barely insignificant

If I had known the graceful song I should know to slow down all the madness. I would have sung a whispered melody to calm you and keep you close. Lyrics from the ninth track on Lisbon, Torch Song. Slow down all the madness, that's exactly what you and him were thinking in chapter one. How did you two meet? It seems a long time ago now but that's what old couples say right? Before scones and afternoon tea. Do you still love the same things you used to love as a child?

Mystery Science Theater 3000, remember that? It was halfway through the laughably bad special effects that you realized you were bonding with him over a can of blue ribbon, before the hipsters had laid any claim to it. It's fun isn't it, flirting? Woozily romantic and all that before things get too heavy or too loud. All among these laughing faces, illuminated by the glare of the campy midnight movie.

Taking risks. Outside comfort zones. And I'm not talking about four strepsils at one go which makes you woozy for entirely different reasons. Was that the night you passed on a sore throat to him? It all seems so long ago doesn't it? Let's see, what else? Oh yes, the parks! I think the both of you had a worryingly untreated penchant for vandalism. What's in store for me in the direction I don't take? gaudily graffitied across the urban sprawl. Have you ever wondered about that? The direction you don't take? Is there really any point or will the myriad seemingly better possibilities just mess you up?

He's such a dreamboat isn't he? I'm pretty sure you were thinking that! Just as he was leaving and looking back at you with that sideways grin you knew so well. It's funny how beautiful people are when they're walking out the door. You left so many people, a million times. The irony hasn't been lost on anyone. You remember the windowsills, you'd perch on them with coffee in your hand and watch as he stared back. People flirt too much before they get heavy and not nearly enough after that.

Why such pretty memories? Don't be heavy, let's be light! you've told yourself a hundred times over. He's located in the song. You don't think about him during the most hurried of days and then it comes on. But I don't know the tune, it's a burden on my sorry soul. I don't have a clue, it's a weight upon my empty skull. I love seeing my old friends, I'm happy all at once, but then there's something else as well. Slow down pretty dreamer, I would have slowed. See the yards, tender goes, then it's up in wonder for all you know.

the moral instruments

the moral instruments, reflective and repetitious as the chinking chain clicks by

releasing its opaque catholic fumes as the altar refrains from spit and sputter

and the membrane holds aloft this paper thin, he it's always a he, eyes rooted upward

passes from his lips as the mass follows suit, following, oh yes they're very big on following

but less so on reason for reason would say that we value the experience which is shared

but no reason on this blistering of sundays, for it is divine oh sure and they repeat their shared divinity

how callous of me to refuse their hands, their eyes rolled back into sockets the tongues like crows

i who have perverted faith to furrow their brows on, they have practiced this i'm sure

and retooled it so those outside the little cliques may never understand, but i do and it terrifies

how faggots are shall we say not the correct term but fret not because they're due to cook anyway

another thing you get off on, light, but luminosity has been diluted by superstition

and the moral instruments clicked away, how lucky we are, how golden, how shamefully grateful we should be

for how could i love without being afraid, how could i be free without consequence, how could i believe when there is nothing to assure

yet the assurance is vapid, conditional on faith alone which makes you the king of what? oh yes, the ants of the hill

i don't mean to snark, we know how upset you'll get, but somehow through superhuman good will or stupidity you still offer your prayers

so pray on my behalf, brother, sister or whatever we claim to be, and i'll think on yours.

boxing day

That part of my brain which collects and time stamps memories must be growing a little faulty, so much has happened this year and I can barely keep track of the intermittent intertwining of both the special and the mundane. As always it levels out and I am able to choose certain specifics. Why choose to archive you ask? Especially since seasoned readers realize that I often extol the immediacy of experience, that present endeavors and future possibilities should outweigh the need for constant retrospection. Well the only excuse I have is one of sentimentality, after all, how many more times will I be able to gaze at the moon and her clouds for a change? Unhurried by the merriment around us, the gentleness, the subtlety and the occasional feline (christened Scratchy on that night) rubbing herself against our hands.

-

These are snapshots of living as well as loving, in scattered chronological order, whatever leaps into thought first, with the reminder that this is good, and this is real.


1) Unwrapping presents by the poolside. I could have received rocks and I wouldn't have cared. It's not the destination, it's the journey. Only half right. It's the passengers you bring along with you and I couldn't have been more blessed.


2) Laughing and sweating and screaming and crying all within a two hour span. Singing myself hoarse, smiling at people with nothing in common other than the shared somatic experience. Wandering around an empty park watching as they dismantled the lights and the metal as a little dream solidified itself in my mind.


3) It is your day. You are surrounded by friends. In the company of men as you called it. We've helped each other through our fair share of ups and downs, you said the biggest problems were the breakups. I laughed. We're both too cool to admit we care. Everything in our stride my friend, and everything on the chin.


4) We huddled together after the hours of prayers which ironically made us feel worse but seemed to cheer her up a little. I've never felt like a responsible person much less a brother, but if there's anyone I feel that for it's you.


5) Conversations that run deep into the night. And in between them the comfort of silence and the silence of comfort. I rack my brain for something more special but it eludes me. In everything, I wish you love.


Woven within these memories is the sense of discovery. Of self, of others, of the world around. The delirium, foolishness, boredom, exhilaration, confusion and wonder which has characterized this year. And perhaps most of all, excitement for all that is still to come.

bagels

Scene 1:

Scene one starts with both of us under the glowy shimmery lights, surrounded by the retro tapestry of Le Pure Cafe. Your fingersandpalms grasp the cappuccino mug but I'm not much of a coffee person so I'm sipping from a cup of peach tea although I suspect there's some ginger in it and I really wish the bored looking boy at the counter with the Sonic Youth t-shirt had told me about the rogue ingredient pre-purchase. Also, the menu looks something like this although the font was really nice but I can't translate that right now:

________________________________________

BAGELS 

1. Sesame Bagel - $1.50

2. Sour Cream Bagel - $ 2.00

3. Cream Cheese Bagel - $2.00

4. Savory Bacon Bagel - $3.00

5. Chocolate Bagel - $2.00

6. Green Tea Bagel - $2.00

7. Coffee Bagel - $2.00

8. Ordinary Bagel - $1.00

_________________________________________


Scene 2:

Scene two is characterized by the usual bout of indecision I struggle with on a daily basis and after MORE DELIBERATION! than it should fundamentally take, I settle for a large Sour Cream Bagel which costs an additional $1.00 and I think this is fair because the diameter has increased greatly. In the same amount of time, although I am fairly certain it was a few seconds longer, you nominate the Sesame Bagel for consumption and we settle down into chairs that look comfier than they actually are. We almost get through half our bagels and a third of our beverages before a random urge, okay I was actually biding my time so random is just an excuse, overtakes me and I blurt out:

"How much do you love me?" (a simple question I've heard many times in movies but they don't tell you how hard and icky it is to say in real life without a script or a second take)

You chew the moderately sized Sesame Bagel in your mouth for an eternity (in real time: 2.73 seconds) and take your own sweet time sipping on the cappuccino (in real time: 1.81 seconds) before addressing the question with the swipe of a half eaten bagel: "I love you moderately" you say, chuckling to yourself at the incredulous question and in hindsight it probably deserved no more than the wind-out-of-your-sails, no-point-holding-your breath answer you gave me.

