“Life is business”
I’ve been in school now for just under 2 months. I am learning so many incredible things, things that my BA never opened my eyes to. Maybe I wasn’t interested in keeping my ears open back then. Maybe I wasn’t wise enough to really pick up on academic learning the way I am now. But none the less, this academic experience is somehow different than the one before.
Registered in the Bachelor of Business Administration program, and in a smorgasbord of 1st to 3rd year classes, I’ve been immediately exposed to many different kinds of business students. And, already in 2 months, I’ve heard a diverse range of studious college attendees utter that magical phrase: Life is business.
The guy going into PR.
That gal who doesn’t know what she wants to do with her life.
The guy in the extra-curricular business organization – a business lifer.
That pair of drinkers in the beer garden.
My sister.
I cannot express how stunning it is to hear this phrase. “Life is business.”
I don’t go fishing for this sage advice. It pops up everywhere. Like a mantra. Like the opening slogan of a class that I must have slept through. Wining and dining and talking as students will about where the hell they’re going and what the hell they’re doing, eventually someone pipes up “but really, you can’t go wrong with the BBA. Life is business” and everyone else smiles and nods. Like a professor has just made a point that we’ve all agreed on and understood for a very long time.
My sister laughs and makes a point to announce that her brother does not believe this. Then people look at me. You? You don’t believe this? Aren’t you in business?
Yes. I am in the business program.
It was in the paper I read today. The opinions section. Someone had mailed in that we should just deal with advertisements because that’s business. And life is business, they claimed.
No. It’s not.
Imagine that you are a painter. Now imagine you have a model. This model is complex, complicated, contorted and twisted. And she is captivatingly beautiful.
You feel you must know her; you are compelled to understand her every curve and contour. For better or worse, you pick up your brush. She will be yours. Ceaselessly, you work to create the perfect illustration, the perfect expression, of this model. You are in love with the model and the painting, discovering over the course of your creation things about her you had never seen before. Hidden, private parts of her that make you smile and seethe, and you paint it all. The nitty-gritty details. You expose her for what she is, putting all the nakedness you discover into the most incredible, honest light.
And when you are done, your creation is beautiful. Sure, there are a few details to add: a spot here to polish, a colour there to blur. But all in all, those are just details. You, however have created something worthy of representing what you see in front of you.
You are our collective sight. Your model is Life. Your painting is business.
Life isn’t an academic subject of study. It’s not a system of economic principles, entrepreneurial innovations, any more than it’s a causal connection between sperm and egg. Certainly, it is THE object of all studies, pursuits, and beliefs. But we would be incredibly remiss to mistake the painting for the model.
Many find my distinction trivial. Especially when I explain that business and an understanding of its principles is an incredibly effective tool to understand how we live. But since the moment I attended my first class, and even prior to that, in the moment I attended my first thoughts to the subject of business, that distinction has been paramount. That distinction is the very matter of free-will and slavery.
We are students. In our orientation we are told that we are the future. Our college makes a point to say how many of its alumni have gone on to be business leaders. We are a successful campus that churns out real movers and shakers.
How then, can we assent to such a ridiculous limitation that life is equivalent to this ready-made package of economic principles and management 5-step plans? How can we, as conscientious students, here to learn, understand, contribute and change the world, walk in nodding our heads at the idea that we are trapped in such a narrow perspective? Trapped to accept this painting as truth.
Seems that if we did, we’d be going to school for something we already claimed we knew. I’ve only experienced a small part of business school, and I certainly have much yet to experience in life. Seems brash – to be polite – to claim that this is all there is.
About as brash as claiming a single painting (no matter how many years of work were put into it) is the perfect representation of life.
Our dear, sweet, seductive model has far more to show us than this one meagre painting – thorough as it may be. She has all sorts of delicious adventures hidden within her form that a perspective of business simply cannot catch.
No, business is a tool, and with it we can change the fucking world as well as our own lives. But the efficacy and efficiency of that tool should never lull us into thinking that it is all there is. When we start thinking that, the tool wields us. I’ll not asset to that slavery.
My sister delights in the suggestion that friendship is a mutually beneficial business arrangement. She is not alone in this suggestion, nor is her logic particularly flawed. And, in another context, I’ll support the logic myself.
But, sharing a cigar with my friend of over 10 years, enjoying the evening and small talk about pretty girls, hopes and dreams, and an assortment of benign pleasures... has a quality to it that has very little to do with business.
And that is life.
- Z
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Triforce of Awesome
They all said we were crazy.
Well, no one said that, actually. Not a single person. But when you announce that you are going to be cramming a third person into a tiny two bedroom apartment, people tend to think you’re either really down on your luck, telling a joke, or just plain bat-fuck loco.
None of us are fairing too poorly financially, so in the telling, I had to clarify a couple of times: No, it’s not a joke. My friend is moving in with us. Yes, we will be sharing a room. This is really what we’re doing.
And then they accepted it, and nodded their head. Some even commented that they thought it would be a good idea. But all of them had that glance or that stare. That twinkle in their eye that said “I wouldn’t be caught dead in a million years doing that. What suffering!”
Despite our supportive friends and family, I privately wished for a dissenter who would suggest that it was lunacy. I wished only so that I would have the opportunity to proclaim from the top of my lungs how sane the damned option was!
We are the land of the free. We are a world where existentialism reigns supreme, where we are encouraged to build our lives up and out and into something beautiful. People do this with careers, others with white picket fences. Friends and family move to new places, others travel the world, others still have babies.
And we three kings are doing it too.
“But it will be cramped...”
Oh you bet it is. Very cramped. But I also have friends who have moved several times because in their pursuit of happiness, their place being too small and crowded for their growing children. And every time, they’ll tell you it was worth it. Career-persons have schedules so tight that they need expensive schedules or assistants to help them wade through the crap.
And us, we just have a few extra things. In exchange for a second family, I lose a little bit of desk space. I wasn’t even using it in the first place. A pretty fair exchange.
(And, don’t tell, but our place is actually neater than it was before. Classier. More put together.)
“But what if you want to bring a woman home?”
