Words like origami.

Folding into my heart.

Transient consolation.

Bokeh Fall

The problem, often not discovered until late in life, is that when you look for things in life like love, meaning, motivation, it implies they are sitting behind a tree or under a rock. The most successful people in life recognize, that in life they create their own love, they manufacture their own meaning, they generate their own motivation. For me, I am driven by two main philosophies, know more today about the world than I knew yesterday. And lessen the suffering of others. You’d be surprised how far that gets you.

Autumn leaves, hot toddies and Presidential debates.

I'm down with this.

I have come to believe that by and large the human family all has the same secrets, which are both very telling and very important to tell. They are telling in the sense that they tell what is perhaps the central paradox of our condition—that what we hunger for perhaps more than anything else is to be known in our full humanness, and yet that is often just what we also fear more than anything else. It is important to tell at least from time to time the secret of who we truly and fully are—even if we tell it only to ourselves—because otherwise we run the risk of losing track of who we truly and fully are and little by little come to accept instead the highly edited version which we put forth in hope that the world will find it more acceptable than the real thing.


-- Frederick Buechner, Telling Secrets

The Paris Wife

More and more I found myself at a loss for words and didn’t want to hear other people talking either. Their conversations seemed false and empty. I preferred to look at the sea, which said nothing and never made you feel alone.

Ordinary days

I'm having one of those days where I just want to hide away in my tiny room, read and listen to the music I want to hear. Some days, those are all I want and all I need. I've had several friends text and call today, asking me to come out to events going on in the city tonight, but I talked my way out of each one. How nice to have a choice! I remember the days when I was just a fresh face in Seattle. The loneliest days of my life; surrounded by people, yet a stranger in everyone's midst. Although honestly, I don't think too much has changed. I'm still alone a lot, but I do have a small handful of good people that I've met who keep me entertained and I think I have gotten used to being in this place. 

Finally. 

Rather than feeling like I've been thrown into a pot of boiling water and expected to learn how to swim and survive there, the water has cooled to a mostly-pleasant lukewarm. Culture-shock has mellowed into cultural-tolerance. I've disappeared into the background by learning how to be, or at least appear superficially like everyone else. A tepid world is so passionless and blasé, but somehow insulated from the intensity of life. 

The extremes, whether they be dullness or madness, are successful in preventing too much feeling. So, for the moment, I am this new person. For the moment, I catch my breath and keep learning to master swimming in this watery madness.

Thoughts

What’s harder than starting? Probably finishing, but nothing is harder than being stuck in the middle. What is there to say? What do you want to know? Do you want to know about my family? I have 8 siblings. I get depressed thinking about how fucked up we all are, at least from my perspective. Was it our upbringing? Was it the divorce? Or is life just like that? Does it fuck you up whether or not your parents loved you to death? We feel angry and think they should have done it differently. Maybe if we hadn’t moved around so much, maybe if our dad hadn't left us, maybe if we hadn't left him. The maybes and the never knowings. Perhaps if I just throw all the maybes and what-ifs into a huge pile, something beautiful will grow out of the unsightly heap. Ugh... this story has been told countless times, we're not special. Yet, for us it's as though this is the first time ever written.

Where do I begin? Literally, where do I ... the Self of me ... begin? I just want to write and write, hoping that something will form from the madness of words on a screen. Like magic. As if a stream of consciousness can create a masterpiece of it’s own accord. If I don’t let my brain take over and edit, maybe I will arrive at order from disorder. Where does the uncontrollable begin and the controllable end? I want to feel something that can be transformed into language, like a secret code. I want to write and wring my own heart and soul. Not to feel sorry for me and not to make the world seem depressing and cold, but what if that's just what it is? Happiness is a myth that we chase. The heavy weight on your chest is the human being in a natural state. Whatever we feel must go deeper in order for it to be meaningful and the deeper we go, the farther we get from the light. Does it scare you? It doesn't scare me, because it just is what it is. It just is.

2 months?