"Why only moderately?" I ask. I like the tone of my voice as I say this because it matches the playful intonation of yours and because it means you probably can't tell that I was looking for a slightly more whelming answer.

"Well if I love you gigantically, like that big bagel in your hand. If I love you like that big bagel instead of my moderately sized one will you be happy?"

"Probably happier than if you loved me like the moderately sized bagel to be honest"

"Well you see you can't even finish your bagel. It looks delicious and fun behind the glass, glazing and gleaming more than the moderately sized bagels and you could swear it whispered come eat me but you can't even finish it now"

This was the gist of the bagel metaphor you pulled on me in scene two and it must have worked because I didn't offer an argument after that. Also, you were right, the big bagel did proposition me and I couldn't turn it down.


Scene 3 (final scene):

In scene three we are locking arms and humming and smiling and I'm walking you home and I'm convinced I can finish big bagels but perhaps not right now. I am also a tad embarrassed for pulling that nonsensical question on you earlier in scene two and I try to make up for it by buying ice-cream but you're full so I eat one on my own. It was pecan pie gelato in case anyone was wondering.

friday night, saturday morning

An apple scented candle is gradually immolating as I'm typing away at this midpoint, fridaynightsaturdaymorning. I guess that's what you would call a recurring theme, apple candles and how the appley fumes stimulate waves and waves of neurological activity.


Earlier on the road:

There are three lanes but everything is deserted apart from the little green car I'm thinking away in. Peculiar but on the opposite side of the road: streams and streams of cars reflecting neon and gold and myriad shapes and colors which seem to blend into a hue I cannot discern. It is all at once stunningly beautiful and utterly captivating how they meander, bored but with purpose, linearly to one destination or another. Cold and cozied from the strangely humid night outside, preoccupied and unoccupied, these strangers in their air-conditioned comforts meshing and sticking and blurring and blending to gleam with such unnoticed beauty. Unnoticed beauty, that's all it is as their lights perforate the mildly tinted glass on my windshield, my cheeks glowing in the rearview. All of this stitched in with one line from one song, and the dusty gravel ridges of bixby canyon bridges swirl like pancake mixture with the lights and the night and the images burn bright bright bright. Zipped by. Five seconds. The glint of Christmas lights on October cars. Waving goodbye to strangers hoping they can't see you, hoping they can.

-

both sides now - rachael yamagata

somersault - decoder ring

measurements - james blake

unspoken - four tet

new year's eve - the walkmen

the blind boy

You said, "I love you"
I said, "Wait"
I was going to say "Take me"
You said, "Go away"

-

A quote, from one of my favorite films of all time. Love is intangible, love fails to materialize in an understandable way outside of a given context. Maybe that's why I feel the need to rely on other lovers to inform my own experience. Maybe that's why I fall so easily in love with the narratives of Jules and Jim and Catherine, or Jesse and Celine. If only it were so easy to fall in love at twenty-one, if only it were so easy to love at twenty two, if only love came easy at twenty-three, if we're both not lovers by twenty four, would you pass me those knee pads and i'll get on the floor (familiar impatience).

-

The title at the top of the page, "The blind boy" is an apt description of the writer's attempt at articulating his feelings on the subject of "love". Both in the intrinsic sense of the experience one goes through as well as the difficulties faced when writing about it.


blindness /blind·ness/ (blīnd´nes) lack or loss of ability to see; lack of perception of visual stimuli.

Love is touching souls. An alternative deconstruction of this word/feeling/discourse leads to the following realization: Love is blindness. A realization implies that some form of meaning has been excavated, but realizing that one is blind does not have the same comforting effect.
The blind boy thinks that he loves. After all, why should he not? He has done all the things that he's been told lovers do (but it's only touching what they do). He has waited, much like the other has waited. He has been consumed, that all encompassing, logic-subverting first fall when the neurons explode but the brain doesn't think, doesn't want to. The magnetic inclination that all of us have felt at one point or another in time. He has been kept in agony, agitated by the unknowns, the combinations and permutations of a mathematics major, hoping half deliriously and half morbidly that the other smarts as much as he does. And he discovers that it is true, there is a shared mutuality that justifies all prior worrying and the jitters and the unsleeping. For one brief, shiny moment there is contentment and comfort, because any lover would testify to the beauty of knowing little, but of liking what you know. The placidity of emotion only lasts for so long because the blind boy thinks of himself as a fearless seafarer when it comes to love, all wonder in his eyes, honest and temperamental eagerness get him over the moodiest weather and the deepest waters. And the assumption that the other sees exactly as he sees, feels exactly as he feels, loves in the same pinpoint way that he loves. Two lovers, but the capacity only to write the discourse of one. A book half-written and half imagined. The blind boy's first attempt at love, he buys gifts and he surprises and he rubs against the skin of his lover leaving behind bruises but what else? He takes the other's hand and sets off at full speed, but soon he is so far around the bend that his lover is nowhere in sight when he looks over his shoulder. But it's only touching what they do, he says to himself as he catches his breath. Love is too complex for a boy so blind, love is too big for a boy who leaves half himself behind.


-
The coda ends on a hopeful note, but perhaps I am too eager to balance the two extremes out. I really don't think love is self-serving. There. I said it. I really cannot elaborate because I feel my narrative is still in the "exposition" stage. There is still so much that refuses to reveal easily (hoping against hope that all future revelations are made with you). So what is love? Well, right now in the most offhand way: Love is you. Ask me later and I promise I'll have charts and graphs to explain what I can't right now. 

Brief Interviews With Hideous Men

Q: I'm delighted to have with us here this evening ___________________. Thank you for being here.
A: (courteous smile) It's my pleasure.


