i had an interesting experience the other day...i was sitting at my desk, minding my own business, typing away at something or other (or perhaps internetting, as i am also prone to do), and a flash of recognition erupted into me. it wasn't deja-vu, or anything of the sort...i had been sitting next to a wall (a rather thin one, it should be noted), and i picked up on a piece of the conversation in the next room. now, i hear conversations from the guys next door frequently; at least once every day. they're crazy characters, sometimes bursting into song in the middle of their little office. but i have learned to completely tune them out when i'm doing my own thing, so it's rare that i actually pay attention to anything that they are saying. the small fragment that i caught, however, happened to be about myself....not directly, but rather it was about the company that i work at. it wasn't derogatory, it wasn't praise; it was just a passive comment slid into one angle of a joke. but where it gets weird is....i wasn't actually listening to them when they said it.
despite the phalanx of distractions that surround me at any given moment, and despite the fact that i was engrossed in many other things, my senses reached down into me, like a hand, and pulled me up into the cool waters of the present moment. this means, if i understand correctly, that my mind actually has reserve storage for everything which is currently happening. and i think that this concept is amazing. despite the reality that you may not be paying attention - in fact you may be completely distracted - you are still caching information on some level unknown to your conscious mind.
i know for a fact that i didn't hear them talking as it happened....i just wasn't listening. simple fact. but, after the actual conversation had occurred, my mind decided to grind it through its economizing machine, just to see if any of it were useful to me. so it stored all these impressions that i was unaware of, packaged them up in some obscure encryption to keep them from me, and sorted them neatly into piles of relevance. beginning of a joke: irrelevant. to the bin with it. vocal inflections: irrelevant. binned. company name: relevant! ring-ring! hallo! what is this that we have here? and then my mind, sufficiently prompted, investigated the situation. it retracted, uncrumpled papers from the bin; in fact i was able to recall the joke in its entirety with no problems whatsoever. this was very odd; i'm certain all of this happened in the snapping of fingers, but still i regarded the ensuing sensation with some degree of scrutiny, and found my recognition of the thing to have happened definitively after the reality had lapsed.
and holy shit! how amazing is that?
this is encouraging, enlivening, for a number of reasons. i've always personally been fascinated with the mind...seeking ways to understand how it makes sense of this chaos that we label our world (Recursive with a capital, i know), and constantly prodding/asking it for insight into its inner-workings. rarely does it give any non-cryptic answers, but every once in a while i am present while it slips up, which offers a whole new perspective on matters. this is one such instance. i wonder how long such information is stored? is it possible that it is still stored outside of us, lingering in the atmosphere, and an uber-short timeframe is the key to being able to still disentangle it from all the other static which spins its wheels perpetually, replacing and realigning? is this something which you could train your mind to perform better and better, with more regularity, until you were able to recall, to access this liminal brain-space, consciously and actively? i could use some extra brain-bank, personally...i always describe my mental function to people as 'a little different', in that i have astounding recall for minute detail, but only once i have a serious trigger with which to work, a hook to hang my reminiscence.
November 5, 2009
October 20, 2009
when you're strange
it is entirely remarkable how we are constantly surrounded by strangers. do you have those words, sometimes, where you always miss the same letter when typing a word, and must go back in order to fix it? strangers is one such word for me; it always ends up 'stanger'. which is not so much even a word; i checked just now. regardless. looking around, i find an overwhelming feeling, a filling-up, with the sheer force of strangeness around me. i don't know any of these people, yet we share such a base commonality that i am able to find comfort in their presence, and perhaps comfort too in that they, for the most part, do not know each other....i am not the odd mind out; i am just as curvy of a jigsaw-piece as all of them, as far as any distinct one is concerned.
they are all focused on different tasks, different projects; all have different thoughts rifling through their minds even just now. there are some moments which rob us of this individuality...say for instance that a red-mortar firecracker goes off in this coffee nook right now. bang! everyone flinches, every mind is void and catches pace with the circumstances and general confusion just as quickly as the others, for the most part. then we are together, somehow. we have all had the same experience, at the same time, and while we may not consciously acknowledge it we have been bonded to these people to a degree; we have been the same as them through circumstance, they have shared in ourselves. on larger scales, this is school spirit, this is patriotism, this is the flexing and uncording of the various muscles of the humanities.
but i feel comfortable around all these people, despite the concrete reality that no firework has bound our shared existence. it seems to be bound on other levels, less immediate and less discernible. i am somewhat surprised to find this comfort within me....not shocked, necessarily, as it has been building, rumbling around, for as long as i can remember, but at least a little surprised to find the ease with which i regard them. just like anybody i have clasped onto my fair share of social anxieties throughout my youth, but at some point they were hammered at by something...good...the human spirit perhaps, and partaking in the realm of it...and ever since then my anxieties (at least, the social ones) have been crumbling, like a cracked and eroding reservoir wall, spilling more positivity and more goodwill as time continues to batter away at it. for all the uncertainty that i could choose to see in this room, knowing that in any human lie sparks and clashes between dignified Ubermensch and primal beast, instead i am experiencing an outpouring of kinship and warm curiosity.