Time flies, while it slowly creeps along. I've been gone what feels like so long now, I barely know where home is anymore. Not like anywhere felt like homehome before -- not really, not anymore, but I feel less connected to any place in particular than I've ever felt before. Feelings mixed with excitement for the freedom this gives me and then sadness of how alone I have become. Although, this is what I asked for and this is what I needed, so I am really not complaining. There is a definitive feeling of change inside me, at least change from how I felt about and saw life a year ago. I just hope this is what wisemen might call maturing and not just cynicism.

Realizing all that I don't want in life, while lightening up in areas I might have felt needlessly strong about and mildly self-indignant about has been most relieving. Allowing myself to want what I want and not carrying so much guilt and the expectations of others has been another remarkable weight I'm happy to let go of. Progress? I hope.

Or perhaps I am suffering from regular case of losing the ability to give enough of a fuck about most things. Well, I give a little bit of a fuck. Enough to worry from time to time about how serious a problem not giving a fuck might present itself some day, yet not enough to actually give too much of a fuck about this either.

The tweaking and examination of the moral compass is a bit of a scary endeavour, for me, but I am not exactly in charge of the intrinsic drive to want to examine every single jottle and tit of every single thing I have ever been told or learned. Perhaps I am, except I am certain that knowing why I know what I know is more important than just knowing things. At least having confidence that I thought something through from beginning to end and arrived at the most plausible conclusion... or none at all, but at least I earn some confidence one way or the other. At least I can confidently state that I don't know anything about anything, instead of halfheartedly thinking I know so much. Does that make sense?

I can say one thing: I am excited about the possibility of having a place to call home one day even if, with my current prospects, this seems highly unlikely.

An Experiment of Description

Opening the front door, a gust of chilly wind bursts through the entryway. Winter in July? Only in Seattle, I think to myself, almost chuckling at the absurdity. My hands dig deeper into my pockets, as if the deeper they went, the more chance they might have of finding a old pair of gloves. In the spirit of summer solstice, I decided to pack up my heavy winter clothes and accessories, hoping the act would somehow coax the mercury to make its way up the thermometer. Unfortunately, all it did was to leave me with my collection of too-thin sweaters. I’m not sure whose idea those were and what good they are even for. There are few things I dislike more than feeling cold and If it weren’t for the noise and chaos of visiting relatives in the house, I would much sooner cozy up on the couch with a hot cup of tea. But I must venture forth, or else risk finding myself giving pony rides to my 2 small nieces for the better part of the afternoon.

A light drizzle has now started and for a moment, I hesitate standing unmoving in the doorway, doubting the assertion I made to leave moments ago. The rain falls like a fine miserable mist. A drizzling, half-hearted rain shower; the kind that appears so innocuous and innocent, but I know this rain well. I know that my too-thin hoodie doesn’t stand a chance against this deceptive deluge. It is such a soaking, intrusive and impertinent kind of rain. Nature possesses a misleading kind of beauty, one that is unfazed and indifferent to the vulnerability we humans experience when at its mercy. Suddenly, a loud noise startles me from my doorway daydreams and reality, in the form of beach ball, hits me in the face, followed by half a dozen more bouncing down the stairs towards me, while a pair of laughing, rambunctious children bound down along with them. Indecision is trounced by my instinct to run before I am trapped  and quickly I pull the hood of my sweater over my head, scurrying out the door. My escape is not quick enough and behind me a chorus of high-pitched beggings and pleadings for me to come play, rings in the distance. I cup my ears and give a puzzled look, faking that I can’t hear them, as I break into a half skip, half jog in an effort to discourage them from following me.

