Things I could be writing about:
Brie Cheese
Himalayan pink salt chocolate
New years resolutions for 2018
Past resolutions
A story about one man fighting against a horde of doubts and insecurities, but when they pull off the mask, it turns out to be old man Wilkenson the entire time
Those aliens who are supposed to show up and tell us our squabbling is pointless and that the real party is 2 galaxies over.
Porn addiction
Sex addiction
Labeling healthy things as addictions
Conquering death by living your best life and being remembered by people whose lives you've enriched
Toddler speak as a second language that changes every time they assign a word to a newly discovered thing
Baldness
Epic quests to live up to a legend, only to face that legend as an enemy along the way.
Anime
Music
Snow
OR
I could make a list of things I COULD be writing about, in order to avoid actually writing something.
I mean, technically I'm writing something by writing it, but I'm also aware of the sneaky misdirection of the whole thing.
I suggest not writing just before bed.
Or at least, not starting writing just before bed.
Do other stuff in between. That way you don't throw everything up to the subconscious to burn for dream fuel. Lost and forgotten after it's been consumed.
Just a suggestion...
Saturday 30 December 2017
Friday 29 December 2017
Day 59
What has prevented you?
This storm? There have been storms before - fiercer storms before this one.
What is so different, that this one should hold back you and I?
It is a thing with no intent, nor will of its own. It is just there. As a rock in the road or the sun in our eyes. We adjust. We overcome. We persevere ... but not this day. Why?
Have we been so beaten by fallen ice? Has the wind startled us into hiding?
It is not the howl of a wolf! No army of beasts come to take from us our lives.
No. The storm is not stopping us today.
It began a moment ago and will pass just as soon, it's might and terror spent ... you on the other hand.
You are a worthy obstacle. You are a trickier sort of opponent and the reason I know this is because you have deceived yourself.
You have been taken in by your own beasts of burden and they have lulled you into a bundle of rocking limbs; self soothing in the hope that the real storm shall pass. The one that resides in you.
The one we cannot weather. Because you are more formidable than any petty hurricane.
Your winds cut deeper than bone.
So I must implore you, before your inner tempest should consume us both, answer this:
Don't you think it's time that we got on with what we came here to do?
This storm? There have been storms before - fiercer storms before this one.
What is so different, that this one should hold back you and I?
It is a thing with no intent, nor will of its own. It is just there. As a rock in the road or the sun in our eyes. We adjust. We overcome. We persevere ... but not this day. Why?
Have we been so beaten by fallen ice? Has the wind startled us into hiding?
It is not the howl of a wolf! No army of beasts come to take from us our lives.
No. The storm is not stopping us today.
It began a moment ago and will pass just as soon, it's might and terror spent ... you on the other hand.
You are a worthy obstacle. You are a trickier sort of opponent and the reason I know this is because you have deceived yourself.
You have been taken in by your own beasts of burden and they have lulled you into a bundle of rocking limbs; self soothing in the hope that the real storm shall pass. The one that resides in you.
The one we cannot weather. Because you are more formidable than any petty hurricane.
Your winds cut deeper than bone.
So I must implore you, before your inner tempest should consume us both, answer this:
Don't you think it's time that we got on with what we came here to do?
Day 58
Regret of the day:
Not getting to ride a dinosaur.
But then again, I didn't have to avoid getting eaten by a dinosaur.
So we'll mark today a success!
Not getting to ride a dinosaur.
But then again, I didn't have to avoid getting eaten by a dinosaur.
So we'll mark today a success!
Thursday 28 December 2017
Day 57
Let our beginnings be those of the future collaborators to come.
Let us go as far as we can, in order to leave a way clear for those that follow after.
Let my final steps open a new frontier for the betters that follow behind me.
We carried the torch this far, let it light them the rest of their way.
How many other ways can I shirk personal responsibility with some grandiose declaration of my intent not to make any contribution, but to ease the way for someone else to do so...?
I guess it's always been easier to imagine myself staring something for someone else to finish.
Those who do see these things through ... are they able to see the end result? Or is it all an act of faith.
Is every step made hoping solid ground waits to greet them?
Or have I simply stepped in something existential again?
What is the story here?
Perhaps it is an expedition, whereby an entire crew is bred and tasked with the sole purpose of dying as far away from the camp as possible. The first attack against that unknown. The great and powerful what if.I've followed this thread as far as I can. The eye rolls are causing dizzyness and the rhetorical questions are causing nausea.
I used to compose a story while walking my fields. I say they were mine, but they weren't. But they were a great place to walk the dog.
I was big into fantasy novels at the time. While I walked, my imagination flew. We were transported to a distant land where magic was real and internet was unheard of.
It started as a story of a young man leaving home; following in the footsteps of a hero he never met. They both were raised by an insular people. A community who shied away from the rest of the world, keeping their teachings and practices a secret. Living off the land, rather than rely on local cities or government.
Spurred by curiosity, enticed by the legends of his idol, our hero struck out into a world that was unknown to him. He didn't really have a goal or destination in mind, so he simply sought out the places his hero had been.
Oh the places he'd go. It took our hero through many exotic locations, with many trials along the way.
And since this is a fantasy adventure, he forms a band of travel companions along the way. As well as a creature companion. A hell-hound, if memory serves me.
He would eventually find himself in the middle of an ever growing war, because let's face it there's always a war brewing in these mythical lands.
The side most interested in toppling the status quo, has among their ranks a particularly fearsome general.
Our hero and this armored man would finally meet, when and where it would be revealed to be our heroe's hero.
The man of legend he had looked up to so long and in whose steps he had been following this entire time!
Why was he doing this? Why had he traded adventure for conquest?
The one time role model, now villain, offered only his own realization that he saw himself as a weapon.
His travels had shaped, sharpened and strengthened him into a formidable tool.
But one without vision. Without purpose.
So he lent himself to one who has a vision. Giving the armored man purpose.
I essentially imagined a fantasy series about disillusioned college graduates ... still better than the hobbit films.
Let us go as far as we can, in order to leave a way clear for those that follow after.
Let my final steps open a new frontier for the betters that follow behind me.
We carried the torch this far, let it light them the rest of their way.
How many other ways can I shirk personal responsibility with some grandiose declaration of my intent not to make any contribution, but to ease the way for someone else to do so...?
I guess it's always been easier to imagine myself staring something for someone else to finish.
Those who do see these things through ... are they able to see the end result? Or is it all an act of faith.
Is every step made hoping solid ground waits to greet them?
Or have I simply stepped in something existential again?
What is the story here?
Perhaps it is an expedition, whereby an entire crew is bred and tasked with the sole purpose of dying as far away from the camp as possible. The first attack against that unknown. The great and powerful what if.I've followed this thread as far as I can. The eye rolls are causing dizzyness and the rhetorical questions are causing nausea.
I used to compose a story while walking my fields. I say they were mine, but they weren't. But they were a great place to walk the dog.
I was big into fantasy novels at the time. While I walked, my imagination flew. We were transported to a distant land where magic was real and internet was unheard of.
It started as a story of a young man leaving home; following in the footsteps of a hero he never met. They both were raised by an insular people. A community who shied away from the rest of the world, keeping their teachings and practices a secret. Living off the land, rather than rely on local cities or government.
Spurred by curiosity, enticed by the legends of his idol, our hero struck out into a world that was unknown to him. He didn't really have a goal or destination in mind, so he simply sought out the places his hero had been.
Oh the places he'd go. It took our hero through many exotic locations, with many trials along the way.
And since this is a fantasy adventure, he forms a band of travel companions along the way. As well as a creature companion. A hell-hound, if memory serves me.
He would eventually find himself in the middle of an ever growing war, because let's face it there's always a war brewing in these mythical lands.
The side most interested in toppling the status quo, has among their ranks a particularly fearsome general.
Our hero and this armored man would finally meet, when and where it would be revealed to be our heroe's hero.
The man of legend he had looked up to so long and in whose steps he had been following this entire time!
Why was he doing this? Why had he traded adventure for conquest?
The one time role model, now villain, offered only his own realization that he saw himself as a weapon.
His travels had shaped, sharpened and strengthened him into a formidable tool.
But one without vision. Without purpose.
So he lent himself to one who has a vision. Giving the armored man purpose.
I essentially imagined a fantasy series about disillusioned college graduates ... still better than the hobbit films.
