So How About that Band

In the traditional gluttonous fashion of a white American male, I stuffed myself until it hurt yesterday. I also imbibed a few goodies to make the day a little... softer, shall we say. Then I sat my bloated carcass down on the couch and watched a Band of Brothers marathon. I did not say a formal thank you for anything until I was leaving and uttered the obligatory "Thanks for everything" to my hosts. Now I'm still bloated and kind of tired with things to do that I really don't want to even think about (and these are very simple things, I assure you).

To conclude, I will say that I don't think I'm half the man I used to be, but I'm definitely, at most, half the man I was supposed to be.

Percepitation and Malinformagnanimity

I have no more hopes for when I die. What I mean to say is that I have no aspirations to leave a legacy or a memory. I have existed in my present state for so long, I can't remember where childhood idealism ended and the "adult" perception of reality began. I suppose the ever coveted independence which came with the dire price of responisibility had a profound effect on the way I act, think and live. I know so little about the outside world. I am aware of cultures and lifestyles, but I have no experience or true knowledge of them. When I really stop to think, I feel so ignorant. At the same time, I am somewhat apathetic; but as much as I try, I will never be truly apathetic. I think that would bring with it a state of numb bliss that I can only hope for. My own personal nirvana.

Animals vs. People (or, how I learned to become bitter and jaded before I turned 30)

I either don't or won't understand... I think I've gotten past the can't stage. In my haste, I will, for the most part, ignore all proper punctuation and spelling unless it just falls out of my head that way. Editing sucks. While it serves the purpose of making things readable and maintaining the flow of the written word, it's a pain in the ass and makes one think too much. Thankfully I have a built in editor who works constantly which is probably why I take forever to write anything and almost never finish or publish my work in any medium.

But here's the thing: I WANT you to read it. All of it. Every nasty detail, every pathetic rant, every embarrassing anecdote, every goddamned thing that comes out of my fucked up brain. Whether it makes sense or not. I want you to read the stuff that will make you think I hate everything. I want you to read all the confusion and negativity that clogs my knotted mind to the point where I can't think. I want to rip open my consciousness and spread its contents like an airborne plague. I want you to judge me and love me. Love my bitterness, my weaknesses, my jaded observations, my pointless ramblings, my vulnerability that I try so fucking hard to hide. I want you to think you know me better than I know myself. Get inside my head and make yourself at home. Leave dirty dishes on the coffee table, drink the rest of the milk straight from the carton and leave it in the fridge after it's empty. Have sex in my bed and don't wash the sheets, pee in my shower, break a window or two.

And when you're finished, do me a favor and burn the place to the ground.

Coming to Grips With the Slouch

There are children roaming around the house I live in. Every day, they randomly bounce from corner to corner, making their child noises and getting yelled at by their parents. They are unattended and ignored, unless they get in trouble. In the house I live in, there are only pets and adults.

Trying to be Creative Again

I'm trying to regain/maintain the creative streak I used to possess as a kid. I feel that the older I get, the more distracted I become by reality. I don't want that to happen. I jotted this down tonight without editing it or having much of an idea for a plot. I've decided random stream of consciousness writing might be the trick to stimulating my creative juices. Here is said jot (slightly edited):

He sat in the wooden rocking chair by the door. A few days may have gone by since he last stood. Not sure. His windows had been blacked out with spray paint, all clocks unplugged. No calendars, no phones, TV, radio. Completely shut off from the outside world. The wooden chair rocked slowly back and forth on the wooden floor, creaking and groaning. The arms had nicks and gouges where his fingers hand been picking and gnawing when he first sat down. He stared at his bed a few feet in front of him, dimly lit by the single hanging bulb that occasionally flickered and buzzed. He had no thoughts. He hadn't felt tired or hungry or bored. The steam heater spat and hissed. It might be day. His internal clock, slowly shutting down and forgetting, told him it might be day. No matter. He started to nod. Not falling asleep but fading away. Finally nearing the end. He vaguely wondered how long he would be in his dim yellow room before anyone discovered him. Again, no matter.

I'm Raising My Eyebrow in Thought

This weekend was filled with triumph and tragedy. So much so that it tires me to even think about attempting to recount it all. Suffice it to say, I'm exhausted on every level and I just want to be completely free of any obligations for the next 48 hours but the world won't let me... and so I trudge on. But I could really use a hug.

$10,000 down, another $15,000 when the job is done

In the past, people have told me that I have an intense aura about me. I've also been called unapproachable, even intimidating (the latter seems completely unfounded as far as I can tell).
Well, we can now add cold blooded to that list. At school people have been joking about contracting me to do "dirty deeds" (not done dirt cheap). I asked my teacher where all this was coming from and came to find out that I have that callous, kind of intimidating look and somebody else in the class threw out the descriptor "cold blooded". I have been sporting a beard for the about a month now and I have an old, longish leather jacket that most likely perpetuates the look. My good friend Mike said I look like a car jacker the other day. To a lesser extreme, I've also been called a mountain man.

And I'm completely digging it.

Time, I Guess.

If I had become comatose six months ago and I woke up next August on my birthday, I would most likely not realize that it was my birthday and, upon finding out that it was my birthday, I would think I was turning 27 rather than 28. What would this mean to me? I don't know.