it is funny how difficult it sometimes seems to meet people, such as when you move to a new city. i'm certain, at this moment, that all it really takes is patience, and then just the tiniest pinch of the outgoing archetype to be summoned within you. looking around, i barely recognize anybody...maybe a face of two that i have seen elsewhere, but nothing solid enough for confirmation. but i recognize that other people, like myself, run in general patterns. you are bound to meet people time after time, despite the randomness of the city, because people seem to be creatures of habit. unless you never venture outside the confines of your walls, you will of course see the same people again and again...perhaps not every day, perhaps not always in the same places...but it will happen, and the only way to not take advantage of that situation is to stay silent, antisocial. or to be looking too....specifically.
the problem, i believe, if there is one, is a tendency to not see people. normally, i take so little notice of other people, other than to regard their general occupation of space and time (and perhaps attractiveness, natch). all these people are incredible, multifaceted minds, flexing and fluxing in ways i cannot even begin to comprehend, but until i make some recognizable contact i resign them to one dimension, just a flat-frame appearance, and leave them at that. i feel bad about this, but really, what more are we to do? i could spend my entire life trying to meet everyone that i could, and still not be able to tackle more than just my own state (or perhaps one more at an extreme best!) additionally, meeting people would become meaningless; i would be saturated with information and it would leak out of my brain faster than 9th grade geometry class. so, it is reasonable to only expect to meet so many people...it just seems a shame, with all the interesting things going on in the minds of the people, all the projects and emotions and expressions which remain intriguingly and perplexingly bottled to me.
on the upside, as a writer, i am beginning to pick up more on the realities and expressions of the people whom i do know, and even beyond that beginning to culture an ability to observe someone whom i do not know and divine something core of them (or perhaps just my own imaginings, but that will do fine for myself and my work). it is incredibly enriching and endlessly interesting, to the point where i must draw a solid line between the observing and the recording, just to ensure that i get something tangible completed instead of whiling away in a fog of thoughts and inspirations that might slip into dizzied memory without a measure of ink.
i am basically never bored anymore.
they are all focused on different tasks, different projects; all have different thoughts rifling through their minds even just now. there are some moments which rob us of this individuality...say for instance that a red-mortar firecracker goes off in this coffee nook right now. bang! everyone flinches, every mind is void and catches pace with the circumstances and general confusion just as quickly as the others, for the most part. then we are together, somehow. we have all had the same experience, at the same time, and while we may not consciously acknowledge it we have been bonded to these people to a degree; we have been the same as them through circumstance, they have shared in ourselves. on larger scales, this is school spirit, this is patriotism, this is the flexing and uncording of the various muscles of the humanities.
but i feel comfortable around all these people, despite the concrete reality that no firework has bound our shared existence. it seems to be bound on other levels, less immediate and less discernible. i am somewhat surprised to find this comfort within me....not shocked, necessarily, as it has been building, rumbling around, for as long as i can remember, but at least a little surprised to find the ease with which i regard them. just like anybody i have clasped onto my fair share of social anxieties throughout my youth, but at some point they were hammered at by something...good...the human spirit perhaps, and partaking in the realm of it...and ever since then my anxieties (at least, the social ones) have been crumbling, like a cracked and eroding reservoir wall, spilling more positivity and more goodwill as time continues to batter away at it. for all the uncertainty that i could choose to see in this room, knowing that in any human lie sparks and clashes between dignified Ubermensch and primal beast, instead i am experiencing an outpouring of kinship and warm curiosity.
it is funny how difficult it sometimes seems to meet people, such as when you move to a new city. i'm certain, at this moment, that all it really takes is patience, and then just the tiniest pinch of the outgoing archetype to be summoned within you. looking around, i barely recognize anybody...maybe a face of two that i have seen elsewhere, but nothing solid enough for confirmation. but i recognize that other people, like myself, run in general patterns. you are bound to meet people time after time, despite the randomness of the city, because people seem to be creatures of habit. unless you never venture outside the confines of your walls, you will of course see the same people again and again...perhaps not every day, perhaps not always in the same places...but it will happen, and the only way to not take advantage of that situation is to stay silent, antisocial. or to be looking too....specifically.
the problem, i believe, if there is one, is a tendency to not see people. normally, i take so little notice of other people, other than to regard their general occupation of space and time (and perhaps attractiveness, natch). all these people are incredible, multifaceted minds, flexing and fluxing in ways i cannot even begin to comprehend, but until i make some recognizable contact i resign them to one dimension, just a flat-frame appearance, and leave them at that. i feel bad about this, but really, what more are we to do? i could spend my entire life trying to meet everyone that i could, and still not be able to tackle more than just my own state (or perhaps one more at an extreme best!) additionally, meeting people would become meaningless; i would be saturated with information and it would leak out of my brain faster than 9th grade geometry class. so, it is reasonable to only expect to meet so many people...it just seems a shame, with all the interesting things going on in the minds of the people, all the projects and emotions and expressions which remain intriguingly and perplexingly bottled to me.