Wednesday 27 December 2017
Day 56
I'm trying to recall something. A secret.
It's important to remember secrets told to you.
You keep secrets. Some may argue that a secret not remember makes it safer than if you had remembered it.
But forgetting and keeping are entirely different things. It's important to keep the distinction.
The secret I was to keep was whispered to me while I lay sleeping as a child.
The minds of children make for amazing message keeping, but you must record it in them while they sleep.
For then the mind matter absorbs and buries the knowledge within the still forming surfaces of the brain.
The day I was born, I was told a secret.
It was whispered to me as I lay sleeping.
Ingenious really.
My mind didn't yet know how to dream, so it hadn't any opinion or idea of what to dream on: so the words whispered to me became the only thing I knew. For my first dream, I was what i was told.
And just as the landmasses of my mind began to shift and split apart, so too spread the seeds of what was said.
Some nights, if I am lucky, a clue will come to me in my dreams. These clues are delivered to me.
By a special kind of messenger.
A figure I don't quite recognize, but whose features I can see clearly.
This person's appearance is made up of everyone that has been in my periphery when monumental moments were recorded to memory.
The waitress working the night of that disastrous date. The student in front of me as I accepted my degree.
The bystanders from ... that night ...
The features from all of those people are recombined into a mosaic of a person and this mosaic of a figure approaches me. The mosaic messenger comes without menace and their smile is genuinely pleasant.
I am not scared of this person. I am momentarily struck by seeing a person in my dream I have no feelings nor opinions towards. But I have yet to be disturbed by them.
I find them novel.
When first we met, it was near the end of an entire life time, lived in a single night.
I had built a home, housed a village, prevented a war and saved a forest from burning.
I'd also helped a family find their dog and child, and they were all about to live happily ever after.
However, just before I the feelings associated with realizing your life was all a dream could flood in, she appeared.
In this instance she was a she - and she said nothing.
She smiled and took my hand.
When she did this the sky's color faded, giving way to a dull pattern-less white surface.
The dream was leaving and my vision was becoming that of a pale bedroom wall seen through eyes opened only a sliver.
With her hand in mine, she leaned forward and whispered into my ear something ... indecipherable.
She stood tall, squeezed my hand and then blended into my bedroom wall.
The last thing I see before waking, is what she left in my hand:
A note in sharpy, written upon my palm.
Can you keep a secret?
It's important to remember secrets told to you.
You keep secrets. Some may argue that a secret not remember makes it safer than if you had remembered it.
But forgetting and keeping are entirely different things. It's important to keep the distinction.
The secret I was to keep was whispered to me while I lay sleeping as a child.
The minds of children make for amazing message keeping, but you must record it in them while they sleep.
For then the mind matter absorbs and buries the knowledge within the still forming surfaces of the brain.
The day I was born, I was told a secret.
It was whispered to me as I lay sleeping.
Ingenious really.
My mind didn't yet know how to dream, so it hadn't any opinion or idea of what to dream on: so the words whispered to me became the only thing I knew. For my first dream, I was what i was told.
And just as the landmasses of my mind began to shift and split apart, so too spread the seeds of what was said.
Some nights, if I am lucky, a clue will come to me in my dreams. These clues are delivered to me.
By a special kind of messenger.
A figure I don't quite recognize, but whose features I can see clearly.
This person's appearance is made up of everyone that has been in my periphery when monumental moments were recorded to memory.
The waitress working the night of that disastrous date. The student in front of me as I accepted my degree.
The bystanders from ... that night ...
The features from all of those people are recombined into a mosaic of a person and this mosaic of a figure approaches me. The mosaic messenger comes without menace and their smile is genuinely pleasant.
I am not scared of this person. I am momentarily struck by seeing a person in my dream I have no feelings nor opinions towards. But I have yet to be disturbed by them.
I find them novel.
When first we met, it was near the end of an entire life time, lived in a single night.
I had built a home, housed a village, prevented a war and saved a forest from burning.
I'd also helped a family find their dog and child, and they were all about to live happily ever after.
However, just before I the feelings associated with realizing your life was all a dream could flood in, she appeared.
In this instance she was a she - and she said nothing.
She smiled and took my hand.
When she did this the sky's color faded, giving way to a dull pattern-less white surface.
The dream was leaving and my vision was becoming that of a pale bedroom wall seen through eyes opened only a sliver.
With her hand in mine, she leaned forward and whispered into my ear something ... indecipherable.
She stood tall, squeezed my hand and then blended into my bedroom wall.
The last thing I see before waking, is what she left in my hand:
A note in sharpy, written upon my palm.
Can you keep a secret?
Tuesday 26 December 2017
Day 55
New game:
Forgive everyone. Just for a moment.
Everyone who has ever done any wrong. Any crime, no matter how severe.
Imagine a scenario in which they are in a hell of their own making; behind bars of fear and hate.
Any words they may have once used to justify their actions have given way to screams of rage, to moans of pain.
Then they become what we all truly are: children.
Look to this sobbing child, scared and alone, not yet aware of the damage and suffering they may cause.
Yet still filled with the deep seeded guilt and shame as if already having done so.
In this moment when they are most vulnerable, most in need of compassion: reach out to them.
Save them before they lose themselves.
Imagine a scenario in which this is possible: to offer complete and utter forgiveness.
Forgive the planet into healing itself.
Forgive humanity into bettering themselves.
Imagine you can. You. Wonderful, stubborn, impossible you. The only one with a heart brave enough to take on sorrow and transform it into love.
Do this, if only for a moment. If only for one person.
If only for you... practice a moment of forgiveness.
If you realize you have an amazing capacity to offer compassion to others: you win.
Bonus points for forgiving someone into positive action and growth.
Forgive everyone. Just for a moment.
Everyone who has ever done any wrong. Any crime, no matter how severe.
Imagine a scenario in which they are in a hell of their own making; behind bars of fear and hate.
Any words they may have once used to justify their actions have given way to screams of rage, to moans of pain.
Then they become what we all truly are: children.
Look to this sobbing child, scared and alone, not yet aware of the damage and suffering they may cause.
Yet still filled with the deep seeded guilt and shame as if already having done so.
In this moment when they are most vulnerable, most in need of compassion: reach out to them.
Save them before they lose themselves.
Imagine a scenario in which this is possible: to offer complete and utter forgiveness.
Forgive the planet into healing itself.
Forgive humanity into bettering themselves.
Imagine you can. You. Wonderful, stubborn, impossible you. The only one with a heart brave enough to take on sorrow and transform it into love.
Do this, if only for a moment. If only for one person.
If only for you... practice a moment of forgiveness.
If you realize you have an amazing capacity to offer compassion to others: you win.
Bonus points for forgiving someone into positive action and growth.
Monday 25 December 2017
Day 54
Everything that there is, is all we've ever had. We just didn't recognize it when it wasn't what it was.
When it was, what it was, it wasn't what it is. But we forget that it isn't what was, only what it is.
I'm starting to confuse myself and it is getting late but basically: if you break everything down, nothing is ever created. Everything is simply a combination and re-purposing of what came before, into what it now is.
... and I wish that was more revolutionary a thought than it is, but it isn't. It's pretty straightforward and obvious, but let me try to explain why this should be a comfort.
We're explorers. Discoverers. Every action we take is a discovery. We are not pressured to will matter into existence. We are not expected to invent new things and push them into the universe.
The universe is doing just fine. The universe has everything it needs.
However, we each have the opportunity to play with those preexisting objects in space.
Our existence becomes an invitation to an intergalactic play date, and the sand in the sand box can be anything!
Some people play with food. Some with literal building blocks.
Some get to make sandcastles out of sounds and music.
Some people get to play with literal sand!
None of this is revolutionary and I will likely never feel good about this post, but let me at least find comfort in knowing that everything I need is already in the world.
The building blocks to whatever life I want are already acquirable. And there is no pressure for me to build castles out of the sand. I can just sit here and play until the mood strikes me.
We are free to just play in the sand.
When it was, what it was, it wasn't what it is. But we forget that it isn't what was, only what it is.
I'm starting to confuse myself and it is getting late but basically: if you break everything down, nothing is ever created. Everything is simply a combination and re-purposing of what came before, into what it now is.
... and I wish that was more revolutionary a thought than it is, but it isn't. It's pretty straightforward and obvious, but let me try to explain why this should be a comfort.