The year on the calendar today has changed from what it was yesterday by one digit. The 8 has turned into a 9. 364 days from now, the 9 will become a 0 and the 0 preceding that will become a 1. Phenomenal.

Now for your job. Figure out the point of this post and get back to me. Please.

Thank you.

I Used to be a Writer

I've walked this ground for a while now
So yesterday I laid me down
And I looked up into the big ol' sky
And searched for our father's big blue eyes

Figured I'd give him another shot
Since I haven't heard much from him lately
Goddamn if he didn't look right down at me
Those eyes as empty as eyes could be

Let me inside your brain. Not all the time, only when you're reading something I wrote. Specifically, lyrics. I want to test a theory that lyrics lose their impact without music. Lyrics are not to be confused with poetry. Poetry has a different flow than lyrics. Poetry is written to be read, leaving the reader to provide his or her own emphasis and inflection, whereas lyrics are written to be heard with specific inflection, tone, and emphasis provided by the singer.

Consider the lyrics to a song I wrote a few years back:

"Devil's Net"

This blood flows cold
Through veins of steel
In these eyes
Burns the face of death
Lucifer

This mouth
Preaches words of doom
And these hands
Will steal the life out of all
Who stand before them

Short and sweet, no? But the impact is all but lost without the music, inflection, and tone to back it up. If not lost, definitely changed.

My point? I want what I write to impact whoever reads it. I want to impart what I feel. I suppose that's the point of any type of art. Unless you're just trying to show off.

One Day

I have seven published blogs so far and six that I have either scrapped or not finished, but saved as drafts. Some are too negative, some are too personal (and maybe too negative), a couple either suck or didn't interest me enough to finish/publish. I'm guessing that eventually I'll have more unpublished drafts than published blogs. Perhaps I will then publish them all in a collective essay titled "Crap: A Retrospective" (a title I stole from Beavis, slightly altered and not as literal).

In Tow

Born head first
With one foot out the door
The writing on the wall
Reflects upon the cracked wood floor
Thinking backwards
Realize that it's O.K.
You could turn back the clock
These things would happen anyway

To obsess over what I possess
Just leaves me distressed
And feeling oppressed
And a little depressed
But I'm sure you could guess
That just having less
Reduces the stress.

Sketchoes

Gonna start posting drawings and sketches. Okay, doodles. Some drawn with my feet, some with only my mind. You figure it out!!

Oh, so profound!

This is where I live.

You can't come in.

A Walk

There's a path in the woods that a lot of people know about, but not a lot of people travel. I used to walk it all the time when I was a kid and I've been revisiting it a lot since I came back to MA. I went there late today to find something. As I started along the path the sun was going down. I knew it would get very dark very soon, but I kept going. I started to think about the past year and a half or so. About the people I've seen, associated with, been close to, fell away from, disassociated with, pissed off, alienated, hurt, been hurt by. I pretty much covered all of them. The sun was disappearing quickly. I could see rays of light through the trees. The dead leaves looked like stained glass in front of the setting sun. I heard echoes of voices that had spoken to me over the past year and a half or so. Statements and questions, lies and truths, compliments and insults. I resurrected feelings of disappointment, regret, fear, happiness, anger, sadness, excitement, joy, anxiety, pain, pleasure, calm, love, hate, distaste, jealousy. I kept walking and the light kept fading. The limbs of the trees started to look like arms trying to reach out and grab me. If one of them had, I would have let it. It was getting very cold. Just before the last of the light faded I found what I was looking for. A box. I lifted it but did not open it. It was heavier than it looked. I reached into the right pocket of my jacket and took out the matches and the lighter fluid I had taken from my house. I dug a small hole in the dirt, placed the box into the hole and emptied the lighter fluid onto the box. I stood up and looked at the box for a moment. I let out a sigh, lit the book of matches and dropped it into the hole. There was a whooshing sound as the box ignited. I watched it burn, basking in the light and feeling the warmth of the flames. I stood in the sphere of light, a bright spot in the darkness. The fire burned down and eventually went out. I covered the ashes and filled the hole with dirt. It was completely dark, quiet and cold. I turned and walked back down the path, enjoying a pleasant sense of calm.

Pretentious Observations From a Stool

I went to a room yesterday and it was full of humans. The room was in a building. When I entered the building, I was in the room. There was a counter to sit at and a floor to stand on. There were humans behind the counter and others in front of it. I sat at the counter and I drank from a cup that was given to me by one of the humans behind the counter. I stared ahead and surveyed the beings in the room. As I stared, I continued to drink the contents of my cup. I thought it strange, this gathering. I was surrounded by beings similar to myself, yet I felt no different than before, when I was the only being, in another room. A common sentiment, I suppose.

Scape

I wandered and I found a place to lay
Over a baby buried in an angel's grave
I closed my eyes, the baby had my face
And as my life slipped by I slept the time away

I flew just like the winter crows tonight
I smelled the devil in my wings, the snow fell in my eyes
The sky was a metallic blue, with no moon in sight
In a crimson dream of evil deeds, I escaped to avoid the light

Opening Day at the Cerebral Farm

This is the beginning. Try not to screw it up.