on the upside, as a writer, i am beginning to pick up more on the realities and expressions of the people whom i do know, and even beyond that beginning to culture an ability to observe someone whom i do not know and divine something core of them (or perhaps just my own imaginings, but that will do fine for myself and my work). it is incredibly enriching and endlessly interesting, to the point where i must draw a solid line between the observing and the recording, just to ensure that i get something tangible completed instead of whiling away in a fog of thoughts and inspirations that might slip into dizzied memory without a measure of ink.
i am basically never bored anymore.
September 12, 2009
wow
it has been a seriously long passage of time since i have pasted up any words on this thing. a lot has happened; details are unimportant and unwarranted; more of a telephone thing anyway. so, what has been on my mind of late?
how long has it been since you have taken a lengthy, analytical and prognostic look at your life? are we settling for the concerns that we have now, which become so overwhelming and eclipse the backgrounds behind them? i feel relatively complacent of late, which always pings as a red-flag status for me once i realize that it has been going on. it's summertime, and the living is easy...money that was made is now spent. weekends, so longed for and anticipated, are shrunken in a haze of relaxation and sloth instead of being charted with intriguing mental cartography. all is fine, i am young...but i am beginning to feel the pangs of frivolity, the lament for lack of accomplishment and distinction.
i am at a loss for how to describe my job; it is good and i feel fortified, insulated by it. at the same time, i feel like it thieves forty hours a week from me - more counting transit - that could be the blankets and backpacks of a genuine pioneering. it isn't that it takes all my time...a large chunk to be sure, but not all of it. but i feel drawn toward vivacity, towards the city, being young and ever-awake. i feel like maintaining friendships is absolutely essential, and rewarding, and that such a thing should not be abandoned for lofty artistic dreams...yet in the mathematical set i am working with, job + friends + sleep = matt at 26. wedging more in has proven difficult.
i have also come to acknowledge that relaxation is essential. this plays into the idea of friendships, because a good friendship is stress-relieving instead of stress-inducing. my job creates stresses; hell, just being inside my mind creates stresses of its own. decompression is a must, if i don't want to end up a crazy person, aimlessly wandering the alleys of Portland. if the equation is as simple as it seems (probably not the case), then what i need readjustment in is my work. do i try to find something else; something incorruptibly-fulfilling and which broadens my horizons as an artist? do i just need something as simple as to pare down my hours, such that i have more time to commit to personal projects and still stay afloat financially? finances are an argh. i see now how adults become progressively more preoccupied with such concerns, and how it has the ability to rob you of so much potential. i have some degree of scorn for our current incarnation of the capitalist system based upon this, but here is probably not the time or place to complain about how you can't stay afloat by scribbling away your days in coffee shops and mountaintops, even if it were for the advancement of the human spirit and all that riff-raff.
so, for the summertime being, i am currently stunned into inaction against this front. it marches over my mind with its full strength, and i plan to observe and characterize it before moving my own armada against its dark and foreboding will. i just need to find a way to set reminders for myself, little mementos that disarm my fear of its structuring ways since i know another, more ideal life, rooted somewhere in the deeper portions of my thought. i have faith at least in myself, as long as i am successful in keeping myself the same self. the people we naturally evolve into have different sets of strengths and weaknesses, different centers of gravity based on their abacus-arrangements and allotments.
how long has it been since you have taken a lengthy, analytical and prognostic look at your life? are we settling for the concerns that we have now, which become so overwhelming and eclipse the backgrounds behind them? i feel relatively complacent of late, which always pings as a red-flag status for me once i realize that it has been going on. it's summertime, and the living is easy...money that was made is now spent. weekends, so longed for and anticipated, are shrunken in a haze of relaxation and sloth instead of being charted with intriguing mental cartography. all is fine, i am young...but i am beginning to feel the pangs of frivolity, the lament for lack of accomplishment and distinction.
i am at a loss for how to describe my job; it is good and i feel fortified, insulated by it. at the same time, i feel like it thieves forty hours a week from me - more counting transit - that could be the blankets and backpacks of a genuine pioneering. it isn't that it takes all my time...a large chunk to be sure, but not all of it. but i feel drawn toward vivacity, towards the city, being young and ever-awake. i feel like maintaining friendships is absolutely essential, and rewarding, and that such a thing should not be abandoned for lofty artistic dreams...yet in the mathematical set i am working with, job + friends + sleep = matt at 26. wedging more in has proven difficult.