We're explorers. Discoverers. Every action we take is a discovery. We are not pressured to will matter into existence. We are not expected to invent new things and push them into the universe.
The universe is doing just fine. The universe has everything it needs.
However, we each have the opportunity to play with those preexisting objects in space.
Our existence becomes an invitation to an intergalactic play date, and the sand in the sand box can be anything!
Some people play with food. Some with literal building blocks.
Some get to make sandcastles out of sounds and music.
Some people get to play with literal sand!
None of this is revolutionary and I will likely never feel good about this post, but let me at least find comfort in knowing that everything I need is already in the world.
The building blocks to whatever life I want are already acquirable. And there is no pressure for me to build castles out of the sand. I can just sit here and play until the mood strikes me.
We are free to just play in the sand.
Saturday 23 December 2017
Day 53
New game:
Holiday newsletter for the future!
Seasons greetings Friends!
I hope the season is being kind to you and yours, on the first winter in Canadian history with absolutely zero road accidents. Who knew just being a careful and patient driver made all the difference?
What a year it has been!
I'm glad we all agreed that mass produced greeting card prices were getting out of control and it is no longer expected to buy an impersonal piece of card stock for 7 dollars. It's made the holidays strangely less stressful.
Biggest shock of the year is a tie between:
1) Aliens showing up and revealing that they know we're here; that they don't have any interest in bothering us, but we should totally meet up when we get our space travel in better order! Really took the air out all those international conflicts that'd been dragging on.
And
2) Every bigoted, homophobic, science denying, poor people hating politician in North America turning out to just be Andy Kaufman in a complex long form sketch! So much commitment for a single bit could only be pulled off by a master satirist. Bravo, Andy. I'm glad monsters aren't running the world.
In my own life, I'm happy to say I have finally let go of all my supporting jobs and am able to focus solely on creativity.
Still a way to go for that big break out role, but sustainability is now an option and that is more than okay by me.
Consistently good writing is finally pouring out of me without my having to open a vein or break a boulder with my skull.
Doctors tell me I can now donate blood twice as often, since I'm no longer pouring so much onto blank pages in hopes of summoning inspiration.
And since flights within Canada no longer cost as much as a flight anywhere else in the world, I've been able to visit the family in Alberta more. This includes watching all the cartoons with my sister's kids! Yes, even the shows I'm not in. They're not old enough to know how cool I am for voicing cartoons, but I'll keep telling them.
All in all, not a bad year and 2019 is looking to be another great one!
Well, I don't have to tell any of you that.
Congrats to all of you for wining the lottery this year!
That's all for now. I'm looking through travel guides for our upcoming tour. In all my years, I never imagined I'd get to perform in - well, I'll leave that for next years letter.
All the best to you and yours!
Love and large grins,
Scott T. Garland
Holiday newsletter for the future!
Seasons greetings Friends!
I hope the season is being kind to you and yours, on the first winter in Canadian history with absolutely zero road accidents. Who knew just being a careful and patient driver made all the difference?
What a year it has been!
I'm glad we all agreed that mass produced greeting card prices were getting out of control and it is no longer expected to buy an impersonal piece of card stock for 7 dollars. It's made the holidays strangely less stressful.
Biggest shock of the year is a tie between:
1) Aliens showing up and revealing that they know we're here; that they don't have any interest in bothering us, but we should totally meet up when we get our space travel in better order! Really took the air out all those international conflicts that'd been dragging on.
And
2) Every bigoted, homophobic, science denying, poor people hating politician in North America turning out to just be Andy Kaufman in a complex long form sketch! So much commitment for a single bit could only be pulled off by a master satirist. Bravo, Andy. I'm glad monsters aren't running the world.
In my own life, I'm happy to say I have finally let go of all my supporting jobs and am able to focus solely on creativity.
Still a way to go for that big break out role, but sustainability is now an option and that is more than okay by me.
Consistently good writing is finally pouring out of me without my having to open a vein or break a boulder with my skull.
Doctors tell me I can now donate blood twice as often, since I'm no longer pouring so much onto blank pages in hopes of summoning inspiration.
And since flights within Canada no longer cost as much as a flight anywhere else in the world, I've been able to visit the family in Alberta more. This includes watching all the cartoons with my sister's kids! Yes, even the shows I'm not in. They're not old enough to know how cool I am for voicing cartoons, but I'll keep telling them.
All in all, not a bad year and 2019 is looking to be another great one!
Well, I don't have to tell any of you that.
Congrats to all of you for wining the lottery this year!
That's all for now. I'm looking through travel guides for our upcoming tour. In all my years, I never imagined I'd get to perform in - well, I'll leave that for next years letter.
All the best to you and yours!
Love and large grins,
Scott T. Garland
Friday 22 December 2017
Day 52
Possible dreams for tonight:
- I'm forced to eat a bunch of vegetables, but they turn into candy right before I eat them, fooling my nutritional tormentors.
- I'm the singer in a band, but everyone forgot their instruments, so I spend the entire set making the sounds of there instruments, hoping the audience won't notice.
- I am the avatar. Just- just that.
- I'm in line at the best amusement park in the galaxy, waiting to get on a Rollercoaster that's powered by screams. Then I turn around and someone asks if I was holding their place in line and I turn around and it's you and I WAKE MYSELF UP!
... I'm not an early riser. If i have a super power in this world it is my ability to sleep through anything. Including floods, earthquakes, a rocking car, a fire across the street and that teething infants cries on our delayed four hour flight ... but here we are. Because I don't want to talk to you.
Not dream you. Not imaginary you.
I don't wanna rehearse this scene,
I don't want to write your side of the conversation, and I certainly don't want my subconscious to use you to remind me I have forgotten something. (Lazy work subconscious! Like Three and a half men level lazy! Lazy!)
So I am making a list of dreams to have instead, in the hopes my brain will have enough fodder to not resort to cameos by a pretty girl I like!
Let's dream of scream powered Rollercoaster tonight...
- Or a marathon where the road is a rainbow...
- Or a freaking flying dream! Come on!
- I'm forced to eat a bunch of vegetables, but they turn into candy right before I eat them, fooling my nutritional tormentors.
- I'm the singer in a band, but everyone forgot their instruments, so I spend the entire set making the sounds of there instruments, hoping the audience won't notice.
- I am the avatar. Just- just that.
- I'm in line at the best amusement park in the galaxy, waiting to get on a Rollercoaster that's powered by screams. Then I turn around and someone asks if I was holding their place in line and I turn around and it's you and I WAKE MYSELF UP!
... I'm not an early riser. If i have a super power in this world it is my ability to sleep through anything. Including floods, earthquakes, a rocking car, a fire across the street and that teething infants cries on our delayed four hour flight ... but here we are. Because I don't want to talk to you.
Not dream you. Not imaginary you.
I don't wanna rehearse this scene,
I don't want to write your side of the conversation, and I certainly don't want my subconscious to use you to remind me I have forgotten something. (Lazy work subconscious! Like Three and a half men level lazy! Lazy!)
So I am making a list of dreams to have instead, in the hopes my brain will have enough fodder to not resort to cameos by a pretty girl I like!
Let's dream of scream powered Rollercoaster tonight...
- Or a marathon where the road is a rainbow...
- Or a freaking flying dream! Come on!
Thursday 21 December 2017
Day 51
If you ever need to pinpoint your greatest insecurities, ask your self: what traits would you not want to see in your child?
I wouldn't want them to be as withdrawn as I was.
I wouldn't want them to be as oblivious to social cues.
I wouldn't want them to conform so damn much! ... I would want them to conform more.
I would want them to stick up for themselves when confronted and not because I need them to be a cookie cutter hero archetype, but because I need them to know they have a right to the space they occupy, and no one get's to convince them otherwise.
I would want them to be unafraid of mistakes, considerate, creative and above all: unapologetic in the expressions of their bliss.
I would want all of this for them.
And I know that if this child ever did present with any of my flaws, I wouldn't shame them. I wouldn't hate them. I certainly wouldn't let them hate themselves. I would love them.
Completely. And help them overcome any obstacles in their way, with both patience and trust in them.
Now I see them as me. Just a child in a world both ancient and new. Fumbling along with one foot following the other in the ongoing struggle to move forward without falling down or running into sharp corners.
Now: I love myself.
Completely. I help myself to overcome any obstacles in my way, with both patience and trust.
I wouldn't want them to be as withdrawn as I was.