Q: In less than a week's time they're going to sing and smile and say darling, we love you very very much. Is this a significant occasion for you?
A: To be honest I um feel a sense of trepidation somewhat. Like it's this thing looming over me and people are fussing over its importance and it's taking up more thought than it should.


Q: So you're dreading the significance of this particular ritual somewhat?
A: Well, it's not so much that I'm dreading it. I think it's more like there are so many things you think you want to do when you're young, and then as you get older you sort of run out of steam. When I was twelve, I had this romantic idea for a long time of writing a book by the time I was eighteen and now I feel I'm deferring it as the years go by, 19, 20, 21 (slight laughter)


Q: Lets talk about the year for you. Has it been a good one?
A:  (pauses for a bit and then exhales) Yeah, as a whole I think this year's been really good in terms of well, everything. Or at least the most important things. I think the last time I had this great a year was when I was 16, and that feels like a very long time ago now. For the same reasons though, 16 was a very secure time in terms of people and myself and this year really reminded me of that.


Q: So has the year been positive because of the people around you or do you think it's because you're a lot more at ease with yourself?
A: I think it's a bit of both really. This year's been a bit of a soul searching one in fact, re-examining and re-evaluating strands of history that have come to pass but ultimately moving forward. And the people intertwined in the year have been really great, really really comfortable in fact.


Q: You mentioned that you did a bit of soul-searching. Now in the past you've been notorious for having your fair share of depressive funks, do you still go through that?
A: (laughter, embarrassed and sincere) Well I am annoyed at how easily I fall into a rut sometimes but I'm definitely dealing with it better. Well, I hope. (mutual chuckling)


Q: I'm sure we're all very glad to hear that but what prompted this newly formed realization?
A: Um I think it's important that you don't internalize too much. I know this sounds ironic coming from me but you need to have a point at which you say stop, and focus your thought processes on something else. It definitely wasn't easy for me to snap out of certain habits but the people around me help me deal with it all the time. Not actively, it's more like I go home and I realize how patient they've been or how much of an idiot I was being at that time and then I feel really guilty. (sheepish grin)


Q: Now you once disagreed with the saying "No one is an island" and at that time you were very adamant about trashing life out on your own terms. That seems to have changed.
A: Well yes and no. I still think I have an extremely strong sense of self and I definitely know what I want (kittens) and don't want (bebbes) but at the same time I've started to relax a little, I used to think that I knew everything, now I realize how silly that little superiority complex was. I think instead of talking in terms of islands we should be discussing peninsulas instead. Happy and secure on your own terms but with important and affirming ties to other people.


Q: A more intimate friend would suggest that you sound a lot more grown up now. Is this a presumptuous statement on my part?
A: (laughter, sincere again which surprises him) I used to think that the music I listened to really said a lot about the places I was at in that particular point in time and I still do. I mean I love my sad, moodily introverted bands and I always will. But my tastes have branched out as well. Sad has been replaced with wistful and moody introversion has been replaced with this very bittersweet taste on my tongue. It's hard to describe feeling bittersweet isn't it? It's right there in the middle of these two great extremes. There's a lyric from one of my favorite songs which goes "You will miss me when I am gone, but the happy music will carry on". And I'm always left with a very whimsical feeling when that line plays and I loop the song over and over again.


Q: Alright, I think that's all the time we have left. I wish to thank our guest _________________ and we wish you all the best for the year ahead.
A: (smiles) Thank you.

Every Love Story Is A Ghost Story

An excerpt, from the diary of Erik Michael Gan, originally dated 18th December 2010: 

You met her when you were both eighteen and although the discourse of love often takes a familiar and structured form, you were inclined to believe that life privileged the both of you over the multitude of human connections that flit around for space. You walk in silence along the platform toward the train, the warm glow of the sun on both your backs and you tug on the sleeve of her sweater when you realize that her steps are more brisk than yours. She takes pictures of you as you walk and as much as she can see that you are trying to avoid being captured through the lens of her polaroid, she also knows that you are in love with this moment. You walk until you find yourselves at a bridge and by then the day is slowly dissolving into night, streetlights flicker on and you marvel at each other in the gaze of this soft orangey light. It is then that she takes your hand and leads you gently across the bridge, there are stirrings of a metaphorical significance that this subtle gesture elicits but time has frozen for you and you are unable to look past the girl with the curious hair as she guides you across the water. You stop in the middle and look across the rippling tide, you stop as she tiptoes ever so slightly and places a graze of a kiss on your right cheek, you stop as she whispers in your ear and traces a gesture on your neck. The night grows into itself and the silence is comfort, the silence is golden. You walk until you come to a gate and it is then that a farewell is slowly drawn out before she traces another gesture, this time on your mouth before a door closes between two doting smiles and you accept that it is time to go. The contextualization of time begins its workings and the minutes become more apparent as you trudge back across the park, the bridge, and the moment solidifies itself in your mind as you realize that you have lived a thousand nights in one.


-


An excerpt, from the journal of Gillian Leigh, originally dated 18th December 2010: 

I met him when we were both eighteen and the more thought I devote to the discourse of love, the more I think that every love story is a ghost story. A spectrum of light hangs in the sky, pale but unmissable as rain comes down on the both of us, seeping into our clothes and into our skin as we laugh and run for shade. Underneath the cover of a Greyhound station we shiver and huddle together as he takes out a camera from his bag but I tell him to put it away because moments should be lived and not frozen in the hope of some futile permanence. We walk through the puddles in silence until we come to a bridge and he beckons to me before taking off at full speed across the water, only stopping when he realizes that I haven't followed after him. The trace of a hand. The way the water looks as it ripples when the tide comes in. The glare from the streetlights above us which bathe both our faces in a pale white light. There are many things that I remember about this particular moment which will be soon archived in time. The significance is an undertone. And the tone has so suddenly and violently shifted. He calls out for me and I see his mouth open and close without sound. I see the smile leave his face as a sharp tinge of worry colors his features. He walks back towards me and tries to hold my hand but it is limp and lifeless by my side. He bends ever so slightly to whisper in my ear and with the tip of my index finger I trace a word into his neck. There is more silence, but this silence is not the silence of comfort. It is a subtle disquiet that layers upon itself until my eardrums hurt and I'm almost tempted to say something, anything, but I refrain. The park, the gate, the front door. Images that pass in a blur, spaces which are lost in time but gestures which remain forever frozen. The goodbye is quick and affectless for it is only when the door shuts between two faces which kiss but feel nothing that the cost of the day can be properly calculated. What turns have led us here? What roads have been taken to leave us so hopelessly stranded? The thoughts can be deferred but the dread hints only at bleaker beginnings. Even now, what once were whole dreams have almost certainly been rendered completely irredeemable.