Then we bring ‘em home! If they think the whole thing is weird, then they’re probably not the type of gal I want to be bringing around to meet my friends. We’re building a future here, and it’s awesome. It’s going to bloom into something beautiful. And if that makes getting girls more difficult, then I don’t want them in my life.
And trust me, they’ll be missing out.
“No, no, I mean, what if you want to bring a woman home. You know, since you’re sharing a room.”
Ah. Then my roommate can get the fuck out! Sock on the door. Man code.
No more complicated than that. These aren’t casual roommates picked up off the street. These are my long time friends. I’d take a bullet for them (and charge them for it later), so I’d sure as hell spend the night on the couch for one of them. And in the morning, I’ll make him and her a cup of coffee.
(And if she seems like a really good sport, then I’ll ask about his performance. We have a standard to keep at this place, you know.)
You see, we three complement each other. Tried, tested and true friends, we’re a trio of stooges that know all our lines. This isn’t a random arrangement, or an arrangement of convenience. No, this is an arrangement of desire. Because, having done the random thing for a number of years, we finally know what we like. We know what we’re after. And we know our own vices.
We’re a chord that always strikes you the right way. Trust me, we’ve been through plenty of practice, and had some pretty out of tune times. But, now together, we’re checking ourselves. Life is for inventing, and we’re setting to it.
A bohemian, a gentleman, and an enthusiast walk into a bar,
A writer, a cartoonist and a musician inspire one another,
An entrepreneur, a creative liason and a computer geek contemplate their future,
A sandwich maker, a service representative and a security guard go to work,
An optimist, a pessimist, and a realist wash the dishes,
A procrastinator, an alcoholic, and hoarder line up to use the washroom.
A Philosopher, an Artist, and a Wingman unlock the door to an apartment.
That joke is ours.
You’re going to love the punch-line.
- Z
Well, no one said that, actually. Not a single person. But when you announce that you are going to be cramming a third person into a tiny two bedroom apartment, people tend to think you’re either really down on your luck, telling a joke, or just plain bat-fuck loco.
None of us are fairing too poorly financially, so in the telling, I had to clarify a couple of times: No, it’s not a joke. My friend is moving in with us. Yes, we will be sharing a room. This is really what we’re doing.
And then they accepted it, and nodded their head. Some even commented that they thought it would be a good idea. But all of them had that glance or that stare. That twinkle in their eye that said “I wouldn’t be caught dead in a million years doing that. What suffering!”
Despite our supportive friends and family, I privately wished for a dissenter who would suggest that it was lunacy. I wished only so that I would have the opportunity to proclaim from the top of my lungs how sane the damned option was!
We are the land of the free. We are a world where existentialism reigns supreme, where we are encouraged to build our lives up and out and into something beautiful. People do this with careers, others with white picket fences. Friends and family move to new places, others travel the world, others still have babies.
And we three kings are doing it too.
“But it will be cramped...”
Oh you bet it is. Very cramped. But I also have friends who have moved several times because in their pursuit of happiness, their place being too small and crowded for their growing children. And every time, they’ll tell you it was worth it. Career-persons have schedules so tight that they need expensive schedules or assistants to help them wade through the crap.
And us, we just have a few extra things. In exchange for a second family, I lose a little bit of desk space. I wasn’t even using it in the first place. A pretty fair exchange.
(And, don’t tell, but our place is actually neater than it was before. Classier. More put together.)
“But what if you want to bring a woman home?”
Then we bring ‘em home! If they think the whole thing is weird, then they’re probably not the type of gal I want to be bringing around to meet my friends. We’re building a future here, and it’s awesome. It’s going to bloom into something beautiful. And if that makes getting girls more difficult, then I don’t want them in my life.
And trust me, they’ll be missing out.
“No, no, I mean, what if you want to bring a woman home. You know, since you’re sharing a room.”
Ah. Then my roommate can get the fuck out! Sock on the door. Man code.
No more complicated than that. These aren’t casual roommates picked up off the street. These are my long time friends. I’d take a bullet for them (and charge them for it later), so I’d sure as hell spend the night on the couch for one of them. And in the morning, I’ll make him and her a cup of coffee.
(And if she seems like a really good sport, then I’ll ask about his performance. We have a standard to keep at this place, you know.)
You see, we three complement each other. Tried, tested and true friends, we’re a trio of stooges that know all our lines. This isn’t a random arrangement, or an arrangement of convenience. No, this is an arrangement of desire. Because, having done the random thing for a number of years, we finally know what we like. We know what we’re after. And we know our own vices.
We’re a chord that always strikes you the right way. Trust me, we’ve been through plenty of practice, and had some pretty out of tune times. But, now together, we’re checking ourselves. Life is for inventing, and we’re setting to it.
A bohemian, a gentleman, and an enthusiast walk into a bar,
A writer, a cartoonist and a musician inspire one another,
An entrepreneur, a creative liason and a computer geek contemplate their future,
A sandwich maker, a service representative and a security guard go to work,
An optimist, a pessimist, and a realist wash the dishes,
A procrastinator, an alcoholic, and hoarder line up to use the washroom.
A Philosopher, an Artist, and a Wingman unlock the door to an apartment.
That joke is ours.
You’re going to love the punch-line.
- Z
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Stepping out of Shadows
Shame haunts me.
We all have vices. Personally, my favourite one is greed. Or perhaps envy. I was never really clear on the details. All I know is that I covet my neighbour’s everything. And Pride certainly puts its two cents in simply by my sitting here pronouncing my favourite sin. And all of that I’m okay with. My ego is content, realizing (or deceiving itself into realizing) that I am capable of beauty and perfection in spite of these things. Often it celebrates the fact that I’m beautiful and perfect because of them.
But shame is the weapon the devil uses against me with stunning efficacy. I am ashamed of my dismal career. Of how much I was capable of and how much I haven’t accomplished. I’m ashamed that I have a well admired degree from a decent university and that I did nothing with it. I’m ashamed I that I cannot recall any of the knowledge I supposedly gained from the endeavour. I’m ashamed that I don’t know more about stuff. I always manage to screw up or let things pass by, as if it were the very nature of who I am. And I’m sure as shit ashamed that I work at such a shitty job. I’m basically ashamed the lacklustre version of myself I see when I look backwards.