I wouldn't want them to be as oblivious to social cues.
I wouldn't want them to conform so damn much! ... I would want them to conform more.
I would want them to stick up for themselves when confronted and not because I need them to be a cookie cutter hero archetype, but because I need them to know they have a right to the space they occupy, and no one get's to convince them otherwise.
I would want them to be unafraid of mistakes, considerate, creative and above all: unapologetic in the expressions of their bliss.
I would want all of this for them.
And I know that if this child ever did present with any of my flaws, I wouldn't shame them. I wouldn't hate them. I certainly wouldn't let them hate themselves. I would love them.
Completely. And help them overcome any obstacles in their way, with both patience and trust in them.
Now I see them as me. Just a child in a world both ancient and new. Fumbling along with one foot following the other in the ongoing struggle to move forward without falling down or running into sharp corners.
Now: I love myself.
Completely. I help myself to overcome any obstacles in my way, with both patience and trust.
Day 50
New game:
Follow the breadcrumbs.
Only, the breadcrumbs aren't breadcrumbs. They're memories.
Each one leads you to another, and then another.
Mark these memories down, like a route on a map. Use cod phrases, lest you be followed ...
Now, this is an ongoing game. You don't finish it all in one go.
Short games are too easy and you need an ongoing project anyway, while you're not writing that novel. So put it down, and then pick it back up again.
Now as you follow back the map of memories you've made out of breadcrumbs that aren't really breadcrumbs, you'll find that your beginning to remember new details each time.
You're not.
This is your imagination filling in the missing pieces.
Don't worry it happens a lot. Colours of fences. Times of the year. Whose memory you're actually accessing ...
You just needed to follow the bread crumbs until you reached a breach in the hull.
This is a tank and you're scratching the inner wall. You've nearly found a breach.
Just need feel around and ...
You see now why you can't do this all at once?
If you are abducted by shady faceless drones: you lose.
If you breach the hull and break free of all restraints: they lose.
How to win?
Winning isn't an option. You simply play...!
Monday 18 December 2017
Day 49
I am a man of many smiles.
Their number is as great as the many joys I've felt
Some, like ear shape or eye colour, were inherited.
Others have been manufactured: extra mortar to support well crafted facades.
Some are small, so you must get close to see them.
Some are so large, you need to step back just to glean them.
Some glow in the dark, so are lost in light of day.
Some smiles are secrets, caught only by code breakers and childhood friends.
Some aren't even smiles, really. They're just menace and mischief doing a good impression.
Some smiles are rusty; they haven't had much need to make appearance. But they're still there, if ever I need them.
Some smiles are gone, lost to time and innocence lost.
... and then there's that smile.
It's a limited print in the library of my contentment.
It's yours.
Because you're the only one who makes it happen.
Whether in meeting, passing or even remembering; this smile truly belongs to you.
And I thank you for letting it reside, on my dumb mug.
Day 48
New game:
Corporate meeting!
If your life is a business then your are the CEO and heads of departments and get to hold annual, bi-annual, or whenever you feel like it meetings.
Check in with your departments.
CEO: Finances, how we doing?
Finances: Still in the red. Bright side, consistency is a good thing.
CEO: Downside?
Finances: Food and housing isn't getting any cheaper. We need to seriously consider building equity and credit scores for possible future endeavors.
CEO: Let's try to get some upward movement in the next quarter.
Finances: I have some thoughts on that. Perhaps looking for more gainful employment and spending less time on the internet looking at porn-
CEO: NOTED! Let's hear from our PR department.
PR: Well we've continued to convince strangers that this company is moral, ethical and above all: competent.
CEO: Truly? How have we achieved this?
PR: Maintaining adequate distance from major debates and works, most commentary regarding tough topics have been behind closed doors and in "off the record" scenarios.
CEO: Smart.
PR: Associating ourselves with low risk high reward ventures. We're the ones standing by the parade, while not actually marching in it. Let alone leading it.
CEO: Any foreseeable downsides?
R&D: Uh yes, if I could interject. Research and development has a lack of critical data to go on. If we don't start putting ourselves out there, we will inevitably find our ability to contribute to the social market an impossibility.
CEO: Hmmm ... but will we risk the "smart nice adult who absolutely has his shit together" campaign we've been running?
R&D: Well ... yea.
CEO: Put a pin in it until next quarter. Legal, how we doing?
Legal: The bodies are still undiscovered.
CEO: Excellent!
Legal: You should consider creating more alibis, however. Being more social. Not staying so much. Varrying activities away from either youtube on autoplay, or shuffling between playlists of porn-
CEO: NOTED. Pushed to next quarter.
*Collective sigh*
Corporate meeting!
If your life is a business then your are the CEO and heads of departments and get to hold annual, bi-annual, or whenever you feel like it meetings.
Check in with your departments.
CEO: Finances, how we doing?
Finances: Still in the red. Bright side, consistency is a good thing.
CEO: Downside?
Finances: Food and housing isn't getting any cheaper. We need to seriously consider building equity and credit scores for possible future endeavors.
CEO: Let's try to get some upward movement in the next quarter.
Finances: I have some thoughts on that. Perhaps looking for more gainful employment and spending less time on the internet looking at porn-
CEO: NOTED! Let's hear from our PR department.
PR: Well we've continued to convince strangers that this company is moral, ethical and above all: competent.
CEO: Truly? How have we achieved this?
PR: Maintaining adequate distance from major debates and works, most commentary regarding tough topics have been behind closed doors and in "off the record" scenarios.
CEO: Smart.
PR: Associating ourselves with low risk high reward ventures. We're the ones standing by the parade, while not actually marching in it. Let alone leading it.
CEO: Any foreseeable downsides?
R&D: Uh yes, if I could interject. Research and development has a lack of critical data to go on. If we don't start putting ourselves out there, we will inevitably find our ability to contribute to the social market an impossibility.
CEO: Hmmm ... but will we risk the "smart nice adult who absolutely has his shit together" campaign we've been running?
R&D: Well ... yea.
CEO: Put a pin in it until next quarter. Legal, how we doing?
Legal: The bodies are still undiscovered.
CEO: Excellent!
Legal: You should consider creating more alibis, however. Being more social. Not staying so much. Varrying activities away from either youtube on autoplay, or shuffling between playlists of porn-
CEO: NOTED. Pushed to next quarter.
*Collective sigh*
Sunday 17 December 2017
Day 47
Fascinating process: book making.
In my world we use trees, like you, but we don't cut them down and harvest them.
We tell stories to the seeds, then plant them.
Each day when they are watered, we repeat the story.
Our gardeners are masters of recollection.
Each tree is told a story, and as it grows more and more, so too is more story told to it.
This is much the same with other plant life. However, they are much smaller and younger, so theirs are shorter.
Flowers often offer short verses, and poems. Often with a delightful tone or tune.
A patch of flowers can be taught a brief piece of music, wherein they sing as a chorus.
Oh and vines! They are wonderful to encounter; due to size and weaving ways, you have to follow them along their length. These are best kept for riddles or jokes, because you must travel for the punchline.
But it is trees that hold our greatest stories.
It can take many visits before you hear a tale in full.
But it is worth it. For as the life grows, so to do these works.
The grander the tree, the greater the story, because no one could bare cut either short, so the tree has had more time to grow. And with it, the story it is telling.
Every garden is a collection. Each forest is a library.
It is not so far a leap in understanding. Every life already has a story.
Now every story has a life.
In my world we use trees, like you, but we don't cut them down and harvest them.
We tell stories to the seeds, then plant them.
Each day when they are watered, we repeat the story.
Our gardeners are masters of recollection.
Each tree is told a story, and as it grows more and more, so too is more story told to it.
This is much the same with other plant life. However, they are much smaller and younger, so theirs are shorter.
Flowers often offer short verses, and poems. Often with a delightful tone or tune.
A patch of flowers can be taught a brief piece of music, wherein they sing as a chorus.
Oh and vines! They are wonderful to encounter; due to size and weaving ways, you have to follow them along their length. These are best kept for riddles or jokes, because you must travel for the punchline.
But it is trees that hold our greatest stories.
It can take many visits before you hear a tale in full.
But it is worth it. For as the life grows, so to do these works.
The grander the tree, the greater the story, because no one could bare cut either short, so the tree has had more time to grow. And with it, the story it is telling.
Every garden is a collection. Each forest is a library.
It is not so far a leap in understanding. Every life already has a story.
