Tag: life

Optimism

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Set me adrift in the blackness,

Let me spin aimlessly like a homeless globe,

Traversing endless light-years without bearing.

Release me to the void.

To the black velvety comfort of a lightless horizon.

I see. I hear. 

Nothing.

A selfish bastard denying the world. One final cowardly display of spite.

I spit at thee and shut up my eyes and ears to all thy photons and surfaces and waves.

You – life animate and inanimate – force me to understand; you squeeze my head until it pops. 

And I say NO! NO MORE!

I do not understand. I do not see it. I do not hear it. I am dumb and selfish; dumb for not seeing, selfish for not wanting to see.

It makes no sense! And I know!

I am absurd and I can’t help it!

I feel the dark beckoning, offering infinitely more promise, more hope, more strength, than your cold, demanding, rational chaos. 

I am selfish. I see. I hear.

Nothing.

Now release me, let me drop, so that I may go spinning, aimlessly, optimistically, through the blackest void.

Alienation: an experiment

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Here’s an experiment. Tomorrow, before entering the world, wear your hair a different way. Don socks that don’t match. When asked ‘how are you?’, don’t lie. Frown.

When the queen walks in, remain seated. 

Be honest. Be yourself tomorrow.

Unless you are infinitely agreeable, unless your hair looks equally good parted, unless you are God, prepare yourself. 

Prepare for the onslaught of thinly veiled snideness, disapproval, disdain; prepare for unsolicited opinions, for rolled eyes, for mockery; prepare for all the tools at society’s disposal to keep you in line. To hammer you to conformity. 

You’re a glass half empty kind of person? You best have them walkin’ papers signed and stamped! 

DO NOT ROCK THE BOAT!

You got that?

And always, always remember: FOLLOW THE CROWD. 

I dare you: wear your hair differently tomorrow.

The wall

metaphor-existential-wall
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Spent a lifetime talking to that metaphorical wall,

Beat my hands and head until they bled.

Through streaming tears pleaded desperately, 

‘WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU WANT FROM ME?’

Spent a lifetime talking to that metaphorical wall,

Until yesterday,

When I chose to listen.

Aphorisms – 2

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Heed not too quickly the disapproving gaze, it may be the clearest proof yet you are on the correct way.

Conversations with myself – #3

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What did you want to be as a kid? I ask you – myself – what did you want to be as a kid?

Did you want to be a slave to your obsessions? To your insecurities? Did you want to feel trapped inside your own mind? Did you pine to be, just simply long to be, an outsider, misunderstood by others, misunderstanding them in turn? Did you wish to lose yourself?

If not these noble dreams, then what?

Maybe you didn’t formulate it. Maybe you failed to think it through. Think of it at all.

Youth was great. We were the lucky ones. I was a lucky one.

Strength of spirit and endless optimism and boundless hope. Enjoying life as it came, sharing experiences with friends and family.

Games.

Hikes and canoe trips and watching TV on Mom’s bed.

Oh, the antics and joyful shit devised with friends!

Christmas.

Shooting hoops outside and swimming in freezing pools. We didn’t need vacation. I didn’t need vacation. It was all – all – right there.

Well…

not all.

No. Not all.

I remember like yesterday walking my street alone, or with a buddy, in the early morn, on the way home. Sometimes drunk, yet always completely sober. And dreaming of nothing, and of everything. This, this whole world was mine, and I loved it, and it loved me.

The stars were so bright on these nights. And when not, then only for the light of the full moon, lighting the gray road and loose stones of the shoulder.

Yellow dashed and solid lines. Black threads of tar filling cracks. Can you feel it? The roughness of the asphalt and the gummy tar and the smooth paint of the dividing line as you slowly jog barefoot down the middle of the road?

This was my road, illuminated by my stars, and the moon, the moon was my deepest friend, my….confidant. And I was so aware, so very aware, of myself, and my feet on the solid ground.

Optimism.

Unbridled hope.

The houses housed guests asleep in my world. I was content they were there. Live and let live. And they let me live.

As did my mother. She let me live. And my father. He let me live.  Hell, they encouraged it…life…and me, in whom they had faith. And my sister too. Perhaps she came to see I was a viciously free spirit, stubborn, passionate. Arrogant. Oh so arrogant! Not with aggression, nor malice, nor sickening self-pride.