When someone asks me what I do or what I’ve done, I avoid the subject. I avoid it reflexively. A hot flush wells up in my emotions, and my fight-or-flight response kicks in. That dread in the pit of my stomach kicks and screams to change the subject. My answer is always awkward or paused; my secret the levy of impending doom. That’s the devil’s weapon in full.
It might be suggested that, if I can comment on these things here, I can’t be that ashamed. It could be claimed that I have plenty of things that I can be proud of, and that tomorrow’s always a new day. But all of that misses the point. I’m not unaware of the shame, nor am I unaware of my life. I’m acutely aware. I have a friend who, sometimes, hates it when I comment on her beauty. I could never quite understand that – because she’s quite evidently beautiful, and my words were always motivated by honesty and truth. But I think this feeling I have is something like it. Because when someone tells me I’m a good person, sometimes it can’t help but cause me to reflect on all the areas that I’m a wash-up. No well-meaning words can fix that.
Somewhere, deep down behind all of that shame (and resultant fear), is the real me. Underneath it.
As anyone who’s been my friend over the past months (read: years (read: intimate friend)) knows that I’ve been working to uncover that man. Discover him. It is an unbelievably slow process.
But I know it will be an incredible find. I know that because my writing teaches me a bit about him. For one thing, he has amazing sex. And more importantly, though just barely, he is real. He is really him, and not someone who’s walking with his face to the past.
First I took time off. Then I broke down. Then I went to Thailand. Then I got a job. Then I went to school for business.
The accounting professor mixed up the class numbers on our first day. The management prof changed her lesson plan at the last minute. The human resources professor apologized for having a testing system that wasn’t the best for students and the marketing professor tried too hard during orientation to be our best friend. This at an institution well regarded for its successful business program.
“Defend everything you say in this class with statistics and facts,” my last professor said, “and remember that people will always act in their best interest. I’m sorry, but that’s it’s just the way it is.”
Sure teaches you a lot about flaws.
One of my professors questioned, politely, why someone in my position didn’t just enrol in a Master’s of Business. The hidden hypothesis he was asserting was that a BBA was a lateral step at best. A needless repetition or possibly even a regression. I could not find the words to adequately explain myself. I could feel the devil stabbing at my heart.
But as I think back to the previous week of classes – the utter realism of honest mistakes, and flaws mixed in with youth, success and ambition, a creeping answer came to me. A simpler reason: The simple fact of the matter was, though I might try and justify, pontificate, and rationalize, I simply wanted to. For 4 years now, I have dreamt about starting over. About fighting back.
Now I am. This is where.
- Z
Epilogue –
My writing is an outlet that I do not intend to lose in the depth of schoolwork. Writing is not necessarily “a part of me” so much as it reveals a part of me. Aside from my ego’s desire to be beloved by hordes of people and make women wet with my words, the thing I like most about my art is that I feel most pure when I create. That, despite the loads of work I will be undertaking with school, is something I want to continue to make a priority.
A friend of mine continually mentions that the most popular online media (blogs, web-comics etc) is that which is updated frequently. To this end, I intend to start updating my blog (which contains what I post on facebook too) more frequently starting in October.
Once every two weeks, I’ll be posting. That’s a commitment. It may be a blog, it may be a creative writing piece, or I may try and do something different altogether. No matter what it is, it’ll always be from the heart.
I hope you’ll bookmark it. I hope you’ll feel comfortable giving your feedback.
As well, on the alternate weeks, I’ll be working with a friend(s?) of mine on a creative writing project involving photography and writing. More on that to come once I can sit down with her and organize how exactly it will work. Hopefully a third artistic project will materialize with my roommate(s) in the new year. I don’t think they really realize how serious I am about it. But I am.
Oh, and I think I’ll be advertising more, so tell your friends. Shameless, I know.
That’s the idea.
We all have vices. Personally, my favourite one is greed. Or perhaps envy. I was never really clear on the details. All I know is that I covet my neighbour’s everything. And Pride certainly puts its two cents in simply by my sitting here pronouncing my favourite sin. And all of that I’m okay with. My ego is content, realizing (or deceiving itself into realizing) that I am capable of beauty and perfection in spite of these things. Often it celebrates the fact that I’m beautiful and perfect because of them.
But shame is the weapon the devil uses against me with stunning efficacy. I am ashamed of my dismal career. Of how much I was capable of and how much I haven’t accomplished. I’m ashamed that I have a well admired degree from a decent university and that I did nothing with it. I’m ashamed I that I cannot recall any of the knowledge I supposedly gained from the endeavour. I’m ashamed that I don’t know more about stuff. I always manage to screw up or let things pass by, as if it were the very nature of who I am. And I’m sure as shit ashamed that I work at such a shitty job. I’m basically ashamed the lacklustre version of myself I see when I look backwards.
When someone asks me what I do or what I’ve done, I avoid the subject. I avoid it reflexively. A hot flush wells up in my emotions, and my fight-or-flight response kicks in. That dread in the pit of my stomach kicks and screams to change the subject. My answer is always awkward or paused; my secret the levy of impending doom. That’s the devil’s weapon in full.
It might be suggested that, if I can comment on these things here, I can’t be that ashamed. It could be claimed that I have plenty of things that I can be proud of, and that tomorrow’s always a new day. But all of that misses the point. I’m not unaware of the shame, nor am I unaware of my life. I’m acutely aware. I have a friend who, sometimes, hates it when I comment on her beauty. I could never quite understand that – because she’s quite evidently beautiful, and my words were always motivated by honesty and truth. But I think this feeling I have is something like it. Because when someone tells me I’m a good person, sometimes it can’t help but cause me to reflect on all the areas that I’m a wash-up. No well-meaning words can fix that.
Somewhere, deep down behind all of that shame (and resultant fear), is the real me. Underneath it.
As anyone who’s been my friend over the past months (read: years (read: intimate friend)) knows that I’ve been working to uncover that man. Discover him. It is an unbelievably slow process.
But I know it will be an incredible find. I know that because my writing teaches me a bit about him. For one thing, he has amazing sex. And more importantly, though just barely, he is real. He is really him, and not someone who’s walking with his face to the past.
