There's a barbershop on my street.
Not a hair salon, not a hair stylist, but an honest-to-goodness, old-fashioned barbershop. Opened in 1952. And it looks like it hasn't changed much since then, with the exception of several framed pictures of the Obamas added to the walls.
And the walls are packed. You know that old-timey kitsch that places like T.G.I.Friday's and Applebee's try to capture with all that faux-historic, pre-packaged, plastic junk they hang all over their walls? This place is what those poseurs are trying to replicate. Framed pictures of Martin and Malcolm (and now Barack and Michelle), Hall of Fame plaques from old football and baseball players, signed jersyes and ballcaps, framed newspaper clippings spanning the last 50 years, and all mixed in with portraits of his family, his sons and daughters and grandsons and granddaughters, and their spelling bee ribbons, and A+ report cards, and other tokens of their achievements. It's cliché, but true - it felt like stepping back in time.
The barber's name is Buddy. Which, again, seems so perfect that it's almost cliché. Of course his name is Buddy - how could it have been anything else? A slim, older black gentleman, with a thin mustache, he took over the shop from his uncle in 1960, when he was just 16 years-old, and he's been running it ever since. He lives upstairs, and there's a beauty parlor for the ladies in the back.
There's just the one barber chair. He's the barber, so why would he need more than that? Made of steel and cast iron, it looks like it dates to the '30s or '40s. It even has an extra footrest above the normal one, where you would rest your feet in order to get your shoes shined, while you got a cut or a shave. It's too bad that service was no longer offered. The pricelist on the wall said, "Haircut - $10, Shave - $4, Afro shaping/trim - $15."
I could tell it's been a while since Buddy cut a white boy's hair. His scissors were a bit rusty, and more than a little bit dull. After a while, he just gave up and went to work on me with the clippers. After all these years, he's a master with the clippers. He's got 4 different kinds, and dozens of guards, and he can do things with electric clippers that they were never intended for. When he's cutting your hair, he stands between the chair and the mirror, and he has you facing out into the room, with the mirror at your back; the exact opposite of every haircut I've ever had. As I sat in his chair, looking at the empty room, and the line of empty chairs in front of me, I couldn't help imagining what it must've been like 20, 30, 40 years ago. (Hell, with the way the neighborhood has changed recently, in part because of me I'm more than a little ashamed to say, we could probably even say just 5 or 10 years ago.) At some point it must've been a center of local men's culture. People hanging out, reading the paper, bullshitting about politics and local gossip, waiting for their turn in Buddy's chair. There's an obvious quiet sadness to Buddy's demeanor, and looking out at that empty line of chairs, it was easy to imagine why that might be.
When he was finished with my hair, he gave me a shave. Trimmed up my mustache and beard real nicely. It's the first time since I grew them that I don't look like a hippie! (Or, at least, someone trying to look like a hippie. Thirty-six years-old, and I still can't grow a full goatee, much less a beard.) When he was finished, he rubbed down my scalp with a lotion that smelled a little like roses, and dabbed my face with some sort of tonic that felt like an alcohol and smelled vaguely of eucalyptus. Then he handed me a hand-mirror to examine his work. (He never did turn me around to face the wall mirror behind the chair.)
He gave me a $10 haircut, straight out of the 1960s. And it looks like a $10 haircut. Too high in the back, way too high around the ears; a little too bushy here, a little too thin over there. And it is awesome. Exactly what I wanted. Simple, and classic. And more than a little nerdy.
I'm really looking forward to the next time I get to spend some time in Buddy's chair.
Saturday, March 31, 2012
Friday, March 30, 2012
The Empty Bottle...
She said the bubbles tickled her nose.
Then she'd giggle. Every time.
In general, she didn't really like to drink. Didn't like the way it made her feel, all confused and dizzy, and sometimes a little sick. When it came to partying, she was always more of a "passing a joint with some friends on the back porch of a summer evening, listening to the crickets, and watching the fireflies" kind of girl. But she liked champagne. She liked the dry, crisp, tangy bite of it. She said she liked the way it made her feel like someone who was "all rich and fancy." And she liked the way the bubbles tickled her nose. And she'd tell me that, every time. And then she'd giggle. And it was the most adorable thing in the world.
I was the one who liked to drink. Pot just made me paranoid. And outrageously hungry. I just didn't see the point of it. But booze... a good scotch, a fine brandy, a properly-poured Guinness - these were some of life's greatest pleasures. They had a romance, and a history about them. And they brought relaxation, and ambiance, and character, and perspective. The only thing I loved more than a good drink, was her.
And I guess that's why I'm here, walking alone in the woods, in the middle of the night, in my best suit, carrying a bottle of her favorite champagne.
...
She'd said it was my drinking. That night, at the restaurant, when she'd found the ring I'd managed to slip into the bottom of her glass of champagne. When she'd gotten this look when she first saw it, this look I'd never seen before, like she'd lost something forever. When she'd handed the ring back to me, saying, "I'm sorry, but I can't." I'd asked her, "Why? Why not?" She'd said it was my drinking.
I hadn't seen it coming, at all. We'd been so happy for so many years now. The years we'd spent together had been the best of my life. She said they were hers, too. "But, I can't marry a drunk."
"I'm not a drunk," I said, startled. She'd never said that to me before.
"Yes, you are."
"No, I'm not," I said, starting to get a little angry, feeling more than a little hurt, and betrayed. How could she be rejecting me like this, all of a sudden, after all these years? "Yes, I drink, but so do most people."
"Most people don't drink the way you do." Staring down at her plate; she wouldn't even look at me.
"Look, just because you don't like to drink, doesn't make me a drunk! This is ridiculous!" My voice was rising now.
"I'm sorry, I just can't."
"So, what, that's it?? We're just over now?? You'd throw everything we have away, just like that?!"
"No, of course not. I just can't marry you. Not right now. Not when you're drinking like this. Marriage means forever, and I don't know what you'll be like down the road if you keep drinking. Haven't you noticed how it's changed you? Haven't you noticed how much more quickly you get angry now? How much less affectionate you are? Can you even remember the last time we made love? And I'm not counting the times that you tried, but were too drunk."
"Fine!," I barked, dodging her questions, wounded by her accusations. I brought my hand down a little too hard on the table when I said it, and the dishes rattled. People were starting to look at us now. And the irony of it all, was that now I really needed a drink.
"Fine," I said, quieter this time. "Enjoy your dinner. I'll be at the bar."
...
Walking down the path through the trees, the heavy weight of the bottle swinging in my hand, I remembered it all with sobriety's stark clarity. Felt it all over again, as if for the first time. The hurt, the sadness, the regret, the loss, the shock, the betrayal. And the warm relief of the double-scotch-on-the-rocks afterwards.
...
I'd done it almost to spite her. Left her sitting there at our table-for-two in her best dress, all alone. An eye for an eye; humiliation in kind. If she thinks I'm such a drunk, then fine, might as well get drunk, then. She thinks she knows everything. She doesn't know a goddamned thing. She doesn't even like drinking, so what the fuck does she know about it?
I took a seat at the polished bar, with its upholstered seats and brass rails, and ordered my usual.
Mmmm... That first sip is always the best. Before the ice has had a chance to start melting, diluting the heat of it. Taste like liquid woodsmoke. Tongue of flame snaking down my throat, into my belly, and up my spine. Warm dopamine rush cascading from my brain, down through my limbs. Ecstasy and nirvana all rolled up into one glass of amber peace.
I can't believe she said that. What the fuck does she know, anyways? I don't drink that much. Hell, I only really started drinking a few years ago, anyways. I mean, yeah, there we times we snuck Dad's beer here and there when we were kids, but all kids do that. It's not like I raided their liquor cabinet or anything. I mean, every once in a while I'd steal a sip of this or that, but just because I liked the warm feeling it gave me. It's not like I was getting drunk off of it or anything.
And yeah, I went to a few keg parties in high school. But, again, so did everyone. Hell, so did she! How the fuck am I the bad guy here?? And I did the usual pushing-your-limits thing that everyone does in college, but still - I only got blackout drunk a handful of times the entire time I was there! I knew guys in some of the frats who would do that every weekend. Now that is a drunk!
And after college, I really didn't drink hardly at all. I'd go to happy hour with the guys from work every once in a blue moon, and maybe we'd have some beer or wine with dinner occasionally, but that was it. I really didn't even start drinking until... well, I guess I started soon after I lost that job, didn't I? But, I mean, that's understandable, right? Laid off, couldn't find work, my girlfriend supporting me - it's understandable that a guy would try to drink that off, right? I mean, that's not easy to deal with. I needed something to help me relax and forget about how much I felt like a failure. And besides, it all worked out in the end. I mean, that was years ago, and I got a new job, a better job. A job that can support us both, and a family, too. So, what the fuck is she so upset about?!
I swirl the ice around in my glass, drawing curly-ques on the bar-top. The ice makes a delicate, crystalline tinkling as it knocks gently against the sides of the glass. I love that sound so much. It makes me feel safe and warm to hear it, like the sound of a mother's voice to her child. tinka-tink-ta-tink Like the sound of an angel, tip-toeing. I signal the bartender for a refill.
Ok, so, after I got the new job, I didn't cut down on my drinking. But so what? I mean, I had every reason to be a little nervous, a little gun-shy, after just losing the job before that. And, yeah, ok, so, I drink every night, but it's not like I'm getting drunk all the time. I mean, a few beers, then a few whiskeys, and then I'm off to bed. It's just my routine. I don't see what's wrong with that. Ok, so, that might sound like a lot when you lay it all out like that, but that's only because I've been doing it for years. I mean, that's the equivalent of what one beer and one whiskey used to be for me a couple of years ago. It's not really that much. And she has to be able to see that! She's been there the whole time! She knows this was a gradual increase over a long period. And she knows I'm not getting wasted every night or anything. Why is she making such a big deal out of this?
Ok, ok, ok - so I like to get drunk on the weekends. So. Fucking. WHAT? I work hard, and I need to relax! That is completely normal. I don't understand what her problem is. It's not like I'm a violent drunk who beats her up or some shit. I mean, yeah, we've been fighting a lot more lately, that's true, I guess. But it's not because of my drinking. It's because she's always nagging me about shit when I'm trying to relax! "No, I don't wanna mow the fucking lawn right now! Can't you see I'm watching the game, you stupid bitch??" "Can't you walk the fucking dog yourself?! Jesus fucking christ, you've got legs, don't you?! I'm sitting here, nice and relaxed, and you've always gotta come in here with some fucking thing to try and get me to do! Take care of your fucking self for once, for a fucking change, why don't you!" "I swear to fucking God, if you tell me to fix that fucking drawer one more motherfucking time I will break your fucking legs, DO YOU HEAR ME?!!"
Fuck.
Fuck.
Wow. Ok. So, maybe I might need to cut back a little. Maybe. I mean, it's completely ridiculous to call me a drunk, or treat me like I'm one of those poor, pathetic losers who have to go to those stupid meetings all the time or something. But, yeah, I've probably been a little hard on her. And, yeah, I guess I probably wouldn't have gotten that upset if I hadn't been that drunk. And, yeah, maybe I...
"Hey."
I look up from my empty glass, snapped out of my reverie, to find her standing next to my stool.
...
It's so dark out here. The trees block what little light the Moon might've provided. I'm pretty sure I'm still going the right way, though. I see what looks like a bit of a clearing up ahead. I make my way through the last of the brush, and come out into the open air; the night and noise. Yes. Yes, this is it. This is where it happened.
...
"I want to leave." She looks so sad.
"Yeah, well, I'm not done yet." I can't let it go. I'm just so pissed at her for treating me like that. In public, no less!
"Fine, stay here, then. But I'm leaving. You can find your own way home."
"No, you're not!" How dare her! "You're not taking the fucking car and leaving me here! Fine, you want to fucking go, let's fucking go!!" I jump off my barstool, stumbling a bit on the landing. How many drinks did I have? Thirty oughtta cover it. I slam the money down on the bar and stomp off toward the front entrance.
In the parking lot, trying to get my key into the door. "DAMMIT!," as I drop them for the second time. She's got me so fucking mad I'm shaking!
"Please, let me drive."
"No! Fuck you! I can drive. I'm not a fucking DRUNK!"
"It's not that. I'm worried about you driving when you're this angry."
"Fuck you, I can fucking drive." Bitch fucking calls me a drunk, completely fucking rejects me, humiliates me in public, and now she won't even let me drive! I have the doors open by now.
"Fine. Just please be careful." I see her look at me for a moment before she gets into the car. I have no idea what she's feeling just then. I don't care, either.
Gunning the engine, I squeal out of the parking lot.
"Please! Be careful!"
"Shut up! When you yell at me like that it makes me nervous!" Rounding the corner through the yellow light at 35 miles-per-hour. "You keep distracting me like that and we will get in a fucking accident!"
We drive down the dark two-lane in blessed silence for a while. I'm pushing the limits of what our little car can do, but it feels good. I can see her gripping the door handle tightly when I round the corners. That feels good, too. I push it a little harder, the highbeams cutting a tunnel of light down the dark, wooded road.
"Please! Just slow down!"
"I fucking told you..."
A flash of white outside the windshield fills my vision for a split-second. I panic, and swerve. I hear a scream, and the world goes completely insane.
...
It was a long walk from the reception to this lonely stretch of wooded road, and I'm all sweaty in my suit. I had no idea what that flash was at the time, but I can see it so clearly now in my mind, as if it were in slow motion. An owl. A white owl, riding the updraft over my windshield, wings spread wide. I guess it must've been diving for a mouse in the road or something. I wonder if that mouse made it, like I did.
It's one of life's cruelest ironies that it's usually the drunk driver who survives the wreck. The theory is, they're more relaxed, and they don't tense up as quickly, so they kind of "go with the flow," as it were, and so often just bounce around a bit, but don't break. I woke up here, in the middle of this road, and I had a few bumps and bruises, and a cut on my scalp, but that's all. They tell me I was actually thrown clear of the wreckage, and that it probably saved my life. She was wearing her seat-belt. She was trapped as the car rolled over and over down the road, smashing down onto the asphalt again and again.