But arrogance in my optimism and self-confidence. And why not? For me, I was the king of my world, this sleeping, trodden street.

On my road. On my road. Arrogant happiness and naivety. Walking on my road. Ask me anything. ‘What would I like to be?’ HAHA. What a silly question. Can’t you see, I am content right here?

What did you want to be as a kid?

In all honesty: nothing precise. Nothing defined. The wind perhaps. Yes, that’ll do.

I wanted but to remain in that blissful state, forever.

It was all right there.

And yet…

it wasn’t.

And now the roads are all foreign. The stars, well they don’t shine as bright. And my feet don’t trust the shifting ground.

I say live and let live, but I don’t understand the rules of life.

And I have a family, kids, a wife. I have a job, a car, responsibilities.

Birthdays.

Graduations.

Report cards.

Football games and bush-craft.

Laughter.

Tears.

And I wouldn’t trade it for a thing.

Well, maybe one thing: to have it all as I have it now, but to have me included. Yes. Me included.

But who am I? I am here, in this form, behind these walls, writing these words. But a part of me is back there. On that road. Where it all made sense.

A part of me walks that road every single night.

A part of me has never left.

Optimism. Unbridled hope.

What do I want to be?

My answer: nothing. But to have that peace again, in whole. To see those stars again, as bright. To be guided by that moon again, back home. To find me again, barefoot, on solid ground.

The subtle art of persuasion

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I am going to make you see the world as I do, even if that means beating it into you.

An introvert’s reminder

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Arrogance is bad. Arrogance grounded in ignorance is even worse.

Independence may be a defense from the truth, a form of self-righteousness and silent arrogance.

Don’t seal yourself from the world, and claim superiority.

We may be our own worst (or forgiving) judges, yet removed from the tempering wisdom found only in human contact, our judgments lack facts.

A mind turned inward fails to recognize its reflection in the arena of social interaction.

The eye can’t see itself.

No one is an island.

The switch

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The mind has made a switch,

From days inward searching spent,

To heed the call of assumed responsibilities,

And rejoin the careening wheels of society.

The mind has made a switch,

And slides sadly into this communal pit.

…rhyming Homer with Homer…

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Insight my mind has not brought!

Endless loops with doubt fraught!

Infinite thoughts pitifully caught!

Stagnation has only wrought rot!

Lyrics #8 – A Murder of One – Counting Crows

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Check song out here.
Blue morning, blue morning
Wrapped in strands of fist and bone
Curiosity, kitten
Doesn’t have to mean you’re on your own
You can look outside your window
He doesn’t have to know
We can talk a while, baby
We can take it nice and slow
All your life is such a shame, shame, shame
All your love is just a dream, dream, dream
Well, are you happy where you’re sleepin’?
Does he keep you safe and warm?
Does he tell you when you’re sorry?
Does he tell you when you’re wrong?
Well I’ve been watching you for hours
It’s been years since we were born
We were perfect when we started
I’ve been wondering where we’ve gone
All your life is such a shame, shame, shame
All your love is just a dream, dream, dream
Well, I dreamt I saw you walking
Up a hillside in the snow
Casting shadows on the winter sky
As you stood there counting crows
One for sorrow, two for joy
Three for girls and four for boys
Five for silver, six for gold
Seven for a secret never to be told
But there’s a bird that nests inside you
Sleeping underneath your skin
Yeah, when you open up your wings to speak
I wish you’d let me in
All your life is such a shame, shame, shame
All your love is just a dream, dream, dream
Open up your eyes, you can see the flames, flames, flames
Of your wasted life, you should be ashamed
Yeah, you don’t want to waste your life, baby
You don’t wanna waste your life, now darlin’
You don’t wanna waste your life, baby
You don’t wanna waste your life, now darlin’
Oh, you don’t wanna waste your life, now baby
I said, “You don’t wanna waste your life, now darlin'”
Oh, you don’t wanna waste your life, now baby
Oh, you don’t wanna, you don’t wanna waste your life, now darlin’
Change, change, change
Change, change, change
Change, change, change
I walk along these hillsides in the summer ‘neath the sunshine
I am feathered by the moonlight falling down on me
I said, “I walk along these hillsides in the summer ‘neath the sunshine
I am feathered by the moonlight falling down on me”
I said, “I will walk along these hillsides
In the summer ‘neath the sunshine
I am feathered by the moonlight falling down on me”
I said, “I will walk along these hillsides
In the summer ‘neath the sunshine
I am feathered by the moonlight”
Change, change, change
Change, change, change
Change, change, change
Oh change, change, yeah
Oh, change, change, change
Oh, change, change, change
Change, change, change change
Change, change, change, change, change