Now every story has a life.
Day 46
In
times when light is scarce and temperatures fall; it is easy to give
way to despair. To sleep more than we wake. To join all other natural
life in this, the annual impulse to simply retreat and slumber.
And I hope you can find some comfort in that notion.
We resist this. In resisting we make each winter a battle, and each battle is between you and a wilderness indifferent to your struggles.
You cannot hold back the elements nor stop the season coming, but every year you win.
Warmth is shared to spite the cold.
Colors and songs are spread to disperse the grey and dreary.
We shine lights to combat the growing dark.
We win through caring for others. Victory through community. Through sharing.
Through love.
We win because we love. Through love.
And I hope you can find some comfort in that notion.
Thursday 14 December 2017
Day 45
Having a hard time getting that novel out?
Symphony not composing itself?
Is the distance from brain to hand to fingers to pen to pad just too damn far for you creativity to be accurately expressed?
Worry no more and enjoy an idea translating projector from future tech.
The scanner scans your brain and the audiovisual holo projector creates sounds and images that best express what those thoughts should present as.
Be it music, literature, or even a picture.
The days of following your bliss and experimenting with ways to constructively express yourself are long gone. The device does it for you, so you don't have to worry about silly obstacles like craft, discipline or time to become an Tristan. You can be one now.
Then you can spend all your free enjoying the other aspects of artistic life.
Like inconsistent income. Waiting for the next project. Actively ignoring all the self doubt and lack of impact on an infinite universe that is not revelling in your struggle, but simply indifferent to it.
And since literally everyone can create accurate representations of their own personal experience of the human condition, you can be sure the demand for your work will be at an all time low.
That's instant gratification for you: sacrificing meaning for pleasure!
Day 44
Tonight, we will dream.
In dreaming we will work through the threats our subconscious battles daily; like a psychic immune system and every shame and insecurity is a would be viral intruder.
We will visualize our doubts and fears and we will see them.
We will not conquer them.
I'm not being defeatist, I'm simply stating fact.
I imagine a great sea creature, slow and lumbering. Half blind in its stumbling and roughly the size of a speedboat.
What it looks like in light of day I'll never know, because it won't stay still long enough. It is also usually covered in coral, sea weed and whatever debris it has picked up along the way in its thrashing and flailing below calm surfaces.
I don't mean to ignore this creature. It is not my intent to be inattentive.
But the only affections I can ever summon for the poor thing, make manifest when distance between us is greatest.
I want to love this scaly creature.
I want to calm the flailing of its confusion and agony whenever it is before me.
But it's jaws grow wide and rows of teeth seem to fly out at me. And in the dream scenario I always cast myself as the dinner to be, before waking up and banishing it back to it's briny depths ...
I hope do tonight's dream will be different.
Let me have the strength to see past the bluster and bile.
Allow me to see myself shattering these facades to reveal the man behind the curtain.
Make me a healer tonight.
Let me love the hidden parts of myself.
Let none of me be neglected anymore ...
Alot to ask I know. But if not in dreams, where else can I ask for the outrageous?
In dreaming we will work through the threats our subconscious battles daily; like a psychic immune system and every shame and insecurity is a would be viral intruder.
We will visualize our doubts and fears and we will see them.
We will not conquer them.
I'm not being defeatist, I'm simply stating fact.
I imagine a great sea creature, slow and lumbering. Half blind in its stumbling and roughly the size of a speedboat.
What it looks like in light of day I'll never know, because it won't stay still long enough. It is also usually covered in coral, sea weed and whatever debris it has picked up along the way in its thrashing and flailing below calm surfaces.
I don't mean to ignore this creature. It is not my intent to be inattentive.
But the only affections I can ever summon for the poor thing, make manifest when distance between us is greatest.
I want to love this scaly creature.
I want to calm the flailing of its confusion and agony whenever it is before me.
But it's jaws grow wide and rows of teeth seem to fly out at me. And in the dream scenario I always cast myself as the dinner to be, before waking up and banishing it back to it's briny depths ...
I hope do tonight's dream will be different.
Let me have the strength to see past the bluster and bile.
Allow me to see myself shattering these facades to reveal the man behind the curtain.
Make me a healer tonight.
Let me love the hidden parts of myself.
Let none of me be neglected anymore ...
Alot to ask I know. But if not in dreams, where else can I ask for the outrageous?
Wednesday 13 December 2017
Day 43
Brief but selfish, because sometimes I have to be:
How often I get re-repeating the echo of a shadow.
One sided conversations with fictionalized factors, and by end of day I've ended up hating or worshipping someone who has in actuality not spoken a single word.
With whom was I arguing. Of what was I lusting?
In both cases the answer is the same: myself.
And I will feed neither vanity nor shame. These appetites do not nurture.
These temporary spells of self indulgence and misdirection must be overcome. Shake your head. Clear the smoke from your ears. Lay down the load. Save your strength for the mountains to come.
Let me not act out of insecurity nor shame. Both are selfish, in perverse and warped ways.
Let my actions not be in service to an apology I never owed, but in pursuit of a bliss I am deserving of.
Not because it's expected. Not even because it's my right. But because it is worth my time to do so.
I am worth it. I am worthy of it.
That, is what love could be. What life could be.
A joy multiplied by the number of stars wished upon by those that could make every dream come true, if only they accepted that they are the wish granters in this empty universe.
That stars are our family too, and they're waiting for their turns to wish on you.
This irony is the last line and first verse of the song we won't get to hear, for having spent all of eternity making it.
Looking up and looking in are in fact the same thing.
So look.
How often I get re-repeating the echo of a shadow.
One sided conversations with fictionalized factors, and by end of day I've ended up hating or worshipping someone who has in actuality not spoken a single word.
With whom was I arguing. Of what was I lusting?
In both cases the answer is the same: myself.
And I will feed neither vanity nor shame. These appetites do not nurture.
These temporary spells of self indulgence and misdirection must be overcome. Shake your head. Clear the smoke from your ears. Lay down the load. Save your strength for the mountains to come.
Let me not act out of insecurity nor shame. Both are selfish, in perverse and warped ways.
Let my actions not be in service to an apology I never owed, but in pursuit of a bliss I am deserving of.
Not because it's expected. Not even because it's my right. But because it is worth my time to do so.
I am worth it. I am worthy of it.
That, is what love could be. What life could be.
A joy multiplied by the number of stars wished upon by those that could make every dream come true, if only they accepted that they are the wish granters in this empty universe.
That stars are our family too, and they're waiting for their turns to wish on you.
This irony is the last line and first verse of the song we won't get to hear, for having spent all of eternity making it.
Looking up and looking in are in fact the same thing.
So look.
Monday 11 December 2017
Day 42
I've grown a disdain for that word: literature.
Don't get me wrong, I like books. I like reading. I like my modest library, despite the back pains it can summon up whenever I remember having to move it as often as I have.
And despite my fondness for all these book and the stories they hold, I can't help feel sometimes: would they not have made better trees?
The fruit those trees might bare, would that not sustain us more. Or provide shelter for a family of furry lemurs, seeking reprieve from a raging storm.
For every page here had a life as a tree, before they became maps for the various states of the human condition.
And each tree had a past before we made it a prison.
For that is what books are. Paper cages with doors closed shut. And what of the prisoner? Left to lie, asleep or dead, only to be awakened at our discretion. Sometimes, not even then.
A double death: first the tree, then the tale.
We entombed these songs of old in the husks of living plants.
How foolish we were.
They were never meant to be trapped here. Museum pieces for the idle collector to keep under lock and key, gathering dust and disdain.
They are our legacy. They are our history- no. No that too sounds too clinical. They are themselves alive, whenever we remember them. Recite them: their verses move from the reader to the listener, like an blood transfusion and we're all O negative. We become universal donors.
Sometimes I look at this library and have to remind myself that these books were once trees.
They reached towards the light of day, sheltered the vulnerable. They held back storms and floods, all while nurturing the world around them.
Should we not then expect as much from the art we've memorializes upon their shrouds?
Bring stories to the light, and give the dead a second life.
Don't get me wrong, I like books. I like reading. I like my modest library, despite the back pains it can summon up whenever I remember having to move it as often as I have.
And despite my fondness for all these book and the stories they hold, I can't help feel sometimes: would they not have made better trees?
The fruit those trees might bare, would that not sustain us more. Or provide shelter for a family of furry lemurs, seeking reprieve from a raging storm.