I might've walked away from that wreck, but I never really left it. No more than she did.
When I saw they were serving her favorite champagne at the funeral reception, I realized I couldn't take this anymore. All the false sympathies, all the accusing stares. I know it was my fault! You think I don't fucking know that?! You think I need you looking at me like I'm a murderer in order to know what I've done?! I know what I've fucking done! I threw everything that meant anything to me in this whole fucking world away, forever, for nothing!! I killed your little girl, and your sister, and your friend, because I was a fucking drunk, and I was too goddamned stupid to know what I had! I picked up one of the bottles, and walked out into the night.
I'd intended to drink the whole thing sitting by the side of this road, here, where my life ended. Where I'd ended her. But now that I'm here, I can't seem to bring myself to do it. I haven't had a drink since that night. I'd wanted to celebrate her by drinking her favorite. But now it feels more like I'd be killing her all over again, somehow.
I don't understand what she ever saw in me. Lord knows I didn't deserve her. The fact that she cared about me at all, that she wanted to help me, that she loved me, is a fucking miracle. Another miracle I threw away, because it meant nothing to me.
What the fuck am I doing feeling sorry for myself?? What the fuck am I doing, sitting here, crying by the side of the road? You think you've lost everything? Fuck you. She lost everything. Because of you. For you. She loved you and she wanted to take care of you. She wanted you to get better. And you killed her. So now you have a choice. You can sit here, and keep pretending this is all about you, or you can get the fuck up, and keep fucking living, and make sure that your life is worth the price she paid for it. Get off your ass, and live a life she would've been proud of you for. Live the life she gave you.
I stand up and brush myself off. I pick up the bottle of champagne and walk out into the middle of the lonely road. I remove the gold foil from around the neck of the bottle. Holding it in both hands, pushing on the cork with both thumbs, the white plastic stopper suddenly explodes and rockets out into the night and disappears. The bottle ejaculates cold, white, foamy bubbles all over my hands, pouring down onto the road.
I hold the bottle up, looking at it closely. I want to remember this moment forever, as vividly as I remember her final night. I look straight up at the sky and, with my mouth closed and my eyes wide open, I upend the bottle, and pour the champagne into my face.
It's cold, and it stings my eyes badly. I keep pouring. It goes up my nose and I start to choke. I cough and I choke, but I keep pouring. It's streaming off of me, soaking my suit, and splashing all over the road. Finally, the bottle is empty. I stagger and cough and blink my eyes, trying to get a hold of myself.
When I can finally breathe again, bent over double in the middle of the road, I realize, that the bubbles are tickling my nose. And I laugh, like I can't remember ever laughing before. I laugh and I laugh and I laugh into the night until I am completely empty. Until there's nothing left of me.
I set the bottle down on the side of the road, and start walking.
...
...
...
It's common to see trash along the side of the road. Any road. But this morning, I saw an empty champagne bottle of all things, along the side of the twisting farm-country road of my new commute. Never seen that before. And I thought to myself, "Ok, there's got to be an interesting story behind that." So I decided to try and make one up. I'm guessing the real story is probably much better than mine.
I didn't plan this out at all, didn't have an outline or a clear story in my mind when I started. I just let it come to me, one piece at a time. I kind of feel like I let the story tell itself, through me. And this is what came out.
So, if you didn't like it, don't blame me.
I'm just the messenger.
Then she'd giggle. Every time.
In general, she didn't really like to drink. Didn't like the way it made her feel, all confused and dizzy, and sometimes a little sick. When it came to partying, she was always more of a "passing a joint with some friends on the back porch of a summer evening, listening to the crickets, and watching the fireflies" kind of girl. But she liked champagne. She liked the dry, crisp, tangy bite of it. She said she liked the way it made her feel like someone who was "all rich and fancy." And she liked the way the bubbles tickled her nose. And she'd tell me that, every time. And then she'd giggle. And it was the most adorable thing in the world.
I was the one who liked to drink. Pot just made me paranoid. And outrageously hungry. I just didn't see the point of it. But booze... a good scotch, a fine brandy, a properly-poured Guinness - these were some of life's greatest pleasures. They had a romance, and a history about them. And they brought relaxation, and ambiance, and character, and perspective. The only thing I loved more than a good drink, was her.
And I guess that's why I'm here, walking alone in the woods, in the middle of the night, in my best suit, carrying a bottle of her favorite champagne.
...
She'd said it was my drinking. That night, at the restaurant, when she'd found the ring I'd managed to slip into the bottom of her glass of champagne. When she'd gotten this look when she first saw it, this look I'd never seen before, like she'd lost something forever. When she'd handed the ring back to me, saying, "I'm sorry, but I can't." I'd asked her, "Why? Why not?" She'd said it was my drinking.
I hadn't seen it coming, at all. We'd been so happy for so many years now. The years we'd spent together had been the best of my life. She said they were hers, too. "But, I can't marry a drunk."
"I'm not a drunk," I said, startled. She'd never said that to me before.
"Yes, you are."
"No, I'm not," I said, starting to get a little angry, feeling more than a little hurt, and betrayed. How could she be rejecting me like this, all of a sudden, after all these years? "Yes, I drink, but so do most people."
"Most people don't drink the way you do." Staring down at her plate; she wouldn't even look at me.
"Look, just because you don't like to drink, doesn't make me a drunk! This is ridiculous!" My voice was rising now.
"I'm sorry, I just can't."
"So, what, that's it?? We're just over now?? You'd throw everything we have away, just like that?!"
"No, of course not. I just can't marry you. Not right now. Not when you're drinking like this. Marriage means forever, and I don't know what you'll be like down the road if you keep drinking. Haven't you noticed how it's changed you? Haven't you noticed how much more quickly you get angry now? How much less affectionate you are? Can you even remember the last time we made love? And I'm not counting the times that you tried, but were too drunk."
"Fine!," I barked, dodging her questions, wounded by her accusations. I brought my hand down a little too hard on the table when I said it, and the dishes rattled. People were starting to look at us now. And the irony of it all, was that now I really needed a drink.
"Fine," I said, quieter this time. "Enjoy your dinner. I'll be at the bar."
...
Walking down the path through the trees, the heavy weight of the bottle swinging in my hand, I remembered it all with sobriety's stark clarity. Felt it all over again, as if for the first time. The hurt, the sadness, the regret, the loss, the shock, the betrayal. And the warm relief of the double-scotch-on-the-rocks afterwards.
...
I'd done it almost to spite her. Left her sitting there at our table-for-two in her best dress, all alone. An eye for an eye; humiliation in kind. If she thinks I'm such a drunk, then fine, might as well get drunk, then. She thinks she knows everything. She doesn't know a goddamned thing. She doesn't even like drinking, so what the fuck does she know about it?
I took a seat at the polished bar, with its upholstered seats and brass rails, and ordered my usual.
Mmmm... That first sip is always the best. Before the ice has had a chance to start melting, diluting the heat of it. Taste like liquid woodsmoke. Tongue of flame snaking down my throat, into my belly, and up my spine. Warm dopamine rush cascading from my brain, down through my limbs. Ecstasy and nirvana all rolled up into one glass of amber peace.
I can't believe she said that. What the fuck does she know, anyways? I don't drink that much. Hell, I only really started drinking a few years ago, anyways. I mean, yeah, there we times we snuck Dad's beer here and there when we were kids, but all kids do that. It's not like I raided their liquor cabinet or anything. I mean, every once in a while I'd steal a sip of this or that, but just because I liked the warm feeling it gave me. It's not like I was getting drunk off of it or anything.
And yeah, I went to a few keg parties in high school. But, again, so did everyone. Hell, so did she! How the fuck am I the bad guy here?? And I did the usual pushing-your-limits thing that everyone does in college, but still - I only got blackout drunk a handful of times the entire time I was there! I knew guys in some of the frats who would do that every weekend. Now that is a drunk!
And after college, I really didn't drink hardly at all. I'd go to happy hour with the guys from work every once in a blue moon, and maybe we'd have some beer or wine with dinner occasionally, but that was it. I really didn't even start drinking until... well, I guess I started soon after I lost that job, didn't I? But, I mean, that's understandable, right? Laid off, couldn't find work, my girlfriend supporting me - it's understandable that a guy would try to drink that off, right? I mean, that's not easy to deal with. I needed something to help me relax and forget about how much I felt like a failure. And besides, it all worked out in the end. I mean, that was years ago, and I got a new job, a better job. A job that can support us both, and a family, too. So, what the fuck is she so upset about?!
I swirl the ice around in my glass, drawing curly-ques on the bar-top. The ice makes a delicate, crystalline tinkling as it knocks gently against the sides of the glass. I love that sound so much. It makes me feel safe and warm to hear it, like the sound of a mother's voice to her child. tinka-tink-ta-tink Like the sound of an angel, tip-toeing. I signal the bartender for a refill.
Ok, so, after I got the new job, I didn't cut down on my drinking. But so what? I mean, I had every reason to be a little nervous, a little gun-shy, after just losing the job before that. And, yeah, ok, so, I drink every night, but it's not like I'm getting drunk all the time. I mean, a few beers, then a few whiskeys, and then I'm off to bed. It's just my routine. I don't see what's wrong with that. Ok, so, that might sound like a lot when you lay it all out like that, but that's only because I've been doing it for years. I mean, that's the equivalent of what one beer and one whiskey used to be for me a couple of years ago. It's not really that much. And she has to be able to see that! She's been there the whole time! She knows this was a gradual increase over a long period. And she knows I'm not getting wasted every night or anything. Why is she making such a big deal out of this?
Ok, ok, ok - so I like to get drunk on the weekends. So. Fucking. WHAT? I work hard, and I need to relax! That is completely normal. I don't understand what her problem is. It's not like I'm a violent drunk who beats her up or some shit. I mean, yeah, we've been fighting a lot more lately, that's true, I guess. But it's not because of my drinking. It's because she's always nagging me about shit when I'm trying to relax! "No, I don't wanna mow the fucking lawn right now! Can't you see I'm watching the game, you stupid bitch??" "Can't you walk the fucking dog yourself?! Jesus fucking christ, you've got legs, don't you?! I'm sitting here, nice and relaxed, and you've always gotta come in here with some fucking thing to try and get me to do! Take care of your fucking self for once, for a fucking change, why don't you!" "I swear to fucking God, if you tell me to fix that fucking drawer one more motherfucking time I will break your fucking legs, DO YOU HEAR ME?!!"
Fuck.
Fuck.
Wow. Ok. So, maybe I might need to cut back a little. Maybe. I mean, it's completely ridiculous to call me a drunk, or treat me like I'm one of those poor, pathetic losers who have to go to those stupid meetings all the time or something. But, yeah, I've probably been a little hard on her. And, yeah, I guess I probably wouldn't have gotten that upset if I hadn't been that drunk. And, yeah, maybe I...
"Hey."
I look up from my empty glass, snapped out of my reverie, to find her standing next to my stool.
...
It's so dark out here. The trees block what little light the Moon might've provided. I'm pretty sure I'm still going the right way, though. I see what looks like a bit of a clearing up ahead. I make my way through the last of the brush, and come out into the open air; the night and noise. Yes. Yes, this is it. This is where it happened.
...
"I want to leave." She looks so sad.
"Yeah, well, I'm not done yet." I can't let it go. I'm just so pissed at her for treating me like that. In public, no less!
"Fine, stay here, then. But I'm leaving. You can find your own way home."
"No, you're not!" How dare her! "You're not taking the fucking car and leaving me here! Fine, you want to fucking go, let's fucking go!!" I jump off my barstool, stumbling a bit on the landing. How many drinks did I have? Thirty oughtta cover it. I slam the money down on the bar and stomp off toward the front entrance.
In the parking lot, trying to get my key into the door. "DAMMIT!," as I drop them for the second time. She's got me so fucking mad I'm shaking!
"Please, let me drive."
"No! Fuck you! I can drive. I'm not a fucking DRUNK!"
"It's not that. I'm worried about you driving when you're this angry."
"Fuck you, I can fucking drive." Bitch fucking calls me a drunk, completely fucking rejects me, humiliates me in public, and now she won't even let me drive! I have the doors open by now.
"Fine. Just please be careful." I see her look at me for a moment before she gets into the car. I have no idea what she's feeling just then. I don't care, either.
Gunning the engine, I squeal out of the parking lot.
"Please! Be careful!"
"Shut up! When you yell at me like that it makes me nervous!" Rounding the corner through the yellow light at 35 miles-per-hour. "You keep distracting me like that and we will get in a fucking accident!"
We drive down the dark two-lane in blessed silence for a while. I'm pushing the limits of what our little car can do, but it feels good. I can see her gripping the door handle tightly when I round the corners. That feels good, too. I push it a little harder, the highbeams cutting a tunnel of light down the dark, wooded road.
"Please! Just slow down!"
"I fucking told you..."
A flash of white outside the windshield fills my vision for a split-second. I panic, and swerve. I hear a scream, and the world goes completely insane.
...
It was a long walk from the reception to this lonely stretch of wooded road, and I'm all sweaty in my suit. I had no idea what that flash was at the time, but I can see it so clearly now in my mind, as if it were in slow motion. An owl. A white owl, riding the updraft over my windshield, wings spread wide. I guess it must've been diving for a mouse in the road or something. I wonder if that mouse made it, like I did.
It's one of life's cruelest ironies that it's usually the drunk driver who survives the wreck. The theory is, they're more relaxed, and they don't tense up as quickly, so they kind of "go with the flow," as it were, and so often just bounce around a bit, but don't break. I woke up here, in the middle of this road, and I had a few bumps and bruises, and a cut on my scalp, but that's all. They tell me I was actually thrown clear of the wreckage, and that it probably saved my life. She was wearing her seat-belt. She was trapped as the car rolled over and over down the road, smashing down onto the asphalt again and again.
I might've walked away from that wreck, but I never really left it. No more than she did.
