Tabula Rasa

Resolutioning is, of course, an art.

It’s like letter writing, or gift giving. Activities that can be done without thought or care, but should be done with the greatest of spirit. Anyone can text hello. Anyone can give you tube socks. But a good letter is a private message from the soul – the things that wine and fireplaces were made for. A good gift is a public symbol from the heart – the things that tears and smiles are inspired by.

How can it be any surprise, then, that a good resolution is no different? It is, perhaps, one of the hardest art forms. Simultaneously, it is a private letter written with the most pertinent of passions and a public gift given to sate the most important of wants - all addressed to the self. And, as if the creating of such a thing was not difficult enough, accepting your own offerings with humility is itself a seemingly impossible hypocrisy.

But anyone can get themselves a gym membership.

Thankfully, not all good art is serious. Good art is real. Is not a hangover a punch-line as much as it is a lesson? Is not a mis-connected kiss a splendour of entertainment? Hesitations and shocks and Freudian slips are the practical jokes of the spirit. If we cannot return the favour, giving ourselves gag gifts and meaningfully satirical missives, then we are no proper artist at all!

We must celebrate our lives with zeal, for our lives most certainly celebrate us.

So, ladies and gentlemen, join me. The task is not an impossible one. And while it is difficult, it also happens to be a most pleasurable pursuit. Grab a cigar. Have a drink. Make yourselves comfortable, because while I’ll do it for myself, I’ll not do it alone. Bring your dreams. Don’t buckle your seat-belt. Because, while it’ll be a fantastic ride, you won’t want to be tied down.

At the turn of every new year we impose upon our community a charge: to capitalize the day. To turn it into an event – a celebration. Not everyone partakes and, though it has its traditions as much as Christmas and St. Patrick’s Day, not everyone celebrates the same way. But it is a time when we call on ourselves and our peers to be creators of a most difficult kind. We call upon ourselves to be artists, and dare ourselves to use our own lives as canvas.

I am certain we are up to the task.

Etch-a-Sketch at the ready,
- Z

Untitled

What is this familiar storm that taps on the windowsill of my mind? I look for you closely, but you are the wind. What is this chill I feel in my bones, that warms to the touch? What is this sound, that I hear between whispers? I listen with all my heart, but your song is sung in a strange silence.

I hear it now and again, in these midnight evenings, around the corner. A smell that was almost a smile in a mind that was almost a soul. How I languish in its melody. Eternity is the air between me and yesterday. Its strings hum in the vibration of ghosts dancing in hallways that were never walked. Where have you gone? Where have you been?

A missing puzzle piece lay inside a picture of you. Its stark contours perfect a reflection I would otherwise ignore. It brings out your eyes. Were it that simple to dismiss your incomplete image. To discard your absent face. I long to find a substitute to complete you. To feel fingers that were never there. To stop knowing so well the knock that never answers. But I fear that you are perfection. I fear that you are divine.

Angel feathers float as if to fly. Tears drop, never meaning to cry. You are a butterfly’s sigh. What is this world that makes up feel like down? What is it about you that is never around? I can taste you on the memories that have forgotten their tales. I know you in moments that never mattered. Why?

When did we forget? When did I protect? When did you first hesitate? When did we say it was okay to abate? Relate? Renunciate? When did a dream become a fantasy? Why did we stop letting go? What questions are these? A strange reversal of toes and fortune, in a land where walking asks only a little wondering and wandering requires wings.

What secret symphony hides behind fingertips? Torrid love affairs politely dare to wait. Passion grows on trees; fallen fruit a maiden’s fare. But here is not there. Here, against the odds of a rich man’s bet, is the breath between the apple and the fall. Nothing bated. Not quite sated. There is a forever that is not quite here. It raps and taps and can’t blow the house down.

But there’s never a but. There is if only. There is a yearning. There is a wonder and a wander, a splendour and a squander. There is a shadow of a smile as bright as sunlight. And there is a puddle that knew what it meant to cry. There is a truth that never had a home and never lost its way. It just didn’t like to stay. And when there is a moon or a star, there is a gentle feeling of what you are.

What does it mean when you come out to play? What am I to do? What am I to say? What is this tender storm that raps against my windowsill? Is that your echo sounding in the wind? What is this warmth underneath my skin? Where do I start, and where do I begin?

"What Dreams May Come"

Everyone you ever know will abandon you.

Out of Office Reply

I’m sorry, the angst that you’re looking for is not here at the moment. It will be out for the remainder of the day. If your heart is urgent, please contact our mutual friend.

A good thing can derail you completely. For me, it’s always been love. Not that very heavy, philosophically speaking, duty bound, obligation wrapped, entrenched in existence, long term love. I mean the colloquial stuff. The stuff that we honestly shouldn’t call love, because it’s not, but we really want to anyways. It’s a combination of romance and a casual cat-and-mouse chase, sprinkled with that touch of light lust. The kind that doesn’t pine, but smiles.

It’s a game. A magnificent fantasy that lives in between the space of what we say, and what we don’t. A delightful, innocent yet guilty escape that we can all live in, just for a little while. A place where all of our worries and concerns, our truths and realities, can be put on a shelf and we can live a life where we’re really who we want to be.

It’s the really good stuff.

I’m addicted to it. I don’t care if it’s not real. When a pretty girl compliments me in just such a way that I can imagine they really do mean it, I’m transported to the top of the world.

The best do it with far more subtlety. A smile. A glance. A laugh. My favourite is a send-off. I know a friend who can do it with a thanks or a goodbye. Incredible grace. She knows the game.

I had the most extraordinary dream the other night. I know I’ve reported dreams before. And I know, one of the most boring thing to hear about is someone else’s dreams. But this was something else. This has got to be told. The very definition of a sweet dream. Nothing smutty, or slutty, or any of the usual nocturnal fantasies of male-ness. All our clothes stayed on. It was Romeo and Juliet without the bad ending.

Have you ever had one?

I will not bother you with the fantastic details. It is enough to say that I was visiting her, this woman of my dreams. Her dad was imposing. There was a challenge of egos. I won, but no one looked bad. We all laughed and spent time together. All of it, of course, distorted by the kaleidoscope of the dream world. Soon after our gallivanting, in a private moment, I admitted that I liked her. In retrospect it feels like the script was stolen from a high school special.

And then, in a moment of pure earnestness and honesty that I’m only capable of in dreams, I wrapped my fingers around hers and we held hands.

I woke up in that moment, in the warmest of ways.

It wasn’t that the dream had ended, so much as that it had become too blissfully real to be contained. If you’ve ever had a nightmare, that cumulated into an image that shook you awake, you’ll know the sort of thing I’m talking about. I didn’t know that it could happen the other way around, not with fear but with joy. Turns out, it can.

It certainly derailed me. None of the waking troubles of the world could touch me in the following hours. False as though it may have been, there had been a reality there that Hollywood and the best of lying lovers will never be able to imitate.

Whether it’s waking or sleeping: sweet dreams.

- Z

Open Pandora's Box

In a fight between Gandhi and my dad, my dad would win. Just saying.

On my way into Starbucks today, I glanced at the headline of a newspaper. "H1N1 may become a regular seasonal flu." I realized, right then, that I was living in the future. The kind of future that predicts massive epidemics that wipe out 98% of the world.

Normally I don't care. Flu is flu, and I am healthy. I may get sick, but then I'll just be sick, and then I'll get healthy again. But a few months ago I had heart surgery. It still hurts when I cough. Sneezing is an event. A proper flu, whether by man or by swine, scares me. This year, I'm actually measuring whether or not I should get a vaccine.

And then I saw that headline. I am reminded of all of those philosophers, whose names I actively try to forget. The ones who tell us that life is merely suffering, and our inevitable end is our only saving grace. In our future, it certainly feels like that. If it's not a cold, it's the cold. If it's not the cold it's the heat. If it's not the heat, it's the drought. If it's not the drought, it's the famine. If it's not the famine, it's the flood. If it's not the flood, it's the fires. And if it's not the fires, then we can breath easy for the rest of the season.

As long as we're secure from the recession and our souls are saved.

But I'm not a doomsayer. Really. 9 days out of 10, I'm not. And the other day, I drink.

After a couple of drinks at a Christmas party last year, I told a friend that the world was just a million little small, simple things. The regalia was simply that - a few dozen lamps, and table clothes in a room built with simple wood and cement. But my point wasn't the theoretical simplicity of nature. It was the theoretical simplicity of ethics. I think she was confused about some politics between her and an old lover, or had made a comment about things being complicated between her friends.

I laughed a pleasantly inebriated laugh, and told her that it had a simple solution. I didn't know the particulars (people protect particulars), so I could only enlighten her as to the theory. Things that are complicated are all things that were once simple. Find the simple building blocks. Acknowledge the ones you can move and affect, and the ones that you can't. Move the ones you can. Untangle the web.

It doesn't quite work that way, she told me.

Sure it does. But here's the kicker, and why it doesn't seem like it does - everyone involved has to move the building blocks. If everyone's interested in doing it, then it is by definition - done.

Often it doesn't seem like that, of course. That's because, more and more, everyone always says they want it resolved. Both lovers in a fight will tell you in candid moments that they don't want to fight. Both lovers that earnestly care for one another will tell you in candid moments that they don't want to hurt one another. But both lovers that would rather protect themselves over their partner also say that they don't want to hurt one another. They've learned the script, the lover's lines.

The final twist from simple to complicated: often, people get so good at reciting these lines, they even think they believe them.

There's good news - there is a vaccine against this false belief. And while it is in very short supply, it is very easy to acquire, and very effective. But unfortunately, it can have side effects.

I've noticed, in my little life, that the vaccine is in highly disputed. Though its sole design is to increase our immune system to defend against self-deception and to increase self-awareness and group cohesion, many people claim that it will do more harm than good. They claim that, in trying to make community stronger, it will only complicate things further. It is folly to think that things can be simplified for they are by their very nature complicated, claim the disputers.