The Memories of Celeste, aged 17/ 25/ 53/ 89

17

The last song had just been played and you were standing on top of the hill, floppy brown hair in your eyes and the biggest grin I've ever seen plastered across your face. I took a picture of you. The excitement, the sweat - but although some things can never be captured, I still tried. I shook it in my hand. I tasted on my tongue, my skin. Everything was in its right place. I kept you in my heart of hearts and I wore you on my sleeve of sleeves. The night was hot and humid but we still chose to walk. We couldn't stay still, the molecules bounced off one another in a curious frenzy. And when I got home I wrote everything down but  before the ink had its chance to dry I began to sound silly and romantic. I am constantly struggling to differentiate between the two. Tonight however is not for tempering, and perhaps that is why I took the photograph. To hold and to remember. The sad thing is that memories don't outlive people. People outlive memories.



25

The folding of a letter, the sound the drawer makes as it shuts, the turning of a key and the click of a lock. Everything was in its right place. But I wonder to myself - is this intentional forgetting anything more than an act of cowardice? We experience time in a very strange way, we feel as if it is constant and that there is a linear progression to it. But time is like a train as it hurtles towards an unknown destination, and only when it stops at various points in the journey are we able to contextualize it. Nothing will ever be as concrete as it is now, when we are actively experiencing it. The rest will be lost to nostalgia. I am afraid our narratives diverge here, and there is no point in grasping. There are many pages yet unwritten for us both and although saddening, there should be much excitement for what is to come. 

53

It was nice seeing you today. If we write a book about our lives, how much space do we allocate the characters that populate this novel? How important are some people in contrast to others? Do they deserve a line? A paragraph? An entire chapter? Do they feature fleetingly or do they keep coming back again and again - in different chapters and on numerous lines? What convictions do we assign these characters? How prominent are these characters in our lives? And how prominent are we to them? Are we just footnotes in the lives of others? A moody publisher. A line of admirers I fear I have grown weary of. Coffee stains on a table after the book signing. A long heartwarming conversation over bagels. It was almost as if nothing had ever changed. But that was impossible, it was only time trying to convince us that there was nothing which had been lost to history. And yet, the lump in my throat remains. Have all my words ironically deserted me? Do I have none left? It is said that actions speak louder than words, but then again I've always been a quiet person.



89

I found something extremely interesting today. An old picture I don't remember taking. Nor do I remember the person in the photograph although I feel I should. My convictions aren't as strong as they used to be. The strife that used to drive me has been turned down a notch, that is not to say that I understand a lot more now, it's just that I don't worry so much about not understanding anymore. Time is contagious, and all my friends have gotten old. The train is slowing down and I know it won't be long before I have to disembark. I've been blessed with so many wonderful realizations but I doubt I have the space for any more. As I'm writing all of this down my mind drifts to different places and different people - pity how none of them seem to be in clear focus anymore. Isn't it funny how we move forward in time but our thoughts move backward? A smile on a hill. A long walk. A closed drawer. A face in a crowd. These snippets of memory frustrate me because they exist as that - mere snippets. All that remains is an idea of what happened. I fold the photograph and place it in my pocket as I smile to myself. Not remembering burdens me slightly, but I doubt I will be burdened for much longer.

midnight city

beginnings: 


locked behind a door, beside a flawed and failing memory. 



the skyline of a midnight city

the skyline drawn from memory

the skyline drawn on my forearm

a skyline that starts to fade

a familiar face against a midnight city

a face etched into memory

a face that starts to fade.


This is what it would look like if my dreams were organized in a list, and I would have no trouble arranging them according to chronology. What came first and what came where. But as it is I awake on a pillow moist with sweat, and the slivers of my dreams appear as lines written over one another. Although some small modicum of meaning can be wrung out if I concentrate extremely hard, the number of lines that overlap and smudge into each other point to the bleak reality that something is most definitely lost forever.

This is the writer speaking now, and I feel it is important that I separate myself from the text just this one time, in the beginning. I fear what I have to say will not be completed, as different lines of thought are constantly imposing themselves upon me, threatening to rewrite whatever clarity I think I've found on this particular island in time. There is a little apple-scented candle burning in front of me and I am typing away furiously in a room with a single table and a single chair. The reason for my impatience is because I will be forced to forget everything at midnight. The apple candle will go out, the rain outside the window will turn to ice and I shall be lost to waves and waves of dreaming.

I make no attempt at honesty and if you persist in looking for it you will only be disappointed. This is fiction and none of this ever happened(all fiction is precipitated by fact, all stories stem from what is lacked). This is repeated several times and only when I have deceived myself do I begin to write:

Cats are having very loud sexytime outside my window. I wonder why Sam isn't barking. Maybe he's watching. That perv.

avo . cado

woke up to find that everyone dressed in bathrobes and that cake had become the global currency/ woke up for real only to discover that clothes remained a social norm and that people did not barter in cake/ displeased/ got up/ made some tea (peach)/ did not finish tea/ looked for weetbix/ found weetbix/  ate weetbix/ still hungry/ ate another/ drank some milk/ said hi to sam/ no response/ went upstairs/ sat on bed/ played guitar/ snapped a string/ went back downstairs/ watched an episode of fringe/ played some music/ pause the tragic ending/ both sides now/ wish you love/ sunday afternoon/ not yet lunchtime and i'm feeling mellow already/ change of mood needed/ midnight city/ drifting in and out/ in the morning/ feel a lot better/ sam finally says hi (i blank him)/ took a shower/ recited the monologue from american psycho whilst showering/ don a bathrobe for fun/ time for lunch/ open fridge/ nothing inside but cheese/ open pantry/ nothing inside but bread/ settle for a cheese sandwich among the plethora of options available/ check the mail/ nothing for me/ read the first ninety pages of flowers in the attic online/ bored as hell/ give up/ play some more dancey music/ really warming up to m83/ spazz out like i'm having an epileptic fit to midnight city in my room/ draw the curtains/ spazz out some more/ exhausted/ take nap/ wake up/ take sam for a short walk/ arm almost ripped out of socket by cray as fuck dog/ dump sam home/ walk across to bazaar/ buy in the following order: ayam percik, bread pudding and guava juice/ accepted currency still money/ hop back home in rather joyous spirits/ nom nom nom/ so damn full/ struggle up the stairs/ start writing another post about things(read: me) i take way too seriously/ get distracted/ write (this) instead/ realize that my text is meta and self-reflexive woo/ and tentatively, perhaps a little later on: browse pictures of cats/ figure out how to make guacamole/ play some more rachael/ go to bed/ hopefully, HOPEFULLY dream of a world where everything is paid for in cake.

the sense of an ending

1) Sunlight through the window as I awake in a strange room with unfamiliar wallpaper.