i have also come to acknowledge that relaxation is essential. this plays into the idea of friendships, because a good friendship is stress-relieving instead of stress-inducing. my job creates stresses; hell, just being inside my mind creates stresses of its own. decompression is a must, if i don't want to end up a crazy person, aimlessly wandering the alleys of Portland. if the equation is as simple as it seems (probably not the case), then what i need readjustment in is my work. do i try to find something else; something incorruptibly-fulfilling and which broadens my horizons as an artist? do i just need something as simple as to pare down my hours, such that i have more time to commit to personal projects and still stay afloat financially? finances are an argh. i see now how adults become progressively more preoccupied with such concerns, and how it has the ability to rob you of so much potential. i have some degree of scorn for our current incarnation of the capitalist system based upon this, but here is probably not the time or place to complain about how you can't stay afloat by scribbling away your days in coffee shops and mountaintops, even if it were for the advancement of the human spirit and all that riff-raff.
so, for the summertime being, i am currently stunned into inaction against this front. it marches over my mind with its full strength, and i plan to observe and characterize it before moving my own armada against its dark and foreboding will. i just need to find a way to set reminders for myself, little mementos that disarm my fear of its structuring ways since i know another, more ideal life, rooted somewhere in the deeper portions of my thought. i have faith at least in myself, as long as i am successful in keeping myself the same self. the people we naturally evolve into have different sets of strengths and weaknesses, different centers of gravity based on their abacus-arrangements and allotments.
July 11, 2009
a passing of time
well.
it has been quite some time, hasn't it? lots of happenings, changes of seasons, musics ebbing and flowing through my list of recent listens and new discoveries. things are always similar, however; let us see if i can pick up the pace of this writing as quickly and as intently as i remember myself having done in the past.
a quick update on myself. i have been reading quite a bit, all manner of short books which satiate the mind for a time. i've been noticing lately, in light of these books, that books with a heavy density of ideas seem to leave less lasting impressions with me on the whole. of course, reading philosophy is an entirely different gear of mental motion than a casual story, but still i have to note the finding that, for a reason which i may dive into, readings which overwhelm me with the rapidity of their ground-shattering ideas tend to slip into grey area of my mind. i find that with shorter, more spaced and storylike books, there is less of a chance of being overwhelmed by the waves which crash into you; you have more down or recovery time and as such your mind has more of an opportunity to turn over the ideas which are given to you and do something memorable with them....even make them, in some incarnation, your own. with a lot of the writing that i would typically read, the writers are incredibly profound and prolific, so much so that it takes an equal mind to keep up with them unless one wants to get all 'literary analysis' and pore over every page for a matter of hours. to do this disrupts the pace, and so i cannot resign myself to it. and yet, being less intelligent than these giants of writing, the crashings of surf, their own minds against mine in turbulent and one-sided conversation, tend to rip my footing out from underneath me, erode my balance, and leave me dizzied and disoriented. many times i cannot tell whether or not i pay more attention at any given time to the story itself, or the ideas which it carries in its pockets.
this is a lesson learned for me in writing: do not over-pace, do not saturate with intensity. a gifted writer is one who, without condescending, can thresh out his ideas and their forms almost surgically, taking one piece and pinning it to a page...keeping the entirety shrouded until it is ready to be revealed as the sum of its parts. good writing is archaeological, it is constancy in your ability to dust and connect, connect and dust. i think personally that i used to have an idea about how my writing would be this immensely good thing that could not be ignored for all its potency, and yet what i come to realize more and more is that a tasteful balance is the essence of one's ability to write coherently, impressively. there are artistic aesthetics which must be adhered to, for threat of entirely butchering the very concepts that you are attempting to reveal to your audience by their misapplication or neglect.
in short: the human mind, at least insomuch as i can speak about it from my own experience, is something which cannot be rushed. it is a delicate recipe, a plant which grows in its own distinct conditions and which only flowers at the correct temperature specifications. i would call these temperatures "focus", for lack of a better...focus can be achieved by a set of conditions that must be conducive, conductive of real thought. many of the books i have read are harsher environments, attainable only to the most adaptable and giving minds, and often i find myself stumbling through them for a lack of interest which really is anything but. it is an incompatibility, an incompatibility. learning, challenge, must be paced appropriately or it will founder before making it off of the shore. part of this responsibility lies on the person who would seek knowledge...you have to prime yourself in order to work with what you can. but in addition, part of the responsibility lies in the hands of the teacher, in order that they might create a lesson with proper pacing and enough tangible ties to allow for navigation through it.
i hope that i have a gift for storytelling.
it has been quite some time, hasn't it? lots of happenings, changes of seasons, musics ebbing and flowing through my list of recent listens and new discoveries. things are always similar, however; let us see if i can pick up the pace of this writing as quickly and as intently as i remember myself having done in the past.