My friend left the issue simply at "you don't understand." The response, of course, was ironic.

What I shout to myself, at the top of my lungs, is how easy living is. Not the fires, or the floods, or any of those nasty things that we don't have control over. I mean, the things we are in control of: the simple building blocks.

The problem of ethics was solved a long time ago. But people still prefer not to take the medicine, thinking not doing so is the more natural route. Thinking it's the easier route. Sometimes even thinking it's the less painful route. It baffles me.

We may get over it this season, and the sick may get well again. But if things don't get simpler, they will get more complicated. The epidemics will only get worse.

My father, in his infinite wisdom, offers an alternative, more effective method than the vaccine in a recent email to me:

"All a problem is, is two opposing forces (remove one side and bingo no more problem)"

Kill the patient.

God I love him.

- Z

Prove It.

My favourite part about Halloween is the irony and near-obvious hypocrisy. We take off our natural masks to don closer facsimiles of our true nature. Real artists must love this holiday. So must psychologists. I don't like to dress up. I dress up every other day of the year.

The first time I heard about "To Write Love on Her Arms" was on a T-Shirt. I almost rolled my eyes and stifled contempt. If not for the political ramifications of speaking out against it, I probably would have done so, right then and there. I would have provided a genuine, obviously uninformed criticism of the on-the-surface value of such a shirt.

The most recent time I heard about the "movement," as they're calling it, was on Facebook. I did roll my eyes, this time. Someone told me, or I read somewhere, that all of the sales for the merchandise goes to mean-well organizations. Charities to help the depressed, or the suicidal, or something like that. I've learned also, that this merchandise is in addition to a giant attempt to raise awareness for these emotional and psychological causes, as well as to genuinely show those afflicted or who feel unloved that they are indeed cared for. This is done by having everyone physically write "love" on their arms, on a specific day.

I've known a couple of "cutters." I think they self-identify as cutters, but I'm not perfectly sure if they do. I'm not about to ask. If a label helps, great. If it doesn't, toss it. I just know them by their names. They've got those curious marks up and down their arms. The ones that you notice, but try not to notice. The ones that encourage an immediate thought in your brain; a judgement, even if it's a judgement not to judge.

I'm glad I've met them, and known them. Honestly, having known people before, during and after they've cut, as well as asking and talking to them about it, has empowered me to the whole thing. I can look at those arm-scars with far less judgement, and certainly without label. It sounds cliché, and is in no way meant to downplay their significance, but they feel merely like another part of who they were and have come to be.

I would be embarrassed to be in their company and have "love" written on my arm. But I'm not embarrassed to tell anyone that I care for how much they mean to me. I'm not embarrassed to tell them they can call me at 3 in the morning if they want to. And I'm not angry when they do call. I'll take a taxi right on over.

My Facebook live-status thing informs me that 9 more friends will be attending "To Write Love On Her Arms". I can't help but wonder if they've ever held a person close while they wept. No ink on a wrist compares. Have they ever altered their actions and taken the time to talk to someone they were concerned about? Do they ever think, unbidden by any presented tragedy, of the well being of specific others? I don't know. But I've known people who don't.

Caring is officially a cause. Hypocrisy, really. Defying the definition of "support." It boils my blood. It's what we excel at, actually. We would rather "raise awareness" than be aware ourselves. Pay lip service rather than actual service. We would rather donate to a fantastic cause than alter our lives to naturally support it. The democracy of the dollar. Buy the image you want, then be whoever else you want to be underneath.

And don't even get me started on corporations. Legally people too, they embrace the masquerade with a particular penchant.

Happy Halloween.

By now, I must sound like the Gandhi quote that I abhor: "Be the change that you wish to see in the world." I don't believe that. I don't think that if you want there to be no war, you must become a pacifist. I don't think the key to everyone loving each other is to start loving.

(The best way to cause change in the world is to convince the people in power that it's in their best interest, while veiling the change in the costume of democracy, and the frills of capitalism. Often that requires a smiling deception, not a genuine adoption of a change well before its time. For more education on the matter, watch any reality TV show.)

I'm not pretending to be a saint, myself. Often, the largest reason I donate to the homeless is because someone else is watching. I don't feel the need to meaningfully connect with every person that I meet on the street. I use careful scepticism to ensure that I feel validated in not donating to charity. And, emotionally, I'm god-awfully selfish.

What I'm trying to say is be the person you claim to be. Be the label, don't label the being. Writing love on your arm doesn't show you care. Actively caring shows you care. So, if you want to show your support, support! Don't write letters, write phone numbers. Don't stand on a soap-box, sit at a coffee table.

And, if you must, then instead volunteer to write love on the arms of anyone that has shown you earnest caring. Better a contest than a cause. It's a far better costume.

Love,
- Z

It's Just a Game

All the world is moved by pretty girls.

I met another one last night. Another one of those smiles that I could fall in love with. Eyes that distract you from really seeing anything else.

I first noticed her when she asked if I wanted my "usual" at Starbucks. 4 pump, no water, chai tea latte. It wasn't until a few visits later that I realized that she was the same barista that I had given money to, to randomly purchase someone else's drink. But I did realize right away when she changed her hair. Her co-workers didn't, she joked.

I went in yesterday evening, to spend some time alone lost in people with a drink I enjoy and a book that makes me smile. She was at the till. That was unexpected. I thought she worked mornings. She volunteered that it was one of her last shifts as a barista: she wasn't doing so well in school, and either her job or her social life had to go. The job never had a chance. I told her I was devastated and asked what she was taking. International Relations. We swapped a couple of niceties about the program. I swiped my debit card.

I never learned her name.

My friends often joke that if it were not for the natural motivation of pretty girls, nothing would have gotten done in our male-dominated history. It's always pleasantly world-altering to meet another one.

The other night I had a dream. A real dream, not an ideological dream. I was enrolled in school. It was the first day. I was taking a bus tour around the campus. It was a tour geared towards all the first years, and I was new, but I already knew my way around. I was restarting.

The dream jumped to my being in a car, just finding a parking spot. I jumped out quickly, with a few of my friends. The sun was shining, and the pavement had that expensive, rarely-driven-on look. I could smell the lifestyle. I was exceptionally happy. I was a first year something, in a new school, in a new place, and I felt relaxed in who I was. This was what I wanted.

When my dream looks through the looking glass, it finds itself no less warped than Alice does. In real life, I've often thought about re-starting. Never has the "I wish I could re-do it" feeling been so strong as it has been for me, about school, over the past couple of years. But school was merely the localized target of a larger, grand-scale desire for a do-over. Over the past couple months, I've been reading through a lot of high school notes from family and friends telling me about how the sky's the limit for me. I've been reconnecting with old friends who express that old understanding that I've got potential. And yet when I tell myself that old "world's my oyster" cliché, in any kind of mirror, I no longer believe it.

And I'd like to believe it again, even though I've said it to myself a thousand times and never followed through, I'd like to act on it again. In light of the paradox, re-doing it all is the only answer my melancholy mind appreciates.

Socrates is famously quoted for claiming that he was the wisest person in the world - the Oracle at Delphi helped him to understand that he was the wisest because he knew that he didn't know anything.

I don't know how to fix a car.
Don't know how to take beautiful pictures.
I haven't the foggiest understanding of how to buy a house. Or start my own company.
And don't even think about putting me in a room with a real philosophy student.

I'm terrified that my experiences might not have taught me anything. My waking nightmare includes feeling like everything I've worked for, and other people have contributed to, has not produced anything of value. Sometimes it feels like it never will.

See, I like to build. I like to imagine myself as one big bucket of accumulating experiences, and that with every drop that goes in, I become a better, more full person. That list of "I don't"s gets smaller. But these past years feel like the bucket leaks faster than it fills. It feels like Sisyphus' rock beats Nietzsche’s will to power paper every time. That's just not fair.

I don't know how to be properly impassioned.
I don't know where I buried that confidence I used to have.
I don't know what will bring me sustainable joy.

But I suppose, technically speaking, neither did Socrates. Accepting that worked out pretty well for him. I could handle being in that company.

I may pass on the hemlock though.

Even though Socrates found out at Delphi that all his work and understanding was worthless, Socrates rejoiced, and redoubled his honest inquiry and legitimate pursuit of the good. For him, it was one of the best things that had ever happened. Restarting made him into one of the most well known philosophers of all time. And more importantly, restarting helped him to be happy with who he was.

I don't know her name. Probably never will.

- Z

You Don't Ever Stop.

Hello. How are you?

Just before I sat down to write this blog entry, I read a friend's blog. She had written, word for word, the sentiment that had inspired my day-by-day survival a couple of years ago. None of us are so very far away from one another, I think, even in the times that it feels like we are miles apart.

I think I've told this story before, but I'm going to tell it again. I actually really like it. A long time ago, I wrote a fictional letter inspired by a non-fictional event. It was supposed to be from one ex-lover to another who had long since parted ways and not spoken for some time. The writer did not know if the intended recipient would ever read it, or if it would have any impact, but it didn't matter. The point was the writing of it.

Privately, though perhaps transparently, it contained my every hope for my own, real life, future.

I was taught through careful eavesdropping that an artist ought to write what they know. So, I poured all of my own hopes and dreams into this creation, first imagining a place where the moon shone, the evening fire was warm and everything in my life was under my control. And then, my imagination complete, I put fingertips to keyboard and started typing.

It began:

~~~

My Beloved,

I hope you are well.

I wish there was a way to stress those words, but I must confess I cannot italicize my written word without making it utterly illegible. Of course, in and of itself, merely altering the text would not – just as putting it first and foremost does not – properly include the importance of the expression. It contains more of my heart than any other thing that you will hereafter endure.