When I saw they were serving her favorite champagne at the funeral reception, I realized I couldn't take this anymore. All the false sympathies, all the accusing stares. I know it was my fault! You think I don't fucking know that?! You think I need you looking at me like I'm a murderer in order to know what I've done?! I know what I've fucking done! I threw everything that meant anything to me in this whole fucking world away, forever, for nothing!! I killed your little girl, and your sister, and your friend, because I was a fucking drunk, and I was too goddamned stupid to know what I had! I picked up one of the bottles, and walked out into the night.
I'd intended to drink the whole thing sitting by the side of this road, here, where my life ended. Where I'd ended her. But now that I'm here, I can't seem to bring myself to do it. I haven't had a drink since that night. I'd wanted to celebrate her by drinking her favorite. But now it feels more like I'd be killing her all over again, somehow.
I don't understand what she ever saw in me. Lord knows I didn't deserve her. The fact that she cared about me at all, that she wanted to help me, that she loved me, is a fucking miracle. Another miracle I threw away, because it meant nothing to me.
What the fuck am I doing feeling sorry for myself?? What the fuck am I doing, sitting here, crying by the side of the road? You think you've lost everything? Fuck you. She lost everything. Because of you. For you. She loved you and she wanted to take care of you. She wanted you to get better. And you killed her. So now you have a choice. You can sit here, and keep pretending this is all about you, or you can get the fuck up, and keep fucking living, and make sure that your life is worth the price she paid for it. Get off your ass, and live a life she would've been proud of you for. Live the life she gave you.
I stand up and brush myself off. I pick up the bottle of champagne and walk out into the middle of the lonely road. I remove the gold foil from around the neck of the bottle. Holding it in both hands, pushing on the cork with both thumbs, the white plastic stopper suddenly explodes and rockets out into the night and disappears. The bottle ejaculates cold, white, foamy bubbles all over my hands, pouring down onto the road.
I hold the bottle up, looking at it closely. I want to remember this moment forever, as vividly as I remember her final night. I look straight up at the sky and, with my mouth closed and my eyes wide open, I upend the bottle, and pour the champagne into my face.
It's cold, and it stings my eyes badly. I keep pouring. It goes up my nose and I start to choke. I cough and I choke, but I keep pouring. It's streaming off of me, soaking my suit, and splashing all over the road. Finally, the bottle is empty. I stagger and cough and blink my eyes, trying to get a hold of myself.
When I can finally breathe again, bent over double in the middle of the road, I realize, that the bubbles are tickling my nose. And I laugh, like I can't remember ever laughing before. I laugh and I laugh and I laugh into the night until I am completely empty. Until there's nothing left of me.
I set the bottle down on the side of the road, and start walking.
...
...
...
It's common to see trash along the side of the road. Any road. But this morning, I saw an empty champagne bottle of all things, along the side of the twisting farm-country road of my new commute. Never seen that before. And I thought to myself, "Ok, there's got to be an interesting story behind that." So I decided to try and make one up. I'm guessing the real story is probably much better than mine.
I didn't plan this out at all, didn't have an outline or a clear story in my mind when I started. I just let it come to me, one piece at a time. I kind of feel like I let the story tell itself, through me. And this is what came out.
So, if you didn't like it, don't blame me.
I'm just the messenger.
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Take What You Can Get...
Well, it was inevitable, really.
Day's almost over, and I've really got to concentrate on my work. I've got an appointment right after work, and by the time I get out of there I'm going to need to eat dinner. And then by the time I'm done with that it's going to be nine-thirty or ten o'clock, and I'm fairly certain I'm not going to feel like writing anything at that point. So, it's now or never.
But despite the fact that I've remained open all day to any form of inspiration that might happen to come to me... nothing has. So, here I am, feeling like I have to write something, but not having anything to say.
What I realize as I observe this, is the Tao of Acceptance.
I made the effort, but I can't force the issue. Inspiration is not an act of Will. All I can do, is try my best, and try to be happy with the results. And I've done that. Sure, I would've preferred to have written something meaningful, or beautiful, or profound, or poetic. But I gave it my best effort. And in the end, I still took what was inside of me, however mundane it might feel, and cast it out into the world.
And I'm satisfied with that.
Day's almost over, and I've really got to concentrate on my work. I've got an appointment right after work, and by the time I get out of there I'm going to need to eat dinner. And then by the time I'm done with that it's going to be nine-thirty or ten o'clock, and I'm fairly certain I'm not going to feel like writing anything at that point. So, it's now or never.
But despite the fact that I've remained open all day to any form of inspiration that might happen to come to me... nothing has. So, here I am, feeling like I have to write something, but not having anything to say.
What I realize as I observe this, is the Tao of Acceptance.
I made the effort, but I can't force the issue. Inspiration is not an act of Will. All I can do, is try my best, and try to be happy with the results. And I've done that. Sure, I would've preferred to have written something meaningful, or beautiful, or profound, or poetic. But I gave it my best effort. And in the end, I still took what was inside of me, however mundane it might feel, and cast it out into the world.
And I'm satisfied with that.
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Because You're Mine...
I keep a close watch on this heart of mine
I keep my eyes wide open all the time
I keep the ends out for the tie that binds
Because you're mine,
I walk the line
I find it very, very easy to be true
I find myself alone when each day is through
Yes, I'll admit that I'm a fool for you
Because you're mine,
I walk the line
As sure as night is dark and day is light
I keep you on my mind both day and night
And happiness I've known proves that it's right
Because you're mine,
I walk the line
You've got a way to keep me on your side
You give me cause for love that I can't hide
For you I know I'd even try to turn the tide
Because you're mine,
I walk the line
I keep a close watch on this heart of mine
I keep my eyes wide open all the time
I keep the ends out for the tie that binds
Because you're mine,
I walk the line
I keep my eyes wide open all the time
I keep the ends out for the tie that binds
Because you're mine,
I walk the line
I find it very, very easy to be true
I find myself alone when each day is through
Yes, I'll admit that I'm a fool for you
Because you're mine,
I walk the line
As sure as night is dark and day is light
I keep you on my mind both day and night
And happiness I've known proves that it's right
Because you're mine,
I walk the line
You've got a way to keep me on your side
You give me cause for love that I can't hide
For you I know I'd even try to turn the tide
Because you're mine,
I walk the line
I keep a close watch on this heart of mine
I keep my eyes wide open all the time
I keep the ends out for the tie that binds
Because you're mine,
I walk the line
-JC
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
My Precious...
I keep forgetting that this all started with Her.
Amid all the psychodrama and melodramatic, existential bullshit at my latest rock bottom, I keep losing sight of how I ended up there in the first place. Of the reason why I started running head-long toward the dark at the end of the tunnel at all. And equally, in the effervescence of all of my recently re-discovered joys, in the heady excitement of my bright, shiny new serenity, I also keep losing sight of the fact that, that reason is now gone. That I got what I wanted all along.
That I'm so in love with Her.
Yes, it's Spring, and that certainly has to be factored into the equation. But that doesn't make anything I'm feeling less relevant, or any less real. For months, and maybe longer, I felt like I'd lost her. (I realize now, I'd actually lost myself.) I couldn't find any reason to be with her, except momentum. I couldn't find any joy in her company, in her touch, or in her place in my life. I realize now that I couldn't find any joy in anything in my life just then, but at the time I was completely focused on her. I thought that We were the problem, that something was wrong with Us that needed to be fixed. That if she could only change, or if I could only learn to be happy without the things I felt I needed from her, then everything would be better. But it never was. It was never good enough. Nothing was ever good enough. And I only ended up more unhappy, and more lost.
I believe my biggest flaw (and I have so many), is how I respond in these situations. When I cannot find joy in my life, when I feel lost and alone, when I begin to struggle to find a reason to keep going, I force-feed myself artificial pleasure in the form of deadly poisons. Now, to be fair, most of the time it's not like that. In fact, I'd say 99% of the time it's just a little here, a little there - just having a good time and blowing off a little steam. And nothing that's even really dangerous, let alone deadly. Under any other circumstance, it's all innocent and under control. No, not "under control," because the truth is that for most of the time, there's nothing there that even needs to be controlled in the first place. But then there's that fatal 1% of the time, when I feel like I have nothing. And believing I have nothing, and feeling that it's all downhill from there anyways, then I might as well enjoy the ride. And that's when I push the plunger on my self-destruct button.
And that's exactly what I did here. I'd made her my entire life, in about the most self-destructive, co-dependent manner imaginable. And so when I felt like I'd lost her, I felt like I'd lost everything. I hadn't, but I couldn't see that from the bottom of the hole I had dug myself into. And when I finally hit bottom, I wasn't even thinking of saving myself from myself. I still hadn't even realized that I was the problem. I thought I was trying to save my marriage. I thought I was trying to find a way to live with her. But I was just trying to find a way to live.
And now I'm so happy, and so overjoyed with every second of every day, blah blah blah. The high of the near-death experience. And it's all such a big distraction, so constantly overwhelming, that I keep forgetting to pay attention specifically to all that I've re-gained with her.
My heart beats faster when I think of her now. It actually skips when she kisses me. Can you fucking believe that? I didn't think that was possible anymore! Everything she does makes me happy right now. Even the things I used to think I couldn't stand. I don't know how I ever felt any other way than I do right now. I'm so grateful for the gift of her life, and the fact that she actually, improbably, inexplicably, wants to share it with me. I look forward to seeing her every day in a way I only distantly remember feeling, long ago. I ache softly inside when I have to leave her. When I make her laugh, I own the fucking world. And when my hands are on her hips, and I pull her to me, and feel every curve of her pressed against my body, I am lost again. But no longer in darkness. Lost in the cloudy depths of her palest-blue eyes. Lost in the scent of her skin. Lost in my lust to reunite with the other half of me. Lost in the warm, comfortable weight of the life we've made, wrapped around us, holding us tightly together. Lost in my joy of Her.
I hold no delusions that this will last forever. Rule #1: everything, everyone, everywhere, ends. But because I know that right now, I am more grateful than I ever thought possible, for every single second I get to be with her. And I remember now, what I had so tragically forgotten:
That She is the single greatest thing that has ever happened to me.
And that no matter whatever else I may be in my life, the one and only thing I will always be, forever, is Her's.
Amid all the psychodrama and melodramatic, existential bullshit at my latest rock bottom, I keep losing sight of how I ended up there in the first place. Of the reason why I started running head-long toward the dark at the end of the tunnel at all. And equally, in the effervescence of all of my recently re-discovered joys, in the heady excitement of my bright, shiny new serenity, I also keep losing sight of the fact that, that reason is now gone. That I got what I wanted all along.
That I'm so in love with Her.
Yes, it's Spring, and that certainly has to be factored into the equation. But that doesn't make anything I'm feeling less relevant, or any less real. For months, and maybe longer, I felt like I'd lost her. (I realize now, I'd actually lost myself.) I couldn't find any reason to be with her, except momentum. I couldn't find any joy in her company, in her touch, or in her place in my life. I realize now that I couldn't find any joy in anything in my life just then, but at the time I was completely focused on her. I thought that We were the problem, that something was wrong with Us that needed to be fixed. That if she could only change, or if I could only learn to be happy without the things I felt I needed from her, then everything would be better. But it never was. It was never good enough. Nothing was ever good enough. And I only ended up more unhappy, and more lost.
I believe my biggest flaw (and I have so many), is how I respond in these situations. When I cannot find joy in my life, when I feel lost and alone, when I begin to struggle to find a reason to keep going, I force-feed myself artificial pleasure in the form of deadly poisons. Now, to be fair, most of the time it's not like that. In fact, I'd say 99% of the time it's just a little here, a little there - just having a good time and blowing off a little steam. And nothing that's even really dangerous, let alone deadly. Under any other circumstance, it's all innocent and under control. No, not "under control," because the truth is that for most of the time, there's nothing there that even needs to be controlled in the first place. But then there's that fatal 1% of the time, when I feel like I have nothing. And believing I have nothing, and feeling that it's all downhill from there anyways, then I might as well enjoy the ride. And that's when I push the plunger on my self-destruct button.
And that's exactly what I did here. I'd made her my entire life, in about the most self-destructive, co-dependent manner imaginable. And so when I felt like I'd lost her, I felt like I'd lost everything. I hadn't, but I couldn't see that from the bottom of the hole I had dug myself into. And when I finally hit bottom, I wasn't even thinking of saving myself from myself. I still hadn't even realized that I was the problem. I thought I was trying to save my marriage. I thought I was trying to find a way to live with her. But I was just trying to find a way to live.
And now I'm so happy, and so overjoyed with every second of every day, blah blah blah. The high of the near-death experience. And it's all such a big distraction, so constantly overwhelming, that I keep forgetting to pay attention specifically to all that I've re-gained with her.
My heart beats faster when I think of her now. It actually skips when she kisses me. Can you fucking believe that? I didn't think that was possible anymore! Everything she does makes me happy right now. Even the things I used to think I couldn't stand. I don't know how I ever felt any other way than I do right now. I'm so grateful for the gift of her life, and the fact that she actually, improbably, inexplicably, wants to share it with me. I look forward to seeing her every day in a way I only distantly remember feeling, long ago. I ache softly inside when I have to leave her. When I make her laugh, I own the fucking world. And when my hands are on her hips, and I pull her to me, and feel every curve of her pressed against my body, I am lost again. But no longer in darkness. Lost in the cloudy depths of her palest-blue eyes. Lost in the scent of her skin. Lost in my lust to reunite with the other half of me. Lost in the warm, comfortable weight of the life we've made, wrapped around us, holding us tightly together. Lost in my joy of Her.
I hold no delusions that this will last forever. Rule #1: everything, everyone, everywhere, ends. But because I know that right now, I am more grateful than I ever thought possible, for every single second I get to be with her. And I remember now, what I had so tragically forgotten:
That She is the single greatest thing that has ever happened to me.
And that no matter whatever else I may be in my life, the one and only thing I will always be, forever, is Her's.
Monday, March 26, 2012
Dream Diary #1...
It's late, and I should be leaving the office now, but I really don't want to try to write this at home, and I also really don't want to skip writing today. Today was one of those busy days where you feel like you never get a chance to catch your breath, and this is really just the first opportunity I've had to write at all. So, I'll try to be brief.