2) A blue couch that acts as a vantage point as different people walk by with bemused stares plastered on their faces.

3) Leaning in for a kiss in the front seat of a car.

4) A boy sitting on a bench in the middle of a park, sobbing uncontrollably as taillights pass him by.

5) The same boy but much younger, staring at his father who is embarrassed of him because he cries too much.

-

As the memories sluice down my brain, I am overcome with a sense of emptiness. Memory acts like a drug, and like all drugs the indulging of memory eventually leads to addiction. This dependency on memory swells till the point that existence is created within memory, and the life lived in the present comes secondary to the one lived in the head.

Memory is history. But more than that it is a guide. Decisions are informed by experience, and experience is hinged on memory. What shaky foundations are laid here, when all our conditions of autonomy are influenced by a series of flashes that may or may not be true.

a + b = x 

To make sense of memory through mathematics would seem logical if not for the fact that memory does not operate based on logic. If the signifier, (a), represents memory, and the signifier, (b), represents experience, the addition of a + b would hypothetically lead to a logical answer. The person existing both here and now, the product of memory and experience, (x). This sense of an ending could seem satisfactory, but the problem lies in the value of memory (a). The slightest of deviations in memory would lead to the outcome of the equation being radically different each time.

This is in essence, the very dilemma that presents itself. Each time I attempt to solve the equation, the value of memory changes and with it the legitimacy of any profound realization I was hoping to extract from all this. The value of memory is a fluctuating one. How can we rely on something that constantly changes with time, that jumps back and forth from one apparent certainty to another? If all our memories are so wildly unstable, so prone to dilution and saturation, what hope is there of an answer? Is there really such a thing as an actual account of what happened? The moment something is experienced, the chemicals in our brains work instantaneously to add impurities to this experience. The truth, if there is any of it, is filtered out semblance by semblance until all that remains is a memory.

All our memories work like circumstantial evidence and we use this information to make conclusions that we are quick to affirm. Categorically, our memories always fall into what is good and what is bad. One, two and three are good ones, four and five less so. But this is only how I remember them. The truth is that we are on shaky ground, the truth is that we are unable to collaborate the event with the memory, the truth is that there is great strife which simmers underneath. The greatest truth perhaps, is that we are all guilty of forgetting.

theories of actualization and realization

another conversation, over a breakfast of whole-wheat bread, sausages, rocket salad and poached eggs:


If life is a gift that no one has asked for yet is thrust upon all of us, do we not have the right to reject this gift? As girls reject chocolates from boys, or as boys reject flowers from other boys, because the acceptance of a gift would carry some form of attached meaning - acceptance (of the gift) and subsequently expectation (what the gift signifies, what the gift alludes to).

The acceptance of life as a gift would also carry a shared albeit dissimilar weight. The weight to live up to this gift, to make the most of life, to at least not waste it. But if this gift of life is one that none of us have asked for, surely we have the option of rejecting it, to make space on an already rented-out planet for someone who could do more with this supposed gift?

This is not to say that I am ungrateful, I understand life for what it is - and I believe it brings with it more good than bad, although this perspective might shift if for instance you asked a young girl forced to bear the child of her rapist if the overall good in her life outweighed the overall bad. The rejection of life is often seen as a deeply philosophical question, perhaps it is because the act of taking one's own life is such an empowering one.

Empowering. Strange choice of words you might ask but what could be more empowering than holding everything in your hands and then choosing to let all of that go? Some may say that this deed is in fact the opposite of a noble autonomous act, that it is cowardly and irresponsible - especially to those that they leave behind. And that it is selfish, this point surfaces time and time again, that it would be a completely self-serving, narcissistic and selfish act. If the rejection of life is a selfish act, could it then be fair to argue that the creation of life is perhaps an equally or even more selfish act?

To force a gift upon someone who had never asked for it. To force upon them so much which they had not asked for, to force upon them so much which you yourself have not come to understand. Why is it that the magnitude of this form of selfishness is not more readily realized whereas its lesser form is vilified?  The rejection of life is after all, wholly dependent and preceded by the selfish act of creating life.

Some might even say that it is liberating -  instead of resigning yourself to a life you've never asked for, instead of watching the years slip by ever faster and having the memories deformed into something weirder each time, instead of accepting a state of passivity, instead of all that you make the choice to recognize life for all it is, its vast potential to hurt and then reconcile, to heal and to scar, to bring great joy and great validation and you accept all of that. To accept all the vagaries of life, and to still choose to put it away. If all of us die someday, and most of us die before we want to, how can you dismiss the individual who chooses to die on its own terms, and by its own hand?


So, she says, chewing on some rocket, What you're saying is that beneath our veneer of fake importance and the desperate need to validate everything we do, life is in fact meaningless? I do not know for a fact if life is meaningless or not. What I do know is that by assumption the converse of meaningless would be meaningful, and from that word you would extrapolate feelings of gratification, fulfillment and the hazy, linear feeling that we are all headed somewhere, for some significant reason and that all of this amounts to some great thing. And in that sense I can say while it may not be meaningless, it is far from being meaningful.  

all the wine

the following is inspired by the lyrics of the national and "not everyone's listening" by kristine



Virginia thinks this place is full of spies, thinks they could be on to her. Weaving between tables and chattering guests she soon discovers how to gracefully disappear in a room. To drown in the drone of conversation without communication, the expressions contorted into familiar smiles. To drown would be the worst way of dying for someone so claustrophobic. I'll drown when I see you.

She's been deluged with well wishes, were they real or were they just echoes which bounced inside her brain. She'll fight for her place at the table like girls fight for their place among boys. She'll run like she's awesome, totally geniuses, she'll run till hey love she gets away from it. She'll run till she's drunk and old and her hands are covered in cake but she swears she didn't have any.

I have weird memories of you, I have a ton of great ideas and I don't want to waste any. I want to dance around the nearest famous city middle where they hang their holiday rainbow lights in the garden. Our place at the table, this river's full of lost sharks. With our fingernails painted we'd watch as they snatch dolls from little boys and replace them with blue instead of pink. And they'd grow up beautiful and braided and cruel but still you'd say they weren't fucked over.