~~~

The letter went on, but its beginning, flowing quickly and easily from my mind, taught me something about myself that I have yet to forget.

I suppose, on this traditional Turkey Day, I should be thankful for all the traditional things. I should be thankful for my family and friends, as well as my health and having the good fortune to live in a country where my health has not bankrupt me or the above mentioned family and friends. I should be thankful for all of the things I've survived through in the past. I should be thankful for all of the things that I have the potential to experience in the future.

But I think that the Old Testament God had things a little confused. I'm not sure we can truly praise that which we fear. Because, in truth, I'm more afraid of these things than thankful for them. Since my heart has been fixed, all I can think of is how much I fear my body breaking down slowly, over the next 70-80 years. I have had friends support me, and all I continually feel faced with is the inevitable, temporary nature and impotence of friends. I live where fortune smiles, and I am reminded that everywhere else it does not, and I'm much too big a coward to do anything about that.

So I can't bring myself to expound upon the virtues of my traditionally thankful topics. The clichés only sound like clichés this year. Honestly, I can feel the sneer creep up my throat as I try to utter them.

But I do hope you're well.

That's what it's all about, isn't it? No matter what we put in between "hello" and "goodbye" to try to express ourselves, doesn't it amount to our longing for the best? Most of the time we ask the standard question - how are you? - dismiss it quickly, and then get into the nitty gritty details of our coffee gossip. But there is a hidden gem there that the evolution of our language has hidden. Much like "bitch" once legitimately meant female dog instead of vindictive woman, "how are you?" once was a legitimate inquiry into the emotional and physical state of another individual, instead of a colloquial greeting.

Since writing that fictional non-fiction, I have come to appreciate the meaning of the saying "I hope you are well." It has a texture, and it has a taste. It's slightly different and unique every time. And in all my texting, and emailing, and talking, it's the one phrase that I always hear my heart chiming in on, and the harmony sounds beautiful. When I put it in question form, I've never been afraid that I might get a real answer. I can be thankful for that.

That doesn't mean I'll always get a real answer, of course. Sometimes I over-play my desire to be a "knight in shining armour" and ask too much. Sometimes people don't want to share. And sometimes I couldn't care less, so I don't ask. No one's perfect.

But when I say it, I mean it. Everything I am is put into it, and time stops while I write/ask/type/text/speak it. We could spend all day there, if you'd like.

It won't disappear once it hits the air. It won't scab or scare. And it certainly won't be lost underneath any other mountain of words or feelings, even if it is sometimes buried. It will not stop.

Hello. How are you?

Happy Thanksgiving,
- Z

Waving Hello

Just the other day, my sister asked me about my love life.

There's something in the brisk autumn air these days. It's not romance, but romance certainly has a lot to do with it. Romance, baby making, adventure finding, family building, getting old, they're all symptoms of a time where we are finding our rightful place.

5 or 6 months ago, my sister would not have outright, out of the blue, asked about my relationships with women. She certainly would not have phrased it "how's your love life?" Maybe a poking or a prodding about a girl I had been mentioning a lot. Or she might give me one of those looks when I drop a feminine name. Sometimes, she'd reciprocate, when I asked her. But this making-it-a-subject was new.

5 or 6 months ago, I was telling a friend of mine (one of those feminine names I dropped), that I felt like the world followed one of those fancy math wave functions. The ones that go up and down and up and down. That is to say, the world went from a place of change, to a place of stagnation, and then back to a place of change, etc etc. She asked me to clarify - if I meant my world, or what. I replied that I meant the whole world. Everyone does. 6 degrees of separation, if you're familiar with it, must also link us to being influenced similarly by the world. What happens to any of us is only 6 degrees away from affecting all of us.

At the time, I believed I felt that the world was entering a new stage of change. A period of stagnation was ending. I cited my proofs for her: the economy was entering or in the middle of a recession, people were quitting, new policies had just finished being enacted at work, I had surgery around the corner, my friends had kids on the way, some friends had just broken up or were about to get together.

I don't like to brag, but I was right. Take a look at the last year, and tell me it wasn't so for you or for someone you know.

And I think it's coming to an end. Our parents teach us that the world is not black and white. They are right at least with regard to this - change will not suddenly cease, just as it did not suddenly appear. There is no starting line, and no ending line. So, while I suggest to you that a period of stagnation is coming, that doesn't mean that I think, in a few weeks, we'll all settle down. It means, I think things are resolving, and will continue to resolve into the intangible future. We'll know it's happened when we wake up one day, and things are again changing for us - changing in that strange fundamental way that we notice.

I see my friends with their children in hands, their onward journey to creating a family well underway. I hear that acquaintances have finally acquired that job they wanted. Others are booking plane tickets. Buying houses. Going to school. Getting married. These are things that require diligence to a particular lifestyle.

Stagnation is a terrible word. It makes it sound like a deplorable fate - the "down" of the up-down-up-down of the world. But I don't think it has to be. Just like there is good and bad change, there is good and bad stagnation. And, as I've listed above, there's a lot of good things that have happened. I honestly get the feeling that this next period of our lives will be dominated by the cultivating of those lifestyles, and not the changing of them.

So, when my sister asks me about my love life, my first thoughts are not about explaining to her my views on being single-by-choice and what I would require from a partner. They're about the change in what's just happened between us. Her asking earnestly about me and love, my giving her honest discussion about guys and commitment... that's a lifestyle change that I want to cultivate.

They say in the big, blue, standardized heart-surgery booklet that after a big operation a patient often re-evaluates their life and makes significant changes. Anyone who watches Hollywood movies can tell you that. But when I got back to my apartment, I have to say, I discovered the cliché had things a little backwards. I didn't suddenly notice all the things in my life I wanted to change. I noticed what had already changed. Life doesn't stop, and so with my changed circumstances and return, I noticed how life had re-evaluated me.

Most changes I adore - and I hope that in their upcoming period of cultivation, I continue to get to play the role I do. I certainly intend to, with glee. And the changes I don't like, and can’t do anything about, I will stoically accept. Because it feels like the world is almost finished hitting the "reset" button, and is at a new starting line.

My sister and I are certainly getting ready for this race. We Websters are particularly good at it. And friends, I've got a feeling about this one.

- Z

Picture Me

Will you take my picture?

Will you make me look manly, or pretty, or happy? Will you make it look like my world is just wonderful - full of joy and excitement and the things of good memories? Will you carefully depict my suffering and make my internal anguish beautiful? Will you use me to rage against the machine of injustice? Will you make me perfect, and imperfect, and all those things in between?

Don't. Don't tell me a lie with your truth. Don't sharpen the image, don't doctor the dream. Don't make me, see, because I want to tell you something. I want to show you. Who. I. Am.

I respect you. I know that without practice and interest and devotion to the craft you could not hear me. But today, while you are with me, I need you to put that aside. Do not be the writer who knows about writing. Do not be the painter who knows all the colours and brushes and canvas. Please do not picture an event, or represent something with an image. I am a beauty, not a project. Watch me, don't develop me. Because I want to talk to someone. I need you to hear me.

And so, I need you to be you. Because the heart does not talk to artists. Artists talk to hearts. But hearts, hearts talk to people.

You will have to be couragous. When I am down, you will have to be out. And when I am grasping for staws, you'll have to watch me flounder.

You'll have to be daring. Prepared to find adventure where strangeness once was. You'll have to risk being too close to me.

You'll have to be real. I'll love too hard, long too hard, laugh too hard and work too hard. You'll have to listen for every moment, because they can't be interpreted and they will never happen again.

