I was taking my daily walk talking to myself as I always do. It turned into an 11 mile walk and I called it the Thesis Walk 2012.  I guess its a thesis of walking and talking to myself 

The thought was about being in a situation and determining if you remain or leave. 

I will describe my situation (two neighbors and son).  

We lived between two assholes. One was a prissy HomeDepot worker who knew everything about home improvement and well you didn't. He liked to get together with the other asshole. This other asshole got mad that our dog barked. Instead of talking to us (she was barky but had a bark color) he threatened me when I was with my infant son standing at the window of my house. He just had an off vibe about him and I grew to hate everything about him, I even hated his name.  Then Prissy asshole moves out and rents his house to some white trash people who single handedly kept the camel brand alive. Add endless ghetto basket ball games trash on the ground and several calls to the police.  

We could have put the house up for sale and moved or gutted it out. Or would you call it grinding it out? At what point do you value your time here on earth more than putting up with these shitholes? Eventually the white trash had to move when the house was sold and we got some great neighbors. Finally asshole #1's wife's father died and they moved into his house and sold, again great new neighbor. 

Second story 

My son hated going to high school (of course that is my impression, I am sure there are things he liked) for me everyday was a guess on whether he would go or not. He was in demanding classes and normally got good grades, until he didn't.  I posted to Reddit and people responded. Save your health and sanity, have him take the exit exam, which he did after his sophomore year. 

Then eventually imbued with the responsibility of  self and after one or two missteps he enrolled in college and is progressing. 

As I walked and looked at Mount Diablo and the coastal range, I started to ponder, do I value my time?

Of course selling a house because the two neighbors are horrible is a slightly bigger ask than graduating/getting out of high school but I am never going to get those years back of anger and coming home from a day at work to an unenjoyable environment. 

I question why I chose to accept this at all?  I realized that I view myself, my personality as a grinder. I learn by repetition and I feel like the titanic. Very subtle changes to the rudder result in slow changes in trajectory. But then again that is just the story I tell myself about myself. 

Mount Diablo, but you can't see it. You can see the Blackberry brambles!