a quick update on myself. i have been reading quite a bit, all manner of short books which satiate the mind for a time. i've been noticing lately, in light of these books, that books with a heavy density of ideas seem to leave less lasting impressions with me on the whole. of course, reading philosophy is an entirely different gear of mental motion than a casual story, but still i have to note the finding that, for a reason which i may dive into, readings which overwhelm me with the rapidity of their ground-shattering ideas tend to slip into grey area of my mind. i find that with shorter, more spaced and storylike books, there is less of a chance of being overwhelmed by the waves which crash into you; you have more down or recovery time and as such your mind has more of an opportunity to turn over the ideas which are given to you and do something memorable with them....even make them, in some incarnation, your own. with a lot of the writing that i would typically read, the writers are incredibly profound and prolific, so much so that it takes an equal mind to keep up with them unless one wants to get all 'literary analysis' and pore over every page for a matter of hours. to do this disrupts the pace, and so i cannot resign myself to it. and yet, being less intelligent than these giants of writing, the crashings of surf, their own minds against mine in turbulent and one-sided conversation, tend to rip my footing out from underneath me, erode my balance, and leave me dizzied and disoriented. many times i cannot tell whether or not i pay more attention at any given time to the story itself, or the ideas which it carries in its pockets.
this is a lesson learned for me in writing: do not over-pace, do not saturate with intensity. a gifted writer is one who, without condescending, can thresh out his ideas and their forms almost surgically, taking one piece and pinning it to a page...keeping the entirety shrouded until it is ready to be revealed as the sum of its parts. good writing is archaeological, it is constancy in your ability to dust and connect, connect and dust. i think personally that i used to have an idea about how my writing would be this immensely good thing that could not be ignored for all its potency, and yet what i come to realize more and more is that a tasteful balance is the essence of one's ability to write coherently, impressively. there are artistic aesthetics which must be adhered to, for threat of entirely butchering the very concepts that you are attempting to reveal to your audience by their misapplication or neglect.
in short: the human mind, at least insomuch as i can speak about it from my own experience, is something which cannot be rushed. it is a delicate recipe, a plant which grows in its own distinct conditions and which only flowers at the correct temperature specifications. i would call these temperatures "focus", for lack of a better...focus can be achieved by a set of conditions that must be conducive, conductive of real thought. many of the books i have read are harsher environments, attainable only to the most adaptable and giving minds, and often i find myself stumbling through them for a lack of interest which really is anything but. it is an incompatibility, an incompatibility. learning, challenge, must be paced appropriately or it will founder before making it off of the shore. part of this responsibility lies on the person who would seek knowledge...you have to prime yourself in order to work with what you can. but in addition, part of the responsibility lies in the hands of the teacher, in order that they might create a lesson with proper pacing and enough tangible ties to allow for navigation through it.
i hope that i have a gift for storytelling.
May 23, 2009
halt....hammerzeit
so it seems clear that i am stepping away from writing smaller entries, and launching into a larger piece of work. but it's daunting, at best, so i think that from time to time i will still be finding spare change to spend on some abstract and unaffiliated subjects here. this site was always a good cathartic release for me, and i'm glad to have the vent here where i can always find it.
memorial day weekend! i should by all rights be excited about this single-day-more-than-usual break for working purposes, but it seems i have been signed up to go to Bend for a good portion of my time off. hopefully that will be fun; if nothing else it will be good to get into a truly fresh area where my mind can recharge, and perhaps recapture a piece of originality. even though i have of broad spectrum of things that i do these days, i feel that for the most part they are things which i have constantly done before. and there is a definite charm to reliving experiences, especially since they always hold some new context even if in small degree...it has been on my mind that repeatability, replay-value, is among one of the foremost tenets of the american economy. sometimes you just want to know what you're getting, or know what kind of atmosphere you are going to immerse yourself in. i do it all the time; holing up in coffee shops because i welcome their kaleidoscopic atmosphere, while still having a comfortable and calming familiarity. at times, though, i get burnt with doing the same things and going to the same places. these ideas start to coagulate, to clump together into a ball like a putty, and they become less and less distinct from one another. it is a phenomenon which i regard thoughtfully, and often, because it seems like the larger themes of my thought and life are reflected in these massed-stars; they are certainly useful if only to illustrate and make more tangible the waves of time passing over me, and how what i think about changes in both manner and mood. but they also, at times, begin to acquire a stale taste which makes me eager for something new.
i am at odds with time lately. my weekends seem to flit away, which would not be so concerning if they weren't in contrast to my weekdays, upon which i typically do not get anything meaningful done. and let me separate senses there, because i do have a full-time job, and a good one at that....i just don't think that i accomplish anything monumental or inspiring while a chip away at it every monday through friday~ my time balances are all mixed-about, because one must save some time for relaxation or risk excess stress. it would be nice to have more time to write, more time to paint, more time for music. always people think it would be 'nice to have more time'. i realize that it must be made, and i am making it, but i worry that my life-formula is currently incorrect because i feel like i am always struggling with time-management. it does not seem, as it sometimes does, as though time is in my corner.