You'll have to photograph me while I cry.

~~~

People who saw me repeatedly over the first few weeks of my recovery from heart surgery often remarked that I "had a lot more colour" upon their later visits. Of course, the first days in the hospital, I didn't feel like I was pale. I felt like I went out for a few too-many beers with Death the night before. Hell, when I first woke up I was still buzzed! How I looked was not really an issue I was interested in.

Of course, as I can often be found remarking when my slobbery takes over, I didn't have to look at myself. That's everyone else's problem. And there are very few mirrors in hospitals.

I suppose no one wants to see themselves in hospitals. It's not a time that anyone wants to remember. Facing one's own mortality, from a stubbed toe to death row, is not a picture perfect moment. There aren't many "hunks" on hospital beds.

But, I have always found certain comfort in pictures. The raw ones. The pictures that you take half-assed drunk at the bowling alley, or in the fall at the local park. When I broke up with my girlfriend an eternity ago, the first time I felt "whole" again was when I went out on the town with my friends and saw myself in those new pictures aftewards. That trick, despite the few pictures I have, never ceases to work when I'm feeling down or need to start fresh.

I have the great fortune to know some very talented photographers. On a couple of occasions I've been able to evesdrop on ideas for photo-projects, and been able to steal peeks into costume shots. I can't count how many times I've seen wedding and engagement and baby photos this past summer. All of them beautiful, and somehow magically representitive of their models. Breathtaking.

And the best ones are those real ones. Ones where you see the picture before the project. The man before the magic. Those are the pictures that demand my infinite respect, admiration, and envy for those talented and wonderful artists.

In writing, I've known the desire and joy of working on a project, or contributing to an artistic idea. There's really nothing like it. But the most comfortable I've ever been in writing is when the speaker and the writer are one. When I write "I".

They say that my new heart valve has a "shelf life" of about 15 years. I think I'd like to have my picture taken next time. I'd love a whole photo-journal, actually. I wonder what my colourless face looks like on painkillers. I wonder what it has to say.

There are stories within me that simply can't be told with words. I'd like to tell them.

- Z

Holding Up The World

For six weeks I have watched my silver neck chain sit on the nightstand in my mother's guestroom.

For six weeks my ritual was the same. I would roll off the bed, literally, and be faced with the decision between jeans or khakis. Then, dutifully deciding on what I thought was best, I struggled to put on my pants with as little bending as possible. Next was the shirt - a collection of all button up shirts to make the task easier. Socks were a necessary evil - my mother's place is paradise with the floors paved cold. Then I could meaningfully take up my effects. Wallet in one pocket, phone and keys in the other. Tissue was an optional accessory; a house that had raised 3 children was amply able to handle any sniffle situation on its own. And then on with my glasses, and a moment's pause in honour of the silver chain which rested next to them.

It reminded me of my mother, and it made me feel successful. Contrary to its description, this chain was a liberation. When it was around my neck, it held me fast to who I was - who I am - on the inside. And before the surgery, I wore it every day.

But sacrifices had to be made, in the name of well-being, including the emotionally fashionable. My chain, when worn, lay right on top of the largest part of my chest incision. An incision that was open, and then was raw, and then was other things that are equally unpleasant. To ensure its proper healing, the chain must be left off. It would only serve to irritate.

I always knew how much I enjoyed that little trinket but, as the wisdom goes - knowing it's raining is different from being wet. I felt naked without it, in all the empty meanings of the cliche.

Two days ago, the incision had healed enough. I did not tell my mother, but I had been secretly giddy about this day. This was just as exciting as Christmas. The incision had turned into a bright red scar much earlier, but I wanted to be sure, and I wanted it to be the right time. No point in giving something meaning if you're not going to treat it as a symbol, after all. And so, after I got back from my follow up appointments and had been told it was time to return to a more normal life, I knew it was time for the silver chain.

I had a lengthy shower to make sure I was fresh. Clean clothes were required as well; the only-worn-twice ones were not good enough for this moment. I decided, after careful thought, to not shave. I looked manlier that way; worthier of the event. Then the chain was polished, made new again. Finally, with the morning sun washing across the street and flooding the windows, I put on my chain.

There was a subtle and delightful weight to it. A weight I had not noticed before - because, I suppose, I had always carried it. But now, emerging from this life of careful healing and awareness, the weight was obvious. There was a weight to being me.

I could only grin. Like Atlas carrying the world I dutifully carried my chain. This was the smallest and most important of the burdens I would have to shoulder in the coming months. Now, more than ever, I was aware of who I was becoming and who I wanted to be. And while I may not know every step of the journey, that weight reminds me that I am walking. I'm holding my own Becoming.

Silver and body-flesh red don't really look great, but I think they go very well together.

- Z

Becoming

Original Post Date: June 3rd, 2009

Take my hand.

It's okay. We don't have to go anywhere today. I just want to show you.

You can't close your eyes, but you can focus your gaze. You can't sleep, but you can shut out the world. I can't tell you what to do, but I can show you what you could.

You can't fly, but you can travel somewhere entirely real.

Now take my hand.

The palm is soft, though not feminine. It is where the heart is held. The fingers kiss back, but don't kiss unbidden. The grip is firm. The bastard knows what he's doing.

Now you have to jump. You have to dissolve mantras and advertising slogans into puddles of alphagetti. Their words must not be given the same weight as true nutrition here! You have to grip faith as your shield and trust that it will hold. An unindulgent mind will let only its enemies through the gates of Eden. And you have to let go of all the things that you know and hold dear. That knowledge will find its own way back to you, without doubt; don't worry.

Lastly, I have a subtle hope, that you have the courage to bring your soul with you. Naked.

JUMP!

To be continued...

A Double Headed Coin

My friend tells me that everything happens in threes.

Truth is, I learn a lot from my friends. Wisdom can be found on tree trunks and tarot cards, in philosophy and philanthropy. But it always seems to have more impact coming from friends. More meaning. More accuracy. "Real friends will tell you when your face is dirty," my friend says. Tree trunks won't tell you that.

It's a difficult thing to do, to tell a friend that their face is dirty or their fly is down. Personally, I always feel awkward telling a friend that they have something in their teeth. There is something about revealing bad news to good people that is difficult. It doesn't seem to matter that not revealing that news will only make it worse. Somehow, it doesn't empower us to know that if we say nothing, the poor shmuck will have something in their teeth all day. We just feel awkward about being the bearer of bad news. It's because we know that there is a part of every person's soul that hates a good mirror with a bad reflection. No one wants to be the one to hold that mirror. That's why it takes a real friend.

My friend told me that they felt tragedy in the air. She told me that she thought large-scale, deep tragedy would soon occur to her friends. She felt it. She didn't know what it would be, or where or who it would be. She had no idea when it would be. But she felt like it was lingering on the horizon: tragedy. And she was afraid.

We are prophets. Like lightning, tragedy struck.

Exactly three weeks before my scheduled open heart surgery, I lost my job. It was lost in the most emotionally trying of ways. It was unexpectedly and sudden. 2 years of earnest service - not a lot of time in the business world, but an eternity in the world of an internet company - dissolved over a weekend. Though the financial loss was (and due to surgery, still is) palpable, this tragedy was rooted in its needlessness and its lasting emotional damage - a combination no person should ever have to endure.

The whole thing could have been solved with a simple conversation, if they had brought it up. It would have been that easy. Instead, fake smiles and laughter were delivered with one hand while formal complaints were made with the other. With no indication of wrong-doing, a man will willingly and unknowingly hang himself, and then be faulted for it. (And these accusers wonder why they are so often treated like children!) Further still, a management bent on finding proof and protection, rather than truth, finds itself ill equipped and uninterested in impartial inquiry or departmental improvement. (And it wonders why morale and loyalty buckle!) Final nails in a coffin never needed to be made: masked accusers appear. I had no known enemies, and so, these people must be people who smiled at me. Their accusations and identities are protected from me, (their well being an obvious priority over the accused's!) and I am to take the accuracy of their statements as true without capacity for verification or subsequent rebuttal. I am dismissed from my job, left with a garden that houses mystery snakes. Few recognize how lasting or far-reaching a sting it is to be entrenched in a community where some mystery persons within that community has caused you harm. Anonymity and secrecy, with good people, only ever causes suffering. It means that I have not only lost my job, but also my community. For what fool would return to possible mouths that bit him? And, whilst I am permanently alienated by the accusation, they will all be re-integrated by the graces of time and human will. Injustice is tragedy.

Open heart surgery is also tragedy. If it is thought otherwise, then you are mistaking it for a routine procedure. It is routine only for the doctors that perform it - but they go home healthy and happy at the end of the day. They go home and have a beer. And so, while it was planned, that did not make it an event of simplicity. Knowing I had no job behind me, and the volatility with which these things evaporate, another cancellation was constantly on my mind. And it almost occurred! Support, over the wait list months and false alarms, was still strong... but it is hard for it not to erode.

And while some things erode, some things do not. Memories remain. The valve replacement and repair part is easy. I just sleep with IV induced drugs. After I wake up, however, there is a gauntlet of trials that are placed under the convenient veil of "recovery". "Now all you have to do is get well," they say. And while the physical healing *is* the easy part, that does not make it easy. Drainage tubes being yanked, food not staying down, breathing tubes in your lungs during waking hours, terrible immobility, catheters, 3am sleeplessness, stabbing lung pains, uncertainty, endless drugs and scary reactions, an incapacity to make yourself supper, itching scars, constant bruising, not being able to lift more than 10 lbs, the list can go on. It is enough to show that this is an ordeal. They say that pain is something that, once finished, is the easiest to forget. And it's true, I don't remember exactly how the drainage tubes felt coming out. But I remember it. I was there. I was drugged, but I was awake and I watched it. That, just like long sleepless nights, stays with you. And of course, the mental lingers as well. Time passes slowly, and passion vanishes as soon as it has reappeared. Our former talents and skills can seem wasted on the wind. No matter how many well wishes or visitors one receives, rehabilitation is a lonely and frustrating endeavour.

Something is frustrating when it is out of your control, but you feel it shouldn't be by rights. I returned to my hometown, where recovery was to occur, leaving my apartment in the city under the care of my roommate. Shortly after my arrival, however, I got a text message. It was my roommate: he was moving out. In a couple of days. He had no intention of leaving more notice. He had no interest or capacity to leave more rent.

Losing a roommate on such short notice, next to the previous two things, seems a minor setback rather than a third tragedy. But it is in tandem with the previous paragraphs that we see what vices make this particularly problematic. I am stuck an hour and a half's drive away, during the recovery from my surgery. This makes looking for, interviewing, and showing potential roommates my place very, very difficult. I am unable to move more than 10 lbs, which makes it impossible for me to consider moving without significant assistance. I have no job, which means every dollar that disappears is one that is not replenished. This includes dollars lost paying for a 2 bdrm place by myself. In a phrase, this is incredibly bad timing and an awkward burden on a mind already recovering and trying to figure out what it will do with itself.

Given these tragedies, how can a person not be optimistic?

It sounds like sarcasm, but it's not. Given all this immense change, these new social revelations and physical repairs, I find it difficult at times not to grin like the Cheshire cat himself.

I have another friend who says that there are always two sides to the story. She says that the truth can always be found somewhere in the middle. But, in this, I don't agree with her. I don't think that two people, or two entities, or two perspectives, by virtue of the fact that they have had a disagreement must then "meet in the middle" for truth. One should never think that another perspective - simply by existing - invalidates the truth of a former perspective. Sometimes one side works harder to get an accurate account of things. Sometimes, one party is simply wrong. Sometimes both are right and equally (or unequally!) meaningful. People are capable of objective assessment. We should work towards that. Our judgements should be based on truth and ethics, not the middle ground.

But my friend is right in one capacity, there is another way to read my tragic stories of the past month and a half. It is a way that does not make them invalid, but does help to see where my optimism bubbles from.

Let me tell you, then. But let you not forget the former reading, for while the optimism is genuine, it was borne from genuine tragedy.

As a preface, it should be mentioned that I am free. I have no debt. No family dependents or other financial obligations. I'm 25 - young enough for fresh starts, but old enough to know the difficulty of what I attempt. I'm not a genius, but I am smart. Smart enough to be able to attempt any of the traditionally "difficult" career paths: lawyer, dentist, doctor, professor. I have built up a very select few friends and family that I know will never let me down. I've learned that sometimes I may need to ask, but those same friends and family will always be there for me. I have a 4 year degree from a very reputable Canadian university. I am humble enough to realize that that does not guarantee me anything. My ambition is not yet sapped. I'm finally getting skilled at recognizing what makes me happy. I enjoy helping others succeed. I believe in mutual success; in everyone winning.

I don't like leaving my job on terms that I will struggle to explain to future employers. I don't like not knowing who it was that accused me. I don't like the obvious degradation of values in a company that I once loved. These are things that will haunt me. But I do like the freedom. I do like knowing that I can write whatever I want, and I don't have to worry about censorship or the stereotype of a big gigantic company stealing my intellectual property. I feel free to connect myself with the open page, and put my imagination down on paper. "What dreams may come."