Quote #8 – Thoreau

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Only that day dawns to which we are awake. There is more day to dawn. The sun is but a morning star. – Henry David Thoreau

The war of the obsessed mind

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With my fingernails broken I scratch,

Every single hidden crevice and patch,

Until I, tediously excavating the last,

Finally from this space move past.

 

And yet with doubt constantly plagued,

Trapped wild beast mercilessly caged,

In my head the war bloodily waged,

Inane, insane, engulfed, enraged.

 

Have you yourself lost in loops been?

Thoughts’ ends and beginnings unseen?

Round they wrap choking tendrils keen,

Life to degrade, destroy, demean.

 

Life is suffering, so I might as well

Live my life in this self-made hell.

Your head may shake, yet can you tell

If your four walls aren’t but a cell?

 

Catharsis

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I’m not reaching out. I’m not playing the victim. I’m not drowning in self-pity (though my knees are definitely wet).

I’m reaching inward. I am fighting. I may be drowning in tears of frustration, sadness, hope, joy. I am suffering, but I am not only suffering. I am healing. Slowly, methodically, not always patiently, always hopefully.

I am reaching deep within. There is a drain that needs unclogging, a blockage that needs removing. It doesn’t flow. It doesn’t flow.

What doesn’t?

It. My breath, my optimism, my confidence, my self-esteem, my thoughts, my life. In short: my essence. It is laboured, shallow, unclear, overgrown.

It doesn’t flow.

I reach inward to purge myself of the undergrowth, the overgrowth, the malignant growth. I pull out all the doubt, the fear, the regret, the neglect, the loathing, the contempt, the anger and hate and jealousy. I excise the insecurity, the arrogance, the apathy, the dregs of my soul.

I pull it all out and assess it honestly; laid out before me, splayed and dissected and arranged in subjective orders only my mind can fully comprehend, I reward myself the final judgment.

GUILTY!

For crimes against my person – death.

Now GET OUT! GET THE FUCK OUT!

And after the stinking fetid shit – the rotting carcasses of my demons – is carted away,  buried in pages and posts and amateur journals, covered in virtual soils of obscurity and indifference, I can finally breathe. In, out, in, out, free, with ease, the soothing airs of health and optimism.

Lyrics #7 – I will survive – Cake cover

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Listen here.

At first I was afraid
I was petrified
I kept thinking
I could never live without you by my side.
But then I spent so many nights
Just thinking how you’d done me wrong
I grew strong
I learned how to get along.
And so you’re back
From outer space
I just walked in to find you here
Without that look upon your face.
I should have changed that fucking lock
I would have made you leave your key
If I had known for just one second
You’d be back to bother me.
Oh now go
Walk out the door
Just turn around
Now, you’re not welcome anymore.
Weren’t you the one
Who tried to break me with desire?
Did you think I’d crumble?
Did you think I’d lay down and die?
Oh not I
I will survive
Yeah
As Long as I know how to love
I know I’ll be alive
I’ve got all my life to live
I’ve got all my love to give.
I will survive
I will survive
Yeah, yeah.
It took all the strength I had
Just not to fall apart
I’m trying hard to mend the pieces
Of my broken heart.
And I’ve spent oh so many nights
Just feeling sorry for myself
I used to cry
But now I hold my head up high.
And you see me
With somebody new
I’m not that stupid little person
Still in love with you.
And so you thought you’d just drop by
And you expect me to be free
But now I’m saving all my lovin’
For someone whose lovin’ me.
Oh now go
Walk out the door
Just turn around
Now, you’re not welcome anymore.
Weren’t you the one
Who tried to break me with desire?
Did you think I’d crumble?
Did you think I’d lay down and die?
Oh not I
I will survive
Yeah.
As long as I know how to love
I know I’ll be alive
I’ve got all my life to live
I’ve got all my love to give.
I will survive
I will survive
Yeah, yeah
Oh no.