I had a strange and unsettling dream this morning. A lot of it I don't remember, and a lot of it was fluff not worth remembering, but there was a core of something strange, and vivid, and unsettling enough that it's been on my mind off and on all day.
I remember that Dollface and I were staying in a hotel room somewhere, in some small town that was strange to us; we'd never been there before. It was a cheap motor lodge kind of place. I remember that she was asleep, and I was bored, and I decided to go check out this new town while we were here. (Something that has happened in our waking life many times.)
It was the middle of the night, and I drove just down the street aways, until I came upon this strange strip mall. It was all lit up like an amusement park. But all the stores were wooden cabins, like you'd find at a campground. Porches and screen doors; everything hung with strings of lights. There were shoppers and kids and punks and stoners smoking joints and junkies looking for a fix. And there were prostitutes, most of them looking like junkies or meth-heads, trolling for johns, so they could get their medicine.
I decided to try and find one I liked.
Definitely not something I have ever done before, in the dream or in real life, and I can't say exactly why I made that decision. For some reason, I thought the best way to go about this was to sit down in the grass next to one of the porches of one of the stores/cabins. So, I sat down there in the grass, and looked up at the stars.
It was then that I noticed that there were two moons in the sky. Both waxing gibbous (a little more than a quarter-full, heading towards full) - mirror images - one slightly above and to the right of the other. And there were these strange trails of the image of the moon, like a dragon of smoke in the sky below them. In the dream, as I stared at this awesome and impossible sight, I remembered hearing about this rare lunar condition on the radio, and felt delighted that I'd actually had a chance to see it, since the radio had said it was not going to happen again in my lifetime.
A young girl walked over to me and asked if I was looking for some company. I said I was. So she sat down cross-legged in the grass in front of me. She was wearing a thin white t-shirt, cut-off blue jean shorts, and low-top chuck taylors. She was very thin. Too thin for her clothes. She looked very young, too. Her skin was smooth and soft and pale. Her dirty blonde hair cropped short in a sort-of bob. She didn't look sick and used, like all the others. In her face, she looked like she still had some baby-fat. She probably could've passed for 15. But I was going under the assumption that she was at least 18, because her arms and legs were covered in tattoos.
All of her tattoos were glyphs and symbols. Sigils and hex-marks and other occult signs. And Runes. I could read them. They were incantations.
"Those are runic incantations," I said to her, pointing to the string of runes on her shoulder.
"Uh, yes, they are," she replied, slightly taken aback.
"Oh, and that is a very powerful mark," I said, pointing to a runic sigil on her bicep that was written in a sort of runic "code." The ancient runic sorcerers had used it after the christian conversions in order to keep their work hidden from the prying invaders, who had a nasty habit of burning sorcerers.
"Now, you don't look like the kind of person who can read runic incantations," she said, smiling.
"No, I guess not."
We sat in silence for a while, staring at each other. I liked her. It seemed like she liked me. At least enough, anyways.
"What's it like?," I asked.
"Well, for the most part, I actually enjoy it. Haven't gotten hurt yet. And I'd be doing it anyways, but this way I get paid for it." She looked down at her feet, started playing with the grass. She looked like such a little girl. "But, I don't really have much choice, do I?"
"Why do you do it?"
"Well, ya know, I got things I need, ya know?" I nodded. I did know about that kind of need. I've felt it pulling down in my bones before, too. Watched from outside myself as I did things I couldn't believe, just to make that ache go away.
I was beginning to feel that way about this beautiful, sad little girl in front of me, as a matter of fact.
"I know what that's like."
"Yeah, right," she said, and I could tell at that moment she thought I was an asshole. Just another mark. I realized what a stupid thing it was to have said. What the fuck did I know about her life? What the fuck did I really know about that kind of hunger? I felt like a privileged rich kid telling a kid from the ghetto that I understood being poor.
I laid down on my back on the grass beside her, and looked up at the sky, with the twin moons, and the dragonsmoke trails of lunar dust.
"Look at that," I said, "Isn't that beautiful? Won't happen again for a thousand years."
She looked up from the grass. "Yeah, I guess it kinda is." She laid down on her back next to me, and watched the sky. We stayed like that for a while, in silence, at peace. Until I felt her take my hand.
"What do you want?," she asked.
"How much?"
"Twenty, fifty, or a hundred, depending on what you want."
"I want it all."
"I know."
I had a strange and unsettling dream this morning. A lot of it I don't remember, and a lot of it was fluff not worth remembering, but there was a core of something strange, and vivid, and unsettling enough that it's been on my mind off and on all day.
I remember that Dollface and I were staying in a hotel room somewhere, in some small town that was strange to us; we'd never been there before. It was a cheap motor lodge kind of place. I remember that she was asleep, and I was bored, and I decided to go check out this new town while we were here. (Something that has happened in our waking life many times.)
It was the middle of the night, and I drove just down the street aways, until I came upon this strange strip mall. It was all lit up like an amusement park. But all the stores were wooden cabins, like you'd find at a campground. Porches and screen doors; everything hung with strings of lights. There were shoppers and kids and punks and stoners smoking joints and junkies looking for a fix. And there were prostitutes, most of them looking like junkies or meth-heads, trolling for johns, so they could get their medicine.
I decided to try and find one I liked.
Definitely not something I have ever done before, in the dream or in real life, and I can't say exactly why I made that decision. For some reason, I thought the best way to go about this was to sit down in the grass next to one of the porches of one of the stores/cabins. So, I sat down there in the grass, and looked up at the stars.
It was then that I noticed that there were two moons in the sky. Both waxing gibbous (a little more than a quarter-full, heading towards full) - mirror images - one slightly above and to the right of the other. And there were these strange trails of the image of the moon, like a dragon of smoke in the sky below them. In the dream, as I stared at this awesome and impossible sight, I remembered hearing about this rare lunar condition on the radio, and felt delighted that I'd actually had a chance to see it, since the radio had said it was not going to happen again in my lifetime.
A young girl walked over to me and asked if I was looking for some company. I said I was. So she sat down cross-legged in the grass in front of me. She was wearing a thin white t-shirt, cut-off blue jean shorts, and low-top chuck taylors. She was very thin. Too thin for her clothes. She looked very young, too. Her skin was smooth and soft and pale. Her dirty blonde hair cropped short in a sort-of bob. She didn't look sick and used, like all the others. In her face, she looked like she still had some baby-fat. She probably could've passed for 15. But I was going under the assumption that she was at least 18, because her arms and legs were covered in tattoos.
All of her tattoos were glyphs and symbols. Sigils and hex-marks and other occult signs. And Runes. I could read them. They were incantations.
"Those are runic incantations," I said to her, pointing to the string of runes on her shoulder.
"Uh, yes, they are," she replied, slightly taken aback.
"Oh, and that is a very powerful mark," I said, pointing to a runic sigil on her bicep that was written in a sort of runic "code." The ancient runic sorcerers had used it after the christian conversions in order to keep their work hidden from the prying invaders, who had a nasty habit of burning sorcerers.
"Now, you don't look like the kind of person who can read runic incantations," she said, smiling.
"No, I guess not."
We sat in silence for a while, staring at each other. I liked her. It seemed like she liked me. At least enough, anyways.
"What's it like?," I asked.
"Well, for the most part, I actually enjoy it. Haven't gotten hurt yet. And I'd be doing it anyways, but this way I get paid for it." She looked down at her feet, started playing with the grass. She looked like such a little girl. "But, I don't really have much choice, do I?"
"Why do you do it?"
"Well, ya know, I got things I need, ya know?" I nodded. I did know about that kind of need. I've felt it pulling down in my bones before, too. Watched from outside myself as I did things I couldn't believe, just to make that ache go away.
I was beginning to feel that way about this beautiful, sad little girl in front of me, as a matter of fact.
"I know what that's like."
"Yeah, right," she said, and I could tell at that moment she thought I was an asshole. Just another mark. I realized what a stupid thing it was to have said. What the fuck did I know about her life? What the fuck did I really know about that kind of hunger? I felt like a privileged rich kid telling a kid from the ghetto that I understood being poor.
I laid down on my back on the grass beside her, and looked up at the sky, with the twin moons, and the dragonsmoke trails of lunar dust.
"Look at that," I said, "Isn't that beautiful? Won't happen again for a thousand years."
She looked up from the grass. "Yeah, I guess it kinda is." She laid down on her back next to me, and watched the sky. We stayed like that for a while, in silence, at peace. Until I felt her take my hand.
"What do you want?," she asked.
"How much?"
"Twenty, fifty, or a hundred, depending on what you want."
"I want it all."
"I know."
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Day of Rest...
I've decided I'm taking the day off. I need a day to just relax and watch TV (Mad Men Season 5 tonight, yay!) and play some video games (about to storm Andrews Air Force Base end the Enclave forever in Fallout 3, yay!) and not have to work on making myself a better person for just a little while. And I'm totally fine with that.
Back to the introspective grind tomorrow.
Back to the introspective grind tomorrow.
Saturday, March 24, 2012
Sitting In Stillness...
Finally meditated again this afternoon.
I've been wanting to meditate for over a week now. But my altar and my cushions were all covered in a thick layer of dust. (How's that for a metaphor?) And it's been hard to find the time this week to clean everything and get it all ready to be used again. But today I had plenty of time, and there was nothing I wanted to do more. So I took it all apart, cleaned everything until it was looking like new, and then set it all back up.
It felt so good to be sitting there again, counting my breaths. A little strange, only because it's been so long, but also so intimately comfortable and familiar, because I've spent so much of my life that way now at this point. Kind of like putting on your favorite old pair of jeans after not wearing them for a couple of years.
I've decided to do things a little differently this time around; we'll see how it goes. In the past, I've set aside a certain amount of time for meditating - 15 minutes, 20, 30, an hour, whatever - and used a timer to tell me when that set time period is up. I actually have a special meditation timer just for that purpose. When the chimes sound, it's time to stop meditating. But I've decided not to do that this time. Somehow, it just feels too rigid and boxed-in.
Instead, I've decided to just meditate until I feel the desire to stop. Maybe sometimes I'll stop after a certain number of breaths. Maybe sometimes I'll stop when my back can't take it anymore, and the pain gets too intense. Maybe sometimes I'll stop when I get distracted and lose focus. Maybe sometimes I'll stop when I just feel the time is right to stop. Who knows? The point is, that each meditation will be unique, and each experience will be dictated more by the feeling of the flow of Tao within me, than by whatever my brain decides is the most appropriate time to put on the clock.
Still, I'm curious to know how much time I spend meditating in each session. So, I'm still using my meditation clock. But now, instead of an alarm counting down, it's a timer, counting up.
Once I'd settled into position and gotten into a rhythm of counting my breaths, and begun to relax, it was just like riding a biker. It felt like I've been doing it my whole life. There was nothing that seemed to indicate that it had actually been almost a year since I'd last meditated. And it just felt so good. And so right. So peaceful and serene. So calm and quiet. So empty and relaxed. I knew I'd missed these feelings, but it took being there again to really bring home to me just how much I'd missed them.
I stopped after 181 breaths. Seemed like a nice, prime number. Also felt like I'd about hit my physical limit; my back was starting to hurt pretty bad on every inhalation. When my eyes had adjusted to the light again, I checked the clock, and found I had been sitting there in stillness for just over half an hour. Double the amount of time I used to spend in a typical session. And basically effortless compared to the half-hour sessions I used to do, where I would have to push myself to get through it, always waiting for those chimes to sound, always wondering how long it had been so far, always "surely my half hour must be up by now!" But this time, without that predetermined finish line to push towards, there was nothing for me to do but simply let go, and relax, and breathe, and be still.
I can't wait to do it again tomorrow.
I've been wanting to meditate for over a week now. But my altar and my cushions were all covered in a thick layer of dust. (How's that for a metaphor?) And it's been hard to find the time this week to clean everything and get it all ready to be used again. But today I had plenty of time, and there was nothing I wanted to do more. So I took it all apart, cleaned everything until it was looking like new, and then set it all back up.
It felt so good to be sitting there again, counting my breaths. A little strange, only because it's been so long, but also so intimately comfortable and familiar, because I've spent so much of my life that way now at this point. Kind of like putting on your favorite old pair of jeans after not wearing them for a couple of years.
I've decided to do things a little differently this time around; we'll see how it goes. In the past, I've set aside a certain amount of time for meditating - 15 minutes, 20, 30, an hour, whatever - and used a timer to tell me when that set time period is up. I actually have a special meditation timer just for that purpose. When the chimes sound, it's time to stop meditating. But I've decided not to do that this time. Somehow, it just feels too rigid and boxed-in.
Instead, I've decided to just meditate until I feel the desire to stop. Maybe sometimes I'll stop after a certain number of breaths. Maybe sometimes I'll stop when my back can't take it anymore, and the pain gets too intense. Maybe sometimes I'll stop when I get distracted and lose focus. Maybe sometimes I'll stop when I just feel the time is right to stop. Who knows? The point is, that each meditation will be unique, and each experience will be dictated more by the feeling of the flow of Tao within me, than by whatever my brain decides is the most appropriate time to put on the clock.
Still, I'm curious to know how much time I spend meditating in each session. So, I'm still using my meditation clock. But now, instead of an alarm counting down, it's a timer, counting up.
Once I'd settled into position and gotten into a rhythm of counting my breaths, and begun to relax, it was just like riding a biker. It felt like I've been doing it my whole life. There was nothing that seemed to indicate that it had actually been almost a year since I'd last meditated. And it just felt so good. And so right. So peaceful and serene. So calm and quiet. So empty and relaxed. I knew I'd missed these feelings, but it took being there again to really bring home to me just how much I'd missed them.
I stopped after 181 breaths. Seemed like a nice, prime number. Also felt like I'd about hit my physical limit; my back was starting to hurt pretty bad on every inhalation. When my eyes had adjusted to the light again, I checked the clock, and found I had been sitting there in stillness for just over half an hour. Double the amount of time I used to spend in a typical session. And basically effortless compared to the half-hour sessions I used to do, where I would have to push myself to get through it, always waiting for those chimes to sound, always wondering how long it had been so far, always "surely my half hour must be up by now!" But this time, without that predetermined finish line to push towards, there was nothing for me to do but simply let go, and relax, and breathe, and be still.