on the other hand, i am much happier, overall, than i have ever been. i can't remember being so satisfied with everything since i was a child. i have complaints, of course...nobody wants an office for 40 hours. but what is irregular, what seems different than ever before, is that all the time i find myself with a genuine smile on my face, and more goodwill towards everyone on the planet than i can usually muster. i have come to a lot of realizations, which ones supposes could be considered maturities, about people in general, and i've subsequently found myself to be in possession of a lot less inward negativity than i used to exhibit. perhaps it comes from having more personal confidence, and being less worried about what others think. i can't pin down the roots precisely (natch; they are underground), but i know that things are better, in so many ways, than they had been for me during say, high school and college. i am actually happier in a lot of ways than i was in college, the so-called 'golden' years, and i take that to be a positive thing. perhaps i am nourishing myself in all the right ways, and have nothing at all to complain about~ least of all time.
perhaps i can find a way, today, to make peace with time. that sounds infinitely pleasurable. here go.
oh.....GO NUGGETS!!~
memorial day weekend! i should by all rights be excited about this single-day-more-than-usual break for working purposes, but it seems i have been signed up to go to Bend for a good portion of my time off. hopefully that will be fun; if nothing else it will be good to get into a truly fresh area where my mind can recharge, and perhaps recapture a piece of originality. even though i have of broad spectrum of things that i do these days, i feel that for the most part they are things which i have constantly done before. and there is a definite charm to reliving experiences, especially since they always hold some new context even if in small degree...it has been on my mind that repeatability, replay-value, is among one of the foremost tenets of the american economy. sometimes you just want to know what you're getting, or know what kind of atmosphere you are going to immerse yourself in. i do it all the time; holing up in coffee shops because i welcome their kaleidoscopic atmosphere, while still having a comfortable and calming familiarity. at times, though, i get burnt with doing the same things and going to the same places. these ideas start to coagulate, to clump together into a ball like a putty, and they become less and less distinct from one another. it is a phenomenon which i regard thoughtfully, and often, because it seems like the larger themes of my thought and life are reflected in these massed-stars; they are certainly useful if only to illustrate and make more tangible the waves of time passing over me, and how what i think about changes in both manner and mood. but they also, at times, begin to acquire a stale taste which makes me eager for something new.
i am at odds with time lately. my weekends seem to flit away, which would not be so concerning if they weren't in contrast to my weekdays, upon which i typically do not get anything meaningful done. and let me separate senses there, because i do have a full-time job, and a good one at that....i just don't think that i accomplish anything monumental or inspiring while a chip away at it every monday through friday~ my time balances are all mixed-about, because one must save some time for relaxation or risk excess stress. it would be nice to have more time to write, more time to paint, more time for music. always people think it would be 'nice to have more time'. i realize that it must be made, and i am making it, but i worry that my life-formula is currently incorrect because i feel like i am always struggling with time-management. it does not seem, as it sometimes does, as though time is in my corner.
on the other hand, i am much happier, overall, than i have ever been. i can't remember being so satisfied with everything since i was a child. i have complaints, of course...nobody wants an office for 40 hours. but what is irregular, what seems different than ever before, is that all the time i find myself with a genuine smile on my face, and more goodwill towards everyone on the planet than i can usually muster. i have come to a lot of realizations, which ones supposes could be considered maturities, about people in general, and i've subsequently found myself to be in possession of a lot less inward negativity than i used to exhibit. perhaps it comes from having more personal confidence, and being less worried about what others think. i can't pin down the roots precisely (natch; they are underground), but i know that things are better, in so many ways, than they had been for me during say, high school and college. i am actually happier in a lot of ways than i was in college, the so-called 'golden' years, and i take that to be a positive thing. perhaps i am nourishing myself in all the right ways, and have nothing at all to complain about~ least of all time.
perhaps i can find a way, today, to make peace with time. that sounds infinitely pleasurable. here go.
oh.....GO NUGGETS!!~
April 16, 2009
aw
you know what's twisted, in retrospect? elementary and middle-school magazine drives. seriously, it seems like there should have been some child-labor laws violated there.
but man do those mag companies know how to market their shit - leeching onto cute little kids who need money for field-trip funding~ then rewarding them with toys that probably cost twenty cents to batch up in china. just awful.
but man do those mag companies know how to market their shit - leeching onto cute little kids who need money for field-trip funding~ then rewarding them with toys that probably cost twenty cents to batch up in china. just awful.