First I took time off. Then I broke down. Then I went to Thailand. Then I got a job. Then I went to school for business.
The accounting professor mixed up the class numbers on our first day. The management prof changed her lesson plan at the last minute. The human resources professor apologized for having a testing system that wasn’t the best for students and the marketing professor tried too hard during orientation to be our best friend. This at an institution well regarded for its successful business program.
“Defend everything you say in this class with statistics and facts,” my last professor said, “and remember that people will always act in their best interest. I’m sorry, but that’s it’s just the way it is.”
Sure teaches you a lot about flaws.
One of my professors questioned, politely, why someone in my position didn’t just enrol in a Master’s of Business. The hidden hypothesis he was asserting was that a BBA was a lateral step at best. A needless repetition or possibly even a regression. I could not find the words to adequately explain myself. I could feel the devil stabbing at my heart.
But as I think back to the previous week of classes – the utter realism of honest mistakes, and flaws mixed in with youth, success and ambition, a creeping answer came to me. A simpler reason: The simple fact of the matter was, though I might try and justify, pontificate, and rationalize, I simply wanted to. For 4 years now, I have dreamt about starting over. About fighting back.
Now I am. This is where.
- Z
Epilogue –
My writing is an outlet that I do not intend to lose in the depth of schoolwork. Writing is not necessarily “a part of me” so much as it reveals a part of me. Aside from my ego’s desire to be beloved by hordes of people and make women wet with my words, the thing I like most about my art is that I feel most pure when I create. That, despite the loads of work I will be undertaking with school, is something I want to continue to make a priority.
A friend of mine continually mentions that the most popular online media (blogs, web-comics etc) is that which is updated frequently. To this end, I intend to start updating my blog (which contains what I post on facebook too) more frequently starting in October.
Once every two weeks, I’ll be posting. That’s a commitment. It may be a blog, it may be a creative writing piece, or I may try and do something different altogether. No matter what it is, it’ll always be from the heart.
I hope you’ll bookmark it. I hope you’ll feel comfortable giving your feedback.
As well, on the alternate weeks, I’ll be working with a friend(s?) of mine on a creative writing project involving photography and writing. More on that to come once I can sit down with her and organize how exactly it will work. Hopefully a third artistic project will materialize with my roommate(s) in the new year. I don’t think they really realize how serious I am about it. But I am.
Oh, and I think I’ll be advertising more, so tell your friends. Shameless, I know.
That’s the idea.
Friday, September 3, 2010
Raindrops
I got a chance to walk in the rain the other day. August 31st, actually. I got to say goodbye to my summer by walking a euphoric 38 minutes in the constant drizzle-pour-drizzle. It was glorious.
I love the rain. I am not a creature of the sea, but part of me always feels at home when I hear the rain. A soft drizzle on my skin reminds me that I’m alive. The spots on my glasses remind me of the windshield of a car, and like that car I can get out any time I want. Because I am not my glasses. I’m not my body. And, with my hands outstretched and my soggy clothing clinging, the rain gets that.
I sleep with the radio politely on. But evenings when it is raining, I listen to that alone. It has sent me peacefully to slumber when mental or physical pains thought to keep me otherwise awake for hours. While it’s true that there may be more comfortable things to hug and snuggle into – blankets, sweaters and people, for example – the rain holds you like a lover. The rain doesn’t pretend that the world is magically bright or wonderful. Nor does it seek to suggest that it’s dour and ugly. It knows that for every flower there is an overcast day. The rain knows every cliché.
The rain cries for you when you don’t have the strength to do it yourself. Like the world itself is releasing some pent up emotion, you cannot help but get swept up with it even if you can help sharing the tears.
Optimism can be a tricky thing. Even optimists can see that, half-full or half-empty, the cup could always have a lot more liquid in it. One of my favourite metaphors is flying. Specifically, not forgetting to fly. “Don’t forget to fly,” I tell people who I know have the sight – the capacity to see the world as it really is. Hook is one of my favourite movies, and once Pan remembered how to fly, everything else was in the bag. We can fly. We can be bigger, and better, and more magnificent than anything else in existence. Our childish imaginations, our lover’s hearts, and our moral souls are all echoes of this fundamental truth; this what-we-can-be. Don’t forget it, I say. Don’t forget to fly.
But as liberating as it is, to imagine one’s self breaking away from the chains of every-day monotony, grief, worry, and stress. It’s not very realistic. Because realistically, family and friendship politics are complicated. And two people can be in love but also not be perfect for one another. Unfortunately, a corporation that wants to change runs the risk of changing into non-existence. Some things you just can’t fly around.
But the rain is beautiful within that world of chains and complications. It has always represented to me a comfortable neutrality in the way that it represents reality. It says in its various forms: “yes. There are sucky parts about the world. And they are here to stay.” But despite what people often think reality is the best soil for optimism to grow in. Real love, success, happiness, and joy is not raised in blindness, but grown through the care of earnest hearts and open eyes. Optimism is nothing more than the desire to see such things grow.
Grow they shall, in spades, in the rain. That’s what I like about it.
A wet-t-shirt contest (as wonderful as it is) will never compare to the beauty of your breathless lover running in the door after being caught en route in a freak rainstorm.
(Yes, your hair is wet and frizzy. A mess, even. You’ve never been more beautiful.)
So when I found myself successful and happy about how my morning had gone on the 31st, with no where to be and all day to get there, I decided I wouldn’t take the bus. It was raining, and I wanted to walk home.
The rain will never dare say “everything will be okay.” But it does help you feel it.
Play in the rain,
- Z
I love the rain. I am not a creature of the sea, but part of me always feels at home when I hear the rain. A soft drizzle on my skin reminds me that I’m alive. The spots on my glasses remind me of the windshield of a car, and like that car I can get out any time I want. Because I am not my glasses. I’m not my body. And, with my hands outstretched and my soggy clothing clinging, the rain gets that.