For every page here had a life as a tree, before they became maps for the various states of the human condition.
And each tree had a past before we made it a prison.
For that is what books are. Paper cages with doors closed shut. And what of the prisoner? Left to lie, asleep or dead, only to be awakened at our discretion. Sometimes, not even then.
A double death: first the tree, then the tale.
We entombed these songs of old in the husks of living plants.
How foolish we were.
They were never meant to be trapped here. Museum pieces for the idle collector to keep under lock and key, gathering dust and disdain.
They are our legacy. They are our history- no. No that too sounds too clinical. They are themselves alive, whenever we remember them. Recite them: their verses move from the reader to the listener, like an blood transfusion and we're all O negative. We become universal donors.
Sometimes I look at this library and have to remind myself that these books were once trees.
They reached towards the light of day, sheltered the vulnerable. They held back storms and floods, all while nurturing the world around them.
Should we not then expect as much from the art we've memorializes upon their shrouds?
Bring stories to the light, and give the dead a second life.
Day 41
Reading old writing challenges, I feel as if I'm visiting with a younger cousin.
A young man with all the energy I admire, filled with the potential I envy.
It's a very one sided conversation, mind you.
He talks. Never listens.
Which is a shame, because I've so much to tell him.
Like: a thesaurus is great but words are meant to communicate meaning to people who will need to understand them. So maybe don't lean so heavily on what the cool kids said in 19th century Sussex ...
That said, this kid has passion. And talent.
Raw untapped creativity, without the least inkling of how to use it. Nor fear of writing about unimportant things.
Like Frankenstein's monster learning to use his limbs for the first time. Just swinging heavy appendages towards the light. Farther along he comes and ... he's fallen down the stairs.
It's okay, though, he's young. He'll bounce back.
More and more, I'm coming to terms with this sad truth: I will love the things I produce, most when time has separated them from me and I've forgotten them. Not for the way I felt when making them and not always for the quality of the work. But for being able to look upon something started and finished. Having accomplished a piece. All without remembering how it was done.
It seems my younger self left a magic trick behind for me to try and decipher.
A treasure map back to creative innocence and freedom.
I should be sorry not to pick up the trail soon.
The distance grows with each passing day ...that is houw time works, I am told.
A young man with all the energy I admire, filled with the potential I envy.
It's a very one sided conversation, mind you.
He talks. Never listens.
Which is a shame, because I've so much to tell him.
Like: a thesaurus is great but words are meant to communicate meaning to people who will need to understand them. So maybe don't lean so heavily on what the cool kids said in 19th century Sussex ...
That said, this kid has passion. And talent.
Raw untapped creativity, without the least inkling of how to use it. Nor fear of writing about unimportant things.
Like Frankenstein's monster learning to use his limbs for the first time. Just swinging heavy appendages towards the light. Farther along he comes and ... he's fallen down the stairs.
It's okay, though, he's young. He'll bounce back.
More and more, I'm coming to terms with this sad truth: I will love the things I produce, most when time has separated them from me and I've forgotten them. Not for the way I felt when making them and not always for the quality of the work. But for being able to look upon something started and finished. Having accomplished a piece. All without remembering how it was done.
It seems my younger self left a magic trick behind for me to try and decipher.
A treasure map back to creative innocence and freedom.
I should be sorry not to pick up the trail soon.
The distance grows with each passing day ...that is houw time works, I am told.
Sunday 10 December 2017
Day 40
A dream journal is an example of something that sounds more exciting than it really is.
Like a Cat-person, or a Dragon fruit. Seriously, take either of those modifiers with noun at face value and the imagination conjures up some bad ass things!
A dream journal is just a journal you record your dreams into. But most people can't remember their dreams, so it's usually half remembered garbles of some shark that represents your ex husband from a previous life. Or a flower with a butt for a face, which somehow suggests you've got an aversion to change ...
It's essentially a book that no one has any reason to want to read, unless they want to put themselves to sleep. Upon waking they can then record their own half-remembered biochemical brain firings into a specifically delegated coiled notebook that may or may not have the phrase be-you-tiful on the cover, so someone else requiring the reading equivalent of a sedative can take a peak at it, keeping the knockout cycle going in perpetuity!
...
Cat people just own a lot of cats. They're not part feline.
And Dragon fruit just tastes weird. The shape is a little bizarre. But come on. You're called dragon fruit. Live up to the hype.
And my attempts to map out my subconscious by translating the reverb from the echoes I experience in REM sleep isn't likely to come up with the best results.
But dammit those cats need someone to care for them.
And fruits don't name themselves. If they did, they'd probably all follow some variation of "Please don't eat me, I'm sentient. You can tell I am because I named myself."
And I'm willing to communicate with my subconscious parts any way I can.
Because that's what I'm trying to do right?
Dip into the pool and come back with lessons learned?
That's what journeys are, right?
Like a Cat-person, or a Dragon fruit. Seriously, take either of those modifiers with noun at face value and the imagination conjures up some bad ass things!
A dream journal is just a journal you record your dreams into. But most people can't remember their dreams, so it's usually half remembered garbles of some shark that represents your ex husband from a previous life. Or a flower with a butt for a face, which somehow suggests you've got an aversion to change ...
It's essentially a book that no one has any reason to want to read, unless they want to put themselves to sleep. Upon waking they can then record their own half-remembered biochemical brain firings into a specifically delegated coiled notebook that may or may not have the phrase be-you-tiful on the cover, so someone else requiring the reading equivalent of a sedative can take a peak at it, keeping the knockout cycle going in perpetuity!
...
Cat people just own a lot of cats. They're not part feline.
And Dragon fruit just tastes weird. The shape is a little bizarre. But come on. You're called dragon fruit. Live up to the hype.
And my attempts to map out my subconscious by translating the reverb from the echoes I experience in REM sleep isn't likely to come up with the best results.
But dammit those cats need someone to care for them.
And fruits don't name themselves. If they did, they'd probably all follow some variation of "Please don't eat me, I'm sentient. You can tell I am because I named myself."
And I'm willing to communicate with my subconscious parts any way I can.
Because that's what I'm trying to do right?
Dip into the pool and come back with lessons learned?
That's what journeys are, right?
Saturday 9 December 2017
Day 39
Envision dark clouds in a world of grey. A snow-less winter on a joyless day. The clouds show no sign of breaking. On the contrary, they gather in greater number. Each one thicker than the last.
A flash deep within the behemoth signals the oncoming storm.
The expected roll of thunder follows and winds rise.
We brace for the rain.
Just what this day needed: to be worse.
As the first drop falls, I anticipate it to be weighted with a mountain of disappointments and greivances. Every inconvenience and sorrow catches a ride on that little lonely drop, and I'm anticipating a mighty quake the moment it lands. Eyes closed. Breath held and shoulders tensed.
Can't this just not happen today?
A fragile voice rings out in reply.
I look down at my feet where I heard the sweet sigh, the very place from which the first drop fell.
This is not rain.
At least, not rain as I knew it to be...
The sliver of ground on which it fell, was now illuminated.
A small patch of brilliant colour, found in a world of grey.
More drops follow. There impact is marked by little voices of different pitch. A heavenly choir, here for a very special performance. Now that they are all falling more rapidly I can see this is not water falling from the sky: it's light.
Little droplets of daylight coming down to earth.
Everywhere they land, another part of the world is illuminated and another voice joins the choir.
Everything, everyone is glowing and alive and brilliant!
It's the first time I've prayed for a downpour to never end. Let this be the life I know. Let the grey days be the exception. Let this one last ...
A flash deep within the behemoth signals the oncoming storm.
The expected roll of thunder follows and winds rise.
We brace for the rain.
Just what this day needed: to be worse.
As the first drop falls, I anticipate it to be weighted with a mountain of disappointments and greivances. Every inconvenience and sorrow catches a ride on that little lonely drop, and I'm anticipating a mighty quake the moment it lands. Eyes closed. Breath held and shoulders tensed.
Can't this just not happen today?
A fragile voice rings out in reply.
I look down at my feet where I heard the sweet sigh, the very place from which the first drop fell.
This is not rain.
At least, not rain as I knew it to be...
The sliver of ground on which it fell, was now illuminated.
A small patch of brilliant colour, found in a world of grey.