And I feel free from the social obligations of wanting to be well liked. It is a particular vice of mine that pops up anytime I am trapped in a room with likable people. I want to be invited to parties and get togethers. I want to be known positively by everyone around me. It is a vanity that I am not proud of, and that I try to suppress whenever I notice it, but it slips in. And in my old job, there were a lot of very likable people. But now I'm not trapped in that room. I will miss those people. I will miss the social interaction, and being a part of a team with a joint mission. But in exchange I have back my capacity to be my own person, and to only make plans when I want to.

I don't like recovery. I don't like that it hurts when I breathe deeply, or that I am stuck in a place with limited guests and limited things to do. I don't like the idea of more blood tests, or the memories of troubled sleep. But I do like the forced freedom. If I am not even allowed to use my hands to help me off the couch, then I certainly can't worry about finding a job. I don't have to worry about it. I'm free to relax, and to dream about the future. I'm given time for a video game vacation, and a time for reflection where no one is expecting results. No one will think less of me for taking the time to wait for passion, because I must also wait for physical repair. My future was once trapped by sloth. Not only has my future now been forced to fend for itself, it's been given the privilege of doing so at its own pace.

I have a new heart valve, and a repaired one. It was successful. How can one not be excited about the prospect of a working heart?

Roommate weaknesses cost money, but that's all. Money and a bit of time. I'm sad that my roommate decided to choose when he did to move out. I don't like that I have to deal with the additional concerns of moving out or moving someone else in during a trying time. But I am excited about the prospect of moving. Of having fresh blood in my living space.

It also reminds me that I am geographically free. That I could move to Toronto tomorrow if I wanted to. Not only am I able to relax, look at my options, decide on a career path that I would like and follow it with zeal, but I can do so anywhere I want. My living arrangements are temporary and without obligation. As the cliché goes, the world is my oyster.

What is the world, if the worst it has to offer me is this? I can go anywhere, I can do anything. Not only am I free to, but I am also capable of doing it. I have cleared my calendar, my obligations, my social network, my physical ties, and my mental worries.

By my tragedies, I have leave to fly.

My friend says that things happen in threes. I believe her. It's poetic and beautiful and something completely worth smiling over.

How can I not?
- Z

Wind and Water Droplets

Let the wind howl. It’s good for our souls.

Let the fury of a Mother Nature never fatigued tear the weak wills of man asunder. I always feel more comfortable when the wind is blowing. I feel more comfortable knowing that things are changing, growing, moulding, progressing, reducing, reforming. I feel more comfortable when I can trust that tomorrow brings something new.

But when I can trust that something will simply blow over, and return to a moral drought, I lose sleep. In stagnant weather, hours past midnight look the same as mid-afternoon tea.

Usually, I lose sleep to imaginary conversations. I lose it to the egoist in me, in that wit of tongue that I’ve always dreamt of having. When I cannot trust in change, laying in bed I imagine change in my mind. Without logic or pre-intention, I am transported to some fake scenario where my well placed quips win the day. Where they illuminate fault in the villain, and where they raise me as a smug hero.

One is never enough. Drought begets drought, and I start on a cycle of my own. Over and over and over, I will have conversations in my head. 11pm. Midnight. 1am. We cannot change the world with thoughts alone. Eventually, I will regain my senses, and demand change. A change in thoughts and a change in focus in hopes of finding a change in sleeplessness. Eventually it works.

But lately I have begun to fear that my waking life suffers similarly. That my writing suffers from the same cyclical drought. The words I type sound the same as before. Slightly different subject matter, very similar themes, no real change. I repeatedly envision a revolution of will that is forthcoming, but never comes. And when the winds howl and clouds threaten, my spirit is rejuvenated. But then the storm blows over.

No rain yet. And my Muse becomes depressed. I become discontented. What is a man who likes to write when he only tells the same story? And it is true, when I bore myself, how can I not worry about boring you? When my fingers stutter and stammer, feeling that they type nothing new, it is logical to assume that it might be read with the same lack of zeal. At least my midnight hero conversations only have one spectator.

But, this is not a negative mourning. It’s a plea for patience.

I do believe it is coming. I do believe that sleepless nights and imaginary conversations will be a thing of the past. I do believe I have something new worth saying. And that’s because I do believe I have things worth doing.

Trouble is, I don’t quite know what they are yet. To reveal myself in naked form, I know not what my future holds. Though the future has been thrust upon me, and all around me the world threatens its indifference and same-same lack of change, there is the faintest feeling of growth that lingers.

I do believe a storm is coming. I don’t think it’s going to be easy on me. I will be chilled to the bone. I think I will have to force myself past sleeplessness. I will have to demand change from myself. It doesn’t disappear naturally. I’m going to have to stop leaning on crutches, and force myself to walk every day. And I am terrified that, along with my weak will, all of me will be blown away. But if I am to be better than who I am, I will have to be better than who I have been.

They say that good writers borrow, and great writers steal. I refuse to let my writing be merely a reflection of this trial and journey. I will steal blatantly from the life I want, from the change I believe is coming, and write that. It must not be just a reflection, but also a declaration. A map as much as a history. I’ve never considered myself an artist, but my writing is very intimate to me. It is very much, to cite the cliché, a part of who I am. And so, I cannot let it drag behind on a leash. I must lead with it.


In addition to random updates and little pieces, I will be starting a longer writing project soon. It will be in blog-type instalments, that hopefully reflects this new intention and growth. It may not be pretty, or my best writing, but the purpose is sound. Perhaps it will serve as a draft for an even larger work in the future. I sincerely hope you’ll join me on the journey.

And, of course, don’t forget my project with Leah MacDermid, which is back on track now that surgery is done. Her instalment goes up Friday the 14th. Shameless plugging is okay if it involves someone else.

http://www.awriterandareader.blogspot.com/

- Z

Be Like a Duck

Original Post Date: July 15th, 2009

I had to laugh.

I'm not sure when the last time was that you spent some serious time in a coffee shop, but it's one of my favorite activities. When you spend enough time there with your book and your obligatory drink, and ignore both for long enough, everything seems to change. It starts to look different. Civilization starts to be revealed as a caricature. People start to look like kids playing at pretend. We're all playing house.

Underneath the line up, and the commentary on the economy, and the smiles and the thank you's... underneath the masks of living life properly are real people. And they're all kids. We're all kids. And we all have no idea what we're doing.

And while it's evident in everyone walking past the window, or waiting for their drink, I notice it most loudly in myself. I'm not sure what to do when life changes. I don't know how to act around my friends when bad things happen. I haven't the slightest idea how to go about bringing all the good things I know are out there into my own heart. I'm just guessing, like everyone else.

I once heard some great advice from my high school band teacher. If you aren't confident, fake it. Eventually, that fake confidence will breed real confidence.

When I'm upset at something or someone, I usually recite the mantra "I don't have time for..." I don't have time for situations that only cause discomfort. I don't have time for people who waste my time, or who aren't interested in my well-being. I don't have time for systems that are broken. I don't have time for immoral people.

I fake it a lot. Truth is, I do have time.

I have a friend who thinks that getting sick is funny, because you get to experience all of the strange sensations that the body does when its sick. No one's laughing at a migrane, but the experience is surreal. It's why I joke about being stabbed. I don't think it wouldn't hurt, but it would be a hell of an experience.

I've always found the same admiration with mental experiences. There is nothing quite like experiencing that strange mental, emotional experience when your mind is hurt (or, to be positive for a moment, deleriously overjoyed). It's a glimpse into that inner child who is desperately playing pretend with everything else. Those overwhelming concerns, that bewilderment, that euphoria... it's more who we are than any mask we enjoy wearing.

And it is then, that caricature is revealed in full. And it is funny. I spend countless hours reciting to myself "I don't have time for...". I catch myself obsessing about, as a greater priority than anything else, these things I suggest I don't have time for. At a glance of someone or the mere suggestion of something, my heart can jump into my throat, pounding so hard I can't see straight. My chest and fingertips are driven to that strange, cold, overwhelming nervousness with the greatest of ease. And, while I do my best to stand up straight, and I always look 'em square in the eyes, I feel like I will collapse at any moment.

And so, I cannot help but laugh. How could we not?

What strange world is this where we have rules and ethics and regulations and ego and all sorts of good intentions, yet our body still goes weak in a tense situation and our mind turns to mush. What beautiful comedy where the little can intimidate the big, and silence can condemn louder than words. Where the girl we really like and want to spend all of our time with, we can't say three words to. Where we can all line up for coffee, complain about our day to our friend, and then tell the cashier with a smile that we're doing just fine, thanks.

I love it.

We have no need to suffer. No need to be awkward. We have no time to not pursue happiness. Let's fake it until we believe it.

Paddle like hell,
- Z

Our Demons Don't Sleep At Night

Original Post Date: July 13th, 2009

The World and I have a curious relationship. I flirt with it's daughter endlessly. She flirts with me. This is who we are. This is who we were meant to be.

It's divine.

When Hurricane Katrina sank New Orleans, that was a tragedy. The World was angry. Or maybe excited. Maybe it was sending a message, or maybe it was an apathetic movement of a succession of weather systems that cumulated into an unfortunate series of events.

But it was the World.

What devastates me is the tragedy that is not created by the World. To be fair, I have never experienced the tragedy of an earthquake, or a hurricane. I've been fortunate enough to never have been wiped out by a flood or a drought. Local fires of so long ago never threatened my home.

But we, in our holy capacity, create much better tragedy. Like everything that we work to improve upon, tragedy has come to have new meaning. We have given it new depths and personal percision strikes. What bilogical weapons did for war, emotional warfare does for tragedy. The signature is civilization's EMP. Labels give birth to devils and demons in ways lightning never could.

The recession is always my example. It always makes me disappointed. Of homes going empty, and families going hungry. Of food that can't be sold and people without shelter. Both, at the same time. We have lost no capacity to live, and yet we invent reason to suffer. I hate seeing large, empty office buildings at night, next to freezing homeless people on the street. We may not kill them - jury is still out on that one. But as a society, there is no doubt that we let them die.

It is man and woman made tragedy that I find truly tragic.

It's a person-made tragedy that we encourage, not discourage. It's person-made tragedy that we accept, rather than rage against. It's person-made tragedy that we will justify and forget, rather than remember. And it is person-made tragedy that happens every day, right beside us.

When it hits too close to home, we want to blame the World.

It's been a rough couple of weeks. And for a few of us, that's an understatement. Devastating, World-Altering, and Tragic, would be better words. Perspective is important - we still have what we still have. But any subject that can cause tears to well visibly and fears to fumble out deserve more than the description "rough."

Person-made tragedy attacks trust. Trust in others - suddenly everywhere there are unknown enemies, instead of well known friends. Trust in yourself - people are not who you thought they were.

It challenges transparancy. Can you be who you are? Is what happens behind closed doors so different than it appears?

It makes you wonder whether you were right or wrong. Whether you are a good person. It makes you question who you are.

The World doesn't attack that. The World has never had an interest in attacking that. It may take away homes and riches and lives. But it doesn't take away your sense of understanding, and it doesn't challenge your morality.

My favorite silver lining is that tragedy enables (and forces) people to show their true colours. Not only can it call trust and transparency into question, it must also thrust it upon us. It is in tragedy that people are as they are and we cannot help but hope they will be the people we hope them to be. There is no other option. To that extent, I love it.

When my friend encounters some unfortunate fate, I am empowered with the capacity to actually be there for them. I am able to show them that, in me, their trust was not misplaced. To show them that I am as I appear, and want to know them for who they are. To show that I do not always get everything right, but I am a good person.

And so, recently, I have been profoundly fortunate to be able to experience that silver lining in others directly. Despite the shadows that threaten eternal haunting, and devils that threaten scathing, I have friends and family that don't give a fuck. They have come through - unrequested and unbidden - in beautiful colours. How lucky I am.

The World's daughter is ready to move our relationship to the next level. But I have to ask permission first.

Surgery's on the 27th.

- Z

Flying

Original Post Date: June 24th, 2009

I think that, if there is a God, His purpose for me is to observe His art.

It sounds a quaint statement. And then it sounds a meaningful one. Then on deeper analysis, it seems a very arrogant one. But, humility needn't defend itself. I watched an old man tip his city bus driver. It was beautiful.

I was on my way to the Greyhound station, getting ready to zone out, when the old man got on the bus. He ambled, and I was in one of the front seats. The bus was crowded. He sat down next to me, after cordially asking if he could. I, with the most respect and mom-and-pop-raised civility I could muster, looked him in the eye and said "of course!" I hadn't even noticed that he had a wife, who had taken a seat close by us.

I knew he'd want to talk. Old people always want to talk. He spoke about how much Kelowna has grown. How small it used to be. He spoke about how he had thought to retire in Toronto, but then he couldn't handle how much it made him perspire. That was his word. Perspire. Now he was retired here, and had watched it grow.

I had begun to worry that I may have to ask this man to get up, so that I could catch my stop, but that was only Nature making sure that I would pay attention. The bus stopped - one stop from mine - and it was his. He hoped I would have a good day, reached for his cane, and got up. His wife got off using the exit in the middle of the bus. He didn't follow. He ambled, very slowly, up the center of our grungy bus, past a few questionable glances, and dug his hand deep into his right pocket. It took him a while, and though he was matter of fact, his pocket mining and speed denied him subtlety. Finally reaching the front of the bus, he produced a small quad of coins and deftly placed it in the bus driver's hand. He'd been doing that for a long time. A quick but hearty exchange followed while we all waited, and then he exited the bus to rejoin his loved one.

I swear I saw, through the window, his equally aged and waiting wife smirk.