I sleep with the radio politely on. But evenings when it is raining, I listen to that alone. It has sent me peacefully to slumber when mental or physical pains thought to keep me otherwise awake for hours. While it’s true that there may be more comfortable things to hug and snuggle into – blankets, sweaters and people, for example – the rain holds you like a lover. The rain doesn’t pretend that the world is magically bright or wonderful. Nor does it seek to suggest that it’s dour and ugly. It knows that for every flower there is an overcast day. The rain knows every cliché.
The rain cries for you when you don’t have the strength to do it yourself. Like the world itself is releasing some pent up emotion, you cannot help but get swept up with it even if you can help sharing the tears.
Optimism can be a tricky thing. Even optimists can see that, half-full or half-empty, the cup could always have a lot more liquid in it. One of my favourite metaphors is flying. Specifically, not forgetting to fly. “Don’t forget to fly,” I tell people who I know have the sight – the capacity to see the world as it really is. Hook is one of my favourite movies, and once Pan remembered how to fly, everything else was in the bag. We can fly. We can be bigger, and better, and more magnificent than anything else in existence. Our childish imaginations, our lover’s hearts, and our moral souls are all echoes of this fundamental truth; this what-we-can-be. Don’t forget it, I say. Don’t forget to fly.
But as liberating as it is, to imagine one’s self breaking away from the chains of every-day monotony, grief, worry, and stress. It’s not very realistic. Because realistically, family and friendship politics are complicated. And two people can be in love but also not be perfect for one another. Unfortunately, a corporation that wants to change runs the risk of changing into non-existence. Some things you just can’t fly around.
But the rain is beautiful within that world of chains and complications. It has always represented to me a comfortable neutrality in the way that it represents reality. It says in its various forms: “yes. There are sucky parts about the world. And they are here to stay.” But despite what people often think reality is the best soil for optimism to grow in. Real love, success, happiness, and joy is not raised in blindness, but grown through the care of earnest hearts and open eyes. Optimism is nothing more than the desire to see such things grow.
Grow they shall, in spades, in the rain. That’s what I like about it.
A wet-t-shirt contest (as wonderful as it is) will never compare to the beauty of your breathless lover running in the door after being caught en route in a freak rainstorm.
(Yes, your hair is wet and frizzy. A mess, even. You’ve never been more beautiful.)
So when I found myself successful and happy about how my morning had gone on the 31st, with no where to be and all day to get there, I decided I wouldn’t take the bus. It was raining, and I wanted to walk home.
The rain will never dare say “everything will be okay.” But it does help you feel it.
Play in the rain,
- Z
Sunday, August 29, 2010
"Just Believe."
We are a culture defined by “you are good enough.”
A thousand times a day, we are exposed to words in quotation marks. “Be the change that you want to see in the world.” “You are worth it.” “...Because you are worth it.” “You’re perfect just the way you are.” “She really loves you if she swallows.”
For a long time these thoughts were floating around in the ether and on billboards. But now, we have integrated them into our society. We have social networking sites like twitter which serve two primary purposes – one is nonsense and the other is sharing these anecdotes. Empowering us to become not only perpetuators of the infestation, but also authors. Now, as I personally often do, we can share our own quotes.
Sometimes they act as veiled messages to others we hope are reading. Often it is the emo-like yearnings of a soul who feels via these websites connected enough to hope for a reaction, but disconnected enough to despair no matter what is said. On a rare occasion, they’re prayers or the silent written desires of our soul.
We have other websites dedicated to text messages or life happenstances that are quotable. That make us laugh, sigh, cry, and emotionally yearn for them or against them. Something in most of them makes us feel, regardless of whether the quotable is real. Online videos and comments have us calling out for the underdog, and cherishing ways of life that we admire. Just yesterday I watched a breathtaking motivational video from a guy with no arms and legs, who was nonetheless “making the best” of his life. He encouraged all his listeners to realize that they were good enough. That they were beautiful.
We are a society of clichés. And there is a hidden falsity here that is tragic.
A gorilla that I talk to once in a while opened my eyes to the 60’s. It’s a time period that I am honestly not particularly interested in, but has a few valuable lessons. The people revolted in a hippie revolution which went nowhere. A few cliques continued, even to this day. But everything else reverted within the fullness of time back into “business as usual.” Try as they might, nothing changed. The Man is still in charge.
That’s what I’m beginning to hear, over and over again, today with clichés and quotables. We continually convince ourselves that we are beautiful, worth it, and important, just to forget it by the evening. Just in time to need to be reminded of it again. Mom-n-pop shops hold the banners of being different high only to sell out to corporations to enjoy the profit of those banners. But they will say to themselves, over and over again, like Sunday Prayer – “we are different. We are good enough.” As if they can make it true by saying it. As if it will sustain them or make them all better.
It has moved from life advice to an opiate. An opiate with very dangerous withdrawal symptoms. I fear that we are nothing better with it, yet descend into anarchy now when denied it.
To be clear: We are not defined as a society that finally realizes that it is beautiful. We have become a society that tells itself over and over again “we are beautiful.” Sadly, there’s nothing pretty about that. Just a broken addict needing their fix to get through another otherwise unbearable day. But “I can quit anytime I want.”
When I told my father (a man with significant working experience) the whole story about my being fired a year ago, everything made sense to him. The corporate reasoning, the corporate decisions, the way it was handled. He didn’t approve of most of it, and certainly not the way he runs his ship, but it made complete sense to him. But the thing he had the most difficulty with was this – the thing I, his son with little-to-no real world job experience – had to explain to him was why my close friends hadn’t done anything to support me.
What a sad realization about society, that I would have to explain to my father why my friends had handled the situation differently than his friends would have not 10-20 years prior. Why my friends appeared to sound so much more supportive and then acted so much less supportive then his own co-workers had “back in the day.” And we call ourselves more civilized. A terrible price for an inaccurate label.
I knew a person once, who wore a quote on her online-sleeve: “call it like you see it.” I’ve never seen someone gossip and backroom chat more. I’ve also never seen someone avoid so much honest confrontation.
I’ve lost count how many people I’ve met that – in one form or another – demand that someone else “put their money where their mouth is” but don’t follow through themselves. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard people dream out loud that they wish their potential lover would not hesitate. They wait wistfully, hoping that s/he will act. The hypocrisy, I trust, is evident.