Chandeliers hang from the ceiling of the hall, like earrings on the guests below it. Virginia wonders how it all went the dull and wicked ordinary way. I'd break my arms around the one I love, I'd break my arms around my love. She'd put on her argyle sweater she'd put on a smile. Take her place at the table among boys, stay quiet and pretty and unpolitical and wait for her place at the table, a room of her own draped in yellow wallpaper. Watch as they'd piss on every tree, stick flags into things they do not own and say we were here, we were here.



I have weird memories of you, wearing long red socks and red shoes. I have weird memories of you and I think I'm like Tennessee Williams, I wait for the click but it doesn't kick in. 

slow show

Virginia shuffled tediously to her husband's side, sipping the chardonnay in her glass without interest.


Where on earth have you been darling? I've just had the pleasure of meeting this wonderful couple.


Virginia half smiled as Leonard introduced her to mister and missus Dalloway. She strained her smile even further as she shook Mr. Dalloway's smooth hand and took note of how his wife's was significantly rougher. The next few minutes she spent in silence as Leonard talked about poetry and art with the male Dalloway, slipping into the conversation various references to painters and poets in case the Dalloways hadn't noticed how infuriatingly pretentious he already was. Virginia and I were at the Tate earlier this afternoon, we absolutely adored the showcase of recently restored Pre-Raphaelites. Mr. Dalloway remarked that his personal favorite was Gustave Moreau and she could see a hint of perspiration begin to form above Leonard's upper lip as he struggled to keep up. She despised his insecurity, his need to pander and keep up with Mr. Dalloway and she wondered if they could see what a fool he was making of himself.

Mrs. Dalloway kept her gaze first on the ceiling then on the ground and seemed to be interested in everything else except the people before her. When Virginia finally caught her eyes she ascertained a certain form of sadness, not explicit, but almost certainly there. She wondered if Clarissa Dalloway was as unhappy as she was, if there was some unifying thread that bound these two strangers together. The Dalloways were significantly older than Virginia and Leonard, although Mrs. Dalloway had a somewhat vibrant twinkle in her eyes if you looked past the wrinkles that framed them. She had small, soft lips and a rather defined jaw with cheekbones so sharp you could cut glass with them. Undoubtedly beautiful, yet there was something about her which was beginning to gnaw at Virginia. She looked excruciatingly sad, and her sadness was so expertly concealed, so gentle - like it could only come from years of acceptance. This particular sight disturbed her, but not as much as when Mr. Dalloway reached to touch her shoulder and Virginia was certain she saw her shrink away for the tiniest of seconds before returning her husband's gesture.

Making a feeble excuse which none of the men heard and which Mrs. Dalloway barely acknowledged, Virginia slipped out of the conversation and into another room which had none of the guests, none of the wine and thankfully, none of the noise. She found a wooden chair and collapsed into it as she rested her head in her hands. Upon the table were a handful of lilies in a beautiful crystal vase and the markings etched into it would have been something to marvel at had it not also reflected Virginia sobbing quietly in the corner.


Fiction however, allows the protagonist in the story to be stronger than what it reflects in real life. Virginia understands this and she takes a long deep breath before making her way back to Leonard's side. Ah, there you are darling. For a moment there I thought I'd lost you. 

my summer of love

When do we know that we've grown up? How do we tell that we've passed this invisible threshold?

The boy is standing before the frame of a door, trembling in fear, trembling in excitement. He is certain he will emerge a man - or whatever he's been told little boys eventually become. Unfeeling, uncaring, strong and rough and elegant, the splitting image of his father. Growing up is a process. We are searching for this single grand realization, that reveals not in entirety but is gentle and gradual. We attempt to trace its trajectory, attaching meaning to experience to make some sense of it all. We are molded by history, products of nurture and nature, both intertwined and inseparable. The way of grace - kind, loving, compassionate, and the way of beauty - raw, innate and selfish. The search for a catalyst proves futile, I no longer remember the experiences that have led me here. All I have is a hazy sense of the here and now. A candle that flickers against the darkening night sky, all to easy to miss, all to easy to lose track of. The only thing I understand is the present. Feeling grown up but not quite in the middle of my summer of love. Love - which has always scared me. It is the world's greatest theory, conceptualized by civilizations of man, each time differently, subject to a thousand years of trial and error, no closer to a definitive answer now than we have ever been. What I couldn't feel I kept locked away. What I felt I never received I convinced myself against needing at all. But everything slowly begins to wash away, the boy is sitting on the shore as the waves come in, gently pulling at his feet. Sadness and anger give way to love. Sadness and anger which I believed I had so much of, fades into the sea to be washed up upon some other shore. What I remember and perhaps will never forget, was what she said.

You know he loved you very much.

And there was nothing else I wanted to believe more that that.

seattle, seattle

          It was the beginning of February, I was standing beside the snow covered train tracks with nothing behind and everything ahead of me. I have made many things up and I feel it is time I set the record straight. When I talked about Seattle I spoke of a time when both our dreams converged into a single reality. The truth is I never went to Seattle with you. My head privileged a version of events that only served to safeguard my pride. To have experienced without you would be to diminish the very experience itself. I am writing all of this down because it is not often that I am able to articulate honesty, and even rarer when I find the humility to admit it. This is not the first letter that I am writing to you and it will not be the last. Perhaps we will look back at our letters ten, fifteen, fifty years from now and be able to make more sense of it all. I no longer choose to wallow in self pity, half-drowned by grand ambition. I have chosen to face the world, armed only with a pen and journal, diving head first into the heady romance of the unknown. I shall document my failures and my ambitions, my drunken lovers and the drafts of my dreams, I shall write about every city gracious enough to play host. Too young to hold on, too old to break free and run. I have been seduced by the lure of self-fulfillment and the promise of meaning. The magnetic pull of the mystic throbs beneath this veneer of existence, I am sure of it. And like stars scattered across the dark blue sky I intend to burn full of madness and desire. I shall write all of this down and one day I will show you everything. 

canada

I drew a line. I drew a line parallel to yours. I tried to keep my hand steady but every now and then it would shake. I traced the borders on your skin, where the countries separated - what was mine stayed mine and what was yours stayed yours. I drew a map, I drew a map of your face and the streams that ran down it. I looked hard for something I missed, something that I hadn't yet seen.