I can't wait to do it again tomorrow.
Friday, March 23, 2012
The New Commute...
I started taking a new route to work this week.
I've known about this route for years - a snaking backroad through farm country that leads straight from my home to my office - but I've always been told it takes about 90 minutes to traverse, so I've never bothered with it. Taking the more direct route down the clogged and congested 6-lane commuter highway, I-270, takes me 90 minutes on the absolute worst days. Usually only takes me about 45 minutes to an hour, on average. And my top priority was always to minimize the amount of time my commute took above all else. As far as I was concerned, an hour and a half to two hours a day in shitty traffic on a big highway was much preferable to three hours a day in shitty traffic on a country two-lane.
I realize now, as I so often have, what a fucking idiot I am.
I don't know why I decided to take the back way on Monday morning. The pull of the Tao in my gut urged me in that direction just then, and so I followed the flow. It took me 45 minutes. And I know for a fact that was a heavy traffic day. So far this week, it has taken me an average of one hour to make the trip either way.
And it is a beautiful drive. Farms and orchards and tiny, old towns the whole way. Great views in every direction the entire route. Forest trails and nature preserves and river walks one after another. Blooming dogwood trees and cherry trees and pear trees every-fucking-where I look. It even smells wonderful!
And it's fun to drive! All twisty and curvy and up and down and around. Definitely a driving enthusiast's road. (And, of course, I love driving. A good driving road is one of my favorite pleasures in life.) Yeah, it's only a two-lane, so every once in a while you get stuck behind a slow truck or something, but there's plenty of places to pass. And getting to overtake someone every once in a while just makes it that much more exciting and fun to drive! And when you can't pass, well, it just forces you to slow down and relax and enjoy the ride (not to mention the view).
Aaand... because all of that wasn't good enough - turns out I get a lot better gas mileage on this road. So it's actually saving me money, too!
I mean, it's like a dream-come-true! It's more fun, less expensive, takes about the same amount of time, and rather than being an exercise in frustration and aggravation and aggression and terror and psycho-drivers and gridlock and exhaust fumes and assholes talking on cell phones and not paying attention to what they're doing and why don't you hang the fuck up and drive you stupid motherfucking piece of shit!!... Instead I get what amounts to a driving meditation to begin and end my day.
I am trying not to grieve too hard for the decade I wasted on that asphalt Styx we call I-270. I am instead trying to concentrate on how grateful I am to have found this oasis of a commute at all, ever. How lucky I am, to never have to feel that stress and pain again.
The sight of rolling green hills, the purr of my engine as I round another bend, and the smell of cherry blossoms are making that pretty easy for me right now, I must say.
I've known about this route for years - a snaking backroad through farm country that leads straight from my home to my office - but I've always been told it takes about 90 minutes to traverse, so I've never bothered with it. Taking the more direct route down the clogged and congested 6-lane commuter highway, I-270, takes me 90 minutes on the absolute worst days. Usually only takes me about 45 minutes to an hour, on average. And my top priority was always to minimize the amount of time my commute took above all else. As far as I was concerned, an hour and a half to two hours a day in shitty traffic on a big highway was much preferable to three hours a day in shitty traffic on a country two-lane.
I realize now, as I so often have, what a fucking idiot I am.
I don't know why I decided to take the back way on Monday morning. The pull of the Tao in my gut urged me in that direction just then, and so I followed the flow. It took me 45 minutes. And I know for a fact that was a heavy traffic day. So far this week, it has taken me an average of one hour to make the trip either way.
And it is a beautiful drive. Farms and orchards and tiny, old towns the whole way. Great views in every direction the entire route. Forest trails and nature preserves and river walks one after another. Blooming dogwood trees and cherry trees and pear trees every-fucking-where I look. It even smells wonderful!
And it's fun to drive! All twisty and curvy and up and down and around. Definitely a driving enthusiast's road. (And, of course, I love driving. A good driving road is one of my favorite pleasures in life.) Yeah, it's only a two-lane, so every once in a while you get stuck behind a slow truck or something, but there's plenty of places to pass. And getting to overtake someone every once in a while just makes it that much more exciting and fun to drive! And when you can't pass, well, it just forces you to slow down and relax and enjoy the ride (not to mention the view).
Aaand... because all of that wasn't good enough - turns out I get a lot better gas mileage on this road. So it's actually saving me money, too!
I mean, it's like a dream-come-true! It's more fun, less expensive, takes about the same amount of time, and rather than being an exercise in frustration and aggravation and aggression and terror and psycho-drivers and gridlock and exhaust fumes and assholes talking on cell phones and not paying attention to what they're doing and why don't you hang the fuck up and drive you stupid motherfucking piece of shit!!... Instead I get what amounts to a driving meditation to begin and end my day.
I am trying not to grieve too hard for the decade I wasted on that asphalt Styx we call I-270. I am instead trying to concentrate on how grateful I am to have found this oasis of a commute at all, ever. How lucky I am, to never have to feel that stress and pain again.
The sight of rolling green hills, the purr of my engine as I round another bend, and the smell of cherry blossoms are making that pretty easy for me right now, I must say.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
The Tao of Yin Becoming Yang...
Yesterday was a really, really bad day, and not just because of Mr. Squirrel. That was, unfortunately, only the beginning. In fact, yesterday was a continuing escalation of a bad day that had really started the day before.
My computer crashed yesterday morning. Again. And crashed, and crashed, and crashed all day, and nothing I did helped at all. In fact, every single one of my personal computing devices has died in the last week. My smartphone died on Friday, and I'm still trying to find the time to get back to the store before they close in the evening to pick up a new one. On Sunday, my internet at home crapped out, and didn't come back up again until Tuesday evening, after I reset and reconfigured every single part of it. And for the last couple of days, my work machine has been dying a slow, painful death, as well. I feel like I've spent my entire week just trying to get my computers, which I rely on so much for the functioning of my everyday life, to simply fucking work.
I ended up spending almost my entire day yesterday trying to fix my work computer. Of course, I couldn't get any of my work done while I was doing this. But that doesn't magickally push any of my deadlines back, either. So every hour I spent trying to fix my machine was an hour that I no longer had to get any of my work done, and I was very aware of this in the moment. And every time I tried to fix the problem, and failed, my frustration, aggravation, and stress levels rose.
I tried to find the Joy in my situation, but I just couldn't overcome the negative things I was feeling. Even the fact that in trying to fix my problem I was learning all sorts of new things (normally an almost sensual pleasure for me) about the coding and configuration behind-the-scenes of my web browser wasn't enough to make me feel better in the face of ACH! FUCK! WHY WON'T MY COMPUTER WORK?!
I felt like a failure. I'd barely made it a week, and here I was, losing my sense of Joy already. I knew it wouldn't last forever, but I honestly thought I could make it last longer than that. And then I realized that feeling like a failure for not living up to the spirit of UT #3, was also contradictory to the spirit of ManniMoonYin's Universal Tautology #2, "You cannot be good. You cannot be bad. You can only be." Which, ironically, only made me feel like more of a failure.
But this morning was the beginning of a new day. And I awoke with a fresh perspective.
What I realize as I observe all of this, is the Tao of Yin Becoming Yang.
You can't be happy constantly, all the time. It's not that it is impossible to accomplish, but rather that if you're happy all the time, then eventually it ceases to be "happy" and becomes simply "normal." Yin and Yang combining to form the Tao symbolizes that we live in a world of duality. Or, rather, that our perception of the world is a dual one. We can only distinguish something in terms of its opposite. We only know what "happiness" is, because of "unhappiness," and vice versa. Without "happiness" there is no "unhappiness," and vice versa. So, in order to maintain happiness, it must occasionally be tempered with some unhappiness. I realize now that the goal of UT #3 is not to be happy all the time, forever. It is simply to be as happy as possible, as much of the time as possible, and to learn to let the unhappiness come and go when it must, without attachment, and to recognize it as essential to continued happiness.
In that sense, yesterday was actually a success for me. Not because I got upset. But because when I was upset, and when it became clear to me that I was not going to be able to Brightside my way out of these feelings, I responded by trying to let them go and not hang on to them, and by trying to remain calm and simply deal with the problem at hand without letting myself get all worked up about it. I reminded myself that, "Yes, this sucks, but it's not the end of the world. And sometimes things suck, and that is just a fact of living. So, there's nothing to do but try to let it go, and focus on the problem at hand." And I remembered UT #1, the "Primary Directive" (I totally just thought that up - no, really): "All things that Are, are Change." In other words, "This too, shall pass."
And it did.
My computer crashed yesterday morning. Again. And crashed, and crashed, and crashed all day, and nothing I did helped at all. In fact, every single one of my personal computing devices has died in the last week. My smartphone died on Friday, and I'm still trying to find the time to get back to the store before they close in the evening to pick up a new one. On Sunday, my internet at home crapped out, and didn't come back up again until Tuesday evening, after I reset and reconfigured every single part of it. And for the last couple of days, my work machine has been dying a slow, painful death, as well. I feel like I've spent my entire week just trying to get my computers, which I rely on so much for the functioning of my everyday life, to simply fucking work.
I ended up spending almost my entire day yesterday trying to fix my work computer. Of course, I couldn't get any of my work done while I was doing this. But that doesn't magickally push any of my deadlines back, either. So every hour I spent trying to fix my machine was an hour that I no longer had to get any of my work done, and I was very aware of this in the moment. And every time I tried to fix the problem, and failed, my frustration, aggravation, and stress levels rose.
I tried to find the Joy in my situation, but I just couldn't overcome the negative things I was feeling. Even the fact that in trying to fix my problem I was learning all sorts of new things (normally an almost sensual pleasure for me) about the coding and configuration behind-the-scenes of my web browser wasn't enough to make me feel better in the face of ACH! FUCK! WHY WON'T MY COMPUTER WORK?!
I felt like a failure. I'd barely made it a week, and here I was, losing my sense of Joy already. I knew it wouldn't last forever, but I honestly thought I could make it last longer than that. And then I realized that feeling like a failure for not living up to the spirit of UT #3, was also contradictory to the spirit of ManniMoonYin's Universal Tautology #2, "You cannot be good. You cannot be bad. You can only be." Which, ironically, only made me feel like more of a failure.
But this morning was the beginning of a new day. And I awoke with a fresh perspective.
What I realize as I observe all of this, is the Tao of Yin Becoming Yang.
You can't be happy constantly, all the time. It's not that it is impossible to accomplish, but rather that if you're happy all the time, then eventually it ceases to be "happy" and becomes simply "normal." Yin and Yang combining to form the Tao symbolizes that we live in a world of duality. Or, rather, that our perception of the world is a dual one. We can only distinguish something in terms of its opposite. We only know what "happiness" is, because of "unhappiness," and vice versa. Without "happiness" there is no "unhappiness," and vice versa. So, in order to maintain happiness, it must occasionally be tempered with some unhappiness. I realize now that the goal of UT #3 is not to be happy all the time, forever. It is simply to be as happy as possible, as much of the time as possible, and to learn to let the unhappiness come and go when it must, without attachment, and to recognize it as essential to continued happiness.
In that sense, yesterday was actually a success for me. Not because I got upset. But because when I was upset, and when it became clear to me that I was not going to be able to Brightside my way out of these feelings, I responded by trying to let them go and not hang on to them, and by trying to remain calm and simply deal with the problem at hand without letting myself get all worked up about it. I reminded myself that, "Yes, this sucks, but it's not the end of the world. And sometimes things suck, and that is just a fact of living. So, there's nothing to do but try to let it go, and focus on the problem at hand." And I remembered UT #1, the "Primary Directive" (I totally just thought that up - no, really): "All things that Are, are Change." In other words, "This too, shall pass."
And it did.
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
A Life's Lesson...
I killed a squirrel this morning.
Hurrying down a snaking two-lane back road in the early-morning fog on my way to work, the little grey furball darted out in front of me towards the double-yellow lines. No way I could've stopped in time, and no way I'm slamming on my breaks for a squirrel even if I could've. But I swerved to the right, in the direction it had come from, in order to at least try and miss it. But as soon as I swerved, the little guy noticed me coming, and darted back in the same direction I'd swerved, essentially running itself under my wheel. If I hadn't have swerved, I wouldn't have hit it.
I felt the bump, and I heard the da-thud-wump against my car's undercarriage as I ran over it. I looked in my rearview and saw its limp, lifeless, furry little body flopping down the road in my wake. I instantly felt like shit. And then I felt like an idiot for feeling like shit. I mean, it's just a squirrel. And I did what I could to try and avoid it.
But I just couldn't shake the feeling that I'd done something wrong. I'd ended a life. And we're not talking about an insect or an apple here. This was another mammal. I don't have any experience with that, so I don't know how to feel about it. But in my gut, in my Tao, it feels wrong.
No, it probably wasn't sentient; it probably wasn't aware like we are. But it was still a complex lifeform. And killing it didn't help me to survive in any way. I feel like it had every right to gather nuts, and chase lady-squirrels around tree trunks, and not get run over by some asshole who's late for work.
What's the Brightside? I don't know. I have no doubt that there is a lesson here, I just don't know what it is yet. I guess I will use this opportunity to practice acceptance. Acceptance of myself (I cannot be good or bad, I can only be Michael), acceptance that all things must end (All things that are, are Change), and acceptance that living means that sometimes the Universe is going to throw a squirrel under your wheels.
Sorry, Mr. Squirrel.
Hurrying down a snaking two-lane back road in the early-morning fog on my way to work, the little grey furball darted out in front of me towards the double-yellow lines. No way I could've stopped in time, and no way I'm slamming on my breaks for a squirrel even if I could've. But I swerved to the right, in the direction it had come from, in order to at least try and miss it. But as soon as I swerved, the little guy noticed me coming, and darted back in the same direction I'd swerved, essentially running itself under my wheel. If I hadn't have swerved, I wouldn't have hit it.