At last. Peace and quiet... but oh this dreadful rain! I pull my hood down lower, but the rain has conspired with the wind and together they surreptitiously encroach under and around the feeble shelter covering my face. The rain collects in the crevices of my hoodie and just above my ears forming pools, and then streams which trickle down into my eyes. Rivers of rain meandering through my eyelashes, transforming the ordinary world into blurring kaleidoscope perspectives. My sleeves are soaked, but reflexively I wipe the rain-tears away and clear my vision just in time to realize I have carelessly stepped into a dirty puddle on the sidewalk. My foot impacts and then immerses into the cold water before I am able to stop myself from stepping onto the camouflaged wet mine. Dirty water sprays upwards to my face, in a spectacular fountain burst and simultaneously permeates the canvas of my tennis shoes. Quickly, I pull my foot back, but the damage has been done. My shoe is sopping wet and I mutter a variety of profanities under my breath. The rest of the walk to my car must now be accompanied by the squishing sounds of soggy-foot-in-wet-shoe. With each step I feel slurps and hear squelches as the water sucks through the spaces between my toes.

The chilling wind, once again in cahoots with the rain, threatens to freeze my toes. As the wind speed picks up, I inturn pick up my own pace, hoping to outrun this mocking duo who seem hell bent on thwarting my mission. Like a war hero returning from a long battle, the sight of my car looming closer and closer with each step kindles a feeling of victory and triumph as a surge of energy enables me to sprint the last few yards to safety. Once inside, I kick off my soggy shoe and blast the heater, resting my foot on the dashboard to defrost my frozen toes.

Mission, to the car, accomplished!  

“You couldn’t make yourself stop feeling a certain way, no matter what the other person did. You had to just wait. Eventually the feeling went away because others came along. Or sometimes it didn’t go away but got squeezed into something tiny, and hung like a piece of tinsel in the back of your mind.”

Elizabeth Strout | Olive Kitteridge

7:58am

Why does this happen? I stayed up till almost 4am watching Mad Men last night on the express condition of being able to sleep in today, my day off. And here I am wide awake, but tired as hell. My brother says I am just sensitive to light and need thicker curtains... or curtains at all. He could be right, but I have noticed a general decline in my ability to sleep really well in the last few years. There is always something in the back of my subconscience, surreptitiously tugging me awake. Assignments, work, life. I spend too much time thinking about the weightier issues in life.

I'm not quite sure if this is because I necessarily want to or if I carry a sense of guilt that I am not using my time productively. Part of me feels unfulfilled or dissatisfied by frivolous thoughts and conversations. There's a sense of urgency in knowing that life is short and a requirement to make the most of every moment. Even at ungodly hours in the morning, on a day I could be sleeping all day if I so desired, I am jolted awake as if sleep and rest were mere luxuries my wicked self could not afford.

What is so urgent? Nothing really. I know I will spend the better part of the morning frittering my time away.

Absence

One by one the doors close. Tied knots and different journeys, welcome to your new lives. I've never wanted what most people want, and really, I'm okay with the drifting. I'm okay with having no plan, no obligations to anyone, but at the same time while nothing holds me down, I feel like one day I might just drift away from everyone and everything. If nothing contains me, perhaps I'll slowly disappear. Is this me that I am okay? Most people follow linear paths, why don't I? The haphazard path, the erratic route, the biggest challenge is knowing what comes next. Deep inside I know it's not that... what you now have, but sometimes I'm afraid that I'm poles apart from everyone else.

There it is. That familiar sensation of pain, but this time it's only ever so faint. The small sting of reality and the beautiful photos...  The part of me that mourns is the part of me that is normal.

And so it is...

The sadness doesn't envelope me the same way it used to, it just quietly sits and swells in my heart. So I  lean my face towards the sun, I close my eyes and remember.

Distressed, distressed, distressed.
If you knew how much, would it change a thing?

No. Not a thing.

Meh

I'm over trying to make a good impression.
I'd rather love and be loved for the beast within, than for how skillfully we stroke each other's egos.

In my fear of losing, I hold onto small pieces of my heart. Stacking them they form a barrier between myself and others. No one can get too close. When the inevitable day comes that someone is lost, I add and the barrier grows.

Day by day a little bigger, a little more comforting.