-

And I traveled, I traveled so far - across different time-zones. I couldn't sleep, there was too much to see, I stayed awake every single night. I traveled, I kept journals and photos - you should have seen me, you would have been so proud. And then it was time to go. I had that map memorized in my head, I knew exactly where it would lead me. I wrote something on the back of the map:

Someday, someday back to you. 

the fast track to soulmateism

          Not too long ago, a friend and I had an interesting conversation about soul mates and the notion of soulmateism. I asked if my friend had a soul mate and she replied that over all her lovers - those past and those present, the most important people, or the only ones she could think of as soul mates were her closest friends. That got me thinking, perhaps lovers really do make insubstantial soul mates. When you invest unhealthily into someone, the relationship takes on a life of its own - and won't stop until all its insecurities are quenched, which ultimately becomes a futile cycle of destruction because the very fact of the matter is that lovers do not long for their insecurities to be quenched. They always desire more than they have the capacity to reciprocate, they look for an elusive spark, a flame that eventually becomes an inextinguishable dependency. There is truth then in what Oscar Wilde is saying when he states that 'each man kills the thing he loves'. It is ironic then (the lovers would say tragic) that in the attempt at loving something, you always ultimately kill the thing you love.

          When posed the same question I paused for a substantial amount of time before telling her that I think I'm too young to have a soul mate. I told her she was much older than I am (much to her chagrin) and perhaps found herself in a better position to hand pick the different people that made a warm and lasting impact upon her life. When I think of soul mates I think of something eternal and mystic, and the world around me diminishes this sense of wonder as I am presented with many notions of fast-track or 'shotgun soulmateism'. Some of my favorite include: 

1) She likes the Smiths. You like the Smiths. You think that dying by her side would be the most heavenly way to die. Soul mates.

2) He likes Japanese food - more importantly he likes unagi on a bed of cold soba, your own personal favorite. Also, he is into Murakami but unlike most people his novel of choice is Hear the Wind Sing, which he considers the writer's magnum opus. That last part was really the deal breaker. Soul mates.


3) You are an architect and she is a writer. You spend your days having conversations about the impact of transgressive art upon society and the psychological effects of space allocation in cities. Within these conversations you create a bubble which is impermeable by the transient whims of an under-cultured world. No one will ever be as cool as the both of you right? Soul mates. 

          Within these common notions of soulmateism I fail to see anything which could be eternal and instead find that lonely people will always gravitate to one another when they see bits of themselves reflected in another person. What is left behind is not some cosmically important convergence of souls but instead a dependency which is rooted deep in personal inadequacy.

          Perhaps I am young, or it may be the fact that I've always fancied myself as a bit of a dreamer but I do not fully agree with Wilde's claim that you taint what you love. I think that there is no fast-track to soulmateism, you do not become soul mates through a shared cultural affinity nor do you become soul mates because you share a host of traits and dreams too important to be dismissed. There are far too many compatible people in this all too vast world to be considered for importance. The road to finding your soul mate is a process, and one that you have to be painfully patient with. Soulmateism in my opinion is something which is gradual, born into infancy, and like all infants must be taught and nurtured. You only kill the thing you love if you are careless, and if you are careless could it be said that you ever loved at all? Just to reiterate the fact (and perhaps to squeeze out another drop of self-serving comfort), I am young and I have much to learn about the world and people. We have our whole lives to be important to each other. Why stop here?

songs for samson

delilah is beautiful / she ties you to a chair

unhooks her gown and lets it fall while you stare

she breaks your will and she taints your pride

they cut your hair while you were sleeping by her side

in the morning you found your locks of gold all gone

and in the corner she was crying broken and forlorn

(my thoughts take me to some terrible places)

could your love have poisoned you as well?

you didn't taste it in the water, you drew it from her lips

naked next to you and traced intention on her bones

but you wouldn't let her leave the bed / you needed in despair

you couldn't see the temptress / only the flowers in her hair

still you couldn't break you couldn't hurt the face that you forgot

they ripped you from her and chained you to a rock

and the laughing faces jeered: look at samson tied up there

his love had poisoned him / his love had cut his hair

will he ever know, his love was really never there

sketches for my sweetheart

               On the eve of your twenty-first year we rented an old blue convertible and drove into the city that had been the final destinations of so many before us. The memories in my mind are always triggered by sharp vivid images and I remember it was a clear October day - the clouds in the sky formed the shape of a goddess, the goddess of travelers and souls lost in transition. The sun in your hair made it different shades of brown and the light on your face made it even more beautiful than I thought it could be. We existed in that song, your feet on the dash, and I  thought I could be your guide for all time. The dusty country road slowly gave way to pavements and streets filled with life and wonder, but you had privilege over all the wonder in my world. As the sun set the streetlights flickered on, the city started to stir from its long slumber and the souls I will never know wandered onto the pavements and alleys. Notions of the sublime slowly invaded my thoughts, sometimes to be lost is the most comforting feeling of all. We stopped on one of those streets so an artist could draw a portrait of you, of course it never aligned with what I saw in my mind - I had so many sketches for my sweetheart. Some sad, some poignant, but all of them were unmistakable - unmistakably you. You tugged on my sleeve when it was time to go and we made the long journey back. Some thoughts linger for awhile before being archived somewhere deep, some thoughts stay with you - like saviors nailed to trees, like lovers draped in flowers. You sang to me as I took in the scent of evergreen, the moonlight made my knuckles look pale and strange.You sang to me and the sketches I had of you made a home in my head as I drove you home.

detroit, michigan!

Any attempt at an explanation of beauty would only come up short. But what is beauty if it's not in the attempt at understanding something ? Beauty is abundant in this small space, the six inches between your face and mine. And as he struggles with his diction he finds that words almost become superfluous. Our tools and our language hinder any emotional honesty we hope to find. And she smiles back at him, knowing they are both individuals with their own personal subtexts and histories. But everything matters in this small short moment, the exact time of day, this beautiful city you find yourself a guest in, the minute - like the ground beneath your feet and the warm light that falls upon her face illuminating it in a candescent glow. The minutes in his world merge for that short amount of time. And there is beauty, a deep personal beauty that sustains and leaves a mark. Their words overlap one another as if they know that this real, all-encompassing connection has an expiry date and they race to get their explanations out in a dizzying haze of words and laughs and knowing silences. As they embrace they realize that their pasts and futures are bound by one line alone: To remember someone is to be very happy or very sad. 