My gorilla friend proposed that the hippies of the 60’s failed in their revolution because they didn’t know where they were going. They knew that they didn’t like how things were, but didn’t know what to go about changing things to. I think our quotable society suffers the same problem. We earnestly want to “be all that we can be.” We want to believe it, but we haven’t got a clue how to go about it. We’ve forgotten. And we’ve also forgotten that the alternative – not being – is far more frightening:
“All it takes for evil to succeed is for good people to stand aside and do nothing.”
My co-worker, when I told him about what the gorilla had said, asked me what I was doing to fix it. A great question. I told him I was living my life in a way that would hopefully open eyes to the reality. Being a believer in treating other people like individuals and not like drones or automatons (see Immanuel Kant and his Categorical Imperative), means that for me, changing people involves a lot more hope and openness than it does control and demands. Now I know how God felt, having to give man free will instead of perfection, hoping that he would find the latter on his own.
Here goes: We do not make things true by saying them over and over and over again. It’s not true in church, it’s not true at the coffee shop, and it’s certainly not true in love or the workplace. We make things true by making them true.
Yes, this may involve “drama.” Yes, this may involve offending people. It will almost certainly involve great risk to your personal, emotional, financial and/or physical health. But we’ve watched enough stars and tabloid shows to know that getting clean naturally involves these things. Rehabilitation has never, ever been an easy process. When we are addicted, there is no way past withdrawal symptoms but through them.
“Act now, and save big!”
C. S. Lewis and I rarely disagree on things (except, you know, about God), but I have to take issue with his implication that we can never create Heaven on Earth. I happen to believe we can. Our “progress” as of the past few decades (read: our generation) has been a bit backwards, it’s true. But it’s never too late.
I’m not perfect. Indeed, a lot of people could read this post and say: “you hypocrite! You do all those things too!” That too is truth. I’m no prophet, much as my ego would love me to be. I’m in the trenches too, making mistakes with all of you. And being down and dirty has helped me to understand.
Helped me to understand why people “fake it.”
To understand why people say one thing and do another.
To understand why people yearn for love but don’t dare endanger friendships.
To understand why we separate our well-being from our words.
To understand why it’s easier to tell an open digital world that you’re aching than it is to look into someone else’s eyes and say it.
To understand why joy is contagious but brief, but what lasts a lifetime is grief.
To understand why it’s so important to “dance like no-one’s watching.” Because it is. And everyone is watching. But fuck it, you are beautiful, right?
Dance!
- Z
A thousand times a day, we are exposed to words in quotation marks. “Be the change that you want to see in the world.” “You are worth it.” “...Because you are worth it.” “You’re perfect just the way you are.” “She really loves you if she swallows.”
For a long time these thoughts were floating around in the ether and on billboards. But now, we have integrated them into our society. We have social networking sites like twitter which serve two primary purposes – one is nonsense and the other is sharing these anecdotes. Empowering us to become not only perpetuators of the infestation, but also authors. Now, as I personally often do, we can share our own quotes.
Sometimes they act as veiled messages to others we hope are reading. Often it is the emo-like yearnings of a soul who feels via these websites connected enough to hope for a reaction, but disconnected enough to despair no matter what is said. On a rare occasion, they’re prayers or the silent written desires of our soul.
We have other websites dedicated to text messages or life happenstances that are quotable. That make us laugh, sigh, cry, and emotionally yearn for them or against them. Something in most of them makes us feel, regardless of whether the quotable is real. Online videos and comments have us calling out for the underdog, and cherishing ways of life that we admire. Just yesterday I watched a breathtaking motivational video from a guy with no arms and legs, who was nonetheless “making the best” of his life. He encouraged all his listeners to realize that they were good enough. That they were beautiful.
We are a society of clichés. And there is a hidden falsity here that is tragic.
A gorilla that I talk to once in a while opened my eyes to the 60’s. It’s a time period that I am honestly not particularly interested in, but has a few valuable lessons. The people revolted in a hippie revolution which went nowhere. A few cliques continued, even to this day. But everything else reverted within the fullness of time back into “business as usual.” Try as they might, nothing changed. The Man is still in charge.
That’s what I’m beginning to hear, over and over again, today with clichés and quotables. We continually convince ourselves that we are beautiful, worth it, and important, just to forget it by the evening. Just in time to need to be reminded of it again. Mom-n-pop shops hold the banners of being different high only to sell out to corporations to enjoy the profit of those banners. But they will say to themselves, over and over again, like Sunday Prayer – “we are different. We are good enough.” As if they can make it true by saying it. As if it will sustain them or make them all better.
It has moved from life advice to an opiate. An opiate with very dangerous withdrawal symptoms. I fear that we are nothing better with it, yet descend into anarchy now when denied it.
To be clear: We are not defined as a society that finally realizes that it is beautiful. We have become a society that tells itself over and over again “we are beautiful.” Sadly, there’s nothing pretty about that. Just a broken addict needing their fix to get through another otherwise unbearable day. But “I can quit anytime I want.”
When I told my father (a man with significant working experience) the whole story about my being fired a year ago, everything made sense to him. The corporate reasoning, the corporate decisions, the way it was handled. He didn’t approve of most of it, and certainly not the way he runs his ship, but it made complete sense to him. But the thing he had the most difficulty with was this – the thing I, his son with little-to-no real world job experience – had to explain to him was why my close friends hadn’t done anything to support me.
What a sad realization about society, that I would have to explain to my father why my friends had handled the situation differently than his friends would have not 10-20 years prior. Why my friends appeared to sound so much more supportive and then acted so much less supportive then his own co-workers had “back in the day.” And we call ourselves more civilized. A terrible price for an inaccurate label.
I knew a person once, who wore a quote on her online-sleeve: “call it like you see it.” I’ve never seen someone gossip and backroom chat more. I’ve also never seen someone avoid so much honest confrontation.
I’ve lost count how many people I’ve met that – in one form or another – demand that someone else “put their money where their mouth is” but don’t follow through themselves. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard people dream out loud that they wish their potential lover would not hesitate. They wait wistfully, hoping that s/he will act. The hypocrisy, I trust, is evident.