More drops follow. There impact is marked by little voices of different pitch. A heavenly choir, here for a very special performance. Now that they are all falling more rapidly I can see this is not water falling from the sky: it's light.
Little droplets of daylight coming down to earth.
Everywhere they land, another part of the world is illuminated and another voice joins the choir.
Everything, everyone is glowing and alive and brilliant!
It's the first time I've prayed for a downpour to never end. Let this be the life I know. Let the grey days be the exception. Let this one last ...
Friday 8 December 2017
Day 38
I have a fondness for snow.
Not all snow, mind you. Slush, for example can be unpleasant. Hail is best viewed and not felt.
Icy flecks in a blizzard storm are a bit too moody for my taste and, frankly, should just work out their issues at home and not take it out the rest of us.
But there is a kind of snow I do have a soft spot for. A sentimental indulgence for.
...
You probably already know what I'm gonna say without me saying it.
The soft stuff. The slow moseying flakes, floating down an invisible staircase like they're the starlet in a big Hollywood picture.
Take your time beautiful, we wait on you.
Those light tufts, gently dropped to Earth.
I like to imagine each one is a little note being passed from sky to ground. They love each other, you see. It's true. And around this time of year they get all sentimental. So the sky puts in the extra effort.
The I love you's aren't so much falling as they're luxuriating to the ground.
It's not a declaration, this won't be breaking into an infectious song and dance.
Not a sudden plea, demanding some kind of return to quell fear and insecurity.
No. This is a crystallization of aeons long courtship, composed of little assurances. Mindlessly holding hands when walking side by side. Lightly laying ones head on the others chest, because pillows are only technically more comfortable than chests. Carelessly moving stray hairs out of their face, so as not to obstruct the view. All this in a thousand-thousand little breaths of I love you, and coming at the rate it's coming, the earth already knows what each note will say. And it doens't mind waiting to hear what it already knows.
This may be why the cold doesn't really bother me, not where snow is involved anyway. (Wind is another story, and don't even get me started on excessive dampness!)
Because snow isn't actually snow. It's little love notes.
And like the best love, it takes. Its. Time.
Not all snow, mind you. Slush, for example can be unpleasant. Hail is best viewed and not felt.
Icy flecks in a blizzard storm are a bit too moody for my taste and, frankly, should just work out their issues at home and not take it out the rest of us.
But there is a kind of snow I do have a soft spot for. A sentimental indulgence for.
...
You probably already know what I'm gonna say without me saying it.
The soft stuff. The slow moseying flakes, floating down an invisible staircase like they're the starlet in a big Hollywood picture.
Take your time beautiful, we wait on you.
Those light tufts, gently dropped to Earth.
I like to imagine each one is a little note being passed from sky to ground. They love each other, you see. It's true. And around this time of year they get all sentimental. So the sky puts in the extra effort.
The I love you's aren't so much falling as they're luxuriating to the ground.
It's not a declaration, this won't be breaking into an infectious song and dance.
Not a sudden plea, demanding some kind of return to quell fear and insecurity.
No. This is a crystallization of aeons long courtship, composed of little assurances. Mindlessly holding hands when walking side by side. Lightly laying ones head on the others chest, because pillows are only technically more comfortable than chests. Carelessly moving stray hairs out of their face, so as not to obstruct the view. All this in a thousand-thousand little breaths of I love you, and coming at the rate it's coming, the earth already knows what each note will say. And it doens't mind waiting to hear what it already knows.
This may be why the cold doesn't really bother me, not where snow is involved anyway. (Wind is another story, and don't even get me started on excessive dampness!)
Because snow isn't actually snow. It's little love notes.
And like the best love, it takes. Its. Time.
Wednesday 6 December 2017
Day 37
At the end of this dream, a car will pull up. A familiar voice will call from the inside, asking if you need a lift to the party.
In the front passenger seat is your best friend, the one you trust with your life.
In the back is an old friend who would always invited adventure, next to her is a new friend whom you haven't seen in sometime. Behind them are two people you don't know, but you can already tell you look forward to learning about them on the way.
You can't really see the driver, but you get in anyway.
The car pulls away from the parking lot you were inexplicably waiting in, while searching for meaningless things. Like addresses and phone numbers.
You know right away that this car isn't going to the back yard party; the one complete with fire pit, open bar, loud music and all the people you knew from back home.
You know right away that this car isn't going to the back yard party; the one complete with fire pit, open bar, loud music and all the people you knew from back home.
And even though this nondescript 4 door fish tails a bit on it's turn, you're not really worried.
You do have the courtesy to ask if you've left anyone behind. Someone answers "Nah, we got everyone we need."
You nod, because they're right.
You nod, because they're right.
This mystery chauffeur, despite being reckless on the turns, keeps a moderate pace as he straightaways to a nearby bridge - or was it a tunnel? Maybe it was a bridge with a tunnel or a tunnel on top of a bridge, you can't really tell. But as you approach you begin to see the morning light shine through and splash onto the dash board - also your bedroom wall.
It's then you realize that it is time to wake up, not because of any alarms or morning tasks, but because that's what your destination is: awake.
You feel a pang of guilt about missing that party. How often do you party with the past?
Should someone call to say your not gonna show? What does the driver think?
It's then you realize that it is time to wake up, not because of any alarms or morning tasks, but because that's what your destination is: awake.
You feel a pang of guilt about missing that party. How often do you party with the past?
Should someone call to say your not gonna show? What does the driver think?
The driver thinks the same you're thinking. Because you're the driver. You're also the car and the merry band inside of the car, off on the next grand adventure.
And nobodies worried, because you've got everyone you need.
Wake up. Anything can happen.
And nobodies worried, because you've got everyone you need.
Wake up. Anything can happen.
Day 36
This minute's hand looked scared; so I took it in my own.
"It's okay" I whispered, "you don't have to be afraid."
"But what if I didn't do enough?" The passing minute asked, fear escaping each syllable.
"Then that's on me." I comforted the fragile measure of moments. "I could have started or finished a dozen things, over and over again. Your only job is to carry on. Mine is to do the best with the rest."
"Where will I go from here?" The minute asked. Their fears not quite abated.
"Oh!" I exclaimed. "You get to join every other minute that has passed from first till now. Where all time winds and weaves into the mosaic of all history. Some moments so mighty they shook the rest into place. Some so small, they hid from memory. Some came and went without anyone even noticing."
"And me." Asked this minute, their time almost an end, "how will I compare to all those many minutes?"
I summoned my most comforting smile, one I reserve for loved ones and lullabies, and answered simply, "Only time will tell. But I am glad I got to spend this minute with you."
With an appreciative sigh and a smile of their own, I let go the minute's hand.
And watched it pass by.
"It's okay" I whispered, "you don't have to be afraid."
"But what if I didn't do enough?" The passing minute asked, fear escaping each syllable.
"Then that's on me." I comforted the fragile measure of moments. "I could have started or finished a dozen things, over and over again. Your only job is to carry on. Mine is to do the best with the rest."
"Where will I go from here?" The minute asked. Their fears not quite abated.
"Oh!" I exclaimed. "You get to join every other minute that has passed from first till now. Where all time winds and weaves into the mosaic of all history. Some moments so mighty they shook the rest into place. Some so small, they hid from memory. Some came and went without anyone even noticing."
"And me." Asked this minute, their time almost an end, "how will I compare to all those many minutes?"
I summoned my most comforting smile, one I reserve for loved ones and lullabies, and answered simply, "Only time will tell. But I am glad I got to spend this minute with you."
With an appreciative sigh and a smile of their own, I let go the minute's hand.
And watched it pass by.
Tuesday 5 December 2017
Day 35
Let's predict. Tonight's dream:
I'm flying. Without wings, in spite of every law of physics I've adhered to my entire life, I am flying!
... I won't likely be flying.
The best I can muster is some impressive jumping.
...
Fine.
I give a mighty leap, leaving the world behind. From up here I. See many houses and back yards. I land in the one with the conveniently located trampoline (there's always a conveniently located trampoline).
Why am I leaping so high? AMI being chased? ...no. I'm in hot pursuit.
See I. Can't fly but this long haired bastard flies freely and mocks me whenever he can.
He floats in place, arms crossed, with his tongue sticking out.
He is going to eat dirt.
I know he will, because I will make him!
I take aim and push off once more. He narrowly dodged, but I've caught him off guard and he's on the run again. Now I'm running along rooftops in pursuit. Each step bringing me closer. He seems to have lost sight of me.
