of skill and athletics, but mostly a game of politics. So everyone was politicking. Why? Everyone was scared because we had yet another challenge where there was no clear winner.
  • I don’t remember what was going on with voting, but we’d gotten nowhere. For the second time in three competitions, I was the forced to place my vote. I didn’t like doing that, because I had to put my neck out there. I could be the leader of a revolution, or trigger backlash.
  • I like Elka. When I met her a couple years before, I loved spending time with her. She’s easy to like. But, she had an injured knee, so I placed my vote for her. That triggered a backlash. That’s okay though, because that’s what happens in a game like this. I dealt with it.
  • Things got messier. Finally, Rachel seemed strong and everyone rushed in for a quick vote. I didn’t feel good about it, but I hadn’t felt that good at any vote.
  • Selfishly, I was glad I wasn’t going to the Gauntlet, but I didn’t think Rachel should be the one to go.
  • When I lived in New York City, I crashed the RW house that was filming. They were in the last days of their stay, doing photo shoots and interviews. They had a beautiful place! It cost $40,000 a month to rent. It was in a cool part of town and oh was it big.

Hangman, Hang the Man:

  • Katie came up again for a vote, and so it was her and Rachel in The Gauntlet.
  • It didn’t last too long, maybe a few minutes. Katie couldn’t keep her grip and she fell into the water.
  • I was SO HAPPY Rachel won. She’d earned her stay on the team. That’s the redemption of the Gauntlet: if you win, you are a hero.
  • That night we went out dancing around town. The bouncer at the night club called out my name. It was Paul, my childhood friend from North Carolina. I hadn’t seen him in years, and here were on the other side of the country. So cool! We used to skateboard when we were in middle school. It was so perfect to be able to talk to him. When you are filming a show like The Gauntlet, you can forget your roots. But Paul told me he was proud of me. That meant everything to me.
  • Dancing Matt…that whole situation was funny. I saw the sign that said, “Good” and couldn’t miss the opportunity. I told the cameraman to film me in front of the sign, and I did my thang.
  • I didn’t realize Coral and Elka were toasting to my demise, but the two situations made for pretty good television. I don’t hold ill feelings towards either of them. You can’t be like that because no one wins in the end. It’s a game, people play it in different ways. I just kept my head high.