An old soul

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I am an old soul.

I weep at the beauty of woodland paths,

of slanted sunbeams breaking through autumn canopies,

and falling, twirling, dancing leaves of red, orange, yellow and brown.

I love this world.

And my existence.

The animals in the forest,

I know they are there. And that suffices.

The trees, the streams, the moss wreathing jutting rocks of granite.

Birds. Deer. Mice.

Insects and worms and peeping frogs.

Paths. Worn, fresh, or to be made.

Blue skies.

White clouds.

The breeze. Wind and rain and sleet.

Gently softly falling snow.

The cold.

Flowers and grass and reeds and the call of the blackbird in the swamp.

The distant ovenbird and piercing screech of the hawk.

Fences, new and broken. Barbed-wire tacked to ancient trees overgrown by gnarled trunks.

Time.

Passing days and months and years.

The ticking clock on lazy Sunday afternoons curled up warmly in the silent comfort of Grandma’s house.

Feeling safe. Secured. Loved. Complete.

I am an old soul.

4 am

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I apologize in advance; I don’t want to bore you with these things. I know sooner than later I will be speaking alone to the abyss; my voice a fading echo traveling through stale air, reaching no ears.

Nobody will hear.

The pain, the fear. I want to run. Faster than the wind outside these walls. As fast as light. Maybe then I could assure escape from these heavy leaden thoughts weighing in the back of my head.

Have you ever felt invisible hands choking your neck, squeezing out infinite tears from below your eyes?

‘Look, it’s not so bad,’ they say. ‘At least you have your health.’ ‘Your youth.’ ‘Have not lost a child.’

Indeed.

But as surely as I cannot experience the world from your perspective, you can’t from mine. And yet I try, and ask for you to understand.

Here I am, at 4 am, waking, shaking, drenched in freezing sweat, hands fumbling, searching frantically for the light, terrified, desperately fumbling, frantically searching for the light.

Oh, that there were monsters under my bed, as when I was a child. Oh, that the rays of light could dispel these choking fears. Old habits die hard; my searching, fumbling hands. The light, like your words, is cold comfort.

The monsters are in my head.

To run. Faster than the wind outside these walls. As fast as light. Maybe then…

 

Lyrics #6 – Beggars by Thrice

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Check song and lyrics out here.

Beggars

All you great men of power, you who boast of your feats
Politicians and entrepreneurs
Can you safeguard your breath in the night while you sleep?
Keep your heart beating steady and sure?
As you lie in your bed does the thought haunt your head
That you’re really rather small?
If there’s one thing I know in this life, we are beggars all.

All you champions of science and rulers of men
Can you summon the sun from it’s sleep?
Does the earth seek your counsel on how fast to spin?
Can you shut up the gates of the deep?
Don’t you know that all things hang as if by a string over darkness, poised to fall?
If there’s one thing I know in this life, we are beggars all.

All you big shots that swagger and stride with conceit
Did you devise how your frame would be formed?
If you’d be raised in a palace or left out on the streets?
Or choose the place or the hour you’d be born?
Tell me, what can you claim? Not a thing, not your name
Tell me if you can recall just one thing, not a gift, in this life.

Can you hear what’s been said?
Can you see now that everything’s grace after all?
If there’s one thing I know in this life
We are beggars all.

A life without you

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And I can’t picture my life without you.

Remember what you said: you leave now and she wins.
Keep in mind, you pleaded, the reasons that brought us here.
Walk in my shoes, you reminded me, see it from my eyes.
Oh I tried.
I tried and I came to see, to feel.
The pain. The loss. The suffering. The insecurity. The doubt. The struggle. The tears. The anger. The mistrust.
I see. I feel. I reach out my hand.
Not for fear of losing you. Not for being alone.
But for you.
Keep in mind what you said, what you did. Walk in my naive steps. Try to understand who I was. Feel my pain. Notice the fear and the storm clouds closing in. Sense the choking hands grasping your throat.
Now open your eyes. And I am here.
Can you not forgive me? Yourself? Us?
You turn and run and she wins.
Remember the deep, meaningful, joyful, loving reasons that brought us here. The true reasons we are here. These reasons are steeped in love, understood without words, but by the gaze shared by emerald green and sky-blue eyes.
And I don’t want to picture a life without you.