The Silhouette of You

And if fiercely you should come to me, I would meet you.
I would run to you.
Yet, there before me, the silhouette of you, against a fading horizon.
Further and further.
We're nothing now, just ghosts.

The hands of time stretched towards us.
Entangled together they pulled us together, now've torn us apart.
The way became lost. Blackened against the night sky, the once guiding stars no longer serve,
And we drift along
Alone again.
We drift.

But we remember. Oh, we fight it; we fight to forget, but how could we?
When we once danced the dance of love's fleeting mystery.
Only to find, we're now invisibly bound.
In another of life's great tragedies.

I am astonished, disappointed, pleased with myself. I am distressed, depressed, rapturous. I am all these things at once, and cannot add up the sum. I am incapable of determining ultimate worth or worthlessness; I have no judgment about myself and my life. There is nothing I am quite sure about. I have no definite convictions - not about anything, really. I know only that I was born and exist, and it seems to me that I have been carried along. I exist on the foundation of something I do not know.
—
C.G. Jung, near the end of his life, in Memories, Dreams.

…dear, one more sigh
only this, dear, is goodbye
for our love is such pain and such pleasure
that I’ll treasure…

La Vie en Rose

Night descends. The darkness can't be held back as it envelopes the landscape, as far as the eye can see, in pallid shades of black. A daily phenomenon. The retreating sun and the lingering night. I don't spend nearly enough of my waking hours paying attention to these truly incredible occurrences. Much too much time is spent contemplating life on every level, save the very present moment and the present miracle of life that occurs with or without my paying attention. A breath of life, breathed to give life, to create life and without a second thought from myself - the one for whom it gives life. I don't have to ask for it, to work for it, to even realize it exists or desire to exist myself and there it is. Perhaps I take for granted these small miracles. They don't require my approval nor my consent, they happen beyond my awareness, and selflessly persist and exist. Thus I, persist and exist.

Should I ask "What for?" - I'm afraid to ask, but this question likes to linger in the shadow of my consciousness. Living examples of such simple complexity, the processes of life, may I ask what for? For no good reason? Perplexing to imagine that there may be no reason for any of this at all, don't you think? No, maybe let's not ask why anymore. Our human nature longs to have what it can't have. This is nothing new. To demand an answer is to confine nature to a pattern, to give it a textbook definition. Have you noticed that the deeper your desire to know all and have the answers goes, the intenser the anxiety, the greater the fear? Knowing is not our reward. Our reward comes from the acceptance of letting go. Allow the night to fall and the sun will rise tomorrow whether you like it or not.

 You can fight the setting sun, but what good will come of it? Tomorrow, the sun will rise with effortless ease and you'll wake up refreshed. The night must happen. It is not yours to control, it never was, it never will be.

Hush now and sleep in peace through your night.

Letters to a Young Poet

So don't be frightened, dear friend, if a sadness confronts you larger than any you have ever known, casting its shadow over all you do. You must think that something is happening within you, and remember that life has not forgotten you; it holds you in its hand and will not let you fall. Why would you want to exclude from your life any uneasiness, any pain, any depression, since you don't know what work they are accomplishing within you?

In the world we live in,
what we know and what we don't know are like Siamese twins.
Inseparable, existing in a state of confusion.

Confusion, confusion.

Who can really distinguish between the sea and what's reflected in it?
Or tell the difference between the falling rain and loneliness?

Sometimes a butterfly will come to sit in your open palm, but if you close your hand, one way or the other, it—and its choice to be there—is gone.

-~ Barbara Hambly (Dragonsbane)

Always Better Said as a Song

NO ORDINARY LOVE by ANGO

I guess, the good news in all this is that I once vehemently believed I would never feel anything for anyone again.

And then I did.

Thanks?

Except now I am stuck feeling sad and missing. Again, feeling like maybe I'm just not cut out to find the mysterious, lasting love for myself.

Un-Valentines

The wind whispers your smile,
Across the lake
Under starry skies
To a place I have not yet shown you
To a place
Where
My heart resides.

-- GG