April 9, 2009
some shadowed places
let me theorize for a moment here. i had a dream the other night that was oddly coraline-esque, in the sense that i was struggling with some dominant monster in the house that i grew up in. i don't remember a lot of the details; i wish i had written closer to the actual event but i haven't been finding the time lately, and it just struck me upside the head with its oddity. i do remember that i was in my parents' bedroom, though as characteristic in dreams it was not so much the same in furnishings, or size, just in relative location and perhaps general shape. this is an energy-center of a house for children, so i can understand why my mind would choose it as a setting of some sort. i'm sure that i also branched, at some point, into my own childhood room, which was just across the hallway...an easy jaunt even if progress was hindered by battle, or whatever~
i'm not really sure where i intend to go with this prelude...it strikes me as, not necessarily unusual, but quite curious that so many of my dreams happen in or around my old house. you would think that my mind would be engaging nightly with newer problems, newer ideas, and setting them appropriately in my new surroundings...but perhaps these are too volatile, in my lack of knowledge of them, to paint adequate pictures for a backdrop. i'm fairly certain that my themes, the ideas that my dreams are really digging their fingers into, hashing out, are more intelligent than they used to be...that they deal with different issues as they develop, as i come across them in my actual experience. but they come as ghosts in my old haunts, which, for my part, was unexpected.
so, the parents' bedroom was unique, usually not a typical setting. there are other places which recur with more frequency...namely the backyard. we had a good-sized backyard at my house in the springs, and i suppose that i spent a good deal of time in it. in the dreams, however, it is permeated with a sense of mystery, of vagueness and enormous, almost incomprehensible, size. i wonder about myself as a child, and in the wonderment i find this charmed recurrence of earlier self. it makes me wonder about the most basic sensations in life....that of the security of the home; the focus of life for everyone that you know. the comfort found inside those walls, and how that is imbued upon a childish mind....what the outside would have meant to me, then. i imagine myself, done up in blue one-piece winnie-the-pooh pajamas, gazing in rapt bewilderment out the glass doors in our main entryway, trying to decipher the strange wilderness, the unexplored depths of our backyard. what does a two-year old think of a tree? of grass and flowers? do they have the same positive valence that we would attribute to them now? part of me thinks that they would be frightening totems (head on pole) of the outside world, of complete loss of control.
of course, to a child, unknowns behave in different ways than they do to us now. our adult selves build up apprehensions based upon our past experiences; they fortify us from the outside world with snowglobe-like bricks, each teeming with motion and memory, each distorting the outside world more and more as we look through them, sometimes not even being able to see past the memories themselves. children become apprehensive, fearful, but only after their base comforts have already been stripped from them. a child misses his mother only once she is gone, not before; a child does not fear being lost until it actually arises. we tangle with these scenarios before they exist, and in that we lose something valuable in our interface with the world - we begin to focus more and more, and ultimately we see less and less.
so here i am, standing with my hands and nose pressed against the glass separating my child self from his house's backyard. squirrels scamper by, and i do not understand them. i wonder what sensations they call to my heart.
if i had to guess (since the time i am describing is before memory), and i am going to infer from my dreams now, i would venture to say that i felt fear. not a gripping terror, but an ambiguous shadow floating just beyond my perception, darkening. i say this, because in my dreams i find this same darkness to it. it has apparently been chosen as the place where i work out most of my unconscious struggles. i wish i had a running count of the number of dreams and/or nightmares which at some point trample through that backyard, which in reality has not a trace of ominousness to it but, who can say what a mind will twist anything into at the end of the day~ different sections of that backyard are honeycombed off in my mind; each attributed with memories and characteristics, properties which are real to me but which never belonged.
additionally, as if that weren't enough, i have an amplification of this wilderness....i have my family's cabin, secluded deep in the woods of kenosha pass. this was the spot for family vacations, an inexpensive spot to get away from it all, and i'm certain that it is tethered to numerous memories for everyone who goes there so it is a logical place to return to. i have spent time at this cabin as far back as i can remember, and always it has been a holy temple to me, an observation of the depths of nature and a retreat from the world as i knew it. this cabin is a fantastic place; perhaps you, reader, will be taken there one day~ but it has also developed, for me, as an extremely psychologically-powerful token. i go to this cabin, in my dreams, in my unconscious mind, when apparently there are mountains of rubble in my head that need to be worked through. almost always this cabin appears to me as a fractured house of the most haunted and haunting capacity possible. always there are deep-seated ghosts, literally; always it is overrun with the raw power of nature, crowned with black, spindly insects, the wardens of what deeper unsettled spirits lie slumbering there. the woods around this cabin host my deepest dreams, my deepest indications of what being 'lost', or pursued by the night, feels like. always it is an incredible adventure just to get to this place, rarely by car as would be expected; typically i must forge my way through snowfields and packs of savage animals, cross extreme conditions and distances in pursuit of something i do not know, at least not consciously. i am never sure what the motivation for returning to this place is, but always there is something drawing me towards it.
i do not know why these nature spots have become the seats for my subconscious psyche. all i can say is that they are bottled with unspeakable things; they reflect a different side of the world, as if i had stood in the middle of them and used the mirror from A Link to the Past. things do not make sense there, and everything is darkened. i thought it notable, towards the goal of figuring myself out a little better...and it always helps me to sort out my thoughts more clearly, this 'writing'.