The fasting soul

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There are words to capture how I feel,

I have lowered my caloric intake to zero

To discover what they are.

My mind and body are one,

Starving for nourishment,

Twisting into hungry knots.

What matters in this state?

This life is all I get,

And I fill it with emptiness;

Cardboard cutouts of complex carbohydrates,

And two-dimensional emotions.

In this hunger, there is clarity,

Moments and seconds filled with epiphany,

The animal, the rock, the clouded sky,

Atoms carrying wind whipping my shaven face,

Making it clean.

I have cried twenty kilos of thought and emotion and soaked the parched ground of my soul.

To bring me back into harmony with this universe,

To nurture and let grow the blissful blossoms of my heart,

Opening optimistic avenues awaiting exploration,

I carry lightness and vitality and strength and

Forgiveness.

Born into this world alone,

Alone I shall die.

I forgive.

I forgive you.

I forgive myself.

Conversations with myself – #2

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Stop feeding off my pain. I cannot take it any longer. The burden, the weight, is far too great. I am no longer your scapegoat, your bearer of misfortune. My pain cannot heal you. I am not your savior.

Though I love you,

I need my strength for me. For me and for them.

(When my son hurts I care for him. I tend his wound, soothe his ailing body. How is it I know what to do?

What of his inner pain? How do I care for that?

When he cries out in pain, I hold him. When he can’t sleep for fear, I reassure him. When he looks down at his feet, reluctant to face the world, I cup his chin in my hand and lift his face toward mine. When he needs me, I am there for him. But even he…even he must someday care for himself.)

I avoid what should be done.

What must be done? What must be done?

(And by must I mean should, as should demands a moral choice: No other choices have meaning. To live with meaning, then, one must choose what should be chosen).

Care for myself as I would my son.

Not so deep within lives a little boy. And when he is afraid, he screams out so loud. A deafening, piercing wail. Screams to be saved.

Silent now. Do you hear him?

The fear of pain becomes the pain.

Fear of loss, of regret. Fear of mistakes. Fear of making an active, as opposed to a reactive, choice.

Through all this. Thirty-five years six months and four days later. That seems to be what I have learned. It all comes down to this: becoming a mature adult man, father and husband and citizen of this world, requires a choice.

Make a choice! Shoulder responsibility, or, rather, make responsibility my own.

I have avoided choices. Certain painful choices. Particularly risky choices. I fear an uncertain future. I sacrifice my present to the morning, but the morning never comes.

I fear an uncertain future, and the morning never comes.

Day in. Day out. Month after monotonous month.

The autumn breeze blows in winter’s chill. Melting ice reveals nodding snow bells, bowing to summer’s rising sun. Around, and around, and around this globe turns in its celestial ellipse. And I, my childlike existence, twirling and spinning and twisting limbs akimbo, orbiting my hard choices, year after bloody year.

(There are only so many seasons the flowers will bloom before these lights go out, and I feed the roots of next spring’s annuals).

I hover in childlike existence. I wait for someone to make the choice. To take it. To move the waltz along. I am not yet finished the dance, the high school wonder. I haven’t yet the courage to take her hand; or to turn my back. I haven’t the fortitude to say yes, to say no. Or anything much, at all.

Days into months, seasons into years; and there it is, nonchalant, uncaring, oblivious. Passing, turning, passing and turning.

Oh how the days pass me by, and the seasons turn their back on me.

And aging.

Thirty, Thirty-one, Thirty-two, Thirty-three. Now thirty-five. Now thirty-five and six months. Now thirty-five and six months and four days.

And it, nonchalant and uncaring, passing and turning. The seasons of my life, orbiting the hard choices, my choices, waiting for someone to make them.

Waiting for me to take them.