I felt the bump, and I heard the da-thud-wump against my car's undercarriage as I ran over it. I looked in my rearview and saw its limp, lifeless, furry little body flopping down the road in my wake. I instantly felt like shit. And then I felt like an idiot for feeling like shit. I mean, it's just a squirrel. And I did what I could to try and avoid it.
But I just couldn't shake the feeling that I'd done something wrong. I'd ended a life. And we're not talking about an insect or an apple here. This was another mammal. I don't have any experience with that, so I don't know how to feel about it. But in my gut, in my Tao, it feels wrong.
No, it probably wasn't sentient; it probably wasn't aware like we are. But it was still a complex lifeform. And killing it didn't help me to survive in any way. I feel like it had every right to gather nuts, and chase lady-squirrels around tree trunks, and not get run over by some asshole who's late for work.
What's the Brightside? I don't know. I have no doubt that there is a lesson here, I just don't know what it is yet. I guess I will use this opportunity to practice acceptance. Acceptance of myself (I cannot be good or bad, I can only be Michael), acceptance that all things must end (All things that are, are Change), and acceptance that living means that sometimes the Universe is going to throw a squirrel under your wheels.
Sorry, Mr. Squirrel.
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Brightsiding...
I'd wanted to write something about Spring, today being Eostre, the Vernal Equinox.
But I'm not feeling it.
What I am feeling today, is frustrated. And I'm still going with the flow, so here we go...
Today's just been one of those days. Everything that can go wrong, seemingly is. My smartphone just up and died last Friday night. The replacement arrived yesterday, but I couldn't make it back to the store before they closed. Was going to pick it up tonight instead, but as soon as I got into the office this morning, I was reminded that I volunteered for a CPR class this evening after work, so I won't be able to make it back to the store in time again, which means I'll be without a phone for another day. My browser crashed my computer, costing me 45 minutes of my day that I desperately needed in order to get some of my work done trying to fix it. Run to the bathroom real quick, there's an Out-of-Order sign on the door. Run upstairs to use that bathroom instead, and the door slams back on a wound-too-tightly hinge, and the door handle nails me right in the middle of my forearm. Go to get coffee, and the pot is empty, and no one has started another one brewing. And I could keep going, but I'll stop there.
With each and every one of these little annoyances thrown in my way, I am reminded of ManniMoonYin's Universal Tautology #3: "Look on the bright side. Make the most of it. Choose joy, and you will be joyous."
I'm trying. I really am. As soon as I realize that I'm pissed off or upset about some minor injustice committed against me by the universe, I say to myself, "Ok, what's the brightside here?" And then I try to think of the situation in those terms, instead of in terms of getting fucked by fate.
Another day without my phone? Brightside - learning life-saving techinques in a CPR class. Bathroom out of order? Brightside - get to walk a little farther, and up a flight of stairs, burning a few extra calories. Door handle cracks me on the arm? Brightside - the pain helps to toughen me up and gain endurance. Have to brew another pot of coffee? Brightside - get to spend a few minutes just standing still, relaxing, listening to the slow gurgle of the machine as it brews. And, of course, each and every one of those difficulties also carries the implicit Brightside of giving me another opportunity to practice looking on the brightside.
But it's not always that easy. From past experience, I remember that some of the hardest moments to maintain UT #3 were when the brightside wasn't so obvious. Like losing an hour's worth of working time dealing with a computer crash. It's hard to figure out how to be happy about that. And somehow, the fact that it's an excellent opportunity to practice brightsiding doesn't really make up for the amount of frustration and aggravation I feel.
Sometimes, the answer becomes clear after a while, if you're patient, and attentive. As in this case, when I restarted my browser (which had caused the crash), and, miracle of Miracles, I somehow hadn't lost all of my tabs and settings! The relief that I felt just then was a wonderful physical sensation, and I allowed myself to just sink into the delicious feeling of it, like a hit, or an afterglow. It was fantastic.
Or, perhaps a better example would be my mother's death. The pain was devastating at first, and it was years before I could see how it was actually a good thing to have happened. As much as we didn't want to admit it at the time, and as much as we didn't listen to her when she told us, the truth was that she was crazy, and she was in a lot of pain, and she was devastating our family. And she knew that. And her suicide was, at least in part, the ultimate act of love. She sacrificed herself to save our family. And she did save our family. All of the happiness and joy in life that we have experienced since her death we owe, at least in part, to her.
(Broswer just crashed my computer again as I was writing this. Brightside - an opportunity to practice patience and acceptance. I didn't do very well, but at least I had the opportunity to try.)
But the hardest times of all, are when I try, but simply fail to imagine any brightside at all. I think and I stretch and I reach and I try my hardest to come up with something, anything that could serve as a potentially beneficial outcome to some unpleasant turn of events, but I just can't come up with anything. Or nothing I come up with is good enough. It's times like that, I have to learn to trust.
The Christians would call that "faith" - belief stemming from a will to believe, rather than knowledge or fact. But I don't use that word for this, and not just because I want to avoid all the xtian baggage that comes with it. It's also just not what I mean. Because, believe it or not, I actually consider myself to be a skeptic. I know that might seem contradictory and hard to believe, considering some of the whacked-out, mystical, some might even say superstitious things I believe. But I would call myself a skeptical believer.
Yes, I believe in magick. I believe that I (or, really, anyone, for that matter) can affect changes in consensus reality through non-local means. But I don't believe that just because I want to believe it. Yes, I wanted to believe that magick was real and possible and that I could learn to do it. But I didn't know if that was true or not. And so I spent years and years studying and practicing and testing and experimenting. And it was only after repeated, verifiable success after repeated, verifiable success that I was finally able to accept that yes, magick is actually possible.
So, yes, I believe. But only because I was able to prove it to myself beyond all shadows of my doubt. Hence, I'm a "skeptical believer."
And so, when I get in these situations where I cannot imagine any brightside to my misfortune, it is not faith that I rely on, but trust. I fall back on all my past experiences where I have felt the Way, the Flow, the Tao, and remember how in those mystical moments the path has appeared in front of me from out of nowhere, brick-by-brick at my feet. I remember every instance of hindsight realization, where I find that though I didn't get what I wanted, I got exactly what I needed, even when I didn't know that I needed it. I remember every time that I didn't know what to do, and so followed my instincts for lack of any other response, only to find that my instincts had led me to do exactly what needed to be done. I remember all of these moments and I remember how these lessons have been reinforced through experience over and over and over and over again throughout my entire life, even before I'd ever heard of "The Tao" - and I trust in that feeling. It has never failed me. Not once.
And, honestly, in those moments when I'm lost in the pain or sadness of it all, it's not the trusting that's the hard part. It's remembering to trust in the first place. Because we're told our whole lives that these things aren't possible. That you aren't supposed to believe in them. And that, if you do, you're crazy, or broken, or sick, or in some other way wrong.
I guess in that way, I'm lucky. Because I've never given a fuck what anyone else has to say about what's right, or what's wrong, or what's true.
And that is my Tao of Choosing Joy to be Joyful.
But I'm not feeling it.
What I am feeling today, is frustrated. And I'm still going with the flow, so here we go...
Today's just been one of those days. Everything that can go wrong, seemingly is. My smartphone just up and died last Friday night. The replacement arrived yesterday, but I couldn't make it back to the store before they closed. Was going to pick it up tonight instead, but as soon as I got into the office this morning, I was reminded that I volunteered for a CPR class this evening after work, so I won't be able to make it back to the store in time again, which means I'll be without a phone for another day. My browser crashed my computer, costing me 45 minutes of my day that I desperately needed in order to get some of my work done trying to fix it. Run to the bathroom real quick, there's an Out-of-Order sign on the door. Run upstairs to use that bathroom instead, and the door slams back on a wound-too-tightly hinge, and the door handle nails me right in the middle of my forearm. Go to get coffee, and the pot is empty, and no one has started another one brewing. And I could keep going, but I'll stop there.
With each and every one of these little annoyances thrown in my way, I am reminded of ManniMoonYin's Universal Tautology #3: "Look on the bright side. Make the most of it. Choose joy, and you will be joyous."
I'm trying. I really am. As soon as I realize that I'm pissed off or upset about some minor injustice committed against me by the universe, I say to myself, "Ok, what's the brightside here?" And then I try to think of the situation in those terms, instead of in terms of getting fucked by fate.
Another day without my phone? Brightside - learning life-saving techinques in a CPR class. Bathroom out of order? Brightside - get to walk a little farther, and up a flight of stairs, burning a few extra calories. Door handle cracks me on the arm? Brightside - the pain helps to toughen me up and gain endurance. Have to brew another pot of coffee? Brightside - get to spend a few minutes just standing still, relaxing, listening to the slow gurgle of the machine as it brews. And, of course, each and every one of those difficulties also carries the implicit Brightside of giving me another opportunity to practice looking on the brightside.
But it's not always that easy. From past experience, I remember that some of the hardest moments to maintain UT #3 were when the brightside wasn't so obvious. Like losing an hour's worth of working time dealing with a computer crash. It's hard to figure out how to be happy about that. And somehow, the fact that it's an excellent opportunity to practice brightsiding doesn't really make up for the amount of frustration and aggravation I feel.
Sometimes, the answer becomes clear after a while, if you're patient, and attentive. As in this case, when I restarted my browser (which had caused the crash), and, miracle of Miracles, I somehow hadn't lost all of my tabs and settings! The relief that I felt just then was a wonderful physical sensation, and I allowed myself to just sink into the delicious feeling of it, like a hit, or an afterglow. It was fantastic.
Or, perhaps a better example would be my mother's death. The pain was devastating at first, and it was years before I could see how it was actually a good thing to have happened. As much as we didn't want to admit it at the time, and as much as we didn't listen to her when she told us, the truth was that she was crazy, and she was in a lot of pain, and she was devastating our family. And she knew that. And her suicide was, at least in part, the ultimate act of love. She sacrificed herself to save our family. And she did save our family. All of the happiness and joy in life that we have experienced since her death we owe, at least in part, to her.
(Broswer just crashed my computer again as I was writing this. Brightside - an opportunity to practice patience and acceptance. I didn't do very well, but at least I had the opportunity to try.)
But the hardest times of all, are when I try, but simply fail to imagine any brightside at all. I think and I stretch and I reach and I try my hardest to come up with something, anything that could serve as a potentially beneficial outcome to some unpleasant turn of events, but I just can't come up with anything. Or nothing I come up with is good enough. It's times like that, I have to learn to trust.
The Christians would call that "faith" - belief stemming from a will to believe, rather than knowledge or fact. But I don't use that word for this, and not just because I want to avoid all the xtian baggage that comes with it. It's also just not what I mean. Because, believe it or not, I actually consider myself to be a skeptic. I know that might seem contradictory and hard to believe, considering some of the whacked-out, mystical, some might even say superstitious things I believe. But I would call myself a skeptical believer.
Yes, I believe in magick. I believe that I (or, really, anyone, for that matter) can affect changes in consensus reality through non-local means. But I don't believe that just because I want to believe it. Yes, I wanted to believe that magick was real and possible and that I could learn to do it. But I didn't know if that was true or not. And so I spent years and years studying and practicing and testing and experimenting. And it was only after repeated, verifiable success after repeated, verifiable success that I was finally able to accept that yes, magick is actually possible.
So, yes, I believe. But only because I was able to prove it to myself beyond all shadows of my doubt. Hence, I'm a "skeptical believer."
And so, when I get in these situations where I cannot imagine any brightside to my misfortune, it is not faith that I rely on, but trust. I fall back on all my past experiences where I have felt the Way, the Flow, the Tao, and remember how in those mystical moments the path has appeared in front of me from out of nowhere, brick-by-brick at my feet. I remember every instance of hindsight realization, where I find that though I didn't get what I wanted, I got exactly what I needed, even when I didn't know that I needed it. I remember every time that I didn't know what to do, and so followed my instincts for lack of any other response, only to find that my instincts had led me to do exactly what needed to be done. I remember all of these moments and I remember how these lessons have been reinforced through experience over and over and over and over again throughout my entire life, even before I'd ever heard of "The Tao" - and I trust in that feeling. It has never failed me. Not once.
And, honestly, in those moments when I'm lost in the pain or sadness of it all, it's not the trusting that's the hard part. It's remembering to trust in the first place. Because we're told our whole lives that these things aren't possible. That you aren't supposed to believe in them. And that, if you do, you're crazy, or broken, or sick, or in some other way wrong.
I guess in that way, I'm lucky. Because I've never given a fuck what anyone else has to say about what's right, or what's wrong, or what's true.
And that is my Tao of Choosing Joy to be Joyful.
Monday, March 19, 2012
Te: The Power of Small Things
I combed my hair the other day.
For many months now, I've been sporting what I've referred to as, "The Mad Scientist Look." Hair going up and out in every direction, like a birds' nest; my only effort to do my hair in the morning being simply to wet it, towel it dry, and then muss it up as much as possible, almost as if I were giving myself a noogie. Though I thought of it as "Mad Scientist," in retrospect it probably came off more as "The Homeless Junkie Look."
After my drift on Saturday, after my shower, as I was getting myself ready to go out to dinner, I decided to comb my hair. I honestly can't remember the last time I did this. (Even before the M-S-L, all of the haircuts I've had in recent memory have required the use of my hands to arrange, if they've needed arranging at all. I can't remember the last brush I owned, and the only thing I've used a comb for lately is my beard.) Just combed my wet hair back along my part, very simple and neat. I don't know why I made that particular change just then, but I felt different, so it felt right to look different. And I'm still following my instincts, listening to my gut, going with the flow of my Tao, etc. And the pull inside me just then said, "comb your hair." So I did.
I have to say that I like the new look better than the old. Overnight my hair went from curly to straight. And I hadn't realized how long my hair had gotten. Swept back over my skull, it has an almost classic, yet still quite nerdy feel that I find I'm enjoying.