My gorilla friend proposed that the hippies of the 60’s failed in their revolution because they didn’t know where they were going. They knew that they didn’t like how things were, but didn’t know what to go about changing things to. I think our quotable society suffers the same problem. We earnestly want to “be all that we can be.” We want to believe it, but we haven’t got a clue how to go about it. We’ve forgotten. And we’ve also forgotten that the alternative – not being – is far more frightening:
“All it takes for evil to succeed is for good people to stand aside and do nothing.”
My co-worker, when I told him about what the gorilla had said, asked me what I was doing to fix it. A great question. I told him I was living my life in a way that would hopefully open eyes to the reality. Being a believer in treating other people like individuals and not like drones or automatons (see Immanuel Kant and his Categorical Imperative), means that for me, changing people involves a lot more hope and openness than it does control and demands. Now I know how God felt, having to give man free will instead of perfection, hoping that he would find the latter on his own.
Here goes: We do not make things true by saying them over and over and over again. It’s not true in church, it’s not true at the coffee shop, and it’s certainly not true in love or the workplace. We make things true by making them true.
Yes, this may involve “drama.” Yes, this may involve offending people. It will almost certainly involve great risk to your personal, emotional, financial and/or physical health. But we’ve watched enough stars and tabloid shows to know that getting clean naturally involves these things. Rehabilitation has never, ever been an easy process. When we are addicted, there is no way past withdrawal symptoms but through them.
“Act now, and save big!”
C. S. Lewis and I rarely disagree on things (except, you know, about God), but I have to take issue with his implication that we can never create Heaven on Earth. I happen to believe we can. Our “progress” as of the past few decades (read: our generation) has been a bit backwards, it’s true. But it’s never too late.
I’m not perfect. Indeed, a lot of people could read this post and say: “you hypocrite! You do all those things too!” That too is truth. I’m no prophet, much as my ego would love me to be. I’m in the trenches too, making mistakes with all of you. And being down and dirty has helped me to understand.
Helped me to understand why people “fake it.”
To understand why people say one thing and do another.
To understand why people yearn for love but don’t dare endanger friendships.
To understand why we separate our well-being from our words.
To understand why it’s easier to tell an open digital world that you’re aching than it is to look into someone else’s eyes and say it.
To understand why joy is contagious but brief, but what lasts a lifetime is grief.
To understand why it’s so important to “dance like no-one’s watching.” Because it is. And everyone is watching. But fuck it, you are beautiful, right?
Dance!
- Z
Thursday, August 19, 2010
A Midnight Missive
If I’m wrong, and there is a God, I’m going to tell Him about you.
If I finally black out for the last time and open my eyes again to the pearly gates, with Judgement at my feet and the big guy ahead of me, I’m going to wave my right to the questions. I’m not going to ask Him what He was thinking about suffering, or ask Him how I was supposed to know that He existed. I’m not going to ask Him how it all started, or how it’s supposed to end.
Love, I’m going to pull up a chair and tell Him about you.
Because none of that other stuff matters. The stuff about Catholics and Protestants. The Dead Sea Scrolls. The Golden Rule vs the 10 Commandments. Capitalism, Communism, and what he would do when both football teams both sides asked Him for help. It’s all nonsense, armchair word games, in comparison.
But I will tell Him about your beauty. About how struck I was by your eyes, your form, and your words. About how you were an artist that I envied and a protagonist that kept me page-turning life. I’ll talk a lot about how I smiled thinking of you, and all the little quirks and asides that we had. I’ll mention that your form physically had a poise and grace that was all at once normal, natural, sublime and intoxicating. I’ll note with distinction that your demeanour always reflected the same.
We’ll talk until the sun goes down, or up, or whatever the sun does in heaven, while I tell Him about how you were the only one I would have crossed oceans for. How my life was altered when I met you. How my being was vindicated by your welcome.
He’ll understand with His perfect smile how I was simultaneously willing to change who I was into the “perfect image” of what a man should be like for you (and you alone!), and yet I understood that that was a blasphemy to you. We’ll sit in big fluffy cloud-armchairs beside a fire recognizing that nothing inspired me to be me more than you. Just by being you. He’ll know what I mean when I say that. And He’ll know that you never said anything like that, but I knew it. When I’m done, He’ll understand that you were my Understanding.
I’ll talk about how you sometimes didn’t believe me, or believed that I believed it but it wasn’t true in fact. But He and I would laugh, because we would both know the Truth. Over angel-cake, we’ll talk about how your life could breathe into mine with the slightest of flickers. How you made “loving” worth doing.
While I can’t put it into words, we’ll be in heaven so I’ll use the language of feeling, and tell him about how we were always independent and yet always connected. How I struggled throughout my life never to come on to strong and too removed from reality, but also never to do a disservice to the importance of your being. Then, using our heaven-language, I’ll convey the secret that I held all my life – that I knew you knew that I never had to worry about coming on too strong or too weak, too surreal or too pragmatic. That I never had to worry at all. We were exactly as we should be. As we would be.
And as my weary head lays to rest, I’ll tell Him the Truth: that you were perfect.
And it won’t matter than He already knows everything, being God and all, because that’s not the point. The point is that if I’m not telling the story of your beauty, then I can’t possibly be in Paradise. Because there is nothing that affects me so profoundly as you. If my soul truly is immortal then it has to be resonating with the sound of you, because you make me feel alive. Like no other.
You’re divine.
- Z
If I finally black out for the last time and open my eyes again to the pearly gates, with Judgement at my feet and the big guy ahead of me, I’m going to wave my right to the questions. I’m not going to ask Him what He was thinking about suffering, or ask Him how I was supposed to know that He existed. I’m not going to ask Him how it all started, or how it’s supposed to end.
Love, I’m going to pull up a chair and tell Him about you.
Because none of that other stuff matters. The stuff about Catholics and Protestants. The Dead Sea Scrolls. The Golden Rule vs the 10 Commandments. Capitalism, Communism, and what he would do when both football teams both sides asked Him for help. It’s all nonsense, armchair word games, in comparison.