~~~

I overheard someone my age hit on a 35 year old woman on her birthday at the bar. They were going to hook up. Apparently he had a girlfriend. Apparently she found out. Apparently the girlfriend's in Alberta. Obviously, she didn't care how far away the girlfriend was, the point is, he fucking had a girlfriend.

I bought her a shot. That's something worth celebrating. Happy birthday.

~~~

I had an unexpected lunch today with a friend. I listened as he told me of his newly discovered role of fatherhood. He is ambitious: This kid will do well in middle school. It's good for him.

My friend never did well in school. It was good for him. He's more successful than me, and I did very well in school. I had nothing to contribute, except that I was writing more than usual. He, on the other hand has grandiose plans: for himself, for his new family, and his new (step-)child. His only regret was that a small set-back a long time ago had delayed his career advancement for a few months.

And, as he sighed over this set-back, he also told the tale his soon-to-be wife explained to him: If it were not for this delay, they might never have met. All things happen for a reason, she had said to her lover.

I found myself wondering where I would have been if my ex-lover had felt as adamant as the birthday girl. If things had gone a different way. Perhaps I would have been more successful, earlier. More ambitious. Living one of the many lives I watched. I wondered whether that kind of a life would have been better, or worse.

But that was only Nature making sure I would pay attention. This next move was important.

~~~

A co-worker reminded me, yesterday, about quantum physics. God's dice.

I don't know a lot about the stuff, but I know the cat metaphor: Place a live cat in a box. Close the box and set a gun next to it, so that when you open the box to check on the cat, the cat is shot dead. Is the cat alive or dead?