But it was a fairly severe departure, as you can imagine. Pretty much the exact opposite of what I'd been doing before. This has become especially apparent to me today, now that I am back at work, in the form of the many double-takes I've received from co-workers. Over and over again, I'll pass someone in the hall whom I've worked with for many years, and we'll each say "hi." And I'll see in their eyes when we first address each other, just a split-second of the process Incomprehension-to-Recognition-to-Surprise.
What I realize as I observe this, is the Tao of Properly Applied Force.
Such a small thing to do, such a minor difference to make, and with such minimal effort. But the affect of this miniscule action ripples out through my entire life and changes so much. My appearance, or the information that I broadcast to every other human I encounter in my day-to-day life, is now completely different. And so not only has my message changed, but for those who know me, and who know how I looked before, there is the additional message of, "something has changed with him; he is different now than he was before." And not just with the hair. Because on some level, even for just a microsecond, they have to think: Why did he do that? Why would he change his appearance to almost the exact opposite of the way it has been for so long now? And why now? What happened to him?
And it affects me greatly, as well. Every time I look in the mirror, or catch my reflection in a pane of glass out of the corner of my eye, I see someone that I don't immediately recognize. For a split-second, I am a stranger to myself. And again, there is that instant of cognitive dissonance, of gnosis. That brief crack in reality where, for the tiniest of moments, you're not sure which side of the looking glass you're standing on. That hyperunit of time where everything is true, and everything is possible. And then recognition sets in, and your ego returns, and you're suddenly aware of who you are again. The effect of so many brief flashes of un-reality inserted into ones' day is not to be underestimated. It tends to make everything feel less real, and more fluid; it tends to make the seemingly impossible feel more possible. And it is exhilarating.
I've managed to change my sense of what is real, simply by combing my hair.
For many months now, I've been sporting what I've referred to as, "The Mad Scientist Look." Hair going up and out in every direction, like a birds' nest; my only effort to do my hair in the morning being simply to wet it, towel it dry, and then muss it up as much as possible, almost as if I were giving myself a noogie. Though I thought of it as "Mad Scientist," in retrospect it probably came off more as "The Homeless Junkie Look."
After my drift on Saturday, after my shower, as I was getting myself ready to go out to dinner, I decided to comb my hair. I honestly can't remember the last time I did this. (Even before the M-S-L, all of the haircuts I've had in recent memory have required the use of my hands to arrange, if they've needed arranging at all. I can't remember the last brush I owned, and the only thing I've used a comb for lately is my beard.) Just combed my wet hair back along my part, very simple and neat. I don't know why I made that particular change just then, but I felt different, so it felt right to look different. And I'm still following my instincts, listening to my gut, going with the flow of my Tao, etc. And the pull inside me just then said, "comb your hair." So I did.
I have to say that I like the new look better than the old. Overnight my hair went from curly to straight. And I hadn't realized how long my hair had gotten. Swept back over my skull, it has an almost classic, yet still quite nerdy feel that I find I'm enjoying.
But it was a fairly severe departure, as you can imagine. Pretty much the exact opposite of what I'd been doing before. This has become especially apparent to me today, now that I am back at work, in the form of the many double-takes I've received from co-workers. Over and over again, I'll pass someone in the hall whom I've worked with for many years, and we'll each say "hi." And I'll see in their eyes when we first address each other, just a split-second of the process Incomprehension-to-Recognition-to-Surprise.
What I realize as I observe this, is the Tao of Properly Applied Force.
Such a small thing to do, such a minor difference to make, and with such minimal effort. But the affect of this miniscule action ripples out through my entire life and changes so much. My appearance, or the information that I broadcast to every other human I encounter in my day-to-day life, is now completely different. And so not only has my message changed, but for those who know me, and who know how I looked before, there is the additional message of, "something has changed with him; he is different now than he was before." And not just with the hair. Because on some level, even for just a microsecond, they have to think: Why did he do that? Why would he change his appearance to almost the exact opposite of the way it has been for so long now? And why now? What happened to him?
And it affects me greatly, as well. Every time I look in the mirror, or catch my reflection in a pane of glass out of the corner of my eye, I see someone that I don't immediately recognize. For a split-second, I am a stranger to myself. And again, there is that instant of cognitive dissonance, of gnosis. That brief crack in reality where, for the tiniest of moments, you're not sure which side of the looking glass you're standing on. That hyperunit of time where everything is true, and everything is possible. And then recognition sets in, and your ego returns, and you're suddenly aware of who you are again. The effect of so many brief flashes of un-reality inserted into ones' day is not to be underestimated. It tends to make everything feel less real, and more fluid; it tends to make the seemingly impossible feel more possible. And it is exhilarating.
I've managed to change my sense of what is real, simply by combing my hair.
Technical Difficulties...
Ok, so I found the first kink in my plan: in order to post, one must have a working internet connection.
So, for what's it worth, I did write this yesterday, even though I'm posting it today. (And who exactly am I justifying this to here? I know the situation, and the only other person who'll read this knows the situation, so why do I feel this need to say all of this? Recording for posterity? So when my future-self reads this several years from now, I don't end up thinking, Wow, he failed after just three days! -?)
Better late than never:
"I had a dream that I fucked my old bartender last night.
Don't need to be Freud to figure that one out."
So, for what's it worth, I did write this yesterday, even though I'm posting it today. (And who exactly am I justifying this to here? I know the situation, and the only other person who'll read this knows the situation, so why do I feel this need to say all of this? Recording for posterity? So when my future-self reads this several years from now, I don't end up thinking, Wow, he failed after just three days! -?)
Better late than never:
"I had a dream that I fucked my old bartender last night.
Don't need to be Freud to figure that one out."
Saturday, March 17, 2012
Drifting Backwards...
Goddamn I hate this hotel room.
I cannot wait to get out of here. Tomorrow, I'll love ya...
I just had to get out, for at least a little while. Decided to just go for a drift. Left with a bottle of water, some good walking shoes, and a strong desire to get lost. At every crossroads turning down the path of least familiarity.
End up in a maze of an old residential neighborhood I've never been in before. (It still amazes me just how many parts of this town I've spent almost my entire life in that I've never seen before.) Winding capillaries of pre-fab, post-War homes. It was an old neighborhood, in every sense - I lost count of the number of "No Smoking - No Open Flame - Oxygen In Use" signs I saw taped to front doors.
Winding my way this way and that through a fucking beautiful spring afternoon, I turned a corner... and there was my old high school, from an angle I had never seen it before in my entire life. I had no idea where I was just then, but suddenly I also knew exactly where I was. Cognitive dissonance. Gnosis.
How could I not wander those grounds again? I made my way towards the campus. Passed the old apartment building across the street where my first love had rented a small basement apartment with a friend of ours when she'd moved out of her parents house after graduation. Where she'd gotten pregnant with his child. Where she'd lied to me that it was mine. I can never see that building without smelling the pennyroyal tea she had used to abort it. A sick, metallic, moldy smell, it had permeated every surface in that small apartment and hung in the air for months. It made the air taste like pain and fear and sadness.
I kept going, and walked around the campus of my old high school, taking in all the sights - noting all the things that had changed, and all the things that were still the same. I saw the giant old oak in front of the school, where we'd use to sit on days like this and eat our lunch. I slid down the bannister outside the front door - one more time, just for old times's sake. I wasn't quite as graceful as I remember being back then. And it gave me a wedgie.
I made my way around to the back of the school, to the parking lot and main entrance. (I always thought it was funny that the main entrance was around back.) I saw the brick tool shed for the apartment building across the street, behind which we used to hide to smoke between classes. It was under a tree on the lawn of that apartment building, across the street from that school one spring break so, so long ago that She and I fell in love. Though it would take us another decade to realize it.
I sat down for a rest under that tree. And I just took it all in. The weight of all that nostalgia like a lover on top of me - heavy, but pleasant; on the edge of smothering, but in a good way. I felt back to all those years ago. I remembered the children we'd been then, so awkwardly confident, so brazenly strange. Even then, we knew that moment was special. That we'd never have another like it for the rest of our lives. It might've been the one thing we'd been right about.
We never could've imagined what would come for us. That we would ever become so important to each other. That we would ever wrap our lives around one another. That we could ever possibly become fat, old drunks.
I realized I was crying. For the children we'd been. For all we've lost. I sat there under that magickal tree in the glow of the evening sun, and I grieved for every missed opportunity, for everything we used to be, for every weight of the world we've decided to carry. For all we could've done. For all we can never do again.
I cried for the children we'd left behind. That beautiful, strong, scared, strange little girl. And for the boy I'd been. And I realized, how much like him I still feel. How I still see myself as 16, as 19, as 20, 25. How could it be that I am this boy with a beard, sitting here under the weight of these memories that are so much larger than I have ever been? It won't be very long at all before I'm 40.
At what point do I begin to feel like a man?
I cannot wait to get out of here. Tomorrow, I'll love ya...
I just had to get out, for at least a little while. Decided to just go for a drift. Left with a bottle of water, some good walking shoes, and a strong desire to get lost. At every crossroads turning down the path of least familiarity.
End up in a maze of an old residential neighborhood I've never been in before. (It still amazes me just how many parts of this town I've spent almost my entire life in that I've never seen before.) Winding capillaries of pre-fab, post-War homes. It was an old neighborhood, in every sense - I lost count of the number of "No Smoking - No Open Flame - Oxygen In Use" signs I saw taped to front doors.
Winding my way this way and that through a fucking beautiful spring afternoon, I turned a corner... and there was my old high school, from an angle I had never seen it before in my entire life. I had no idea where I was just then, but suddenly I also knew exactly where I was. Cognitive dissonance. Gnosis.
How could I not wander those grounds again? I made my way towards the campus. Passed the old apartment building across the street where my first love had rented a small basement apartment with a friend of ours when she'd moved out of her parents house after graduation. Where she'd gotten pregnant with his child. Where she'd lied to me that it was mine. I can never see that building without smelling the pennyroyal tea she had used to abort it. A sick, metallic, moldy smell, it had permeated every surface in that small apartment and hung in the air for months. It made the air taste like pain and fear and sadness.
I kept going, and walked around the campus of my old high school, taking in all the sights - noting all the things that had changed, and all the things that were still the same. I saw the giant old oak in front of the school, where we'd use to sit on days like this and eat our lunch. I slid down the bannister outside the front door - one more time, just for old times's sake. I wasn't quite as graceful as I remember being back then. And it gave me a wedgie.
I made my way around to the back of the school, to the parking lot and main entrance. (I always thought it was funny that the main entrance was around back.) I saw the brick tool shed for the apartment building across the street, behind which we used to hide to smoke between classes. It was under a tree on the lawn of that apartment building, across the street from that school one spring break so, so long ago that She and I fell in love. Though it would take us another decade to realize it.
I sat down for a rest under that tree. And I just took it all in. The weight of all that nostalgia like a lover on top of me - heavy, but pleasant; on the edge of smothering, but in a good way. I felt back to all those years ago. I remembered the children we'd been then, so awkwardly confident, so brazenly strange. Even then, we knew that moment was special. That we'd never have another like it for the rest of our lives. It might've been the one thing we'd been right about.
We never could've imagined what would come for us. That we would ever become so important to each other. That we would ever wrap our lives around one another. That we could ever possibly become fat, old drunks.
I realized I was crying. For the children we'd been. For all we've lost. I sat there under that magickal tree in the glow of the evening sun, and I grieved for every missed opportunity, for everything we used to be, for every weight of the world we've decided to carry. For all we could've done. For all we can never do again.
I cried for the children we'd left behind. That beautiful, strong, scared, strange little girl. And for the boy I'd been. And I realized, how much like him I still feel. How I still see myself as 16, as 19, as 20, 25. How could it be that I am this boy with a beard, sitting here under the weight of these memories that are so much larger than I have ever been? It won't be very long at all before I'm 40.
At what point do I begin to feel like a man?
Friday, March 16, 2012
Words Everyday...
I've decided - for my mental, emotional, spiritual, psychic, and perhaps even physical well-being - to try to post something here every day. We'll see how long I'm able to keep that up.
I imagine most, if not all, of it will be like most everything else I write - masturbatory, self-indulgent drivel all about me, Me, ME. But they say "write what you know," and what I know is introspection and self-analyzation. I am, after all, my favorite subject to ponder.
I think a key to keeping it going will be to just write whatever I'm feeling right then, whatever comes into my head, whatever I want to write about. No set topic, no set word limit, no pressure to do anything specific other than WRITE SOMETHING. Again, we'll see how well I actually do. But I'm looking forward to it. It will feel good to do some small creative exercising every day.
...
Some people are able to walk the middle path. Able to keep balance in their life. I know that I have wanted that for as long as I have wanted at all. And, I guess, in my way, I have been able to do that. But not in a straight line. Instead, looking back on my life, I see that I have always bounced back and forth from one extreme to the other, over and over and over, back and forth. And there is definitely a kind of balance in that. But not stability.
It's a violent kind of balance. Not exactly the serenity one associates with the idea of "walking the middle path." And, I must admit, not really what I want for myself, either. I keep hoping that one of these days, I will end up in the middle. That I will somehow bounce myself into a state of grace. I'm not sure how realistic that is, though. I like to believe that each time I whip from one pole to the other, that I get a little closer to the center, that I am drawing my poles closer and closer to each other with each oscillation. But I don't know if this is true, or just wishful-thinking.
And another thought I try (and often fail) to not worry about: is this what they refer to as "bi-polar?"
And if it is, then what does that mean for me?
I imagine most, if not all, of it will be like most everything else I write - masturbatory, self-indulgent drivel all about me, Me, ME. But they say "write what you know," and what I know is introspection and self-analyzation. I am, after all, my favorite subject to ponder.
I think a key to keeping it going will be to just write whatever I'm feeling right then, whatever comes into my head, whatever I want to write about. No set topic, no set word limit, no pressure to do anything specific other than WRITE SOMETHING. Again, we'll see how well I actually do. But I'm looking forward to it. It will feel good to do some small creative exercising every day.
...
Some people are able to walk the middle path. Able to keep balance in their life. I know that I have wanted that for as long as I have wanted at all. And, I guess, in my way, I have been able to do that. But not in a straight line. Instead, looking back on my life, I see that I have always bounced back and forth from one extreme to the other, over and over and over, back and forth. And there is definitely a kind of balance in that. But not stability.
