Around a year ago, I thought to treat myself to a 70 inch TV. I was just starting to get pretty deep into web development and writing code, but I felt pretty cramped in the corner of my living room behind two computer monitors. I wanted to be more ‘open’, and I thought getting a big screen TV to serve as my computer monitor would help with that.

And it has.

I ordered the TV online, and waited a grueling week before it arrived. I took the fateful day off of work to make sure I was here for its delivery, and at around 11:30 in the morning I see a truck pull up. I’m sitting there in my window, alongside Rowboat as we both eagerly watch this ginormous dude pull an equally ginormous box from the truck and carry it up to my door on his back.

The guy sets the box down in my living room, where I notice a pretty decent sized dent in one of the corners. I apprehensively sign for the TV and the guy leaves. I open the box, and it’s very clear that the TV is damaged.

A wave of feeling passed over me as I realized something I was waiting for and so excited about arrives DOA at my doorstop after a week. It felt very symbolic. “This is how things turn out that you’re looking forward to, Albert. No use in even trying. This is life, for you.”

And I said, “Well, screw that.” So after being bent out of shape and dejected for a day, I asked my sister to go to Best Buy with me the next day. Damnit, I was getting that TV.

And so I bought another 70 inch TV that I’m using write now as I type this.

But I still had the broken one.

I went back and forth with the company I bought the busted TV from, who were surprisingly helpful. It was the shipping company that were being a bag of dicks about the whole thing. So the TV company asked me to hold on to the TV for a while while they sorted out the insurance claim. That was fine by me. They had already refunded me the money I paid for the TV without any hassle, so I felt it was the least I could do.

Three months pass.

I get an e-mail from the company, saying that the shipping company only wanted to give the TV company $300 as insurance payment, and that it cost them $500 to ship the TV out to me in the first place, so they were pretty much boned. They said I could just throw the TV out, or do whatever with it.

Case closed.

But this is a 70 inch friggin’ TV. In a big ass box, and is heavy as all get out. I wasn’t a 6’8″ Russian dude that could lug this thing out by myself. There’s only a handful of people I know around here that would help me carry the thing out, and I struggle with asking people for help or feeling like I deserve help from people. And I didn’t know what policy, if any, my place had about dropping ginormous size things off at the trash area.

So… I just kept it. In the box it came in. Ever since.

I leaned the box against a corner in my bedroom and it just became a fixture, obscuring the Speed Racer poster I bought that reminds me of watching cartoons and action movies with my dad on Friday nights as a kid.

It was the first thing I’d see every morning, and the last thing I’d see before I turned the lights out to go to bed. This reminder that when I try for things, it’s going to show up dead in a box while I was excited for it and anticipating it. That that was my life, and the result of all the requisite ambitions therein.

And in some ways, I had truly accepted that.

Imagine having a thought like that burrow into your mind, reach your subconscious, take root, and underscore every thought and action for a year or so. Have it compound with a lifetime of self-deprecation and self-loathing. Not exactly the most healthy thing ever, I’d argue.

I woke up this morning, did my exercise routine, fixed a cup of coffee, put on some jazz and started cleaning when I froze. I’ve been thinking a lot about what I can and can’t accept these days. From people. From things. From myself.

From that fucking dead TV sitting in the corner of my room.

I decided it was time for that damn thing to go. Originally, I had decided I would wait until tonight to try to get it out. I didn’t even know if I could do it by myself, and I didn’t want anyone to really see my take the thing out at all, let alone fail in the process.

But something in me said, “No. This damn thing is going now. Like, right now. And if someone sees you, who cares? What happens if they look at you? They laugh? They point at you? Do you know them? Do they know you? Does it REALLY matter what they say? Above all that, do you realistically think they even care enough to do anything more than glance your way and get back to living their life? Why are you overthinking this? Why have you been overthinking this for so long? What happens if you keep this thing here still? You concede to everything it’s come to represent. Do you think these hypothetical people you’re worried about are going to offer anything remotely approaching comfort? Do you think they care that you struggle with these thoughts? Is it really that big a deal to them? Why are you in your own way? Why enable this?”

Fair points. Fair points.

So, I found some tape, strapped down the open edges of this ridiculously sized box, and with no small amount of effort dragged that God forsaken dead TV out to the dumpster in broad daylight.

Some dude was getting groceries out of the back of his minivan. Looked right at me as I did before going on about his business. And, surprisingly enough (/sarcasm), the world didn’t explode. I didn’t die of humiliation. To be honest, I was too busy feeling jacked because I was able to lug that damn box out a lot easier than I had thought.

I let these thoughts weigh on my mind for a year, and it took me all of 15 minutes from start to finish to get that thing out of my house.

Now that’s something worth committing to memory.

Stop getting in your own way, Albert. You’ll never know what you’re capable of if you don’t try. And stop giving a shit about what people think when it comes to you doing something to better yourself.

Write that down.