Point is: it's both. But observation changes things.

~~~

Tonight, I was catching up on the archives of a blog of a woman I have come to appreciate beyond measure; a woman I would never have met meaningfully if things had progressed differently with my ex-lover. I didn't know she had a blog. She never told me. I never thought to ask.

It was going to make for a quaint night. She's a good writer. As I got lost in her old discussions, I found myself particularly taken with one entry about her soul's pilgrimage. It spoke to me. I felt happy and weightless reading it.

As I swirled the entry around in my mind's mouth, I realized that she used exactly the same metaphor that I had used months ago to describe to a friend of mine, the sense of freedom a heart and mind should have.

Then I smiled as my thought process ambled up along my grungy memory. That friend of mine just so happened to share the namesake of this woman beyond measure. Same metaphor. Same meaning. Same name. Then I dug deeper.

The blog entry was posted at the same time that I had used the metaphor; it was the same date.

Watching me then, God must have smirked.


Tip your bus driver,
- Z

It Takes Two to Tango

Original Post Date: June 8th, 2009

Men are often attacked - in that subtle way, in which women are exquisitely apt - with the phrase "chivalry is dead."

I had intended on cooking dinner with the Muse, and then settling into a little blogging foreplay with regard to the recent Convocation up at my local University. Some incredibly talented people recently graduated, and provided me with the circumstance (and pomp, of course!) to write. But that intention, as Louis Armstrong sang to me and my taco meat sizzled, was halted, completely, when the divine Slut demanded my attention be turned immediately to a different direction.

In that subtle way, in which women are exquisitely apt.

In Her defence, she was probably just jealous. I was thinking of other women. When the heart aches, as mine has been unexpectedly recently, one tends to linger on the longings. And so, I did. "I wish I had a girl to cook with. I wish I knew a gal that was interested in listening to Franky, or reading poetry. A gal that was interested in drinking wine with me at three in the morning and dancing in the rain."

I had no intention of lingering on the subject any longer than the 3 minutes and 26 seconds of "La Vie en Rose". More so endangers the soul on an evening already filled with so much promise. But it was too late. She caught me. As I thought of my enjoyment of the olde jazz, and finding a woman that would get lost in it with me, I heard the ancient war-cry in my head:

"Chivalry is dead."

The voices of at least 4 wonderful women that I know echoed Her in my head: their scoffs and footstamps supporting their exasperations. How could I resist a reply? And so, the Muse and I made love over chivalry. Necrophilia at its finest.


Whenever I first hear the phrase, no matter its source, amongst the first thoughts that enters my head is almost self defeating: I'm chivalrous. The irony of making the claim does not escape me, of course. And certainly, based on the wisdom of that irony, I never attempt to reply with it seriously. But let's be serious. I'm chivalrous.

I buy the women that I love flowers unexpectedly, when the mood strikes me. And it does - on many more occasions than just holidays. I open doors for people. I do not rush to be front of the line, though I desire my Starbucks just as much as the next guy. I make sure that the women at my table always have the opportunity to order first. I will shiver while a woman wears my jacket. And I will lie and say that I'm not cold.

And though those are the traditional chivalrous acts, none of those is what makes me chivalrous.

I can certainly understand the counter-argument. I'm often late with birthday gifts, if they come at all. I probably stare at your ass as you precede me through the door. If I'm pressed for time, I may pretend not to see you as I head to the line-up. I don't always insist on paying and I believe in "going dutch". And when I feel that my sense of kindness is being abused or unappreciated, I decline a request by saying "you're not fucking me, so do it yourself". When male critics overhear, my reply from under my warm jacket is a hearty "I believe in equal opportunity."

And I do. Heh.

I can hear my incorporeal accusers - those who know me best, perhaps - let their spears loose in a concentrated volley: How can someone so insensitive, arrogant and dirty minded possibly be chivalrous?

They have a point. I do ask women if they squirt.

My only reply can be: the same way that the clumsy and lumpy can be graceful. A friend of mine redefined grace as a quality not inherent in sitting with stature, but in being able to have someone else walk away a failure, thinking themselves a complete success. (And by that definition, I thank the gods for the number of graceful women I have in my life!)

Equal opportunity redefined chivalry. It changed the battlefield of romance and civility. When princesses might be knights in disguise, the rules of engagement change.

When women were objects, the conduct was straightforward. Women were to be placed on a pedestal, not used as a footstool. The mindset and actions that accompanied that maxim were chivalrous. But now objectifying, itself, has become the murder weapon. We lay blind, unable to tell if a woman desires a kiss on the cheek or a professional hand-shake. We are expected to read body language but taught never to look at the body. We are to make the same amount of money, but are expected to buy the ring. We are to be "just friends" but never pigs. Assassins lay hiding in every corner.

It is no wonder at all how chivalry has come to die. When it invited the times of this dangerous tomorrow into its house, it dressed ceremoniously naked. How could it survive?

And as I hear, unceremoniously, the obituary of chivalry I cannot help but think that its resurrection is stifled by the oppression of the speakers. "Chivalry is dead" - and I die a little. For I can do nothing to give it life in those moments, any more than I could have had a woman appear magically to cook dinner with me tonight. I must ask them to join me first. And so, too, for chivalry to live in this new world, women must first invite it to do so. In that subtle way, in which women are exquisitely apt.

That is no small feat. It certainly takes courage and skill to live as a worthy princess in this world. It's going to look different. It's going to feel strange. But every woman I have ever heard utter the war-cry is capable of it.

I cannot prove to you that chivalry is alive in me; that we can walk together as equals, whilst I hold you on a pedestal. But I can do it, and with the greatest of ease. It comes naturally to me, this new age dance, and its pleasures are immeasurable. But I cannot do it alone. It cannot be done alone. That's not how this world works.

Let's do it together.

- Z


Addendum:

This discussion is not to suggest, in the slightest, that men are exempt from their due part of the resurrection, which takes just as much devotion as it does for a woman. Men who hide earnestly behind the murder weapon, and live as if the death was something to honestly celebrate are hardly men at all.

The Very Will of Ecstasy

Original Post Date: May 4th, 2009

She laughs when we fuck.

Fuck. There's something about the word, uttered by red-blooded lips. The raw promise of orgasmic bliss. Passion demanded. The mind, commanded. Lethargy, like loose clothing, is ripped asunder at the mere mention of the word.

And then, we go. HA!

Meanderings mold to fantasy. Languid longings turn to liquid lust. The beautiful torment of temptation teases at every fleshy curve. Every wayward glace distracts. Every seductive smile calls for concentration's surrender. Unconditional.

We laugh together. We laugh at eachother when the depths of normalcy have crept in again, unexpectedly. But then we quickly banish it to the ether, to the dreams of some other unfortunate, for we have Pleasure to attend to. And then we laugh in euphoria. We laugh in the sweet surrealness of sin.

I madden merely for the tip of her tongue. Crazed to feel her skin against mine. My mind demands the release of carefully bridled passion. TAKE HER. She laughs then, my favorite laugh: "My clothes are still on" it says. Her eyes challenge. They dare.

We fuck. On the wall. On the table. On the bed. Orgasms in succession. No fancy words, no moral of a story. Sex makes the world go round. No meaning deeper than a thrust, no temple greater than an arched back. I feel her fingers on me now, her nails demanding a tithe. But my tongue brings no worship to her Word of God, it speaks the devil's script instead. Temptation never knew strength like seduction scorned. She begs. Now I laugh.

We are the very will of Ecstasy.

After the Curtain Call

Original Post Date: Apr 29th, 2009

It's not that the world was lazy today. It's not that it slept in, or was hungover. The morning sun was there, its dim glow warming the sidewalk cement at its most mediocre. The wind was there, blowing half-heartedly in girls' hair like it had never known the giggle of a flirting skirt. The clouds were there, covering calmly, a sky that never looked in a mirror. The world simply couldn't muster the mettle, today, to say, that it cared.

A whore, whose passion was not a part of the price.

Half a dozen lines sprawled out on my page, now. Scattered. Parts of paragraphs I've yet to craft into the figure they deserve to have. So much message, so little inspiration. The day mimicked in my mind like a raincoat in a puddle. What sweet irony that a tale to tell that Life's Muse has fled, is uninspired to be told. This misery seeks no company. Solitude is its own private tutor.

My soul feels damp today.

I give up.

- Z

~~~

Below are the mentioned lines that were crafted but never connected. I commit them now, in the midnight hour, to the ether - a sacrifice to the Muse non-existent.

My favorite depiction of hell is a place that is absent of God. And so the ironists, rebels, and skewed fundamentalists chime together that here is hell. Hell on Earth, when we cast aside God. I chuckle. They say it with fear, anger and conversion in their hearts. They call that Love. I say it too, but with pride, lust and joy in my heart. And I too, call it Love.

My friend said that love is a lie. I said she lied. I lied. We like to lie together. We all fall down.

I like the lie. I enjoy looking into a person's eyes, searching earnestly and meticulously for that inner, innocent hope that they cherish and protect with all their heart. I enjoy showing them where mine is. I enjoy touching them with trust. I imagine that fingertips can convey dreams, and proximity can prove promises.

I like the lust. The lust of a new friendship, a new partnership, a new challenge or a new goal.

Days like today, after a curtain call, are always the toughest.

I traded a hand-delivered cheeseburger for a blow job once. It was fun. The dance is delightful.

Words paint pretty pictures and I know my lines. I enjoy acting out the orgasm. Dali's clock never felt so good!






But not today.

Turning Tricks

Original Post Date: Apr 10th, 2009

Deep inside us each is the deviL.

hE made us forget, forget, forget. A quaint thought. we drink and smoke and work, work, work. we fight and war and take, take, take. we play house and play store and play games, games, games. we sigh and cry and bitch, bitch, bitch. But the deviL tricked us! hE convinced us that hE does not exist.

And then we laugh.

we laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaugh, and laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaugh, and laaaaaaaaaaaaaaugh.

Because it's true, right?

Ha. Ha ha.

See deviL? I'm laughing. Funny trick. 'cause yoU lied. I know yoU did. I whisper it sweetly in your ear after the most wonderful of midnight fucks I know it wasn't youR trick.

Hee hee.

From subjectivity comes the most sublime objectivity. I have become accustomed to the lies of words.

Words. WorDs. wOrds. WORDS. words! wORDS

Take your pick, they all sound as sweet as the lies you left behind. Post-modernism. Meta-meta-physics. The Greeks’ myriad of turtles that must have been Atlas' pets. Nihilism, a word, a word has seized your soul a word, a word. Sisyphus has abandoned his rock. Take what he abandoned with zeal! Take it with your begrudging tone, your rebellious happiness and your blissful ignorance! Embrace your hypocrisy, and never look anything in the eye! Be content with your understanding of one in nothingness! Hold up the world! Hold!

Into the depths of the great chasm with you!

Hold! They can take our lives but not our freedoms! They can take our labels but not our caves! They can take this but not that!

Take!

we are charitable. we are giving. Give 'em hell! we are (the next) the chosen people, made in the image of perfection. Living one-way mirrors.

God.
mmm, I love this part!

We fucked. I wrote dirty letters on every part of her body. She drew blood from mine. Animals! Sweat dripped from sin's afterglow. But we would not abate. She fingered my spirit. I tongued her soul. She squirmed with a smile. I laughed. She giggled a deepthroated thing. I hungered.

oh god She trembled oh god Her hand grabbed my head oh God!

From the very hand of the great and honorable Lord is delivered the morning glory of Lucifer.

hello. I have many names too. Many names and many games. Many psalms and cd-roms. But never quite so few faces as You!

I can be Aristotle. My sum is far more than the whole of my parts. Where godlike images and sinner's souls meet, nothing is hidden from lover's hearts.

You look funny naked. Odd and frumpy. A washed up pimp. Your rolls are showing, ugly city streets lined with godless gospels. Your masochistic scars betray Your private habits, You hear the praises best after bringing out Your razor. Your backhair grows, You're too cheap and lazy to pretend anymore. Your frienD calls. eH wants to go for 40 night bender, like old times; paint the town red.

I am Mercutio! A plague on both YouR houses! And what a plague it is! Already in motion, the tale all written before it is read. In artistic lies and hidden truths lay reality bare.

He laughed too. He laughed to his grave. The world a joke wrapped in a tragedy, wrapped in a sorry excuse for a best possible world. Who would not laugh?

I know your trick! I know your trick!

they prance around the prickly pair

I know that sataN didn't trick us into thinking hE never existed. You tricked us into thinking that You DO exist. And we believe!

we belieeeeeeeeeve and belieeeeeeeeeeeve and belieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeve.

Sometimes, I'm called [your name here].

It's okay Almighty, i'm naked too. i'm stumbling in an empty parking lot, aimless. There are no footprints behind me. No footprints, no footprints, no footprints. Who will carry me now, i wonder?

Who has the strength to carry You?

I'll speak softly and hold your hand sweetly as you give birth

Growing in us each is God.