shhh! listen:
royksopp - "royksopp forever"
i'm not really sure where i intend to go with this prelude...it strikes me as, not necessarily unusual, but quite curious that so many of my dreams happen in or around my old house. you would think that my mind would be engaging nightly with newer problems, newer ideas, and setting them appropriately in my new surroundings...but perhaps these are too volatile, in my lack of knowledge of them, to paint adequate pictures for a backdrop. i'm fairly certain that my themes, the ideas that my dreams are really digging their fingers into, hashing out, are more intelligent than they used to be...that they deal with different issues as they develop, as i come across them in my actual experience. but they come as ghosts in my old haunts, which, for my part, was unexpected.
so, the parents' bedroom was unique, usually not a typical setting. there are other places which recur with more frequency...namely the backyard. we had a good-sized backyard at my house in the springs, and i suppose that i spent a good deal of time in it. in the dreams, however, it is permeated with a sense of mystery, of vagueness and enormous, almost incomprehensible, size. i wonder about myself as a child, and in the wonderment i find this charmed recurrence of earlier self. it makes me wonder about the most basic sensations in life....that of the security of the home; the focus of life for everyone that you know. the comfort found inside those walls, and how that is imbued upon a childish mind....what the outside would have meant to me, then. i imagine myself, done up in blue one-piece winnie-the-pooh pajamas, gazing in rapt bewilderment out the glass doors in our main entryway, trying to decipher the strange wilderness, the unexplored depths of our backyard. what does a two-year old think of a tree? of grass and flowers? do they have the same positive valence that we would attribute to them now? part of me thinks that they would be frightening totems (head on pole) of the outside world, of complete loss of control.
of course, to a child, unknowns behave in different ways than they do to us now. our adult selves build up apprehensions based upon our past experiences; they fortify us from the outside world with snowglobe-like bricks, each teeming with motion and memory, each distorting the outside world more and more as we look through them, sometimes not even being able to see past the memories themselves. children become apprehensive, fearful, but only after their base comforts have already been stripped from them. a child misses his mother only once she is gone, not before; a child does not fear being lost until it actually arises. we tangle with these scenarios before they exist, and in that we lose something valuable in our interface with the world - we begin to focus more and more, and ultimately we see less and less.
so here i am, standing with my hands and nose pressed against the glass separating my child self from his house's backyard. squirrels scamper by, and i do not understand them. i wonder what sensations they call to my heart.
if i had to guess (since the time i am describing is before memory), and i am going to infer from my dreams now, i would venture to say that i felt fear. not a gripping terror, but an ambiguous shadow floating just beyond my perception, darkening. i say this, because in my dreams i find this same darkness to it. it has apparently been chosen as the place where i work out most of my unconscious struggles. i wish i had a running count of the number of dreams and/or nightmares which at some point trample through that backyard, which in reality has not a trace of ominousness to it but, who can say what a mind will twist anything into at the end of the day~ different sections of that backyard are honeycombed off in my mind; each attributed with memories and characteristics, properties which are real to me but which never belonged.
additionally, as if that weren't enough, i have an amplification of this wilderness....i have my family's cabin, secluded deep in the woods of kenosha pass. this was the spot for family vacations, an inexpensive spot to get away from it all, and i'm certain that it is tethered to numerous memories for everyone who goes there so it is a logical place to return to. i have spent time at this cabin as far back as i can remember, and always it has been a holy temple to me, an observation of the depths of nature and a retreat from the world as i knew it. this cabin is a fantastic place; perhaps you, reader, will be taken there one day~ but it has also developed, for me, as an extremely psychologically-powerful token. i go to this cabin, in my dreams, in my unconscious mind, when apparently there are mountains of rubble in my head that need to be worked through. almost always this cabin appears to me as a fractured house of the most haunted and haunting capacity possible. always there are deep-seated ghosts, literally; always it is overrun with the raw power of nature, crowned with black, spindly insects, the wardens of what deeper unsettled spirits lie slumbering there. the woods around this cabin host my deepest dreams, my deepest indications of what being 'lost', or pursued by the night, feels like. always it is an incredible adventure just to get to this place, rarely by car as would be expected; typically i must forge my way through snowfields and packs of savage animals, cross extreme conditions and distances in pursuit of something i do not know, at least not consciously. i am never sure what the motivation for returning to this place is, but always there is something drawing me towards it.
i do not know why these nature spots have become the seats for my subconscious psyche. all i can say is that they are bottled with unspeakable things; they reflect a different side of the world, as if i had stood in the middle of them and used the mirror from A Link to the Past. things do not make sense there, and everything is darkened. i thought it notable, towards the goal of figuring myself out a little better...and it always helps me to sort out my thoughts more clearly, this 'writing'.
shhh! listen:
royksopp - "royksopp forever"
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