-

Tonight I have been romanced by life. She teases the world to me and I can't help but follow her. A mix of Etta James, Billie Holiday and Nina Simone is playing in my room as I am writing all of this. Lost in between the lines of verse and song I listen to her voice till' early morn.

less than zero

The only thing that you cannot affect is eventuality. She whispers that without looking at me, instead she stares ahead at a mirage that begins to form in the middle of desert. She's lying back on one of those long deck chairs, sipping away at her drink. There is no one else on the balcony and the sun is beginning to set. This is what we do to ourselves, we scrutinize the past details of our lives in order to obtain a sense of clairvoyance about the future. We are all unreliable journalists, our columns contain no traces of truth which our readers can discern. I turn to look at her but her eyes offer nothing. They are vapid and washed over with an expression that has advanced sadness. A nonchalance that has been my doing. I make my way down to her neck, my eyes following her till the curve of her shoulders. In the middle of her solar plexus just below her breasts something begins to form. A black hole which is widening before my eyes. I have helped it grow larger and larger with every word and half formed gesture. Soon there is nothing left of her except this void which I have filled with objects impure and hidden. I am in love with my kidnapper but my Stockholm syndrome is wearing off. I stare ahead as the mirage becomes more and more vivid. In the middle of the sky two words form within a bracket. (disappear here) / There is nothing I can do but oblige. Every cell in my body dissipates into the desert air. I am all too familiar with this disappearing act and the parentheses closes removing me with it.

au revoir simone

An idea I have for my room: 

Chalkboard paint over one wall to create a canvas of sorts for when I want to write. Did you know that words in your head and words on paper have totally different meanings? The borders of the wall will retain the original colour of my room so the chalkboard will look like its framed. Also, the problem of dustiness will be solved with ChalkInk! 

sunday smile

Contrary to the title of this post, this has nothing to do with Sundays or smiling for that matter. And with that out of the way: A friend once asked me why we should try for anything when we know that everything will end eventually. I think the only logical answer is that we should try because the world does not exist in our head. In heads everything is structured and planned according to your hopes and expectations but these dreams rarely make a safe transition to reality. We should try because after countless years, after our bodies catch up with our minds, all that will be left for us is what we did and did not do. All our memories will work like foreign imagery; cities we have vague recollections of, polaroids we have to shake in our hand. And when we grow old all our experiences will be transmuted into little snippets of dialogue, our retinas will fire countless images, our hearts will exist as uneven shards, each one belonging to a different person. So everything will end in the end. We cannot affect eventuality. There is nothing we can do to preserve permanence or life on earth. But there will be no more regret left. We will look for it but we will never be able to find it.

-

writer type

Writer Type
(a short story)

     Let me write this down before I forget. I have a friend named E. This friend of mine is a writer or at least he thinks he is. There is a reason why E's writing should be privileged over other writers and this is because everything he writes in his notebook becomes the equivalent of literature gold. The way this works is that when writing in the notebook, creative and neural pathways in E's brain are so stimulated that he can write a draft for a novel in a day.

      Don't inquire about the logistics of this or how his notebook never runs out of pages but what I do know is that this notebook would be coveted by artists and writers all over the world. Anything they envision in their mind would be automatically enhanced and given form through the notebook. This position that E finds himself in cannot be attributed solely to himself however, it is the notebook and not the writer that causes this dissension in the time-space-logic sphere.

      All writers want to leave something tangible on the facade of this planet, a strain of beauty, an outcry of controversy. So of all people this chance has fallen to E, whom some would argue possesses more insecurity and pretense than actual talent.The notebook provides E with an easy existence, he has molded a life for himself - that of a highly successful author who is well respected in critical circles as well. His first novel, The Transsiberian was described by the Seattle Times as "a profound inquiry into the nature of human emotion which blurs the line between prose and poetry". David Foster Wallace called E the "Jack Kerouac of a feeling deficient, ADHD generation" shortly before his death in 2008.

      All this works out very well for E because all he really does is scribble in his little notebook for a few frenzied hours and the following day after some editing he has a book so important that literature courses all over the world scramble to include it in their syllabus. Now you must be thinking that my friend here leads a pretty swell life - a financially secure and distinguished existence. However like all things that sound too good to be true, E's notebook also comes with a catch.

      The more he writes in it, the more he forgets his past. Only the other day he was telling me that an unknown woman screamed at him, claiming to be his wife of 7 years. You can imagine the shock my friend must have been in, even more so when he found evidence of this apparent marriage in the family photos he has at home. This forgetting had never been much of a problem before because it only used to erase memories that he felt he would be better off without - he forgot about the girl in college he never really fell out of love with, he forgot how estranged he was from his father, he forgot the numerous promises he made to himself about self-worth and artistic integrity. But now the notebook was erasing gigantic portions of his memory and the worst part was that he couldn't stop writing.

      So my friend flees in a panic from a wife he doesn't love and a daughter he does not recognize to this old motel a few miles outside the city. What an existence it must be, to have a seemingly perfect future yet not have any semblance of a past. Can you even make any meaningful progress on this long linear line they call time when your line is slowly fading away from back to front? Do you cease inhabiting this world and slowly transform into a wraith? We are but products of history and when history gets washed away the minutes in our lives may tick on but we stop travelling forward. I shudder at the position he finds himself in, the past and the future cannot exist independent of one another. I worry greatly for my dear friend and it saddens me to say that when I called him yesterday he showed even more signs of deterioration. I am surprised that he still remembers me and he leaves me with something to muse over before he hangs up: "The writer types all turn half-crazy in the end."

      I plan on visiting my old friend soon but I have problems of my own. I do not know why I've been clutching the same book close to my chest for the past hour. It is titled The Transsiberian and I'm holding it as if it is supposed to mean something very important to me. The walls around me are grey and unfamiliar but I am not bothered because I am too busy scribbling away on this notebook. It is important I write all of this down before I forget.

-

etymology

I wonder sometimes if dreams are the glimpses we have of our alternate lives in other universes. So often I see a face in my dream that is so familiar and foreign at the same time. Maybe we do know these faces, just not in this life. I woke up feeling the youngest I've ever felt. I used to think that I was an old soul trapped in a young body. I guess that comes when you generalize the little you know about the world to everything you come across in life. I have great designs in my head, but the person I think I am does not correlate with the physical that inhabits my place on this earth. Writing is the only connection I have with myself. Writing is just a way of guiding my dreams. There is so much to see and feel and learn about the world. I have spent too much time thinking and rationalizing. I feel that the further I travel, the deeper I go within myself as well. This post may or may not be an attempt at honesty, I have tried my best to filter out the unconscious which seeps through these lines. I have already said too much, I shall stop now for there is much to live for. And I am filled with excitement.