Puzzle Pieces and Poetry

Original Post Date: Apr 9th, 2009

I never drink alone.

There was a time when I never drank at all. A time when the idea of altering one's mood and perceptions against the body's will by ingesting fermented stuffs seemed repulsive to me. It was a moral stance, and a well thought out one. I argued with my friends, and even wrote about it. I even argued with my beloved father about it. I can remember the ever so slight sound of mockery as he rebutted my purity. I remember hating him for it.

Then I thought about it, and then I thought some more. And then, after poetry and talks, arguments and heavenly glances, something struck me. Sometimes things just strike you. Nature didn't invent lightning just for a cool show. She did it to teach us how suddenly things can change. I didn't let go of my morality, nor did I compromise. I simply found a missing puzzle piece.

The first drink I ever had, I had with my dad. And the second. And the third. I remember taking a sip of his beer. I remember swerving to the washroom 3 times. I remember how much more difficult it was to aim and how much less I cared each time I made it to the urinal. I remember him laughing and patting me on the back, telling me stories of when he was drinking at my age. I remember us stumbling home together, arm in arm.

For the right reasons, some things are worth changing.

I still don't drink alone. It's not a moral stance this time. Simply something that never appealed to me. I enjoy drink as liquid courage or inspiration, social lubrication or panty remover (mine, not theirs). But its effects when I'm on my own rarely seem to interest me. I was mulling about the suggestion tonight, however, while listening to my stomach growl and my music softly howl. There was something about the day's events, combined with the longing of my thoughts, that seemed to call for the wistful melancholy that beer brings.

But then, through a curious reminder of a friend, I went to look at my unimpressive stock of liquor. There in the fridge I saw her two bottles of vodka water, saved from a night of boozing long since passed.

For the right reasons, some things are worth keeping.

Over the course of my most recent move I have found things that I have kept. Treasures of my very own. Private pleasures. Emotional porn. Trinkets that were worth - to a man who absolutely hates moving anything he doesn't have to - dragging from one place to another.

Amid stacks of university alumni magazines and old class notes, all junk, a handful of school newspapers remains. Inside are the articles of a woman I would (and may very well) chase forever. I kept the ones with my articles in them too, but I don't know where they are.

The old pocket watch of a man who wore it religiously. Why he offered that particular watch to me I'll never know. But it is as cherished as my own family heirlooms. I don't even know if it works. I haven't the slightest idea how to wind it. But it doesn't need to be. It keeps perfect time with my mind.

Old love letters from a woman that I don't think ever really loved me. I keep them, along with our pictures together, in a shoebox far from sight of my daily life - there is no better cliché. So little is left in my heart from those 3 years. What does remain is deep.

The paper mache bunny with the broken ear in my nightstand drawer. The only experience at a summer camp that I remember.

An old poster from my dad: Be Like A Duck. It sits atop my dresser, swimming constantly.

A gigantic childhood map of a fantasy world.

A friend's vodka water.

No alcohol can compare to this quaint nostalgia. In the movies, when the hero looks back on some item and it means the world to them, it seems cheesy and weak. It seems unlikely that someone could become so attached to something so insignificant, just because of its symbolism.

And it is true. Symbols can be lost, and anything can be remade to fit a mould. We persevere. I could lose everything I have tomorrow, and my lamenting would be minimal. That is the sign of a successful freedom from materialism.

But not so much symbols, those puzzle pieces are instead birth-mothers. Each time my eyes chance by those living memories they sing old poetry anew into my soul. Those songs remind me of who I am and who I was, whom I affected and who affects me, what I changed and what I did not. And, most importantly and most effectively, they remind me why.

They are worth keeping around.

- Z

A Life's Worth

Original Post Date: Mar 28th, 2009

My first word was "more".

It took me just over 5 hours to pack. Everything I owned fit into a few garbage bags, my dresser drawers, a handful of plastic grocery bags, and a couple of boxes. The contents, minus my bed and nightstand, filled just under half a room. Nothing was piled on top of things. It would have all fit nicely into the corner if I had organized it. My life in 5 hours sat before me, diligently waiting to be picked up.

I packed much like I wrote my essays back in university: dedicatedly, methodically, chaotically, and at the last minute. It is a wonderful experience, to toss on some music and know that for an entire evening, you and your own wits are completely devoted to a problem. You form a strange partnership with the world. Other stresses become meaningless - shelved. Other people fade into the background. You have a pot of tea at your disposal. A lot of sugar and milk, so you won't run out. You spread your source material out on your bed (or your boxes out in your living room) and you look at your project. "Okay," you say. "Let's do this."

It reminds me of a time at 3 in the morning in the middle of winter a few years ago. I had a paper due in under 6 hours and I decided it was time for a break. I stood on the balcony with 5 pages remaining. Tea in my hand, I was completely alone. The air was chill, and I was shivering. But me, my smile and my frozen floating breath did not feel lonely. Not for a moment. Those are the moments, actually, that I live for.

More.

Last year I decided to give myself a birthday gift. Of all the things that might be important on a birthday list - whether you have a huge party or whether you get drunk, whether anyone shows up or whether that special someone remembers the day - I have found it personally most important that you do not forget to give yourself something. All holidays are man-made events, to be sure. And the meaning behind just about any of them is usually a meaning that is better suited to an all year 'round celebration. But that, as with every holiday, should not negate the comfortable man-made opportunity to celebrate it in those moments.

And at worst, it's a great excuse to buy that blender that you said you couldn't afford, while sipping your 5 dollar cup of Starbucks.

Last year I silently promised myself I would give myself the gift of dedicated time to write and to discover what my soul was really made of. I don't expect my career path to be that of an author, but I certainly have been feeling more of a comfortable connection with my soul through the written word. And so, I decided I would find time to break from the rat race of my every day life, and find my artistic self. A couple months and a few encouraging conversations later, I booked my ticket to France.

In my new place, it took me over 5 days to unpack. Boxes sat unemptied in my living room. Clothes crumpled into half full bags littered my would-be bedroom. Files in dresser drawers lay un-filed.

It's not that I'm anti-materialist. I'm not. I like a comfy couch as much as the next person. And, much as it's a social faux pas to admit it, sex sells to a guy like me. But I AM anti-stuff-owning-you. The world of things seems interesting, I know. Walking down an aisle in Wal-Mart and realizing that you can buy a kettle and a teapot that match sells the appeal. But once you keep yourself free of it, it's as wonderful as keeping yourself free from any addiction. It's then you fly. 10 pairs of shoes just isn't as interesting as the world of passions. Unpacking my Xbox 360 isn't nearly as inspiring as talking with a cute girl until 2 in the morning.

I'm not sure what this new place holds for me, nor do I know what my 26th year holds for me. But I do know that my life was not packed into a corner of my old place after a few hours of work, and it was not unloaded into my new place. I have found that I tend to, instead, pack it into pots of tea, and unpack it into dinners with friends. I walk through it on the sunny days and watch it fall from the heavens on the rainy ones. I intend to write it into love letters and hear it in the sound of children's laughter.

This value cannot be weighed, of course, but it also doesn't need to be lugged into a truck. The tragedy of this value is that it cannot be kept, and vanishes as readily as it appeared. The blessing of it is that it is wholly unique, boundless, and endless. No new video game can boast eternality. But (despite the very best efforts of relativity, immorality, and Hollywood), the moments that live in places like Love, Happiness, and Beauty, can. For my birthday this year, I want more of them.

As if to write the stereotype of every brotherly conflict, my brother's first word just over a year later was "mine".

- Z

Dinner for 1

Original Post Date: March 3rd, 2009

Nietzsche said, "God is dead." Chicken Little said, "The sky is falling." Frost said, "Nothing gold can stay." Ozymandias said things that none of us remember.

We are in a storm. It's pouring outside. Go look. Do you see it? The raindrops of change beat on our windows. New ambitions flash with sudden brilliance, followed by a revealing groan of the way things were. The wind sings with the voice of time itself, and these nights it is no love ballad. Time waits for no one, and the devastation of fallen nature imposes its importance on the man-made structures of security and supremacy.

Responsible homeowners are worried about their houses of cards. Children are in awe, standing next to the window.

Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me ... for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these."

I love the rain. Especially when it pours. The only place better than next to the window with a cup of hot chocolate, is outside in a playground or a parking lot. Somewhere where there is nowhere. Where the only shelter is the shelter of nature - tree-branches of memories and caves of laws. A shout in the rain is a muffled pebble and every droplet it touches, ripples. A smile is a lighthouse, guiding lost ships safely into their port of happiness.

We can't choose when it will rain. Usually we complain about its inconvenience, when it ruins a parade to celebrate Achievement, or when a rousing game of Friendship is called on account of it. We are furious at the clouds of Gods when it happens on a wedding.

We also can't choose when it stops. I had my raincoat on today. I woke up with it, actually. I wasn't looking forward to getting all cold and shivery. But I was looking forward to that familiar pound of the world's elevator music.

The jailwarden said, "You get one last meal."

Steak. Bacon wrapped asparagus. Garlic mashed potatoes. Gingerale. It was perfect. I am actually an amazing cook, hidden deep within the bowels of a picky eater. I learned from the best.

Frank Sinatra helped me make it. Good ol' Frankie - he always helps me make it. He's getting old, and repeats a few lines once in a while, but he still knows how to make me smile.

Phantom of the Opera was my conjugal visit. We've met each other a few times before. She knows all of my favorite positions.

There is an eye to every storm, and today was it. There is something to be said for not being wet, for being in the purest moments of consistency. There is a brilliant comfort in those lulls, where one is able to meander as they will, knowing that for those moments, everywhere is a warm, trusting place. They do not come often, and when they do, we are well advised to treasure them.

But you can't jump in puddles when it's dry.

"I wish it was raining," I said.

- Z