It's a violent kind of balance. Not exactly the serenity one associates with the idea of "walking the middle path." And, I must admit, not really what I want for myself, either. I keep hoping that one of these days, I will end up in the middle. That I will somehow bounce myself into a state of grace. I'm not sure how realistic that is, though. I like to believe that each time I whip from one pole to the other, that I get a little closer to the center, that I am drawing my poles closer and closer to each other with each oscillation. But I don't know if this is true, or just wishful-thinking.
And another thought I try (and often fail) to not worry about: is this what they refer to as "bi-polar?"
And if it is, then what does that mean for me?
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Emptying, to Form...
Where am I going with this?
What am I doing?
What's wrong with me? Why am I so unhappy?
What do I want?
Do I love you, completely?
Do I love you, at all?
Or do I just need to feel loved by someone?
...
No. No, that's not the right question. I do love you. We've been through way too much together for way too long, have too much history, for me to not love you. There's a part of me that will always love you, in some way.
The question is, do I love you the way that I'm supposed to? Do I love you the way that a husband should love his wife? Or do I just love you as the one person I've been closer to in my life, and shared more of myself with, than any other?
And is there a difference?
Questions, questions, questions! Everywhere I look it's more fucking questions! WHERE ARE THE FUCKING ANSWERS?!!
...
I've moved out, temporarily. Checked myself into a hotel for the week.
Why? What do I hope to gain from that? Am I just trying to "shake things up" - just introduce a little anarchy into my life to see what happens? Am I just trying to force a random change? Or am I trying to step out of my life, to gain some perspective? Or am I just hiding? Just running away?
I don't know. I don't know if I ever knew.
I'm grasping at straws here. Suddenly, every single little thing is pregnant with meaning. Is this The Answer? Is this what I need? Will this make me better? Will this solve my problems?
How can I get better when I don't even know what's wrong? How can I find The Answer when I don't even know The Question??
Am I looking for fulfillment? Or do I just want a happy, satisfying marriage? Are they mutually exclusive? Or are they one and the same?
...
I keep coming back to this one thought. That I need to clean up my act. That everything will be better, and I will be happy and content, if I just give up the drink and all the rest, start working out and losing weight and eating right, start meditating again and studying the Tao, etc., etc.
But then I also can't shake the feeling that all of that is just a bunch of middle-aged, white, American, liberal, hipster bullshit.
But I'm following my gut, aren't I? That's what I'm doing right now. I'm following my gut instincts, blindly, in a desperate attempt to get away from wherever the fuck I am right now, to someplace, anyplace else.
And it's my gut that's telling me to follow that path. That salad yesterday (my first in I-can't-remember-when; it's been all pot pies and beer lately) was the best thing I've tasted in a long, long time. It's was, literally, unbelievably, shockingly delicious. And there was absolutely nothing special about it - just greens, some veggies, and oil & vinegar. I keep thinking about how wonderful it would be to just spend some time sitting still and being quiet. I keep dreaming of my gomden the way I've so often dreamed of the pipe. That stupid little weekly email quote from Pema Chodron felt like the Universe speaking directly to ME.
And it's my head that's telling me it's all a load of crap.
That means something.
Doesn't it?
But what if all of that only feels right because it's my safety net; because it's safe and familiar because that's what I do when I get lost in these existential crises? ("Existential Crisis" - jesus, talk about a first-world fucking problem. How spoiled of a brat do I have to be to even be taking any of this seriously? But, what, am I supposed to pretend I have the experience of a migrant worker in Guatemala or some shit?? I DON'T. I can only be who I am. And I am a white, middle-aged American liberal, who is fortunate enough to have the luxury of being able to engage in this kind of introspective panic.)
But what if that's what I do when I get in these situations because that's what I'm supposed to do in these situations because that is The Answer to these problems?!
Ugh, this is making me dizzy.
...
And way, way back in the deep down of me, I feel this fear. This fear that I'm going to die here. That I'm never going to get out of this maze of questions alive. That any reprieve is only temporary, and that I will always end up right back here.
That they're going to find me, cold and still on a hotel bed, the same way they found my mother.
I'm scared of the way that feels like Destiny.
...
And She says, "I'm sure it hurts! I can't imagine caring so much about so many things. It must be exhausting! Maybe you should get back into the Tao so you can let things go and ease your pain..."
And I can't help but laugh! She has no idea I've been thinking that, or writing this here, at the exact same time. Out of the mouths of babes...
Is it another sign? Or am I just connecting dots to find the pattern in the chaos that I want to see?
...
Is all of this just because I don't like myself? Is that why I feel compelled to do all of those self-improvements? Because I feel like I would like myself better?
...
When I'm drifting like this, grasping at straws, lost and desperate in this vague and undefined way, I find that I start to obsess about strange things. A lot of the time it starts as ordinary, banal escapism. But sometimes it leads me to the Way Out. The most famous example of this in my life so far, was reading Wild Cards in the bath way back when. In about the strangest way possible, it was those baths that led me directly to my first direct experience of the Tao. Changed my life forever.
Right now, it's The Moth.
I can't stop listening to it. Every story just makes me feel, so much, and so powerfully. And so I guess there must be something about that feel-ing that I need right now, just like I needed to disappear into the warm water back then. I would assume then, that also like the baths, I probably will only be able to explain this obsession in hindsight.
Follow Your Instincts.
It's the only thing I feel like I can do right now. When all else fails (and, let's be honest, all else really has failed here), then Follow Your Instincts.
It's the only thing I feel like I know, for certain.
...
Yesterday, the quote on Zen Pencils reminded me of Bill Hicks' "It's just a ride..." quote. I got a strong urge to submit that quote to the author/webmaster. In doing that, I had to find it in my PDA so I could copy and paste it into the email.
Just now, I needed to go into the same section of my PDA that holds all my little notes and stuff, to look up something else. It was still on the same page with the Bill Hicks' quote. That page is titled "Philosophies."
I have a collection of notes on my Philosophies of Life that I've collected over the years, stored in my PDA - and I had completely forgotten about it!
And there it was, right in the middle of the list: The Tao of ManniMoonYin that had come to me so many years ago under such similar circumstances - the Tao that I had been led to from my bath.
How can it be?? It seems that I've forgotten my Tao:
"All things that are, are change."
("All things that are, are fire." The only constant is change. Nothing lasts forever. EVERYTHING is mutable.)
"You cannot be good. You cannot be bad. You can only be."
(You cannot be "good," and you cannot be "bad." These are entirely relative judgements - what is "good" for one will be "bad" for another, and vice versa. The only thing you can "be," is Michael.)
"Look on the bright side." "Make the most of it."
(This is the only life you get. There's nothing good nor bad but thinking makes it so - so find the good in *everything* - even your mother's suicide was a good thing when you figured out how to look at it right. Choose joy, and you will be joyous.)
"You are amazing. And so is everyone else."
(Glass houses; no one is fit to judge anyone else. Judgement only leads to division, separation, and loneliness. We are all One.)
...
That's 3 coincidences now today, all pointing to the same thing. And today is my 3rd day of this desperate searching.
Even if I'm just connecting the dots in the chaos to find the pattern I want to see, that pattern is obviously deeply meaningful to me in some way. My path clearly leads in that direction. And if I am to follow my instincts, then how can I ignore the pattern I see in the noise, like meaning in an inkblot?
It seems that I have found My Answer.
...
What am I doing?
What's wrong with me? Why am I so unhappy?
What do I want?
Do I love you, completely?
Do I love you, at all?
Or do I just need to feel loved by someone?
...
No. No, that's not the right question. I do love you. We've been through way too much together for way too long, have too much history, for me to not love you. There's a part of me that will always love you, in some way.
The question is, do I love you the way that I'm supposed to? Do I love you the way that a husband should love his wife? Or do I just love you as the one person I've been closer to in my life, and shared more of myself with, than any other?
And is there a difference?
Questions, questions, questions! Everywhere I look it's more fucking questions! WHERE ARE THE FUCKING ANSWERS?!!
...
I've moved out, temporarily. Checked myself into a hotel for the week.
Why? What do I hope to gain from that? Am I just trying to "shake things up" - just introduce a little anarchy into my life to see what happens? Am I just trying to force a random change? Or am I trying to step out of my life, to gain some perspective? Or am I just hiding? Just running away?
I don't know. I don't know if I ever knew.
I'm grasping at straws here. Suddenly, every single little thing is pregnant with meaning. Is this The Answer? Is this what I need? Will this make me better? Will this solve my problems?
How can I get better when I don't even know what's wrong? How can I find The Answer when I don't even know The Question??
Am I looking for fulfillment? Or do I just want a happy, satisfying marriage? Are they mutually exclusive? Or are they one and the same?
...
I keep coming back to this one thought. That I need to clean up my act. That everything will be better, and I will be happy and content, if I just give up the drink and all the rest, start working out and losing weight and eating right, start meditating again and studying the Tao, etc., etc.
But then I also can't shake the feeling that all of that is just a bunch of middle-aged, white, American, liberal, hipster bullshit.
But I'm following my gut, aren't I? That's what I'm doing right now. I'm following my gut instincts, blindly, in a desperate attempt to get away from wherever the fuck I am right now, to someplace, anyplace else.
And it's my gut that's telling me to follow that path. That salad yesterday (my first in I-can't-remember-when; it's been all pot pies and beer lately) was the best thing I've tasted in a long, long time. It's was, literally, unbelievably, shockingly delicious. And there was absolutely nothing special about it - just greens, some veggies, and oil & vinegar. I keep thinking about how wonderful it would be to just spend some time sitting still and being quiet. I keep dreaming of my gomden the way I've so often dreamed of the pipe. That stupid little weekly email quote from Pema Chodron felt like the Universe speaking directly to ME.
And it's my head that's telling me it's all a load of crap.
That means something.
Doesn't it?
But what if all of that only feels right because it's my safety net; because it's safe and familiar because that's what I do when I get lost in these existential crises? ("Existential Crisis" - jesus, talk about a first-world fucking problem. How spoiled of a brat do I have to be to even be taking any of this seriously? But, what, am I supposed to pretend I have the experience of a migrant worker in Guatemala or some shit?? I DON'T. I can only be who I am. And I am a white, middle-aged American liberal, who is fortunate enough to have the luxury of being able to engage in this kind of introspective panic.)
But what if that's what I do when I get in these situations because that's what I'm supposed to do in these situations because that is The Answer to these problems?!
Ugh, this is making me dizzy.
...
And way, way back in the deep down of me, I feel this fear. This fear that I'm going to die here. That I'm never going to get out of this maze of questions alive. That any reprieve is only temporary, and that I will always end up right back here.
That they're going to find me, cold and still on a hotel bed, the same way they found my mother.
I'm scared of the way that feels like Destiny.
...
And She says, "I'm sure it hurts! I can't imagine caring so much about so many things. It must be exhausting! Maybe you should get back into the Tao so you can let things go and ease your pain..."
And I can't help but laugh! She has no idea I've been thinking that, or writing this here, at the exact same time. Out of the mouths of babes...
Is it another sign? Or am I just connecting dots to find the pattern in the chaos that I want to see?
...
Is all of this just because I don't like myself? Is that why I feel compelled to do all of those self-improvements? Because I feel like I would like myself better?
...
When I'm drifting like this, grasping at straws, lost and desperate in this vague and undefined way, I find that I start to obsess about strange things. A lot of the time it starts as ordinary, banal escapism. But sometimes it leads me to the Way Out. The most famous example of this in my life so far, was reading Wild Cards in the bath way back when. In about the strangest way possible, it was those baths that led me directly to my first direct experience of the Tao. Changed my life forever.
Right now, it's The Moth.
I can't stop listening to it. Every story just makes me feel, so much, and so powerfully. And so I guess there must be something about that feel-ing that I need right now, just like I needed to disappear into the warm water back then. I would assume then, that also like the baths, I probably will only be able to explain this obsession in hindsight.
Follow Your Instincts.
It's the only thing I feel like I can do right now. When all else fails (and, let's be honest, all else really has failed here), then Follow Your Instincts.
It's the only thing I feel like I know, for certain.
...
Yesterday, the quote on Zen Pencils reminded me of Bill Hicks' "It's just a ride..." quote. I got a strong urge to submit that quote to the author/webmaster. In doing that, I had to find it in my PDA so I could copy and paste it into the email.
Just now, I needed to go into the same section of my PDA that holds all my little notes and stuff, to look up something else. It was still on the same page with the Bill Hicks' quote. That page is titled "Philosophies."
I have a collection of notes on my Philosophies of Life that I've collected over the years, stored in my PDA - and I had completely forgotten about it!
And there it was, right in the middle of the list: The Tao of ManniMoonYin that had come to me so many years ago under such similar circumstances - the Tao that I had been led to from my bath.
How can it be?? It seems that I've forgotten my Tao:
"All things that are, are change."
("All things that are, are fire." The only constant is change. Nothing lasts forever. EVERYTHING is mutable.)
"You cannot be good. You cannot be bad. You can only be."
(You cannot be "good," and you cannot be "bad." These are entirely relative judgements - what is "good" for one will be "bad" for another, and vice versa. The only thing you can "be," is Michael.)
"Look on the bright side." "Make the most of it."
(This is the only life you get. There's nothing good nor bad but thinking makes it so - so find the good in *everything* - even your mother's suicide was a good thing when you figured out how to look at it right. Choose joy, and you will be joyous.)
"You are amazing. And so is everyone else."
(Glass houses; no one is fit to judge anyone else. Judgement only leads to division, separation, and loneliness. We are all One.)
...
That's 3 coincidences now today, all pointing to the same thing. And today is my 3rd day of this desperate searching.
Even if I'm just connecting the dots in the chaos to find the pattern I want to see, that pattern is obviously deeply meaningful to me in some way. My path clearly leads in that direction. And if I am to follow my instincts, then how can I ignore the pattern I see in the noise, like meaning in an inkblot?
It seems that I have found My Answer.
...
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