But I will tell Him about your beauty. About how struck I was by your eyes, your form, and your words. About how you were an artist that I envied and a protagonist that kept me page-turning life. I’ll talk a lot about how I smiled thinking of you, and all the little quirks and asides that we had. I’ll mention that your form physically had a poise and grace that was all at once normal, natural, sublime and intoxicating. I’ll note with distinction that your demeanour always reflected the same.
We’ll talk until the sun goes down, or up, or whatever the sun does in heaven, while I tell Him about how you were the only one I would have crossed oceans for. How my life was altered when I met you. How my being was vindicated by your welcome.
He’ll understand with His perfect smile how I was simultaneously willing to change who I was into the “perfect image” of what a man should be like for you (and you alone!), and yet I understood that that was a blasphemy to you. We’ll sit in big fluffy cloud-armchairs beside a fire recognizing that nothing inspired me to be me more than you. Just by being you. He’ll know what I mean when I say that. And He’ll know that you never said anything like that, but I knew it. When I’m done, He’ll understand that you were my Understanding.
I’ll talk about how you sometimes didn’t believe me, or believed that I believed it but it wasn’t true in fact. But He and I would laugh, because we would both know the Truth. Over angel-cake, we’ll talk about how your life could breathe into mine with the slightest of flickers. How you made “loving” worth doing.
While I can’t put it into words, we’ll be in heaven so I’ll use the language of feeling, and tell him about how we were always independent and yet always connected. How I struggled throughout my life never to come on to strong and too removed from reality, but also never to do a disservice to the importance of your being. Then, using our heaven-language, I’ll convey the secret that I held all my life – that I knew you knew that I never had to worry about coming on too strong or too weak, too surreal or too pragmatic. That I never had to worry at all. We were exactly as we should be. As we would be.
And as my weary head lays to rest, I’ll tell Him the Truth: that you were perfect.
And it won’t matter than He already knows everything, being God and all, because that’s not the point. The point is that if I’m not telling the story of your beauty, then I can’t possibly be in Paradise. Because there is nothing that affects me so profoundly as you. If my soul truly is immortal then it has to be resonating with the sound of you, because you make me feel alive. Like no other.
You’re divine.
- Z
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Parties and Hospital Beds
A year ago, I was being discharged from the hospital.
A year ago, the red scars down the front of my chest were fresh, covered in bandages that I shouldn’t get wet. I could not sleep for more than 2 hours straight, and often sat up painfully in plastic chairs tired and hot, hungry but too nauseous to eat.
A year ago, I couldn’t walk for more than five minutes at a time, and I stumbled with my hands crossed over my chest, a baby pillow wrapped in my arms. Sitting in cars produced cricks in necks, and self-sponge bathing was awkward. Slugs moved faster, and with more dignity.
A year ago, a friend who had promised she would come to the coast and visit me during the whole thing, didn’t. And a girl I liked, and devoted much of my earnest attention to her trials in the past, didn’t even send me a text. Many people would show up to a party, but too few take the time to visit hospital beds. Only one of the two really matters. Only one of the two will I really remember.
A year ago, I was miserable. A dear friend of mine privately commented that, when I lost my job before surgery, they were concerned I might actually commit suicide over the whole thing. My father continually suggested that after surgery life would turn around for me, I’d feel so much better with that emotional baggage of “needing surgery” over and done with. They were both wrong. My lowest point was a year ago, just after the surgery, and just after the hospital. My heart, and its dysfunction, had never played a role in my mind until after the surgery. Never. Not once did I ever feel limited, or cautious, because of some supposed difficulty with the ticker. And now, since a year ago, I’ve worried about it more with its “fixed” valve than I ever have before. I wish they had never needed to fix it.
“Do you ever just throw a pity party for yourself?”
I smiled when I was given the question. Yes. Yes I do.
A year later, I’m still going. My family – today and last year - never stopped being there for me, and has always been the very definition of what love should be. I am headed to school in the fall, and am back to work. I’m even re-finding my old ambitions and passions – to fight for what’s right, to not give a shit about what’s not important, and to laugh honestly when we confuse the two.
But yes, friend. Sometimes I still walk with an emotional pillow crossed between my arms, hugged against my heart.
The new scars begin to dull, but they still feel foreign. Not at all like my old scars, which had been a part of me. Which I had privately liked.
- Z
A year ago, the red scars down the front of my chest were fresh, covered in bandages that I shouldn’t get wet. I could not sleep for more than 2 hours straight, and often sat up painfully in plastic chairs tired and hot, hungry but too nauseous to eat.
A year ago, I couldn’t walk for more than five minutes at a time, and I stumbled with my hands crossed over my chest, a baby pillow wrapped in my arms. Sitting in cars produced cricks in necks, and self-sponge bathing was awkward. Slugs moved faster, and with more dignity.
A year ago, a friend who had promised she would come to the coast and visit me during the whole thing, didn’t. And a girl I liked, and devoted much of my earnest attention to her trials in the past, didn’t even send me a text. Many people would show up to a party, but too few take the time to visit hospital beds. Only one of the two really matters. Only one of the two will I really remember.
A year ago, I was miserable. A dear friend of mine privately commented that, when I lost my job before surgery, they were concerned I might actually commit suicide over the whole thing. My father continually suggested that after surgery life would turn around for me, I’d feel so much better with that emotional baggage of “needing surgery” over and done with. They were both wrong. My lowest point was a year ago, just after the surgery, and just after the hospital. My heart, and its dysfunction, had never played a role in my mind until after the surgery. Never. Not once did I ever feel limited, or cautious, because of some supposed difficulty with the ticker. And now, since a year ago, I’ve worried about it more with its “fixed” valve than I ever have before. I wish they had never needed to fix it.
“Do you ever just throw a pity party for yourself?”
I smiled when I was given the question. Yes. Yes I do.
A year later, I’m still going. My family – today and last year - never stopped being there for me, and has always been the very definition of what love should be. I am headed to school in the fall, and am back to work. I’m even re-finding my old ambitions and passions – to fight for what’s right, to not give a shit about what’s not important, and to laugh honestly when we confuse the two.
But yes, friend. Sometimes I still walk with an emotional pillow crossed between my arms, hugged against my heart.
The new scars begin to dull, but they still feel foreign. Not at all like my old scars, which had been a part of me. Which I had privately liked.
- Z
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