I take careful aim and this time, I'm not going to miss.
I leap off and wake up. It's still raining.
I still can't fly. I also can't leap tall buildings.
Ugh. What a drag.
Sunday 3 December 2017
Day 34
I wish I could play piano.
Not for concerts, nor recitals. Not even to be that good at it.
Just to have that thing that all those shitty shows cut back to when our misunderstood protagonist is brooding.
One of the other characters happen upon him and gleans some insight; a crack in the well kept facade...
But I'm not a misunderstood protagonist and I don't play piano and I'm not overly fond of people feeling like they have to spy on me to figure me out.
I'm me. And the me I am does not play piano.
Oh, I'll listen. I'll listen till my ears bleed.
The warm up - tickle those ivories gentlemen. One chord. Two chords. Three chords. Four. Build. Plateau. Fade... until ... notes.
One after another and another, some familiar re-visitations, but always moving. Movement keeps the pulse of the piece alive- Lifted up above the former place it once thought high. Higher still! Still the thrill will be always moving upward as if we are the rim to the drain and the sky is where we truly fall. Flying becomes falling, just the other way. And the rain in the clouds not yet formed is vibrating from the building crescendo in my ears-in my bones in my body, throughout me and I shake like the rings in the water. The still surface that was me ripples with tiny rings, because now I am the lake. I'm the pond. I dip my toe not into it but into myself, because there never was a pond. No pool. No page. No blank slate to be made into infinite possibilities only me.
Me and my infinite possibilities. Was this the fear. The hesitation. All this time, circling not a lump of clay, procrastinating the first hack- not a canvas but a mirror. And in it's reflective pure white surface- like liquid marble- pure white light of the happy open child that was always me. Looking right back at myself.
As I was. What I was, is what I still am?
...
And in a moment that swings between dream and wake. The lucid dream that I have acclimatized myself into, brings me to the conclusion that I am not so much living my best life as I am merely experiencing it. The greiver becomes a witness to grief. For that is how deep within the pond I've fallen. How far the little pebble of myself I've thrown can go.
I am not scared to drown. I cannot drown down here. I fear only that I shall find no need for breath.
In this warmth. This safety. This: where I came from after all. Floating in the essence of untapped potential and eternities of what could one day be.
It's safer here. Freer here. I am the pool, the pool is me and all my anxieties rooted to silly things like gravity, time, and direction fade. Form and thought are no longer contradictions, but rather brothers. One and the same.
Thought breeds form, and light is the true shadow of shape. Not the other way round. This cough, this sickness, is only a distraction. Only further evidence *cough* that I am getting closer *cough* *cough*
ever closer. Utill ...
...
Break the surface.
Take a breath.
Take another ...
Writing while ill can be - interesting to say the least.
Not for concerts, nor recitals. Not even to be that good at it.
Just to have that thing that all those shitty shows cut back to when our misunderstood protagonist is brooding.
One of the other characters happen upon him and gleans some insight; a crack in the well kept facade...
But I'm not a misunderstood protagonist and I don't play piano and I'm not overly fond of people feeling like they have to spy on me to figure me out.
I'm me. And the me I am does not play piano.
Oh, I'll listen. I'll listen till my ears bleed.
The warm up - tickle those ivories gentlemen. One chord. Two chords. Three chords. Four. Build. Plateau. Fade... until ... notes.
One after another and another, some familiar re-visitations, but always moving. Movement keeps the pulse of the piece alive- Lifted up above the former place it once thought high. Higher still! Still the thrill will be always moving upward as if we are the rim to the drain and the sky is where we truly fall. Flying becomes falling, just the other way. And the rain in the clouds not yet formed is vibrating from the building crescendo in my ears-in my bones in my body, throughout me and I shake like the rings in the water. The still surface that was me ripples with tiny rings, because now I am the lake. I'm the pond. I dip my toe not into it but into myself, because there never was a pond. No pool. No page. No blank slate to be made into infinite possibilities only me.
Me and my infinite possibilities. Was this the fear. The hesitation. All this time, circling not a lump of clay, procrastinating the first hack- not a canvas but a mirror. And in it's reflective pure white surface- like liquid marble- pure white light of the happy open child that was always me. Looking right back at myself.
As I was. What I was, is what I still am?
...
And in a moment that swings between dream and wake. The lucid dream that I have acclimatized myself into, brings me to the conclusion that I am not so much living my best life as I am merely experiencing it. The greiver becomes a witness to grief. For that is how deep within the pond I've fallen. How far the little pebble of myself I've thrown can go.
I am not scared to drown. I cannot drown down here. I fear only that I shall find no need for breath.
In this warmth. This safety. This: where I came from after all. Floating in the essence of untapped potential and eternities of what could one day be.
It's safer here. Freer here. I am the pool, the pool is me and all my anxieties rooted to silly things like gravity, time, and direction fade. Form and thought are no longer contradictions, but rather brothers. One and the same.
Thought breeds form, and light is the true shadow of shape. Not the other way round. This cough, this sickness, is only a distraction. Only further evidence *cough* that I am getting closer *cough* *cough*
ever closer. Utill ...
...
Break the surface.
Take a breath.
Take another ...
Writing while ill can be - interesting to say the least.
Saturday 2 December 2017
Day 33
Possible backstory for the shadowy figure I keep seeing at the foot of my bed, which is actually just my catering uniform hanging up on a valet rack I purchased from ikea:
Sleep inspector.
He's just there to make sure I'm sleeping the correct way. On a bed. Lying horizontally instead of vertically (it's more common than you'd think.) My briefly stirring awake and seeing him, is a result of my going to sleep too late. And so the sleep inspector accidentally dozed off and is really embarrassed by the whole thing and would appreciate you not telling his supervisor.
Sleep inspector.
He's just there to make sure I'm sleeping the correct way. On a bed. Lying horizontally instead of vertically (it's more common than you'd think.) My briefly stirring awake and seeing him, is a result of my going to sleep too late. And so the sleep inspector accidentally dozed off and is really embarrassed by the whole thing and would appreciate you not telling his supervisor.
Day 32
This holiday season, would it offend if I said: take care of each other.
Stay warm.
Be safe.
Bundle up.
Get some sunshine if you can.
Because every time I see someone offended about this war on Christmas thing I, want to ingest and upchuck all the candy and ceramic ornaments from my local shopping centre.
I can't dictate what people should value, nor determine what they hold to be important in their lives. But when the days are at their shortest, we've bid farewell to the warmth, and now settle in for the oncoming winter month; how can you choose to fixate on which holiday greeting your local billboard shows?
How can an inclusive greeting offend you?
Suicide rates skyrocket this time of year, homeless youths risk freezing and starving on the streets, traffic accidents are on the rise and everyone is sick in bed at some point from the air attacking their face!
But you have decided to champion the stupidest cause I've heard of since coke vs pepsi "it's not happy holidays, it's merry christmas"
Good news: It's both and it's neither.
Because it's cold: Stay warm.
Because it's dark it: Be safe.
Because it's snowing: Bundle up.
Because the days are getting shorter: Get some sunshine.
Because of all of these things, and because we all must deal with them together: take care of yourselves. Take care of each other.
If any of these sentiments feel like a war on your Christmas, then I don't think you're celebrating Christmas properly.
Friday 1 December 2017
Day 31
When you awaken from this dream - this is a dream by the way - you will try desperately to remember what I am about to tell you.
Failing to recall the words will infuriate you.
You'll remember certain details, like me standing here with my angelic wings half unfurled behind me. The moments leading to our standing here before the Ferris wheel-bumper car hybrid. That's a Ferris wheel that you play bumper cars on while it raises you in a circular motion, instead of just sitting stationary.
Really this should have tipped you off to all this being a dream, but it is very endearing of you to look past it just to spend time with me.
Now: these final pivotal words I'm about to say that you'll forget: You will rush about for pad and pen, even though you've placed both on your bedside.
You'll be compelled to try and preserve as much of these final moments as you can. It is not unlike trying to catch a waterfall with just your hands.
Don't be too saddened.
After all, this is your mind that conjured me. I'm still here, as are my words.
Even if you forget them. Even if you forget me.
I am never lost to you. Not really.
Take some small comfort in that, will you?
...
Now, the thing I must tell you.
It's simple, but important. And if you really think about it, all your problems could be solved by adhering to precisely this statement:
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